Hinata of the White Lotus

Revelation

"What the hell happened here?" Tayuya asked, looking around at the destruction.

She and Kimimaro had made their way to Higaoka City after chasing down a rumor that there had been a battle here involving a Hyuga girl. What they hadn't expected to find was this level of damage.

Tall trees blocked any entrance to the former battlefield, keeping any and all civilians out, and forcing the two Otonin to access it by jumping to the roofs. The street itself had once been flooded, but the water was mostly drained, leaving just a small ankle-deep pool behind. The buildings were littered with numerous holes, scorch marks, and the foundations seemed to be warped from the water damage. It looked more like a typhoon had swept through rather than a battle between people.

"As expected of the one that foiled Lord Orochimaru's plans." Kimimaro jumped down from the roof, landing in the flooded street with a splash. "She will be a worthy final opponent." He bent down, looking for clues of any kind that would tell them what exactly went down. Kimimaro knew he didn't have much time and seemed fully committed to dying on this manhunt.

"...Shit." Tayuya cursed, jumping down to join her comrade in his search. She had no idea what they were hoping to find down here. The battle seemed to have been self-contained, so she doubted there were any leads to where the Hyuga girl and her team were heading next. It would be faster to talk to those around the city, find some eye-witnesses.

Of course, she didn't dare say any of this to Kimimaro. She didn't want him thinking she was going against him. Her only concern was bringing him and the Hyuga girl together for a fight. After that, she would decide what to do next. To her surprise, however, she saw a glimmer of something in the water.

"Hey, I think I got something!" She yelled, reaching down and pulling the submerged item in question from the street. Holding it in her hand, she could see it was a small ring. The character for 'South' was engraved on it, the base of the ring yellow. It didn't seem like much at first glance, but something about it also felt significant. Like it had some kind of hidden power.

"What is it?" Kimimaro asked, walking up to her to stare down at the ring. She shook her head, not really sure herself. As she started to turn to hand it over to him, a new voice called out to them.

"Oh! You found it! Yay!" A man in an orange mask clapped like an excited child, drawing their attention to him. Kimimaro immediately drew a bone blade from his shoulder, Tayuya pulling out her flute and holding it like a knife. "Ahhh! Please don't hurt me!" The man in the orange mask held up both hands, crying out in childish fear at their aggression.

He was sitting above them, legs dangling out from one of the holes put into one of the buildings. Nothing about his stance seemed to indicate he meant them any harm, but if anything that only put Tayuya more on guard. This guy saw himself as so powerful, he didn't even need to raise a hand against them as they held weapons towards him. What's more, he had been completely invisible to them until just now. One moment he was just there, as if he popped in out of thin air.

"Who the fuck are you!?" Tayuya yelled, pointing the tip of her flute at him in a threatening gesture she knew was ultimately meaningless. Nothing she did would scare this guy.

"Me? I'm Tobi!" The man-child introduced himself, scratching his head as if to signify embarrassment.

"Like I give a shit about your name!" Tayuya spat, already sick of this guy and his antics. "What do you want? What are you doing here?" Her hand tightened on the ring she had picked up. It was obvious this was what he was after, but she didn't know why.

"Akatsuki." Kimimaro muttered quietly, having somehow picked up some clue about Tobi's identity. Tayuya had to double-take, finally noticing the cloak with red clouds he was wearing. That meant… this guy was a member of the same organization that Orochimaru used to be a part of.

"Well, kinda." Tobi chuckled as if ashamed. "Thing is, I'm still a bit of a newbie myself. However, that ring you just picked up will allow me to get a promotion!" He gave them both two thumbs up. "So it would be really great if you would let me have it! Pretty please?" He asked, tilting his head. "My senpai must have thrown it away as he realized he was dying! Please allow me to honor him by carrying on in his place!"

"Why should we?" Tayuya shot back, although she had no idea why she bothered antagonizing him. If he wanted, it was very likely he could just come down and take it. Yet her motor-mouth just wouldn't leave it be. "Lord Orochimaru betrayed your sorry ass organization. What makes you think we would do something to help you guys out now?"

