"Is this the land of fire?" Mitsuki asked as she looked around on the port.
"Not yet, we would have to cross the border by land," Kisame replied. "The port at the Land of Fire will not be an ideal landing place for us."
Mitsuki nodded in understanding. From what she had heard before, the Land of Fire is one of the major shinobi nations. She can only imagine how guarded and crowded it would be in any of their port, especially towards ships that are bound from their competitor country. "No wonder they had difficulty for gathering passenger and how they are still not so developed even though they have a port with access to the continent. "The journey to the land of fire from this port must be a tough one for common people, else Hazuki-nee's village would have prospered more," Mitsuki thought to herself. Shaking her head, Mitsuki shoved away her thoughts. Thinking about the inter-country relationship and the transport line benefits shouldn't be her main concern now. Weird, why would she think about this? Mitsuki asked herself as a frown appeared on her forehead.
"Let's divide and regroup at the town's exit. Even with the more relaxed security here, moving together is too conspicuous. Remember, this is still a port village linking two major shinobi nations." Itachi said in a subdued voice.
"Eeeeh?" Mitsuki complained. For her, a brief solo travel is of little benefit. It's too short of a time for her to actually forge any meaningful connections and learn more about the place, and she lacked any money to spend during the short break. However, unwilling to burden the other two, Mitsuki replied,"Understood," and jumped off the boat quietly before continuing to walk down the main path with a disappointed look on her face.
"Well, then I'll look around a while and resupply as needed," Kisame said as he lifted his Samehada, hoisting it to his back.
Itachi nodded in silence as he put his Akatsuki issued hat on to cover his features. After slight delay, Itachi followed down the boat and towards a separate path from the other two. However, unlike the other two, it was evident that the path he took was deliberate. Not long after his walk, Itachi arrived at a back-street pharmacy. Several dubious figures lingered around the entrance, and a strong smell of medicine wafted through the air. Without hesitation, Itachi slid the door open and closed it back behind him. Inside, a grumpy looking granma smoked a big puff from her pipe.
"Welcome, how can I help you?" the granma greeted Itachi dryly as the door closed behind him.
Without a word, Itachi slid a paper over the counter. Immediately, the grumpy granma took the paper and examine the content, a frown appeared in her already wrinkled forehead.
"I know it's not my business, but it must be tough for you, young man," said granma shopkeeper as she stood and turned towards the back room.
Itachi stood in silence without a response as he waited for his prescription to be prepared.
Mitsuki is utterly bored. Again. Her stomach let out a growl as she stared down to a row of street food vendor from atop a building. She had finished scouting around the port village during the short while since the three had separated. It wasn't like there was any necessity of it since they won't be staying over the area for the day, but Mitsuki couldn't figure out anything else to do. As she expected, there are quite a few number of shinobi around the port, some more dubious than most.
"It must be because of the rough path ahead. Unless they really have to take this road, I bet most people will just find a bigger port," Mitsuki noted in her head. "In other words, ronin, mercenaries, bounty hunter, people who can't afford big ships, and some dubious people, huh?" Mitsuki held in her chuckle, realising how she fit into that category as well. "Thankfully, most people seemed to ignore each other here," she thought. Except for bounty hunters, she guessed, as she saw some figure went ahead to confront another group on the road.
"Well, if they can't even hide themselves from those bounty hunter, they probably aren't skilled enough," Mitsuki smirked, weirdly prideful of her travel companions. She wondered if there has been anyone skilled enough to give her companions enough trouble during their journey so far.
