Hello! I hope you'll like this chapter!

Disclaimer: I own the OCs in this fic, the rest is Masashi Kishomoto's. Sorry for any spelling mistakes or any OCCness.

Character age:

Akane, Itachi: 24

Naruto, Sasuke: 19

Shisui: 28

Kakashi: 33

There was a small tornado swirling in the palm of his hand. Sasuke did not let it break his focus. He had Kenichi in front of him, on the docks, and he knew he would not use chakra. It did not mean he could not surprise him though.

His primary target was the stone, that he apparently wore around his neck. Sasuke exchanged his place with a box behind him and tried to use his katana, only for it to be stopped. His arm started to shake and wind currents appeared around Kenichi. Sasuke jumped away before it sent everything around Kenichi away.

Susanoo was the god of storms, so he could control the natural elements at will. As clouds gathered above them, thunder rumbling, Kenichi let the small tornado in his hand go toward him. It quickly grew, attracting everything around inside.

Sasuke used the Great Fireball Jutsu. It engulfed the tornado. Sasuke felt it trying to keep moving forward, but he overpowered it easily, the wind of the tornado morphing with the fire. Kenichi made a huge wave that covered everything. The tornado didn't resist, and neither did his fire.

Sasuke stopped Kenichi's kick, wincing a little. He had strength. A lot more than a regular civilian should have. Still, he was not a shinobi, so he should be able to win this quickly.

He raised his arm, a lightning strike hitting his hand. Then, he had a yellow lightning bold in hands and started using it as a weapon. He could feel pins and needles in his right hand as his katana kept clashing against this lightning bolt, so he covered his blade with the Chidori. He quickly overpowered him, his sharingan deciphering his every move.

Despite being trapped between him and the sea, Kenichi's red eyes showed nothing. Lightning hit the ground between them, and Sasuke attempted to move away from it, but it followed him. He used his Susanoo to protect himself.

Wrong move. It went right through the purple giant and electricity cursed through his body. He fell on one knee, his cloak burned and his whole body numbed. He was panting and raised his eyes to Kenichi. Natural energy, it went through chakra for him as well.

The Uchiha stood up, hitting the ground with his foot to get rid of the numbness. He tried to use genjutsu on him but couldn't. If anything, there was a dim blue light from under his clothes. The kami stone could protect him from genjutsu as well then.

Amaterasu appeared on his blade, and he went back to it, trapping them in a circle of black flames. Kenichi seemed shocked at the flames but didn't let this trouble him as they were exchanging blows one more. Sasuke dropped his katana behind Kenichi and exchanged his place with it. Kenichi turned around, ready to attack but Sasuke stabbed him in the chest before he could.

Blood ran down from the corner of his mouth as shocked eyes were on Sasuke.

Then, to the Uchiha's surprise, he smiled.

"Thank you." Amaterasu was stopped as Kenichi's body stumbled on him. Sasuke put him down on the ground.

'Thank you'? Was he doing all of this against his will? Sasuke pulled the stone from under his clothes and tore it off him. It was a bright, electric blue that was now dull.

"Sasuke!" Sasuke looked to the side and saw Naruto and Haku running toward him.

"Did you succeed?" Naruto showed him a yellow stone. "What about Sakura and Min?"

"We haven't seen them yet, but the whole city is infested with guards. We had to make our way through them; Masashi-san is holding them back right now."

"Who?"

"Nee-chan's great-grand-father." Naruto waved off the Uchiha's confusion. "It doesn't matter right now. What did we miss?"

"Akane's wedding was moved, and Itachi went to get her. I think he succeeded. I have this now." He showed him the blue stone dangling from the red cord. "We need to destroy these three to…"

"We know," Haku interrupted him. "Let's hope Sakura and Min did not break theirs."

Itachi was not using genjutsu. It was usually his go-to, but if Samuru got rid of the previous one easily…he was furious anyway, I could see it in his posture. They were trading blows, Samuru following Itachi's pace easily.