"Hmm… that's a good point." Tobi nodded to himself, placing a hand on the chin of his mask and making a hum of deep concentration. Then he snapped. "Oh, I know! How about a trade?" He suggested.

"The ring for what?" Kimimaro asked before Tayuya had the chance to make another biting remark.

"I heard it! Yes, I did!" Tobi laughed loudly, holding his sides and swinging his legs back and forth. "You two are hunting the Hyuga girl that was here!" He pointed down at them with an accusing finger. When neither one of them denied it, he continued. "Well, we just happen to have someone here that's an excellent tracker on our team. You give me the ring, and he'll lead you right to the girl. How's that sound?" Even when negotiating, his voice was too utterly chipper for Tayuya's liking. As if he was looking down on them.

"...Where is this tracker?" Kimimaro asked, not sounding entirely convinced.

"We've always been here." The answer came from behind them. Both Otonin spun around, holding their weapons now at the newest intruder. A giant venus flytrap emerged from the ground. When the plant opened up, it revealed a person. One half of his face was pure white, the other pitch black. "The very ground you walk upon is like a part of us. Unless they're flying, we can find them." They explained exactly how to track them.

"...Tayuya." Kimimaro said after several seconds of silence. "Give them the ring."

"But-" Tayuya started to protest.

"Tayuya." Kimimaro turned to face her, his expression dark. If she stood in his way, he would kill her too. Nevermind she was the one that set him on this suicidal path.

"...Fuck." Tayuya once again muttered under her breath. She turned back to Tobi, flicking the ring up to him. He caught it casually, admiring it for a moment by holding it up to the hole over his eye.

"Good." His voice changed now, much darker and more sinister than before. A shiver ran up Tayuya's spine and she nearly dropped to her knees out of extinct. That voice just now… it commanded authority. "One more thing." The new persona of Tobi said. "Traveling with the Hyuga girl is a blond. Leave him alive, even if barely, and my companion there will collect him. Everyone else on the team you're free to kill."

"And if we don't?" Kimimaro asked, turning back to Tobi now. Unlike Tayuya, he appeared unphased by the change in demeanor. He also didn't have much left to live for, knowing his days were already numbered. That didn't mean Tayuya intended to go down with him, however.

"Nothing." Tobi admitted with a shrug, as if he didn't actually care. "Just think of it as a favor between new friends."

"...Very well." Kimimaro relented. "My only interest is the girl. So long as he doesn't make it too difficult for me, I won't kill the blond one."

"Thanks!" Tobi said, his voice back to the happy-go-lucky tune of before. It was still grating on her nerves, but Tayuya was loath to admit she preferred him this way. "With that, bye-bye!" Just as he had appeared, the masked man was gone in the blink of an eye.

"Lead the way." Kimimaro ordered, turning back to the plant-creature that was still with them.

"...As you wish." The venus flytrap closed back up before sinking into the ground. "Follow our voice." It then said, speaking through the earth itself. No choice but to listen to it, Kimimaro and Tayuya set out, leaving the battlefield behind.

As they left, Tayuya began to wonder just what exactly she had gotten herself into.

Hinata opened her eyes to the Eight Trigrams Dimension.

"You finally made it." Kali greeted, floating in her usual position. Unlike in the Tsukuyomi where she had moved freely, Hinata had never actually seen her walk around, let alone fight. She was just always floating there. It hadn't really bothered her before, but something about it now made her uncomfortable.

"Kali…" Hinata paused after only saying her name, not knowing where to start. It felt like there were a million things they had to talk about. She had entered the dimension sitting down in a meditative state. Rising to her feet, Hinata gingerly approached her previous life. "What exactly are you?" She asked, that being the only way she knew how to word the question.

There was no question that Kali was her ally and friend. Hinata knew and accepted that. However, the power Kali had unleashed in the fight against Itachi… it scared her. How was she so powerful and at such a young age? It practically wasn't human.

"Hmm… that is a difficult question." Kali said with a sigh. Then she did something completely unexpected. She jumped down from her usual spot, landing on the ground of the eight trigrams runes with her feet. Hinata had always thought she was floating there, but now she realized that wasn't entirely true. Kali herself hadn't been floating, but she had been sitting on something else that was. It was a pure black disk. At least it was until she jumped off of it. Its shape changed as if reacting to Kali's will, floating behind her as a small orb now.

