5. Ryouma's Past-

The door opened and the 12 ninjas walked out into the village. People were running in all directions screaming. People were all panicking and quickly grabbing their important possessions and running off in different directions.

"What the hell is happening?!?!" yelled Kakashi.

The Fruit ninja they met was running towards them. "Come with me quickly!" he yelled while panicking. The ninjas ran after him. Kakashi looked back and saw that the cause of the chaos was only 50 feet behind them. The cause of he choas was standing before a man that was on the ground and cowering in fear. Kakashi stopped for a couple of seconds and watched.

"Please don't hurt me," whimpered the man.

The standing man performed a couple of hand seals and placed his hand on the forehead of the cowering man. He lifted his hand off and pulled out a white orb. The cowering man fainted while the white orb was placed inside a jar that was sealed shut.

"Hurry up Kakashi!" yelled Shizu. Kakashi ran back after his friends.

They reached a dead end. "What are we doing here for?" asked Tetsuma.

"Give me a second," the Fruit ninja said. "My name's Shin by the way." Shin places his hand a brick and the bricks magically disappeared and a steel door appeared in its place. The door then slid open. "Follow me."

They entered the secret area and each sat down in one of the metal chairs. Kakashi looked around the large room. It had plain white walls and had many chairs and a white board. "This room was used a secret base for us Fruit ninjas in case of an emergency, but Ryouma, that man you saw causing all of the chaos attacked the place where we were having a meeting. He stole all of the souls of the Fruit ninjas. I'm the only one left that can actually fight."

"Who's Ryouma?" asked Kakashi.

"Well it's a long story," Shin said.

"We're willing to listen," said Kakashi

"Ryouma used to be a Fruit ninja three years ago. We found a magical crystal, but to extract the crystal's magic, we had to develop a technique that would let us do that. We dedicated a team of ninjutsu specialists to create this technique, me and Ryouma were part of this team. Ryouma became too obsessed with the crystal though. He stayed up many nights and read about it. He learned about the thousands of legends on it. How certain men could receive great power from the crystal. How a peasant became a king. How an army of ten men overcame an army of one hundred men. He wanted to be like the people he read about because he was never really liked. He had a girlfriend at that time. Her name was Kami. She left him after he spent more time with the crystal than with her. She left him, leaving him heartbroken. I never saw her again. This caused his obsession to grow to a point that it became difficult for us to even touch the crystal, so we decided to remove him from the team. This devastated him. He took all the information he learned from working on the technique and left the village."

The ninjas listened closely. "His last words before he left were: 'I swear I will get revenge'. We didn't hear from him for a while, but one month later, he came back. The leader of his former team, the one who said that Ryouma should be removed from the team, was working late one day on the technique. He ambushed him and used a technique no one had ever heard of before on the leader. We found him later in the morning. He was dead, but all of his organs were still working, even his brain. His body remained motionless. We declared that he was dead, but we still couldn't figure out how. Over the next three days, the other members of the team were killed the same way the leader was killed, one each day. On the fourth day after the first attack, I met Ryouma. He explained to me his whole plan. He told me his reason was he felt like it."

"My plan was to get revenge on the team that didn't let me fulfill my dream." said Ryouma in the flashback. "So I changed the technique we working on. Instead of harvesting energy, it now steals souls."

"I panicked so I quickly used my Energy Cutter jutsu on him." continued Shin. "It slashed his whole body leaving a large scar. He broke through the wall of my house and ran off into the darkness. Now I assume he's come back to get revenge on the Fruit ninjas once again, three years after he left abandoned the village. I'm sorry that you guys were involved in this. I would escort you guys out, but Ryouma used some spell that's stopping us from getting outside of the village."

"I have one question," said Chouko. "What happened to the crystal?"

"I lost it yesterday," replied Shin. "They left me in charge of it and I don't know where it is."

"Did they give you the golden fruit to hold too?" asked Kakashi.

"Yes," Shin replied.

"What color was the crystal?" asked Chouko.

"It was gold."

"Is this it?" asked Chouko as she pulled a golden gem out of her pocket. "I found it during the challenges to get the watermelon seeds.

"THAT'S THE CRYSTAL!!!" yelled Shin. "I suggest you keep it though. If I have it and Ryouma kills me. He might get a hold of the crystal and its power. I need to go help my village now. Stay here. Don't leave this place." Shin approached the steel door and it slid open again and he left.

The 12 genin sat in silence. The thought of that they might not survive long enough to make it outside of the village was running through their heads. Chouko was holding the crystal in her hands staring at it.

"This is the cause of everything," she thought in her head. "It caused the deaths of many all over the pursuit of power."

Ten more minutes passed. "I can't take this anymore," said Musashi. "I'm going to go help Shin." Musashi attempted to run to the steel door, but Maasaki stopped him by pulling on his hood.

"If you help him, you're only going to die," said Maasaki.

"We're going to die anyway if he doesn't get some help," replied Musashi. He rushed through the steel doors.

"Then shouldn't the rest of us go?" asked Kakashi as he stood.

"No," Maasaki replied. "We need a lot of people protecting the crystal in case Ryouma finds the secret base."

Reiko stood up. "Um…well…um…I'm going after my team," she said.

"But we're supposed to stay here and protect the crystal," said Shizu.

"Nine people are enough. I need to go help them". Reiko ran off through the steel doors.

On the outskirts of the village, nine shadowed figures were standing next to the village entrance.

"Ryouma's inside?" asked a man.

"Yes," said another man. "He left me during our mission and I tracked him to this location. I assume he's come back for his revenge against the Fruit village.

"He better not die," said a woman. "I would then have to find a replacement for him."

"He won't," said another woman.

"How can you be sure Kami?" asked the first woman.

"Trust me, he won't," said Kami. "Ryouma…what have you become?" she thought in her head.