He was not easy to follow.

As Itachi used a water jutsu, Samuru just returned it.

"My gift is Creation, do you really think imitating your cheap tricks is difficult?" Samuru taunted him.

"It is a gift only depending on what it is used for," Itachi retorted coldly.

I loved watching Itachi fight. Not only did I feel proud of thinking that this incredibly strong and smart man was my other half, but he looked good fighting.

However, it was not the time for that. I had to figure out why I could not fight. I felt…like my mark on my wrist was slowly waking up since I woke up but…I couldn't get chakra out right now. For all I knew, he did something to my mind that locked any kunoichi skill I had.

"The Yata Miror?" I blinked at Itachi's Susanoo, in its small version but fully armored, now present. Samuru seemed shocked and knew of the Yata Miror. A crooked smile split in face, the glint in his eyes making me shudder.

I knew he was not the most stable, but it seemed fighting Itachi was just making it worst. Maybe Itachi was thinking about sealing Samuru with the Totsuka Blade or something.

He used the Yata Miror to protect himself from Samuru's attack, who got sick of it and tried to attack with his version of the Claw. If it was like me, direct contact with the Miror would make him go through it. Itachi knew this though and attempted to use the Blade on him. Samuru dodged and slid on the ground.

"The Totsuka Blade too!?" he roared. "What are you!? Where did you get those!?" Itachi didn't reply. Samuru created a huge wave out of nowhere and sent it toward us. Itachi spread Amaterasu on it, effectively evaporating it.

Samuru looked broken.

"Black flames too?" He gritted his teeth and glared at the sky. "HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME!?" I caught Itachi's eyes briefly.

He had to be dealt with, and quick. Itachi then got the upper-hand, Samuru's anger blinding him to what the best next move was. After a few minutes, he dug his golden claw in the ground, plants growing big out of it, the beautiful amaranth flowers around us changing to be deformed and growing tumors. Itachi grabbed me around the waist, threw me on his shoulder and dodged the plants trying to choke him. He used Amaterasu to burn them in return, but they were quicker. If anything, it reminded me of Hashirama's Mokuton a little.

I widened my eyes, like Samuru as he stopped his attack. Itachi and I were back on the ground, and I got out of his grasp, falling harshly on all four. I grabbed my left arm.

"Akane?" I looked up at Itachi.

"I think they did it, they destroyed them." He nodded, a harsh and murderous glint in his eyes.

It was almost as if a switch had been flipped. Itachi was more vicious, aggressive, and violent than before now he knew he could truly hurt him. I gulped. Itachi was composed in fights yet here…he was furious, anyone could see that.

I hated seeing him like this, because it could only mean he had been under a lot of stress, anxiety and worries.

I tried to mix my chakra. It felt a little bit…better. I stood up, making sure they were both too busy to notice me. Samuru's power, at its core, worked the same way as mine. We both had a fraction of Izanami's and Izanagi's powers in one of our arms. I looked at my left hand and closed it in a fist. If he could use his power on me, then I could do the same on him, right? I mean, I probably couldn't get his soul like for Hidan, but I could…have some effect.

Maybe it would make the kami stone leave his body.

I quietly made my way behind Samuru, who was too busy by Itachi's attack to notice me. Itachi saw me, but if he didn't like me there, he didn't let it show. When he pushed Samuru back enough, I activated the Claw, with a lot more efforts than usual, and grabbed his right arm. I could feel a surge of energy running up my arm and he yelled, trying to get rid of me. I gritted my teeth, trying to keep him in place but he kicked me in a tree. I spat some blood, but his right arm was fuming, like mine. However, in my case, it stopped quickly, my chakra coming back. He just cradled his limb in pain.

As my bond with Izanami was through the pact and chakra, unlike for him, then chakra was giving an extra layer of protection, I guess. Maybe my bond was the most stable out of the hitogamis as it relied on chakra?