Curious, Mitsuki extended her perception. She had been slowly trying to increase her perception reach as much as possible whenever she got the chance to train. Sitting still like she did, covering the small port village no longer pose a challenge for her. "However, it will still be a while until I can keep my maximum perception on constantly or while on the move," Mitsuki smiled bitterly. She felt like it was of the utmost importance for her to develop this skill further. Shinobi develop skills and deception to counter another shinobi, but if no one in the world had the same ability as hers, no one would be able to hide from her. Somehow the thought both excite and worry her at the same time. Excited to find if there is a special meaning of her existence, yet dreading to figure out about what conclusion she might reach during her journey as well. With an annoyed look on her face, Mitsuki shook her head again before refocusing her attention around her. As she extended her perception, the rough image of the terrain, and the living beings within, are transmitted within her head. Everyone, everything, have different color, patterns, and amount of energy. Mitsuki has recently decided to call this light within the living beings their "soul". Through the unique color, pattern, and the amounts combined, Mitsuki can easily identify the soul's owner, as no single human's soul was identical. It was also easy for her to tell shinobi and non-shinobi apart, as shinobi have stronger and more intricate pattern on their souls. Maybe the patterns indicate their chakra print somehow? Mitsuki thought to herself, unsure. "And then, there's Itachi-kun's.."Mitsuki thought for a while before pulling her attention back to her perceptive circle. Immediately, a few people caught her attention.
"This giant amount of energy, and this color.. Ah, it's Kisame. What is he doing? Bargaining?" Mitsuki frowned as her consciousness examined the area where Kisame was standing. Nothing peculiar. Bored, Mitsuki shifted her attention to the next target.
"This warm color, unique pattern, and this mark," Mitsuki smiled, "Ah, it's Itachi-kun's.." Mitsuki took a mental note as she scouted the area around Itachi. There seemed to be quite a number of people, with weird, sad, or angry color about them. Well to be fair, that's how she found most of the visitor of the port to be. However somehow, the area around where Itachi was, felt more like… despair? "Why?" Mitsuki asked herself, wondering if she should take a closer look personally. However, something else caught her attention. Mitsuki frowned as she examined her target.
"This mark?" Mitsuki examined the person's soul. "The color, the pattern, and the feel is different, but this mark?" Mitsuki frowned as she recognised the familiar mark. Undoubtedly, it was a mark of a black spear, imprinted into the person's soul. Mitsuki had only seen that mark on one other person before. "What does this mean?" Mitsuki frowned as her mind races to find an answer. The person himself seemed to be ordinary, and he might even not be a shinobi. Before she could find an answer, something else caught her attention.
Just outside the village, among the forest's tree, a soul observed over the village. The color of the soul gave Mitsuki unease. So much sadness, and anger? Mitsuki shivered. Whoever that was, he or she was definitely dangerous. But something else about the pattern she saw on that person's soul weighed heavily on her mind.
"What should I do? Should I tell Itachi and Kisame about it? Or should I find out more by myself?" Mitsuki gritted her teeth as she felt her heartbeat raced. "No, this person might not even be related to us, engaging unnecessarily might just endanger us. But just in case.." an idea flashed within Mitsuki's head. Can she do it? No other way to find out than to try, she thought. Slowly, subtly, Mitsuki extended her hand, hoping that the person wouldn't notice what she was trying to do. Slowly, the wind blew faster and faster from the sea, towards the forest.
"Please reach," Mitsuki prayed in her heart, and reached it did. Sudden, gentle gust of wind swiped over the forest, right to where the suspicious person stood watch. Focusing everything she had, Mitsuki analysed every bounce of the wind's energy, as she tried to get a better grasp on the person's appearance through the resistance against the wind. "It's a guy? With wooden mask? Hole only in front of his right eye.." Mitsuki noted as she etched in the man's impression and the color of his soul into her brain. Satisfied with her result, Mitsuki jumped down.
"Darn, wasn't that sea breeze a tad bit too strong?" some villager remarked.
"I hope it's not some storm brewing," another responded.
With worry in her heart, Mitsuki wished as such as well.
