Blood
Even from afar, they could not be mistaken, not with the color of their hair, not with that impossible shade that looked like blood made solid, scarlet spilled and somehow caught mid-fall, then draped over skulls like a banner.
The Uzumaki.
I had seen some of them in my past life through reading the manga, watching the show, following characters like Naruto, Nagato, Karin. The Ren part of me knew them from the occasional picture in some dusty book that tried to summarize the allied clans of Konoha in neat little chapters. In my past life, I had seen anime and manga panels, stylized reds that popped against flat backgrounds, a red that was more aesthetic than real.
But this? This was different.
This was the kind of red that made my eyes lock on even when I didn't want to stare, the kind that made my brain itch in a way I couldn't scratch.
Calling people redheads was, when you thought about it, kind of an error. Most red hair, actual red hair, was orange. Copper. Carrot. Auburn that lived somewhere between brown and rust. Even the most striking redheads I had known in my past life, my mother, my maternal grandmother, cousins from both sides, they all had hair that caught sunlight like flame, not like fresh blood.
Because blood was not orange.
Blood was iron and life and violence, blood was scarlet when it was new, darker when it dried, almost black when it crusted.
And yet the Uzumaki stood there with hair that looked like blood.
I remembered, in my past life, being curious enough to actually look up what caused red hair. It came down to melanin, the pigment that colors hair, skin, and eyes. Two main types: eumelanin, which tends to be brown or black, and pheomelanin, which tends to be yellow or red. Red hair happens when you produce more pheomelanin relative to eumelanin, usually due to variants in a gene called MC1R. It's a normal biological variation, rare, but explainable.
It was human.
It was plausible.
And it was not what I was looking at now.
Because what the Uzumaki had was not copper, not orange, not auburn.
It was scarlet.
It was crimson.
It was the color of fresh arterial spray, the color you saw when a knife opened skin cleanly and the blood came out bright before it began to darken.
My mind tried, reflexively, desperately, to force the Uzumaki into that scientific frame anyway. Pigment granules, melanin types, light scattering, maybe some extreme mutation.
But even if I squinted, even if I bent my brain into knots trying to rationalize it, there was no way.
In human biology, hair color is polygenic, influenced by many genes. You can have two redheaded parents and still get variations. One child more strawberry blonde, one more auburn, one more copper. Even in families where everyone "has red hair," the red is not identical. The world doesn't print people in perfect batches.
But the Uzumaki, even from far away, looked like they had been printed.
The first sign anyone should have that there was something really funky about the Naruto universe, other than chakra itself, other than chakra beasts and dōjutsu and all their bullshit, was a clan like the Uzumaki with their hair color. It could be nothing but alien bullshit genes they inherited.
I thought about Kaguya, about the Ōtsutsuki, about the fact that in this world "alien ancestry" was not metaphor, it was literal history. About the way bloodlines here could manifest impossible traits. Eyes that saw through time. Bodies that regenerated like myths. Seals that bent reality.
The Uzumaki were not human, not entirely, not in the way that mattered.
It was fascinating.
It was also deeply, profoundly annoying, because I had to work with this, had to pretend this was normal, had to walk up to people who looked like they'd bathed in crimson paint and act professional.
We were approaching them from the side of the main road, not directly, because Fumiko insisted on that. We were supposed to be discreet, professional, supposed to look like a standard escort team meeting a client.
But even with the distance, even with the crowd between us, I could already tell something was off.
One of them, a young man, turned in our direction.
Not in the vague way people sometimes looked around casually. Not in the way a guard scanned a crowd with obvious focus.
He turned like he had always known where we were.
Then a smile bloomed on his face, and it changed him entirely, like someone had lit a candle behind a painting, like warmth suddenly had permission to exist. It softened the angles of his features, pulled brightness into his eyes, made him look less like a mission client and more like a friend who had been waiting.
He was tall, taller than most shinobi I had seen up close, and his posture had that relaxed control that suggested training and confidence. His hair was that impossible crimson, pulled back, the strands catching light like a blade catches sun. His clothes were travel-practical but carried details that spoke of wealth, embroidered seams, clean stitching, a cloak that draped in a way that made him look almost theatrical.
His face was striking without being pretty in the delicate way. Strong cheekbones, straight nose, eyes a touch too sharp for someone supposedly just a noble needing an escort. There was a small scar near the corner of his mouth, thin and pale, the kind you got from something sharp and fast.
I had the irrational thought that if he wasn't an Uzumaki, if he had black hair and a Konoha forehead protector, he would have been able to perfectly pass as an Uchiha.
And then my brain caught up to the other detail.
There was easily a hundred meters between us, maybe more. That was without mentioning all the people between us, civilians, shinobi, random bodies moving through morning traffic, all the visual noise that should have made it hard to track anyone precisely.
Yet he did.
On top of that, it was the first time we'd met.
Which meant this was not recognition based on faces.
This was chakra.
And then, between one step and the next, something inside me shifted.
It wasn't dramatic, wasn't loud, wasn't the kind of thing anyone else would notice. But inside me, deep in whatever metaphysical space held the thing that gave me superpowers was, I felt the stars expand, reach outward, touch something new.
Another constellation clicked into place.
I kept walking, kept my face neutral, kept my pace steady beside Fumiko, but internally I was racing through the new information flooding my mind, understanding settling into my consciousness like it had always been there.
Shapeshifting.
