Missions: Part One

The compound was a four-story structure with each floor narrower than the one below it. The building blended in with the trees, camouflaged with greens and browns that would throw off most civilians.

Sasuke and Naruto landed amongst the trees.

"Yeah, that's it," Sasuke said, his Sharingan alight.

"Finally," Naruto grumbled quietly. The clone dispersed with a quiet pop! Sasuke circled the compound in his absence taking note of the stationary, similarly camouflaged guards on each of the floors.

A few moments later the real Naruto and Sakura arrived, the latter guided by her own clone. Their objective was simple. Neutralize that compound.

Sasuke's Sharingan spun. "There's six on the first balcony, four on each of the levels above that."

"Top floor!" Naruto exclaimed, two clones appearing next to him as he darted into the upper canopy.

Sasuke shook his head. Idiot.

Sakura looked to him, and he could tell she was thinking the same thing about their blonde teammate.

"Together?" she asked. He nodded. Then they ascended until they were parallel with the third floor. They waited. From above they heard a grunt of exertion and a rush of air.

Then, they moved.

Sakura shot out from the trees, landing between two guards on the upper floor. They turned to look at her in surprise.

It was short lived as kunai thunked into them from Sasuke. He watched as Sakura sped through the remaining guards, sliding her staff across the backs of their necks as she darted past.

Naruto landed on the upper level, slowing his descent and pinning the guards on the roof with his incomplete Wind Style: Pressure Break.

The two groups fell together and Sasuke unleashed another barrage of kunai. The guards below still hadn't noticed anything. More shuriken took out a couple as Sakura came for the rest.

Then he darted down out of the trees, rifling through his pack for exploding tags as he slapped them along the sides of the building. One full circle later, he darted back into the trees. Naruto and Sakura were waiting for him. All in all it had taken about fifteen seconds.

"Do it!" Naruto exclaimed, his hands in the same seal.

Boom!

Exploding tags went off at every level, and the compound came tumbling down.

Mission accomplished.

Obito started to clap, appearing out of nowhere as he always did. "Good! Good! I mean, it's not how I would have done it exactly, but at least you only failed a little bit."

"Argh, what are you talking about? We nailed that one!" Naruto yelled.

"That's right, you did! Except, no one checked for tunnels, and the guards were able to tip off those inside to escape! But, still, a valiant effort. And, three hours? Tracker-nin you are not."

From behind them, similar, shadowy looking figures emerged from the trees, waved merrily and faded away.

Sasuke's eyebrow twitched.

"Ah well, you win some, you lose some." He paused, stroking his chin, "Well, you guys do seem to lose a lot."

Ever since Obito had accepted them as his genin, he had been training them. Every day they would run through some kind of mission simulation or other, often featuring a skilled, motivated opposition, a jovial Obito, and a lot of pain for Team 7.

This mission by comparison seemed relatively easy to accomplish. It was simply finding and destroying the compound and its "bandits."

It would have been easy too, but the target had been hidden expertly in the massive forests that made up Training Ground 21—a number of similarly looking decoys scattered throughout the training ground hadn't helped. In addition, the enemies were far more competent than expected. Apparently—allegedly—they were able to communicate to those inside when the team definitely hadn't given them enough time to do so, and some of the "bandits" had escaped.

On the bright side, Sasuke supposed, it had only been the mission. These simulations tended to be tense with the team always on the lookout for their sensei.

That was because, every now and then, Obito would interrupt everything with a bright smile and a shout of "Surprise Missing Nin!"

That wasn't fun.

The missions they did complete—taking down compounds, defending some central location, avoiding detection and so on—almost never went well and always ended with Obito breaking down the various and, occasionally obvious, mistakes they had made.

Like the squirrel.

Sasuke twitched at the thought. "How were we supposed to know there were tunnels? Let alone find them?" He asked, the annoyance leaking into his voice.

"You should always check for tunnels!" Obito said, holding his finger up as if to lecture them. "Or don't! I don't, you see, but then I'm good enough to not have to." He winked.

"But how," Sasuke repeated, "what jutsu?"

Obito just shrugged his shoulders, throwing his arms into the air with a look that said 'How should I know?'

That was the worst part of it for Sasuke. He wouldn't actually help them improve. He would just say that they didn't have enough A-Rank sensor jutsu or the ability to redirect lightning or tunnel-detection abilities. That meant Sasuke would have to comb through the Jutsu archives at home and at the Library to find something that might work.