A Truthseeker Orb.

That was what Kali had called it when she created one inside the Tsukuyomi. Its very existence was a contradiction. Nothing so powerful should be able to exist in such a compact form. In a way, that was no different from Kali herself.

"My Grandmother was once called the Rabbit Goddess." Kali began to explain. "She wasn't from this realm, coming from a distant world. To transcend between boundaries like that, an incredible amount of energy is required. It's why the gods and goddesses you all worship in their shrines don't just pop up here all the time and instead require so many worshippers to even be able to do something like affect the weather."

"W-wait!" Hinata waved her arms in front of herself frantically in an effort to get Kali to slow down. "The gods and goddesses of those temples are all real?" She had never really considered herself anything like an atheist, but the Hyuga clan in general followed the doctrines of self-enlightenment rather than putting stock in the existence of beings beyond their comprehension.

"Sure are." Kali said with a simple shrug. "Most of them are pretty small time deities, like what you find at your local shrines. Those guys are just harmless narcissists that are simply happy being worshiped. In return they'll sometimes make it rain if they feel like it. The ones you gotta look out for are those like who's power that Itachi guy was recklessly borrowing from. They're a nasty bunch and if they ever managed to cross over to this world it would be bad in a whole bunch of ways."

"What do you mean by borrowing?" Hinata asked. She had thought something like the Tsukuyomi was just a Genjutsu. Certainly a powerful Genjutsu, but not something steeped in the realm of the gods.

"Exactly that." Kali answered. "In the first place, isn't it weird that he gave his Genjutsu the name of a known moon god?" To that question, Hinata could only shrug. She hadn't thought about how he named it. "The truth is, he didn't name it. He might think he did… but that's not the case. He was told to name the technique that. The god Tsukuyomi himself is exerting his power through him. Tsukuyomi was using Itachi's Mangekyo Sharingan as a gateway into our world to influence it."

"That's…" Hinata opened her mouth, but immediately snapped it shut. The implications of this were too large for her to comprehend. Everything she thought she knew about the way their world worked was being thrown into question and she was now starting to understand how far out of her depth she truly was. She was also beginning to see why Kali had kept all this a secret. It was just too much. "Then the reason you're so strong?" She asked, wondering where her place in this was.

"My power, and by extension yours, is because we have the blood of the rabbit goddess flowing through our veins." Kali said. "The difference between the Mangekyo Sharingan and the Nichiren Byakugan is that we use our own natural-born divinity as a power source. Whereas the Mangekyo opens a gateway to other dimensions for outside gods."

"I think I understand…" Hinata placed her hand on her chin as she considered what this all meant. "So that's why you created an alternate version of the Caged Bird seal too then?" For a lot of reasons Hinata didn't like that seal, but she understood why Kali would modify it if it meant keeping out the powerful gods that were trying to enter their world.

"Ah… that." Kali had the decency to suddenly look embarrassed, averting her eyes in a rare moment of shame. "You're probably going to hate me for this, actually." She mumbled, not willing to look her reincarnation in the eye.

"What do you mean?" Hinata asked, voice suddenly on edge. She didn't understand why, but she felt a pit growing in her stomach. As if she already knew what Kali meant.

"I'm older than the Hyuga clan, Hinata." Kali said and at that moment Hinata understood why she felt such sudden dread. "I didn't make a modified version of the Caged Bird Seal. It would be more accurate to say your ancestors found my designs and modified it to fit their own needs." Even as Kali spoke Hinata shook her head slowly as if in disbelief.

No, no, no. That couldn't be. If her previous life had made what served as the prototype for the Caged Bird Seal… didn't that mean she was in a way responsible for the rift that existed between the main and branch clans? Everything that led to the events that would kill her uncle and brand her cousin. It had all been her.

"Why!?" Hinata cried out, unable to control her emotions. "You… I… what were we thinking?" She felt her knees go weak and she thought she might collapse as the world around her began to spin.

