Bab 74: Chapter 59 (4/5)
"We fucked up." Shikamaru elegantly sums up the entire situation. "We fucked up bigtime."
"No shit!" Anko spins around and quickly looks over Ino. "You okay? You're still trembling."
"He's gone again." She says as tears start to form in her eyes. "He seemed so much better from last time. He was connecting with everyone again. He seemed like he was shifting back to his old self. I thought… I don't know what I thought but I didn't think he'd run away!"
"Shh Honey." Anko pulls the emotional wreck that is her student into a hug. "No one saw this coming. It's not your fault."
"It's not over." Naruto promises with determination. He has a fire brewing in his eyes and he stands tall despite everything that just happened.
"How the hell can you say that?" Shikamaru questions is bewilderment. "Did you not feel what he did? Naruto that was the worst killing intent I've ever experienced!"
"We'll see him again." Naruto confidently assures everyone. "Maybe not today, or tomorrow, or even on this mission but we will see him again. And when we do we try again. Then again after that. We try as many times as it takes until we bring him home. I refuse to give up on him even if he's given up on himself."
"Good luck with that." Shikamaru points at Ino. "Look at her, he made her like this. She's the one that he likes the most out of all of us. If he's willing to do that to her then what's he willing to do to us?"
"He won't hurt any one of us." Ino says between tears. "He… he cares about us. Even if he did all of that. He still cares in his own way."
"You two need to pull your heads out of your asses." Shikamaru scathingly shouts at his friends. "Did you two not see what he just did?! That is not how you treat people you care about! He threatened to slaughter everyone here! As far as I'm concerned he's an enemy now."
"He is our friend!" Naruto gets right in Shikamaru's face. "You will not hurt him more than he already is!"
"If we run into Alvarcus again we will treat him as a hostile threat. If he takes one malicious action against us we will remove the threat." Shikamaru narrows his eyes at Naruto, daring Naruto to challenge him. "That is an order from your team leader."
"I refuse." Naruto doesn't hesitate to deny the order. "I will not accept that."
"Then stay out of my way." Shikamaru growls out a warning to Naruto. "Enough of this! We're here to do a job! It has nothing to do with Alvarcus. We're going to rotate shifts guarding Koyuki. The order is Kakashi, me, Naruto, Anko, then Ino. Three hour shifts. Kakashi you start now."
Kakashi takes two steps and the water monster falls in step next to him. Kakashi turn his head to the cloaked figure. "I will end you if you try anything funny. If you so much as twitch and I don't like it you die. Understand?"
The monstrosity nods its acceptance.
"And why the fuck aren't you doing anything for Alvarcus?" Kakashi growls out to the Jiongu. "You're sentient, he's your host. You should care about him much more than anyone else here, even me. He's the reason you're alive but you've let him fall so far down the path of evil? Do you not care about your host at all?"
~Perhaps it is time I do something for my Host.~
"FUCKING DAMNIT!" I roar once I'm far away from everyone else. My roar is accompanied by a gigantic gout of flame that spears upwards to the sky.
"I am tired of this!" I shout and a furious surge of wind explodes from me, shredding several trees into splinters. "I am tired of people trying to get involved in my life! I do not want to make friends! I do not want to have happy meaningless conversations about my life! I don't want to deal with anyone!"
"No more!" I punctuate those words with a roar of lighting that pierces through several trees, leaving behind large holes in all of them. "No more people! No more idle conversations! No more beating around the bush! I do not care if they want to save me! I do not care if they think I'm a good person! I am not! I know it! The world knows it! Everyone but them knows it!"
"I am not here to rekindle past flames of friendship." I slowly go through hand signs. "I am not here to save a country. No, that's all meaningless. It all pales in comparison to what I am here for. I'm here to get something to help me stop a war. I don't have time for these pointless interactions."
"Summoning Jutsu!" I slam my hand to the ground with so much force it cracks beneath my palm.
"Sup Al?" Shirokumo casually greets me. "Wow it's fucking cold here."
"Shut up. I don't have time for pleasantries." I snarl at him, letting my anger at myself and the Konoha shinobi bleed into my words. "Where's Doto?"
"Well aren't you in a fantastic mood." Shirokumo grumbles at my obvious anger. "Right now he's on a train. I don't have his exact location."
"He's got a fucking train?" What the fuck?! No! Not important. I can break a train in two. "Where's he headed? I'll beat him there."
"To the caravan. That Koyuki is in. Which you're not. What's that about?" Shirokumo asks.
"They pissed me the fuck off." I snarl out as the conversation springs back to the front of my mind. "They want to save me. I got tired of dealing with that bullshit so I left. I have more important things to do than listen them try and feed me false hope and ideals."
"Ah." Shirokumo awkwardly says. "You know they might have a point."
"Goodbye Shirokumo." I dismiss my summon and he is forcibly sent back to the Nest. "I've already heard that from them I don't need to hear it from you."