And it would be just him too.

Naruto had enough on his hands trying to learn the wind jutsu that Itachi had planned to teach him—though he was nearly done there. Sakura could have helped him, but she spent most of her time working on more advanced medical ninjutsu, which was probably more important than catering to the imagination of their crazy sensei.

Still, he searched through various scrolls for useful jutsu and then divided his time between trying to find someone who knew the jutsu to copy from or learning it himself. Sometimes, he would skip the scrolls and just ask random clan ninja how they would do something or other.

Sometimes, Sasuke wondered why he bothered, especially when he wasn't sure if Obito was doing all this just to screw with them.

The older Uchiha seemed to get a perverse pleasure from watching them suffer in training or knowing Sasuke struggled to find answers for all the weaknesses he demonstrated.

But it didn't matter.

All that mattered was whether or not Obito knew what he was talking about.

So, he would feel skeptical, and he would grumble at his sensei's idiotic antics. Then, he would glean what he could from him anyway.

Because his sensei was an elite jonin, next in line to be Hokage. Because he wasn't arrogant enough to ignore that.

He couldn't afford to be.

If sacrificing his pride meant he had a chance to achieve his goals, he would do it in a heartbeat.

He had more than a couple random, useful jutsu up his sleeves already, and it had only been three weeks.

It wasn't the only thing he had been working on.

"Argh, I've had it!" Naruto yelled at Obito, "Enough with all these stupid simulations! We're ready for a real mission!"

Obito turned slowly to Naruto, his lecturing demeanor falling away as a look of confusion spread over his face. "A...real mission?" He said it like the very concept was new to him. Then he disappeared before they could respond.

Naruto slammed his head against a tree.

"Don't worry," Sakura said to him, "he'll give us a real mission soon."

Naruto just mumbled into the tree trunk. "You said that last week."

Sakura laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of her head.

"Well, you have fun with that. Naruto, I'm going," Sasuke said.

Naruto gave a half grunt, half groan into the tree. Sakura turned to ask him something, probably where he was going in such a hurry, but he just Shushin'd away.

He reappeared on a street corner near the center of the village. He checked the time. It was a bit too early. About five minutes passed as he reviewed his plan in his head, his eye on the clock. Then, he started walking.

Eventually, he saw her: Ishikawa Mineko.

She was a fairly unremarkable chunin. She had enjoyed some early success, but a mixture of injuries and lack of improvement had caused her to retreat from the high-demand missions that took her outside of the village. Instead, she became a support member of the Leaf's infrastructure. Like the Hokage's secretaries, barrier squads, and researchers, she was among the many who helped make the village run smoothly but were often overlooked by the majority of the workforce. She happened to be a record-keeper.

She was also 15 years old.

Sasuke knew her previously. About a week ago, she had been walking down a street just like this, when some academy students who were playing ninja with blunted shuriken, lost control of the weapons. Mineko had frozen, unprepared for the sudden accident—and, Sasuke mused, probably couldn't tell the weapons were blunted.

She could have been hurt.

Instead, Sasuke had landed swiftly, catching the shuriken out of air, poking his fingers through the holes in their centers.

As they spun to a stop, he had asked, with the same calm voice he was known for, if she was alright. Then he had left the way he came, returning to the Uchiha-Senju compound.

Well, he had stopped to surreptitiously pay off the Academy students first.

As he walked closer, he paid her practically no attention, but he could feel her eyes on him, an odd sort of pressure that he was all too familiar with from all the fangirls he had accrued over the years.

Then he passed her. He could practically hear her deflate. Normally, that was where things would end.

"Hey. Don't I...know you?" He spoke even more slowly than normal. It tended to have a negative—er, positive?—effect on his fangirls.

She turned around, meeting his eyes with surprise. Unlike others, she didn't squeal, but there was a bright sort of tension in her eyes.

Odd. Sasuke wasn't quite sure if that was good or not.

"Yes! Yes, you, uh, saved me from those shuriken a week ago, Sasuke. I mean, it is Sasuke, right?" She said to him excitedly.

That was more normal. She knew his name without him telling her. That was pretty normal too.

"Hn. Right," he said, looking closely at her as if trying to remember. Then he nodded.