Itachi set him on fire. Samuru screamed in agony, black flames eating him alive. I moved something in my guts, in spite of myself, to see him and hear him. I stood up on shaky legs and joined Itachi halfway as he had gotten closer to Samuru, a satisfied glint in his sharingans. I wanted to say something, but I figured it would be better not to.

"Are you okay?" I nodded as he looked at me. "Goo…" In the blink of an eye, Samuru was on one knee between us, still burning. However, his right arm was covered in golden energy, and he dived it in my stomach.

He dived it straight in my seal. I widened my eyes, my heart missing a beat. Itachi's face was horrified, his lips moving but I couldn't hear him. The only thing I could feel right now was my seal…being ripped away from me. He flexed his fingers as if to grab something and ripped it away from me.

As I fell back, I saw the starry night sky. Then, I felt myself falling and the sky was gray. I stood up and looked around in panic. I fell to my knees when I saw the black sun above.

I was in Yomi.

A strangled sob left my lips.

I was in Yomi, I was dead because I dropped my guard like an idiot and now I…it was not possible, it was a nightmare, it had to be! I couldn't die, not now, not in front of Itachi, not when I was changing my village and could build something with the man I loved…

I couldn't be damned to wander aimlessly in Yomi for eternity!

Itachi could not tear his eyes off Akane, her eyes wide opened, on the ground. His brain did not want to digest this new piece of information.

What…what had just happened? They were talking and then…

His red eyes found Samuru, coughing a yellow liquid on the ground that solidified into a square stone. What had he done? How come he was still moving despite the Amaterasu on him? Itachi stopped the flames and grabbed a fistful of his hair, smacking his face against the ground. He did it again, and again until he saw Samuru's nose smashed. Then he turned him around and kicked him in the torso, making sure to break ribs.

What had he done?

Itachi knelt and used the Tsukuyomi on him. This time, now he was freed from the kami stone's protection, he could fully use it. He did, he tortured him in several, many ways for what seemed to be years for him. Some were tricks he learned during his ANBU days, others where the primal part of him just wanted to hurt him like he was hurting.

Itachi stopped the Tsukuyomi before it killed Samuru, opting for slashing his throat instead. Blood poured from his wound, and he watched it, blankly, soak into the ground. This flower field was beautiful before, now it was destroyed and deformed.

He gulped and slowly turned around to look at Akane. He numbly walked over to her and knelt, raising her left sleeve. The mark was still there, but it was as if someone took an eraser and started removing it. He didn't need to see her stomach to know it would be the same.

From the moment she became a Yuurei, her soul was combined with the one in their time and the Shinigami seal became the anchor keeping her soul in their world. The moment it was broken…her soul was sent to…

He knew all of that.

"Akane, wake up," he asked her quietly, shaking her shoulder. "Please sweetheart, it's over, we have to go home now." He bit on his bottom lip at the lack of reaction.

He sat down and lifted her upper body to put her against his raised knee. He removed a lock of hair from her blurry face.

He didn't try to refrain himself from crying. He was aware of the warm tears on his cheeks or the burning lump in his throat, the aching beating of his heart in his chest. Itachi put two fingers on her pulse point. They had the habit to do that after all, to reassure themselves on each other's well-being after a bad fight.

There was none. His fingers were supposed to feel a reassuring beating, but there was nothing.

"Akane, please don't…" he started, his voice breaking. He kissed her forehead softly. "Please don't leave me alone Akane, please…"

Weren't they supposed to have plans? Once she was done with being the Mizukage, she was supposed to move back with him permanently and they would think about their future together. He wanted another pet first, and then they'd get married. He wanted to marry her as soon as possible, being annoyed when she'd turn him down. But he could see that she was warming up to the idea of marriage. Ideally, she would accept marrying him at the end of her years as the Mizukage. Then he would look for a house they could move in together, and they'd get married shortly after her coming back in Konoha. He didn't want anything too big or fancy, he wanted something she would love. A wedding with their loved ones in a beautiful place would be more than enough, just like eloping would be fine to him. Then they would go on their honeymoon, and if they were lucky, they would conceive a baby. He wanted two children with Akane, ideally a boy and a girl, or a girl and a boy, but if they were healthy, it was all that mattered.