"I know you think of me as this wise, all-knowing being…" Kali sighed, looking back to Hinata with extreme reluctance. The self-loathing Hinata felt was reflected in her eyes too. "But I was young back then. And I was very brash. I didn't mature until after going through this reincarnation cycle several times. The sad thing is, I never even used the seal I designed because Asura forbade me from using it. He insisted that he would be the one to deal with Indra. If I hadn't been such a prideful idiot, I would have destroyed it right after that."

"Kali…" Hinata hiccuped, tears rolling freely down her cheeks. She wanted to yell at her. Curse her for having caused all this harm to her family. She might have even done that, if a sudden idea didn't form right at that moment. "Wait… if you made the seal, doesn't that mean you know how to remove it?" Kali had told Itachi it would only disappear with his death, but Hinata didn't necessarily believe she had been telling the truth. Why would she? Itachi was still their supposed enemy when she told him that, after all.

"Hmm…" Kali rubbed the back of her head and appeared to mull it over. "Unfortunately, but like I said, I was pretty brash back then. I didn't put a backdoor into the seal because I didn't think I would need one." Those words caused Hinata's eyes to fall in defeat. "That being said," Only to dart back up as Kali continued. "It's not like it would be impossible for me to come up with a way to dismantle it."

"We could use that to remove the Cage Bird Seal from the branch clan too?" Hinata pressed, taking another couple steps closer and grabbing Kali's hand in both of hers. They were so close now their faces were practically pushed together. Hinata didn't even notice. This was it! There might actually be a chance for her to make everything right.

"It's not that easy." Kali answered bluntly. "I made the prototype so I might be able to find a way to remove that, but there's no way I would have the knowledge to remove the modified version. However… I don't see why you couldn't use my prototype unsealing to make one that would work on the Caged Bird Seal. Same way your ancestors did to create it in the first place."

They were banking on a long shot. Hinata understood that Kali might not even be able to create the unsealing algorithm in the first place. And even if she did, there was no guarantee Hinata would be able to modify it to fit the Caged Bird Seal. Furthermore, she didn't even know anything beyond the basics about Fuinjutsu. All that to say their chances at the very least weren't zero.

"Let's do it!" Hinata proclaimed anyway. She knew it might be impossible, but she had to try. Even more so knowing it had been her previous life that had made the seal possible to begin with.

"You've got the spirit, that's for sure." Kali said with a laugh. "There's an order to things though. Unless you've forgotten about your mission to save your teacher?"

"Of course I haven't." Hinata knew she was getting ahead of herself. It felt like the list of things she desired to do was only growing longer. She had to find the Moonfire Flower. Take care of Kali's task while at the shrine near the volcano. It wasn't just enough for her to apologize to Neji anymore, but she needed to set him free too. Any one of these things would be daunting by themselves, and yet she wanted to do them all.

"Well, it's fine." Kali nodded in approval. "Your enthusiasm reminds me of how I used to be. Just don't become too much like me or you'll wind up repeating my mistakes." It was an ominous warning, but Hinata wasn't worried about it. She knew Kali would stop her before she got that far.

"Do you think Itachi-san is actually alive?" Hinata asked. If they were going to test Kali's theoretical unsealing algorithm they were going to need him. He had looked quite dead to her, but she couldn't be sure.

"He's alive." Kali assured her. "I have no doubt he borrowed the power of another god: This one is known as Izanagi." Her tone was dark as she shared this information. "It's a miracle the Uchiha Clan hasn't created a rift big enough for one of those gods to slip over with their abuse of such power."

"Is it really that bad?" Hinata wondered aloud. She didn't actually know anything about these gods and goddesses, but Kali certainly seemed worried about them. Of course, if what Itachi had done in the Tsukuyomi was with only a small bit of their power, she could see why her previous life was so concerned about it.

"It took the power of my uncle and father together to defeat just one goddess and they could only seal her." Kali shook her head. "It's not like it would be impossible, but you would probably need help. That's why I always preferred to go with the appeasement route, praying at the shrines in order to keep them happy. No need to tempt fate." It really must have been bad if Kali was saying it, considering how brash she was self-proclaimed to have been.

"I see…" Hinata mumbled, thinking about what kind of help she could possibly even seek out. Then she remembered what Itachi had been looking for. "What about the Kyubi?" She asked.