She spoke up quickly before he left, stepping closer. "I never got a chance to thank you! Thank you! Who knows what could have happened if you hadn't been there."

"I'm sure you would have been fine."

"No, I wouldn't have been. I'm a bit out of practice," She laughed in a self-deprecating manner, "but if there's anything I can do for you..."

Sasuke shook his head, but his eyes stayed on hers. Eye contact, very important, he recited mentally. "I don't think so. I was just heading to the library. Another day searching for obscure scrolls for my sensei." He looked off into the distance intensely. Or tried to anyway.

"Ooh, I can help with that. Yep! I'm an archivist, you see. Scrolls are my specialty!"

He turned his incredibly intense stare towards her. He hoped a breeze would come by to make his hair rustle in the wind or something. His raven-black hair, he corrected mentally. "I'd like that."

Two steps down, one to go.

Sakura glanced down through the eyepiece of the microscope. After a moment, she looked up, made a small mark in her notebook, and replaced the slide with the next one.

Sakura glanced down again, made another note, and replaced the slide again. Rinse and repeat.

She went through the motions swiftly and carefully, although some may have mistakenly called it robotically. Classifying the damage to the cells—neurons from a high level medical ninjutsu procedure—wasn't particularly difficult, but it was important. Being able to determine causes of damage was a crucial step in managing obscure jutsu, exotic poisons or different types of diseases.

She was focused, but still...

Her mind was on other things.

"Ken?"

"Yes, Sakura-chan?" Her brother responded distractedly. His eyes were glued to his own microscope. She didn't think he was working on the same thing as her anymore though; his slides lay neatly stacked and catalogued to his right.

"Why don't we go to the Clan Ceremony?"

"We" meant their family. The Clan Ceremony happened every four years, but the four of them had never attended. It was a celebration between the Uchiha and Senju clans meant to reinforce and reaffirm the bonds between them.

Sakura's parents weren't ninja, but that really wasn't enough to explain anything. All Senju and Uchiha were invited, even some non-clan members attended.

"They're not ninja," Ken responded.

"So?"

Ken started writing in his notebook, recording his observations from whatever tests he was doing. Sakura waited as patiently as she could. He would answer her eventually.

"You should read some of Dad's books. He probably considers it a 'celebration of the violence and bloodshed of war.' I assume Mom feels the same way." He resumed writing in his notebook, glancing back through the microscope every now and then. Then, he said, "Pacifists don't go to war ceremonies."

That explained it, she supposed. But...

"Well, why don't you go? You're not a pacifist." At least, she didn't think he was. What sort of pacifist used the Chakra Scalpel like he did?

"Ah, but if I went, then I wouldn't be working," Ken said. He got up, moving into the adjacent room to get materials for the next steps of his experiments. He motioned for her to finish her cataloguing as he left.

Sakura blew the pink hair out of her face in exasperation but went back to work anyway. Ken was something of a workaholic. He left before her every day and, most days, would return after her as well. He was only a chunin, yes, but he had become one at around her age. If he trained the way he focused in the lab and the hospital, he would have been a Jonin by now for sure!

Ken came back with a rack of test tubes and culture plates. Then he was back at the microscope.

"Well, will you be able to help me with the next part of the Chakra Scalpel?" She asked, looking up again.

"Of course," he responded reassuringly. He glanced at her. "You finished the scroll? Explain it to me."

Sakura smiled. "Instead of using a weapon to help stabilize the spiritual energy, the long-range Chakra Scalpel requires enough control to extend the blade of spiritual energy through the air. Also, it requires enough control to extend the physical energy over the same distance and at the right time and location to make cuts inside the body." Ken nodded absently. "I've been working on the exercises." She added.

"Hm, what about an infected limb? Treatment protocol?"

She quickly rattled off the answer, covering different possibilities that she could run into instead of asking clarifying questions. It went faster that way. Then Ken asked her another question.

He always did this when she wanted his help with training. He considered her knowledge of medical ninjutsu more important than her combat skills. As such, the older Senju would always ask her random questions before helping her with training (during training too), but he would always make time to help her.

She had gotten questions wrong before when she was younger. The first time, she had been terrified that he would stop teaching her until she memorized every fact there was.

Instead, he had stopped working and quietly explained a few of the simple mnemonics he used to remember the answer. And, when they were done, he had trained her anyway.

Of course, she never got the questions wrong anymore.