I turn my head back the way I came.
"So Doto is after Koyuki." I start to retrace my steps. "Fine. I'll tail her until he shows up. Then I'll get what I came here for and get the fuck out."
Hours Later
"That is just pathetic." I'm perched high in a tree while staring down at a woman who is in an unconscious heap on the ground. It's Koyuki, she must have escaped somehow. I'm almost impressed, she got away from not only the Konoha shinobi but my minion as well. "You escaped and ran away. Do you really think that is going to change anything? You think that the Konoha shinobi are that feeble and weak willed?"
"Do you not see the hypocrisy in those words?" A faint voice whispers into my ear. It's not a voice I've never heard before, in fact it is one I'm very familiar with. It's Tsunade's voice.
"Holy shit I'm actually crazy now." I say to myself. "I'm hearing voices in my head that's not the Jiongu. I'm actually crazy."
"Yes, it only took me this long to twist and turn you." Another voice speaks in my head but this one is sinister and evil. It's Orochimaru. "I'm so happy you've become like me."
"I'm nothing like you." I snarl out. "Why the fuck am I responding? You don't exist. I'm imagining things."
"But you are like me." Orochimaru continues. "Isn't life so much more fun when you don't care what happens to others?"
"I do care for others. I'm nothing like you. I refuse to fall down to your level." I wage war with the imaginary voice.
"You used to." Tsunade softly chimes in. "You used to be someone I admired, the representation of all the good Konoha can offer. Someone willing to sacrifice everything for their friends."
"I'm trying to stop a fucking war!" I snarl out. "I care so much about people that I'm planning to stop a war before it starts! You don't get to say I don't care!"
"But what about the people of this country?" Tsunade brings them up. "They're fighting a war right before you yet you do nothing. What caused you to fall so far from the shinobi I respected?"
"I know!" Orochimaru cuts in. "It was me! I took him and made him like me! We're monsters in arms!"
"NO!" I'm fucking insane. I'm arguing with voices in my head. "I am not like you! I will never be like you! I want nothing to do with my family's murderer!"
"Kukukuku, it's far too late for that!" Orochimaru laughs in glee. "After all, you're my child!"
"I AM NOT YOUR CHILD! I WILL NEVER BE YOUR CHILD!" My roar echoes across the barren tundra.
"Then why do you act like him?" Tsunade asks of me. "Why is it that when faced with a problem you react exactly like your father would?"
"He's not my fucking father!" I snarl out.
"Isn't he? Because that's what I see." Tsunade's words cut me to my core. "I don't see you, I see another Orochimaru."
"I am better than him! I am not him! I am nothing like him!"
"Then prove it." Tsunade demands. "Your words mean nothing, your actions do."
"And right now you're acting exactly how I want you to!" Orochimaru happily says. "You're only thinking about yourself and what you need! Just like your father! Just like me!"
"ENOUGH!" I shout out and I grab a kunai. Then I bury the blade into my temple without even a wince of pain. "I am not crazy! I do not have voices in my head! What the fuck am I doing responding to them like that? No! I'm not crazy. I'm not."
With a sharp tug I pull out the kunai.
"Okay." I look at the kunai that was just in my head. "Maybe I'm a little crazy. None of that shit was normal."
Hours Later
"This is pointless." I sigh out from my high perch in the trees. "Are they ever going to find her? She's going to be at risk for frostbite."
~Host Naruto is approaching.~
"About fucking time." I growl out.
I watch from my high perch as Naruto stops a few strides away from the fallen princess.
"How long are you going to fight this?" He asks her and miraculously she begins to stir. "Come on. Everyone is waiting."
Naruto doesn't wait for a response, he bends down and picks her up. He starts walking them back towards where everyone is waiting.
"How long are you going to fight this?" Tsunade asks me. "All they want is their friend back."
"Oh my god I am fucking crazy. It's happening again." I'm half tempted to slam my head into a tree. Repeatedly. "Shut up. Just shut up."
I begin the delicate process of tailing the two people. Doto is after Koyuki so I'm sticking near her until he shows up.
"My how far you've fallen." Tsunade condescendingly says in my head. "Reduced to stalking after your own friends. You could be down there right now. You could be the hero that found the Princess. Instead you're the coward that ran away."
"I am not a coward."
"You are." Tsunade assures me. "If those who have the strength to make a difference do nothing then they are cowards. They're too afraid to step up to the challenge and instead step aside like weaklings."
"I am not weak!" I snarl at her.
"Chakra and jutsu does not equal strength." Tsunade lectures me. "True strength is never giving up. Never succumbing to defeat. Always striving to move forward. You hold a great amount of power and talent at your fingertips but you are lacking in strength."
"That's not what I've taught him." Orochimaru cuts in. "He knows from my teachings that power rules over all. That you can't depend on others that the only person you can rely on is yourself. He's taken my lessons to his heart! All five of them!"