"Not very likely." Kali said with a shrug. "It was Asura's previous reincarnation that helped create the Jinchuriki system to begin with. Now he's the Jinchuriki for the Kyubi, which seems like too much of a convenience to just be a coincidence. I haven't spoken with the fox in a long time, but I doubt he's too keen on making alliances with humans after they imprisoned him like that."

"You knew Naruto-kun was a Jinchuriki?" Hinata asked. There was a lot more to unpack with that statement, such as the fact that Kali had at one point been on speaking terms with the demon fox, but Hinata could only take things one question at a time.

"I did." Kali admitted with a shrug. "The Tailed Beasts were left in the care of Asura by his father. So they fall outside of my responsibilities which are to tend to the Impurities." She said as if to explain why she hadn't brought it up before now. "Like I said earlier too, but Indra and by extension the Mangekyo Sharingan are also Asura's self-imposed responsibilities. I try not to involve myself in those things if I don't have to." No doubt Hinata getting trapped in a Genjutsu from the Mangekyo was exactly such an exception she was talking about.

"But I thought you were worried about those different gods getting in?" Hinata pointed out, not understanding how the two things were unrelated. It seemed like she should also be trying to handle that too if it concerned her so much.

"The Mangekyo Sharingan is only one way for those gods to exert their influence." Kali pointed out. "I told you my grandmother made it here before, right? If those impurities grow unstable enough, they release a huge burst of dimensional energy. If one of the gods is around at the right time, they can use that energy as fuel to enable their journey to this side." Now Hinata understood. It wasn't that she wasn't worried about it, she was just busy covering her end of it. She dealt with one way for the gods to cross over while Asura was supposed to deal with the other.

"But Naruto-kun doesn't know about any of this, right?" As far as Hinata could tell, Naruto had no idea he was a reincarnation like she was. Whether or not he knew about the Kyubi was also up for debate.

"To the best of my knowledge it's pretty rare for Asura to be able to reach his reincarnations the way I speak to mine." Kali agreed with Hinata's assessment. "Even so, it seems he is always drawn to Indra. It's one reason the Senju and the Uchiha warred with each other for so long. Although something in that dynamic changed in the last run, but I have no idea what it could be." The name Indra kept being brought up, but Hinata had yet to know who that was. She suspected if she ever saw someone with a reincarnation on their back like her or Naruto she would know then.

"For now, I think I should speak with Naruto-kun…" Hinata mused aloud. Telling him about Asura aside, she did need to at least verify if he knew about the Kyubi and his relationship to it. Itachi had been working with an organization and there were likely to be more of them in his place now that he was presumed dead. So Naruto at the very least deserved to know why they were after him.

"I'll trust you with how much you want to tell him." Kali didn't raise any objections to Hinata's surprise. "Things are different this go around." She explained as if sensing that small shock. "People are harnessing the power of Impurities. Asura is a Jinchuriki now. And something is developing with the Mangekyo, even if I don't know what it is yet. Whatever is going on, I don't think you're going to necessarily be able to handle it by just doing things the way all your previous lives have done. We need to be on our toes." This was already in addition to the things Hinata wanted to accomplish for herself.

"I understand. Thank you, Kali." Hinata stepped back as she prepared to leave the Eight Trigrams Dimension. Before she sat down to meditate, she paused awkwardly. "Sorry for yelling at you. I know you only created that seal because you did what you thought was best. Even you couldn't have seen what it would be used for." She truly regretted having lost her cool, especially when the seal had been their only way to escape the Tsukuyomi.

"It's fine, Hinata." Kali said with a smile and a shake of the head. Although the smile didn't quite reach her eyes. "It's true my decisions back then are affecting the lives of people over a thousand years later. Yet you're the first one of my reincarnations to suggest trying to fix it. I think that already makes you pretty incredible." It was as Kali said, but things were different this time; Including her own reincarnation.

Hinata blushed at the praise. Sitting down and crossing her legs she then closed her eyes. When she opened them back up, she was in the darkness of the forest. In front of her was a crackling campfire, the orange light illuminating the trees and casting eerie shadows out around them.