They'd raise them with all the love and care in the world and grow old together, as long as Akane's body could handle the Shinigami's power.

Now his whole world just crumbled in front of him.

"Please, please," he kept mumbling through his tears, his lips on her forehead. "Please, you're my whole world sweetheart, please wake up…"

He felt helpless. Did she feel like this too when he died? But she had the twins, he had nothing from her. It could not end like this. They both made it out of the war, she could not…she could not leave him now. Not like this, not with him at arm-reach when it happened and…

"I love you, I've always been madly in love with you, so please wake up…I swear I'll make you happy, I'll get you the moon if that's what you want but please just…just answer me sweetheart, please…"

There was no answer. Itachi buried his face in her hair, hugging her against him as he cried. He didn't want it to be real, he didn't…there had to be something, just anything to…

His sobs got louder; his hand buried in her hair. By now, he should be feeling her comforting and warm embrace around him, but nothing.

It was the scene Team Seven and Haku found themselves in front of when they arrived. Naruto stopped for a second and ran to them, falling to his knees in front of Itachi.

"SAKURA-CHAN!" It got Sakura out of her shock, and she ran to them as well.

Haku was frozen in his spot, shocked and refusing to believe what he was seeing while Sasuke looked at Samuru. From the state of the body, his brother did not hold his punches, which could only mean that Akane really was…

His fists were shaking.

"Sakura-chan, please!"

"I know, but I can't…" Itachi wouldn't let go of Akane. Sasuke took it upon himself to move Itachi away from Akane. He refused to at first.

"Nii-san." Seeing his brother so broken was breaking him too. "Nii-san, come on, you…"

"No!" Sasuke pursed his lips and with some force, moved him away so that Sakura could work. "Sasuke stop…"

"Nii-san, look at me." Itachi's eyes were filled with tears.

"I was…right there…I didn't see…I didn't notice him…" Sasuke embraced his brother firmly. "Sasuke…she's dead, she's…she's gone, and I was right there…" Sasuke looked at Sakura.

The medic somberly closed Akane's eyes, Naruto begging her to try harder. Haku slowly made his way to Naruto and fell to his knees next to him.

"Sakura-chan please…please bring her back…" Naruto shook Akane's shoulder. "Please nee-chan, don't go yet…" There was no response.

Too deep in their grief, they didn't notice the golden stone shining behind them, nor the ominous presence irradiating from it. Soon, a male figure completely emerged from it, a spear in his hand.

The figure aimed it at Naruto and Haku and charged.

I slid down the cliff. I had wandered around and had found a cliff going up so high I couldn't see where it ended. I had tried climbing it.

"Akane, stop it." I blinked and turned around.

"Oji-chan?" He nodded and I jumped in his arms, shaking like a leaf. "I don't want to die, I don't…" He hugged me back tightly, a hand in my hair.

"I know, and I'm so sorry it happened this way." I spotted the other three Hokages behind him, looking at Yomi from our spot.

"Maybe there's a way-out Oji-chan, maybe…"

"Akane…"

"No, help me find a way out!"

"You can always bargain with Izanami again," Tobirama suggested.

"Yes, yes you're right, I can…" I ran to them and spotted the Tori at the end of the valley. "We need to reach the Tori, but the onis won't let us do that so easily. Oji-chan, try to form a rasengan please." He did, the blue of the rasengan clashing with the lack of colors around us. "So, you can use chakra and fight, that's good."

"Akane, are you sure that…"

"We won't know without trying Yondaime!" Hashirama interrupted him, his hand on my shoulder.