That thought filled her with a quiet sort of pride that had her smiling at her brother's all too simple questions.

"So...?" She said when he stopped asking.

"Yes, yes, I'll tell you when I'm able to carve out some free time," he said. Then, he looked up at her. "It might be a while though, Sakura-chan."

That was a bit disappointing. But then, he was always pretty quick to help her even when he said it would be a long time. So, she shrugged and went back to her slides.

She couldn't help her mind from wandering though.

"Maybe, I'll go to the ceremony then," she said.

Ken looked up from his microscope, his eyes meeting hers suddenly. There was a flash of something indecipherable across his face, but then it was gone.

"That might not be a good idea," he said.

"What? Why not?" Her parents would support her, she was sure, even if they didn't like it themselves.

And the rest of the clan...her eyes darkened. "What, because Ryoshima-sama didn't invite me?"

The Senju clan head was responsible for inviting all those non-clan members that attended. And perhaps this was the real reason her family had never attended the ceremony.

Sakura wasn't welcome.

"No," Ken responded quickly, then he hesitated for a half-second as if considering it, before continuing, "No, that's not it."

"Then why?" She asked.

Ken looked like he was searching for the words. Then he thought better of it, running a hand through his sandy brown hair. "Nevermind. If you want to go, you should."

She pressed him some more for an answer, but she knew she wouldn't get an answer. Ken could be remarkably stubborn at times. He proceeded to ignore her, returning, ever intently, to his work.

Okay then? Well, maybe it really was nothing. "Okay, I guess I'll go then." She said tentatively, inviting him to speak up. Ken didn't respond, just continued analyzing the next experiment.

That was taken care of then, she supposed.

Sakura went back to cataloguing her slides.

Finally, when she was nearly done, Ken spoke again. "It's a war ceremony," he repeated slowly.

Sakura just nodded absently, her focus now elsewhere.

Yeah, it was. Whatever that meant.

Besides, Sasuke would be there.

"Slowly."

The red aura of power grew once more with a start, stretching out too quickly. The unstable chakra sloughed off the figure, dissipating into the room.

"Now that wasn't it at all, was it?" The Fourth Hokage said, a small smile on his face. "Do it slowly."

Naruto was cloaked in a translucent shroud of energy, two tails swinging behind him. He reached into the river of chakra flowing into him and pulled ever so slightly. The energy flooded forward. His shroud, a transparent reddish color, darkened slightly before he lost control. Excess chakra dissipated around him once more and the darker color receded.

He tried again with similar results.

"Alright, stop."

The cloak slowly faded. Naruto looked up at the Fourth. Sakumo seemed deep in thought.

"It seems the more chakra you draw, the less control you have over it."

"Yeah! It's like a little bit at a time is fine. But when there's a lot, it just all comes out, you know?"

"Yes, but that means there is an artificial limit on the amount of the Kyuubi's chakra you can manifest at one time." Sakumo said as he retreated to his desk in contemplation. "For jinchuriki of biju, limits like these come from the influence of the demon's consciousness. But yours is a matter of control. Control that can improve with practice."

Naruto nodded.

His mother didn't use the Kyuubi's chakra even when she was an active shinobi. But if she had, how much of it would she have been able to use before the Kyuubi's influence was...too much?

Not a happy thought.

Naruto's oldest memory was hardly even a memory. It was the feeling of the dark pressure of the Kyuubi's chakra slamming into him again and again, faster and faster, as its power transferred from his mother to him.

He had been only one-year old, still a baby. Still nursing.

"It's important that you learn to control more, Naruto-kun. As it stands, you're only using a little over half of the chakra that could potentially be available to you."

"Yeah. Right." Because that was another problem. All that chakra wasn't available to him.

Somehow, the Hokage caught onto his sour mood. "Is something wrong, Naruto?" Sakumo asked.

"Yeah," he said, crossing his arms, "what's the point in learning this stuff when I'm not even allowed to use it?"

That was the rule that had hung over his head ever since he was young. Never use the Fox's chakra. Never. He wasn't even supposed to have it in the first place.

It had been ages until he had been allowed to use even small sparks of demonic energy to supplement his fighting. And that had come after months of poking, prodding, and testing.

Yet, here he was throwing around tails-worth of chakra, a feat that he would never be able to repeat outside of this room.