After having been ambushed in the city and seeing the destruction caused just by having been there they decided to set up camp for the next night out instead. They knew it didn't decrease their odds of being attacked again if someone was after them, but at least this way it wouldn't catch any innocent lives up in their problems.

Just to be sure, Hinata used the Nichiren Byakugan to scan the forest around them. As far as she could tell there were no other Shinobi in the area. No one else was hunting them, at least not any close enough for her to see. They never knew when more would come. In another attempt to circumvent this they had moved at an ever more brutal pace then the day before. Now it didn't just feel like a race against the clock, but potential pursuers as well. Something that put her whole team on edge.

Hinata returned her focus back to their little campsite and checked on the condition of her team. They were all gathered around the campfire, all four of them sitting on separate logs they were using for chairs. Shino's expression was impossible to read, hands in his pockets as he stared directly into the fire, the light from it reflecting off his dark shades. Kiba was stroking a sleeping Akamaru, his face oddly tense and ears twitching at every rustle from the forest around them. Even Naruto had a solemn look, arms crossed as if hugging himself while staring vacantly at nothing. No one was talking.

Hinata cleared her throat, gaining all their attention. It was unnerving, their heads all snapping at once to look at her, their expressions wide alert. Hinata attempted to smile at them, trying to tell them without words they could relax. They weren't in danger for the moment. It seemed to work, their shoulders all slumping.

"That was some hell of a meditation you were in." Kiba remarked, smirking at her as if it was amusing. "I actually thought you had fallen asleep at one point." It was the first time any of them had seen her meditate in order to talk to Kali. Of course, they didn't know that was what she was really doing. They just thought she was doing it to relax and clear her mind.

"Sorry." Hinata apologized out of reflex. "Did I miss anything important?" She asked, wondering if they had called out to her at all while she was under.

"Nothing of note." Shino answered, his gaze already returning to the fire. "We attempted to find out if Naruto knew anything about why they were after him, but he seems genuinely clueless as to the cause." She didn't think Shino meant to sound suspicious, but his words nonetheless came out as accusatory.

"You pickin' a fight!?" Naruto jumped to his feet, clearly picking up on the same thing. Not wishing to see things escalate further, Hinata was on her feet a second later, holding a soothing hand out towards him.

"Shino-kun didn't mean anything by it." She said in an attempt to placate him. "Why don't you and I go get some water from the river?" She suggested, nodding to the empty buckets placed behind her log. This would both give him a chance to cool down and for her to talk to him in secret.

"Fine." Naruto grumbled, not realizing anything about her intentions. He stalked around to the buckets, taking both of them before storming off into the forest. Hinata nodded at her teammates as if to reassure them she would take care of it before then bolting off after him. It didn't take them long to lose the light of the fire, the two of them essentially stumbling blindly through the dark forest. They didn't have to go far, the sound of the flowing river guiding them to it.

As they came to the river, the waxing moon illuminated the area just enough that even Naruto could move around without enhanced vision like Hinata's Byakugan. He crouched down, beginning to fill one of the buckets. When Hinata didn't immediately join him with the other he looked back at her, blue eyes reflecting the moonlight as he gazed at her questioningly.

"Umm…" Hinata swallowed the lump in her throat. "You really don't know why they were after you, right?" She asked just to be sure. If he was hiding it she could understand why, but she had to make sure of that first.

"I really have no idea." Naruto told her plainly. Unlike with Shino, he seemed to understand that Hinata wasn't accusing him of anything. He knew her well enough now to know she was too kind to do something like that.

"I see." Hinata nodded slowly, licking her dry lips. She really could use a drink from the river right about now, she thought. There was no easy way to bring this up, but she pushed through it anyway. "Naruto-kun… what do you know about the Kyubi no Yoko?" She asked.

He froze.

Not in the way that implied he was thinking about her question. No, he had completely locked up. It was like he was a spring, and the slightest change in tension would set him off. Even without saying anything, she knew now he was at least aware of his status as the Jinchurki of the Kyubi.