"It's not just me stuck here, it's you four as well! Do you want to stay here for eternity!? Don't you want to go to Aunty and watch over your son!?" Oji-chan still had this pained look in his eyes, but he shook his head slowly. "Then please, please help me."

"Alright, I will."

On this note, we ran in the valley.

"Haku!" Naruto yelled as Haku was sent flying across the field, Akane's body in his arms to protect it. They were suddenly attacked and Akane just went flying, so Haku did not think and just…protected her.

"Naruto watch out!" He jumped toward Sakura.

In front of them was a man, twice their size, dressed in feudal clothes, a spear in his hand. His eyes were golden and almond-shaped, long silky black hair framing his masculine features. His eyes went from Sakura and Naruto to the Uchiha siblings, to Haku and Akane. His eyes lingered on the woman on the ground.

Black flames appeared between him and Haku.

"Amaterasu's flames," he stated in a deep, calm voice. There was no feeling, no emotion in it. Then, he looked down at Samuru's dead body and narrowed his eyes. "Useless insect."

"Izanagi," Itachi said after having wiped his tears. It was bad, he could not break down, even if the thought of Haku hugging Akane's body was making him want to.

The man reacted and looked his way.

"Are you the one using my daughter's power?"

"Wait, is it really Izanagi?" Sasuke asked his brother, shocked.

"He looks like Izanami."

"How do you even know how she would…" Right, Sasuke didn't know about his…meeting with Izanami and old Itachi now being in him.

"I can feel her lingering trace in you, human. A part of you should not be here." He hit his spear on the ground, the black flames disappearing.

They could not use their chakra though.

Izanagi stared at what remained of the first God Tree in thoughts.

"Ever since this appeared, we have lost our power and stand in this world. You thought you were more than humans with your newfound capacities and just turned to insects, finding new ways to kill each other. This world…is ill."

"It's not!" Naruto refuted with a frown. Izanagi merely looked at him.

"It is. This…chakra, will be the death of this world. It is rotting it from its very core. This world that I have created…will cease to exist so I must…" He stretched out his hand toward Naruto when he had a rasengan in his hand. "You…will stay quiet."

None of them could move. Izanagi pointed his spear at Naruto, ready to attack him again and eliminate him but he found himself unable to move. He looked down, seeing three stones around him.

"Shouldn't they be broken?" Itachi asked Sasuke, who pursed his lips.

"The old man found a way to break the bond without breaking them immediately."

Figures emerged from the stones as well. Two men and a woman. The woman, with long golden hair and golden eyes, shot the siblings a quick look and smiled at them.

"You have gone crazy," one of the men said, his long silver hair framing silver eyes.

"What?"

"This world has forgotten us like it should have Father," the other man, with wild black hair and electric blue eyes said.

"I am only trying to save my creation."

"Your creation is no longer your responsibility, it is the responsibility of the people who live in it," the woman replied in an elegant, smooth voice. "You should not get involved via a human vessel."

"Oh, Izanami has done it for centuries, but I can't?"

"Mother's way of doing is different than yours. She does not pray on weak beings who immediately crumble under the weight of her power."

"You are still taking her side Susanoo." The blue-eyes man narrowed them at his father.

"Enough." They all widened their eyes at the purple specter above Akane, Haku dangerously close to it.

He shivered in fright when the Shinigami was visible to all above Akane's body, its eyes looking down at him. It floated away from them before putting its foot on the ground, quickly turning into a female version of Izanagi.

"That is enough," Izanami repeated.

"Look who decided to show up," Izanagi taunted her. "How did you even get here?"

"Your vessel broke my vessel's seal, but it is not like swallowing a kami stone. My power still lingers in her body right now."

"And yet you have forsaken her." Izanami's face did not move an inch. "What are you going to do now, my dear, beloved wife?"

Even if the shinobi could not move, they would not have if they could. They were witnessing something surreal, and they did not know if they really could believe what was happening or not.

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