The room they were in was hidden beneath the Hokage Tower. Covered in seals, it was designed to mask any and all demonic chakra he might produce by absorbing it and converting it into nondescript energy. Apparently, it did even more than that and served as the Fourth Hokage's secret office.

Every now and then over the years, Sakumo would retrieve Naruto and bring him here. He would teach him how to utilize the Kyuubi's chakra.

"Well, if your sensei is to be believed, you could use the chakra control anyway," Sakumo said knowingly.

Naruto stuck his tongue out at him. Chakra control had always been one of his worst skills, but he had dragged it up from 'truly abysmal' to just 'below average'. No need to remind him of it.

"But you're right. This is not something you should use, which is why you should never utilize more than we've discussed in even the most dire of circumstances."

That was what Naruto would call a 'handful.' The amount that could fill his reserves from empty and make nearly a hundred clones at the same time. It, unlike the spark, would be detectable by certain techniques and kekkai genkai and was a last resort—something the Fourth had stressed endlessly. It was a level of chakra that maybe, possibly, could be explained away if necessary.

Wait, what about if it's a life and death situation and he really had to use more than that or else he'd die? A younger Naruto had once asked this question.

You die, was the Hokage's calm reply.

Which sucked. But, he sort of understood. Sort of. There was only supposed to be one jinchuriki in Konoha after all.

"I know it must seem unfair to you, but trust me, it's for the best."

Naruto shrugged, fiddling with the seals on the floor. He released a small flare of demonic chakra, feeling the warm energy flow past his fingertips. The seals activated, glowing then dimming as the energy left the blonde's hand.

"Naruto," Sakumo said seriously. Naruto glanced up at him. Despite his tone, he was smiling gently. "This is the first of our meetings since you became a genin. Congratulations, by the way."

Naruto grinned.

"But I have a question for you," Sakumo continued.

"What is it, old man?" He asked curiously.

He paused, then asked, "Do you still want to become Hokage?"

Naruto blinked, not understanding the question for a moment. Then, he said, "Uh, yeah? It's like you don't even know me!"

As far as Naruto was concerned, these sessions were secretly grooming him for the position.

He grinned mischievously.

Sakumo shook his head bemusedly. "I suppose that's not what I meant exactly...why do you want to become Hokage, Naruto-kun?"

What kind of question was that? Who wouldn't want to be Hokage?

"It's the best thing you can be! It's like ramen or world peace or something. Of course I want to do it."

Sakumo's eyebrow raised. Then he shook his head with a sigh. "It's the best thing ever," he repeated. "Naruto, don't you think you'll need a better reason, a more thought-out reason, to be entrusted with the role of Hokage?" He asked with a look of significance.

Yeah, he didn't sound impressed. It was the sort of question and tone of voice that invited him to pause, think about his life goals, and start asking the big questions.

"Nope!" Naruto responded cheerfully.

Sakumo covered his face in exasperation. "You're kidding."

Naruto laughed. "Nah, I'll get so good, old man, you'll have to give it to me. And if you don't, well, I'll just get even better.

"Strength is admirable, but being Hokage tests you in many ways, Naruto. You need a deep motivation to survive its challenges."

Naruto shook his head. "I don't just mean getting strong. Whatever it takes, I'll do it, and I never give up," he said, "So throw whatever you've got at me, old man." Then he smiled. "And, when you're done, you can throw the hat over here too."

Sakumo gave a short laugh, then looked contemplative. "Well, it's certainly unusual-"

The seals around the door they had entered through lit up. Sakumo pressed his hand against the wall tensely. Then, he relaxed.

"That will be all for today, Naruto. Remember what we talked about."

Naruto nodded as the seals around the room receded. Sakumo took his seat at the desk and the door opened. Naruto walked out as Nara Shikaku entered.

The Nara watched Naruto as he left.

Then the door closed.

Shikaku stared at the door long after Naruto had gone. His hands were in his pockets but his gaze was dark.

He turned to Sakumo. "You're playing a dangerous game, Hokage-sama."

Sakumo nodded. "Perhaps."

"Then, why?" He said as his arms crossed. "You know what we have to do. It's what we should have done from the start."

"Let's not play out this old argument again, friend. This is the best solution. We've prepared for the different possibilities. And we're already reaching out."

"But the risk-" Shikaku began.

"No." Sakumo said, his voice suddenly hard.

Shikaku pulled back, his hands slipping back into his pockets.

