Two years ago, a six foot seven inches tall matured male stood in front of his son, Genjou. His very muscular physique seemed to completely cover the seven year old child who was only four foot five. Ganjou, the male's name, had short spiky black hair, bright white teeth, and deep brown eyes.
"I know you're worried about being alone with Rita for a short while, but by the time you know it, I'll be back. Your baby brother or sister will be here too, and you'll also get close with Rita in due time. She has a temper I know, but she's a nice woman. I wouldn't be with her if she wasn't." Ganjou smiled, brushing his rough and large right hand along his son's head.
"Y-yeahhh, I know, but she's... she gets so mad sometimes over small things, dad. And it's not about me being with Rita, it's about you going back into that country." Genjou stared up at his father with concern.
"Yeah... I got a pretty cool looking scar from the last time, wouldn't ya say?" he grinned, Genjou scoffed and looked to the side, but couldn't hold back a laugh. "There we go. Listen, Son... part of being a ninja means to be willing to put your life on the line, to be willing to die for others. I'm afraid each time I walk out the door to do a mission, despite how minor it is. I've seen things go wrong so quickly. I love life, but I can't promise you I'll come back alive, so if I do die, I want you to replace me and surpass me." Ganjou knelt down in front of his son, placing his right hand on his shoulder.
"Don't waste your time mourning. We both made it through your mother's death, you did it at such a young age and quicker than me... I'm sure you can make it through if I pass on." Ganjou teared up a bit, but only one tear managed to roll out.
Genjo stared him in the eyes and nodded once, being able to hold back his own tears. Ganjou wrapped his large arms around his son, which cover half of his body, "Your father loves you, kid."
Seven weeks later, two ninja knocked on the door. One ninja had half of his face covered with bandages, and his right eye showing a fresh scar in the corner of it. The other ninja had long hair, and small burn marks scattered across his face. Rita answered the door, staring at the men with an attitude clearly in her facial expression. Her dark eyeshadow brought out her eyes even more while she stared at the two silent men for an awkward moment.
"Yes, what do you want?" she asked, breaking the silence.
The men paused because of her beauty and intimidation.
"Y-Yes, sorry. My name is Yoshi, and this is Jun. Miss Rita, we have bad news about Ganjou." the ninja with the burn marks on his face spoke.
"Ganjou's dead?" she asked calmly.
Yoshi looked down for a few seconds and then back into her eyes before nodding his head stiffly.
"I see..." Rita stretched her left arm up and against the side of the door, placing her head against her arm. She stared blankly at the ground while tears filled up in her eyes and began streaming down her cheeks. Behind her, Genjou looked on, he took a deep breath and held it in, holding back his tears.
"I'm sorry for your loss, I need to speak to his son." Jun said with a soft tone in his voice.
Rita looked over her right shoulder seeing Genjou, she placed her head back against her arm and simply moved to the side to allow Jun to walk in. Jun walked into the house while Yoshi attempted to comfort Rita.
"Hello, young man." Jun got on one knee in front of Genjou, giving him a faint smile.
"H-Hel-lo." Genjou said, you can hear it in his voice that he was forcing himself not to cry.
"From this day forward you're considered to be a growing man. I fought alongside your father, he was very brave, incredibly strong... and sacrificed himself for us. I would like to give you something he wanted you to have, but before that I would like to tell you what happened. I think that as his son, you should know now before the story becomes folktale, would you like to know it?" Jun asked, Genjou nodded before taking a deep breath.
"I'm glad to hear that. We were deep within the enemy's base, infiltrating. We were short on men, and the enemy believed we retreated, or so we thought. Unfortunately, the enemy caught us by surprise and began attacking. We lost a lot of men, but we had so much information. We all tried to escape with the important info, but the enemy were relentless. Ganjou knew that if we stayed and fought, the enemy would win. He decided to stay behind and allow the rest of us to go ahead. We were reluctant, but we knew the mission's success could save hundreds of lives at least. Ganjou defeated so many of them, but he wasn't able to take them all out, we lost two more men out of the escaped group. Ganjou was able to injure the enemies who chased us so severely that they couldn't last long after the brief encounter with me and Yoshi. It's because of your father that so many people will wake up another day, healthy, and alive. He told me to tell you, to remember what he said before he left." Jun slipped his left hand into his pouch, slipping out a flat razor edged black tanto knife inside a silver sheath.
"Don't be careless with this. Your father had this since he became a ninja from his mother." Jun handed the tanto over to Genjou.
Genjou grabbed it with both hands and gazed down at it for a few moments, a smile crawling across his face. "Yeah, I know. He told me about it about a dozen times... I was hoping nothing happened to it." Genjou smiled more and nodded to Jun. "He told me that I'll replace him, and surpass him. I'm gonna work harder to become a Genin." Genjou looked back down at the tanto.
Jun nodded, giving Genjo a smile, "Make your father proud. We're putting our faith in you, take care." Jun gripped Genjou's left shoulder for a few seconds before standing up and walking out the house. Rita slammed the door closed before they could say goodbye to her.
"She's such a bitch." Yoshi groaned while walking beside Jun.
"Her husband just died, what do you expect?" Jun replied.
"No, she's always like that, she's always a bitch." Yoshi quickly answered the question being irritated while Jun just laughed.