"How do you know about that?" He hissed, but she couldn't tell if it was out of anger or urgency. Like how she knew he was aware of it, he had also deduced that she knew the truth. That in a way saved her several steps of the conversation, but now she was in the difficult situation of how much to actually tell him. Deciding to play it safe for the time being, she went with a half-truth.

"I can see it with my Nichiren Byakugan." She said. It was true she could see the chakra from the seal leaking out and mixing with his own chakra circuits. However, she hadn't realized what was in the seal until she had been told.

"...Ah." Naruto let out a breath it didn't even look like he knew he had been holding. "That kinda makes sense. I thought it was weird that someone our age knew about it, but if you can see it..." She recalled that Itachi had said something about a law. It seemed Naruto was aware about its existence as well. She decided to tip-toe around that, as it would only raise more questions if he knew she also was aware of it.

"Itachi-san also mentioned they were after the Kyubi." Hinata whispered, although she wasn't sure why. She could see that Kiba and Shino hadn't left the campfire and there was no one else around them. Yet it still felt like the appropriate volume in which to speak.

"Damn it…" Naruto cursed, pulling the bucket he had been running through the river out and throwing it behind him. "Shit, I'm really screwing up this mission for you, huh? After you went out of your way to pick me too…" He lamented, burying his head in his arms.

"T-That's not true!" Hinata bent down, resting a hand on his back before she could even think about it. "I could see the Kyubi, but I still picked you for this mission. So the responsibility for it lies with me." This time her words were an outright lie. She had only found out about the Kyubi when Itachi had come for it. However, Naruto didn't need to know that. So long as it would make him feel better.

"...I don't get you." Naruto said after several minutes of silence. "You don't hate me for the fox?" He had grown up being shunned by most of the adults and other children their age who followed their example. All because he was a Jinchuriki. Hinata hadn't known why at the time, but it made sense to her in hindsight. She could see how that would lead him to think about it like that.

"I don't really know anything about the Kyubi attack, Naruto-kun." Hinata reassured him and this time it was true. She hadn't even been born yet when it happened. Certainly it sounded terrible, but her clan also hadn't really suffered anything from it. And by the time she had been told to stay away from Naruto, she had already been infatuated with him. "The only thing I know is you." The Naruto that had inspired her to change herself. That was all that mattered to her.

"You really are weird, you know that?" He turned to her, and despite his words he smiled at her. It wasn't his usual brash smile that he used to hide his pain. It was small and gentle, unlike any expression she had ever seen him make before. Seeing a new side of him for the first time set her heart thundering, and she thought for sure he must be able to hear it.

Hinata opened her mouth to say something but no words came out. She was just so captivated by him in the moment under the moonlight that her mind was devoid of all else.

"Do we have to tell Kiba and Shino?" Naruto asked, the expression disappearing to her disappointment as he looked back to the campsite and at their remaining teammates. It was clear he hadn't been hiding anything before, genuinely not understanding the connection between the Kyubi and those hunting him. However, now he knew the truth. So if he told them he didn't know again it would turn into a lie.

All the same, she didn't want to make him reveal anything he wasn't ready to.

"No, we don't have to." She told him gently, finally finding her voice. "They won't think any less of you if they know the truth, but you don't need to share anything you don't want to." It was important to her that he knew that. She believed in her team and their strength of character. But she understood why he wouldn't want to reveal it yet.

"Maybe some other time." Naruto acknowledged her words, but shook his head anyway. "Thanks, Hinata. If anyone was gonna find out, I'm glad it was you." There he went again, saying things that made her heart race and the blood rush to her head.

"I-I'm glad I know too." She admitted. All she had ever wanted was to know more about him and now she was finally getting that wish. It was more complicated than she could have expected, but that only made her like him more, knowing what he had overcome to get here. This also served to further her own resolve to continue changing.

Hinata knew now that the road ahead of her was tough and full of threats she still couldn't comprehend. Yet knowing Naruto was walking a similar path helped ease that burden in heart.

If he was by her side, she could do anything.

Chapter End

AN: In this AU, the gods like Tsukuyomi, Amaterasu, etc. are real beings similar to Kaguya and are equally dangerous. A lot of the inspiration this time is from old Japanese mythology and Shinto belief, with narrative liberties taken.