Sakumo sighed. "I won't tarnish it. Not yet. Not unless we must."

Shikaku grimaced and didn't respond.

"So unless you really do have a better plan-" Shikaku shifted and Sakumo continued, "-a different, better plan?"

There was a long moment of silence.

Then Shikaku sighed wearily. "No."

Sakumo nodded, leaning back in his chair.

"But, Hokage-sama," Shikaku continued, "I've learned that things tend to go wrong in unexpected ways."

Sakumo smiled woefully. "Yes," he said, "That they do."

Naruto flew through the hand seals then brought his palms up together. A tight cone of wind rocketed from between them.

Well, it was supposed to be a tight cone of wind. In reality, the circumference was much too wide, the jutsu striking forward more as a buffet than a focused punch of power.

Wind Style: Pressure Break was just that. He gathered as much wind as he could into a tightly contained ball. Then, a small opening or excess of power released the energy. Somehow, it was supposed to come out as a "tight cone of wind," but Naruto hadn't figured that part out yet.

It would have to be enough.

The shuriken were knocked away as he backpedaled. Then there was Sasuke in front of him, rushing toward him. He lashed out with a kick, realizing too late his mistake.

His foot sailed through, the regular clone smiling evilly at him.

Five shadow clones burst into existence around Naruto as he landed, but another wave of shuriken impaled them almost as soon as they appeared. Only one clone remained and they split, the real Naruto going one way, jumping into the trees, and the clone another.

The two were literally identical. No one could tell them apart.

A kunai zoomed towards him from behind. He ducked, dropping from the branches, but the telltale sound of a wire snapping, made him groan. A wire trap snapped around his feet as he landed. His feet tied, he crashed into the earth.

You have got to be kidding me! He yelled internally. Not out loud, of course. No use giving his location away.

Bleh, who was he kidding? Exactly one person could tell him apart from his clones.

He cut himself loose, darting up and running away again. He looked over his shoulder for more projectiles. Nothing, but that didn't mean much.

As he turned back, Sasuke appeared from around a tree. Fu-

An elbow cracked him across the head, followed by a punch, knee, and then a brutal spinning kick to the head again. He crashed into a tree, slumping against it as Sasuke looked down at him, a kunai spinning on his finger.

It stopped in his hand with finality. "Submit," he said. "Don't make me knock you out again."

Naruto responded with a number of slurred obscenities. Sasuke said something in return.

Then, Sakura was next to him, a cool energy washing over his head. His level of consciousness improved dramatically as Sakura fretted over him.

"Don't act so smug," he said as his vision focused. "I nearly had you."

"Hardly."

Naruto growled, but it turned into a squawk of pain as Sakura pushed him down firmly. "Stop fidgeting!"

So he sat still, grumbling quietly until she was done.

Obito arrived just as she finished. "Mission time, everyone!"

Naruto stood, rolling his neck out. "Ugh, not another simulation!"

Sasuke and Sakura looked similarly nonplussed.

"What?" He asked with confusion. "No...didn't you hear me? I said mission time!"

And then Obito pulled out something Naruto thought he might never see: a mission scroll!

"Yes!" He cheered, jumping in the air. Then he rushed towards Obito, trying to yank the scroll out of his hands. Obito held it above his head, holding the blond back with one hand. He stopped trying to reach it and just bounced around the Uchiha excitedly. "So what is it? Rescuing a princess? Assassinating a crime lord?"

"Patience, my young, impressionable student," Obito said sagely. Then he, glanced down at the scroll in his hand and sighed. "Unfortunately, we're forced to start with the lowest ranked mission."

He spun the scroll around. A red "C" stared back at them.

Sakura opened her mouth to say something, but suddenly Obito was behind her and Sasuke, putting his arms around them as crocodile tears streamed down his cheeks. She let out a small noise of surprise instead. Sasuke tried and failed to shrug their sensei off.

"Don't worry," Obito said tearfully, "we'll get through this together."

AN: This was originally going to be one chapter that covered the mission as well, but it was getting pretty long. The second half was taking far more time to write anyway, so I split it.

But yeah, everyone's doing their thing, starting up their arcs and whatnot. I don't really know what to say here but wanted to say hi!

Please let me know what you think! If you have any questions about the story, I'll make sure to answer them.

And for those of you who have already left reviews, thank you very much!