"Here's your prescription: Anti-inflammatory, painkiller, immunosuppresants, along with some regenerative medicine as well as ninja supplies and medical kits for several month worth. Everything prepared according to your specification." Granma shopkeeper muttered in low voice as she counted and packaged the various drugs that were laid down in front of her. After showing the total with the abacus in front of her towards her customer, the young man in front of her paid her without a word. "Take care, young man," the granma muttered in pity as the young man left her shop.
Author's note:
Hi all~ Today's author's note gonna be quite long and probably will reveal where am I going with all this setup in the long run. However, the explanation itself will be spoiler free, so feel free to read and speculate.
Firstly is how Mitsuki's perception work. Her perception is close to a sonar. She extended her energy and in return it will interpret the natural element she touch and transmit it back to her as a simplified images. Think of it as 3d wireframe or those lidar game! However as her ability rely on nature/life energy only, those are the only thing that she could detect as well normally! In my concept, the major elements all have energy that is readable and exploitable for her, so does living beings. So based on this, water, earth, fire (temperature), earth, and lightning (electricity), are included in the things that she herself is sensitive about. However other than those, her perception will just pass through.
(Reference Credits: Scanner Sombre)
On how Mitsuki read on living beings, for humans and animals, instead of getting a feed of their form, she got a feed of their soul signature instead. She perceive this as color, pattern, and amount (size). Color usually represent the human's mind and personality. That's why she had always seen Itachi as a warm/gentle person, albeit sad (more detail in upcoming chapter). As for pattern, this indicate everyone's unique chakra pattern as well as the strength of it, same as how in Naruto's world people can detect people's different chakra and identify it. The amount, since in Narutoverse people's life is tied to the amount of chakra as well and lack of chakra causes death, to put it simply, the amount of soul's energy (size) also represent their chakra reserve. Because of this, Mitsuki also noticed something is odd with her since she can't perceive her own pattern and her amount is not related to chakra whatsoever.
Regarding this limitation, how Mitsuki managed to perceive Madara (Tobi)'s appearance is by reading the resistance received by the wind that she moved. Think of it as invisible man in the middle of the rain or sand blown to glass! From how it bounces, she can determine basic materials as well, like how we can tell wood is different from plastic by tapping it and listening to the sound that came out.
Then, the last one, the mark in shape of black spear that Mitsuki mentioned. I will reveal it directly in the story next time due to it's plot relevance and how Mitsuki herself is still not yet aware about the meaning!
Here's the sample of how Itachi's and Kisame's soul looked like for Mitsuki!
However, as you guys noticed, despite her control of all this, in combat her prowess is mostly insignificant hahahaha so please be patient with her! She won't be crazy strong but she won't be useless either!
Second explanation is about Itachi's sickness. I'm a.. very curious person (?) and I also studied science as part of my education back then (before I betray science and be an artist) as well as a bit of psychology (it's somehow required in animation study, I'm serious x'D), so I kinda took my research seriously, too serious even x'D
I've been searching for a theory that fits Itachi's symptoms and timeline, and I came across this interesting theory by chuunin at livejournal. If you guys would like, please give it a read. I will base a lot of the future thing on these which points to his sickness being MPA (microscopic-polyangiitis-mpa), sorry that i can't attach link or picture here!
If you guys are interested in biology please give them a read too! It's quiet interesting how things line up, and that's why I decided to go with this as the base of the illness's progression. My own speculation is, because in shinobi world people rely a lot on chakra, the study on the biology themselves might not be as advanced as ours, hence the medicine effectiveness might not be able to bring the 80% survival rate that we have in our world while maintaining 13 to 19 people in a million rate of occurrence (and even so, in our world the cause is not yet clear and there's some case where it affects younger people even thought its main victims are people above 50 years old). This also shows that in LN about Sakura, they don't think counselling therapy is necessary and only Sakura has established it with opposition. I think this is where Itachi suffers the most, expecially because of the possible complication that might be caused by this sickness.
Anyway now that I've got the 2 main frame out of the way, I hope you guys will continue to enjoy their journey together towards a happier ending.