Sprawling forests older then any species of flesh spanned the lush green landscape. Once towering proofs of natures prosperous power. They had fallen to the mighty fires of war, quite literally. Now they proved to be but giant matchsticks in unity alighting and falling one after the other leaving ash, and quick burning leaves to billow skyward.
The crackling inferno of wildfires engulfed everything in its path spreading slowly but steadily, unstopped in its unquenchable thirst to consume. It was a special monster able to take down the mightiest of things. Gigantic oaks once standing mightily as resilient foes to age were nipped at the roots by the fires then engulfed as the flames traced its form traveling upward to once unreachable peaks.
Laterally the forest floor was in even worse condition, a blanket of flames covered everything entirely. Plants well known to be toxic and found only at the roots of trees were now fuel to a even more deadly destroyer. Poisonous clouds made of millennia old plants covered a section of sky in billowing hues of purple colored smog.
Forever camouflaged in the poisonous inferno the overwhelmed ruins of a fort made of wood was made visible for scant seconds before it fully collapsed in on itself proving to be another causality.
Naturally every being that had the baser of instincts to survive fled the wildfire and its path. Though there were few animals that were caught in its conception most had made it safely away from harm. And yet even in imminent danger it seemed two figures had the detachment for their own safety to remain.
OSAKA FORT|
Aki looked on at his failure with uncharacteristically cold eyes. The fires he saw burning his charge had not the warming qualities they would of normally been able to broker upon a man gone cold.
Though he supposed at the moment the mass bonfire was the least threat to his precarious position laid back down on a ground covered in flames. To his own slightly amused going dark view he wondered why the flames had yet to consume him too.
His attention would stray once again as his eyes cast to the figure surrounded by orange light that could not hide its approaching form neared him.
"Folly, pure folly is the reason you lay upon your back almost dead Uzumaki" lamented the ruler of Iwagakure "Tell me have you learned a lesson today? Have you been enlightened on why the shadows of ninja cast such big swaths of darkness upon the land?"
Silence was the answer that Aki gave in reply. The care for trying to dispute their own views while they did battle had enraptured the dueling two. An so it seemed right up till the end. One of them had yet to surrender his opinion on what he was doing was right or wrong.
Being ignored did not sit well with Onoki but the view of his enemies slowly glazing eyes alerted him to the mans expiration lingering closer. His own selfishness missed with curiosity though wanted a answer upon the mans usually idealistic views he preached in battle. To somehow be shadowed upon by the hopelessness he was now in.
'Surely such a position will show him the true folly of his ways. I wonder if all of Whirlpool is like him' reflected the young kage still staring intently at the glazed eye man.
"How do you expect to prosper?" whispered Aki surprising the kage who thought the man to be long slipped in to the clutches of death.
Moving closer to hear the whisper but with his guard still up the teen answered "When all enemies of a ninja's master is dead. Like a tool we will be sheathed but will not go dull as even little conflicts will keep the blade sharp and oiled. "
Aki emotionless feeling no pain anymore as his time living slowly ran out asked amazed "The one who trained you was quite diligent I see but what they lacked I guess they tried to impart in to you through teaching you. Tell me though as leader will you do the same. Will all your weakness be pushed upon others and strengthened as if it were theirs. Will you call your loyal subjects tools and let they be used as such?"
To his chagrin Onoki expected such words and made his reply but was interrupted swiftly
"If the leader at the front of the flock. . . If only for a moment becomes unsure of himself. Then all who follow will be thrown in to chaos" Aki whispered his voice growing quieter as he continued "You'll understand what I mean one day. . . Then maybe my foolish ideals will be understood by a kage kid"
Eyes narrowing upon the heap that was once a fierce adversary Onoki made to fiercely disagree with such words then the last insult but his emotions fled as he saw the Uzumaki's eyes were closed and his chest no longer rose.
Slightly flustered at his enemies ominous last words. He was definitive in knowing the red-head had spoke knowing they were his last and made to "impart" something off to him. Without hearing of his own opposite reasoning.
The Tsuchikage reminded of the environment that was imploding around him by the crackling sound of bark wearily took off from the ground. His tired body, disheveled and exposed armor shifting with small clinking noises as his feet left the ground.
Rising slowly above the burning forest to take in the aerial view of the one time battlefield.
Onoki's eyes bore witness; roaring flames lapping at any immobile object or foolish soul to come near, the ground dancing with small spit-sparks that alighted newer flames when met with a adequate fuel.
Cut-out squared shapes an triangles of earth with their odd imprints too were present upon the scape. A keen recollection of what technique and how to perform it slithered in to the young Tsuchikage.
Even at a glance the remains of a mound of ash stories high could never go unnoticed. Appearing in stark contrast to any other thing visible, a bisected colossal ribcage exposed itself when the wind whisked past blowing away some of the covering ashes that acted as a last skin to the bleached white bones.
Onoki couldn't help but be displeased at the height of power shown by his newly official enemies. The testament of the battlefield itself spoke of the gauge of power the so called peaceful Uzumaki wielded and the legendary zanpakuto users boasted.
Turning his back to the infernos heat and ignoring the whereabouts of his been lost comrades. Onoki unconsciously wondered about the zanpakuto users last sentiments.
A look cast over his shoulder in reconsideration at the destruction never the less instantly dismissed any of the dead mans words. Unmoved Onoki flew at a tired pace towards a battalion he knew to be entrenched a few miles away.