"But you are not his sensei." Tsunade speaks. "You're merely a stepping stone, his true sensei is Kakashi. And Kakashi imparted a very important lesson to Alvarcus. One that he remembers from before they ever met in this world."
"Those who abandon the mission are scum but those who abandon their comrades are worse than scum." I recite from memory. "I have not abandoned them."
"Then what do you call this?" Tsunade asks.
"That's it!" I snarl out at a quiet volume as I continue to tail Naruto and Koyuki. They're heading into a tunnel and judging by the tracks left in the snow the rest of the movie crew and Konoha gang are on the other side. "I've had enough of this bullshit gimmick of angel and devil on my shoulders!"
"Yes that's right! Ignore her! You don't need friends, they'll just be in the way. All you truly need is unrivaled power." Orochimaru doesn't listen to me and continues talking anyways. "All you need is me."
"I do not need you. I am using you." I say back to the voice in my head. God dammit I'm insane.
"You're becoming him." Tsunade points out. "You've stopped caring about people. Isn't the real reason behind this trip to calm yourself down and start to care again? The sword was just a ruse for Orochimaru. Even you recognize that you're becoming like Orochimaru."
She's right. That was the entire point of going on this trip. It was to collect myself and start caring again.
"That's never going to happen." Orochimaru snorts. "If he cared about people he'd be down there right now helping the Konoha gang. But instead he's running across a mountain to beat Naruto and Koyuki to the exit. At the very least he'd do something like planning to save the people of the Land of Snow but there's not even a single thought of that in his head. It's like he's afraid to care about anyone again!"
"Alvarcus why are you afraid to care about people again?" Tsunade asks softly.
"Because it hurts so much to lose them." I admit and my throat starts to block up and my eyes start to water. "I've lost so many people. Each one of them rips out a piece of me, it's the worst kind of pain imaginable. It surpasses everything else I've been through. I don't want to go through that pain again. I don't want to watch as they die before me. I'm afraid to care about people because I don't want to lose anyone else."
"So you're sacrificing your humanity to spare yourself pain?" Tsunade gently asks. "Alvarcus the bonds that you make with people will last lifetimes. Just because you can lose someone does not mean you will."
"How can you say that?" I weakly ask the voice in my head. "If I might get hurt again then why even form the bond in the first place?"
"Alvarcus you do not have to stand alone." She assures me. "You will not lose them because they can stand on their own two feet, and should they stumble you'll be there to catch them before they fall. One person cannot become all powerful. No matter how hard you try there will always be things that you can't do. That is why these bonds are important. Because when it is your turn to stumble and fall it will be your friends who reach out and catch you."
"But they have to hate me now." I hang my head in shame as I perch in a tall tree overlooking the convoy of trucks. I've beaten Naruto and Koyuki here, they're still moving through the tunnel. I had the advantage of moving at shinobi speeds while Naruto is walking with a civilian on his back. "How can I possibly go back to being friends with them?"
"Do you not remember what Naruto said to you?" Tsunade asks. "One day someone is going to reach out to you to pull you from your darkness. Alvarcus every single one of them extended their hands to you. All you have to do is take them."
"But it's far too late for that!" Orochimaru cuts in. "He already swatted them away. He's lost that chance."
"It is never too late." Tsunade assures me. "All you have to do is take their hands. All you have to do is start to let people in again. All you have to do is allow yourself to care. There's no reason to be afraid of opening yourself up and letting these bonds form."
Two very surprising things happen in the next moments. The first is Naruto with Koyuki still on his back bursting out of the mouth of the tunnel at top speed. The second is a train barreling out a fraction of a second after they did.
Naruto and Koyuki tumble down a small slope and crash into the snow. Naruto is clearly exhausted from the all out sprint that outran a train and Koyuki is staring at the train in terror.
"It's been a long time, Koyuki." A male voice says over a loudspeaker that's mounted to the train.
"I-I know that voice." I hear Koyuki say to herself with my Jiongu enhanced hearing. "It's Doto."
"It's been ten years." Doto steps out onto the roof of one of the train cars. "Come, let's get a look at that face."
Doto doesn't get a good look at his long lost niece because he's distracted by something else. That something else is roughly two dozen logs and a small avalanche of snow slamming into the side of his train. Except Doto doesn't seem particularly bothered by the sudden turn of events, if anything he seems mildly amused at the feeble attempt to damage his vehicle.
"There you have it men!" Sandayu, who has changed into plate armor and strapped a sword to his hip, shouts to the surprisingly large group of men behind him. There has to be at least fifty gathered in total, all here to attempt to overthrow Doto and see their Princess. "Princess Koyuki has returned, with her at our side we will be victorious!"
Status Power Mingguan
-- Peringkat
Power 
-- Power
stone