That was the core of it, the foundation, but not shapeshifting the way shinobi did it with the henge, not the temporary illusion-over-reality trick that every academy student learned.
This was about making an object my true form.
The knowledge came with instinctive clarity, the way you knew how to breathe, how to blink. I could choose an object, any object, and bind myself to it, make it what I actually was instead of this flesh-and-blood body I was currently wearing. A sword, a ring, a bottle, something simple, something singular. And once I did, once I made that choice, the object would become empowered, would gain properties beyond what it should have, would become exceptional at whatever its nature suggested.
A sword would be unnaturally good at cutting, at parting flesh and steel and reality itself if I pushed hard enough.
A hammer would crush, would shatter, would break things that shouldn't break.
A ring would bind, would hold, would connect.
The object would define the power, and the power would define me.
I would still have this body, this human form, would still be able to walk and talk and pretend to be normal. But it would be secondary, a manifestation, a puppet I wore to interact with the world. The object would be what I actually was, the core, the truth beneath the lie.
And there were benefits that came with that, thematic resonances that would bleed into everything I did.
I could feel the potential humming in my chest, waiting, patient, ready for me to make a choice.
One choice.
One object.
One decision that would define me forever.
Because the ability would work only once.
I knew that with the same instinctive certainty I knew everything else about this power. Once I picked something, once I bound myself to it, that was it. No take-backs. No do-overs. No "actually, I changed my mind."
Permanent.
If I didn't know what I knew about the Naruto universe, if I didn't have memories of a past life spent reading manga and watching anime and absorbing lore like a sponge, I would have been disappointed. I would have looked at this gift and thought, "that's it? One object? What if I pick wrong?"
But I did know.
I knew about the Sage of the Six Paths.
I knew about the weapons he'd supposedly left behind, tools so overpowered they'd shaped history, artifacts that could level armies, that could make their wielders into S ranks.
The Sword of Nunoboko, the blade that had supposedly helped create the world, that could manipulate truth itself.
The Treasured Tools of the Sage, weapons that could seal anything, that could cut through anything, that made their users untouchable.
The Bashōsen, the fan that could generate any element, any natural disaster, any force of nature with a swing.
Also, could the gedo mazo as long as it was without any tailed beast chakra, could it not count as an object? Wasn't it in some way the corpse, the carcass, a remnant of a juubified Kaguya and couldn't corpses be considered objects too?
And with this power, with this ability, I could make one of them my true form.
I could bind myself to a weapon so powerful that its mere existence was a threat, could take its nature into myself, could become not just a wielder but the weapon itself.
The potential was staggering.
This power was broken as hell.
But that wasn't what made this ability truly valuable, wasn't what made my heart race, wasn't what made me want to laugh and cry and scream all at once.
No.
What made this ability precious, what made it worth more than any combat skill or bloodline or jutsu, was simpler, more important than any of that.
As long as the object I chose, as long as my true form wasn't destroyed, I could not die.
The body could be killed, could be torn apart, could be burned and crushed and obliterated. But as long as the object remained intact, I would persist, would regenerate, would come back.
In other words, this power was immortality with extra steps.
And I just needed to not be Voldemort, to be smart about it.
I just needed to pick something durable, something that could survive, something that wouldn't shatter the first time someone swung a sword at it. I needed to pick something powerful enough to matter, useful enough to justify the choice, but stable enough to last.
A legendary weapon hidden in a vault somewhere, sealed away and forgotten, would be perfect.
Something no one knew existed, something no one would think to destroy, something that would sit safe and protected while I walked around in this fragile meat-suit doing whatever needed doing.
And if this body died? If I got unlucky, got outmatched, got killed in some stupid way I didn't see coming?
I'd come back.
I'd regenerate.
I'd persist.
Because the object would remain, and as long as it remained, I remained.
Immortality with extra steps.
All I had to do was be smart about it, be patient, wait until I found the right object, the right weapon, the right artifact that would serve as my anchor to existence.
No rush.
No hurry.
I had time.
One day.
Not today, not tomorrow, but one day.
I blinked, returning my full attention to the present, to the Uzumaki group ahead of us, to the red-haired sensor who had already clocked our approach
He could differentiate between dozens of chakra signatures in a crowd, could do so on hundreds of meters without seemingly focusing. He could do it like breathing, like a second sense that never turned off.
And while he wasn't familiar with me or Fumiko personally, the Uzumaki must have been familiar enough with the taste of Uchiha chakra to know that the two signatures coming at him, one genin-level and another seemingly jonin-level, were us.
I felt the skin on my arms prickle.
It was a good thing my aunt hid her true chakra level through seals.
Because if the boy before me could read chakra like that, then if Fumiko had walked around with her actual reserves unmasked, she would have been a lighthouse in a storm. If I remembered right, Uzumakis were by nature good sensors. The boy and the other Uzumakis would have felt her from streets away. Tobirama would have smelled it like blood in water, and we didn't need that.
That was terrifying.
It was also impressive.
I could see why multiple major villages who hated each other decided to team up to deal with Uzushio. I could see why they threw armies at an island and why most of them died trying.
As we reached them, as we crossed the last stretch of distance, the red-haired man stepped forward, still smiling, and his voice was bright and polite.
"Hi, the two of you must be Fumiko and Ren Uchiha, it's a pleasure to meet you, my name is Shusei Uzumaki and I'm the one you're supposed to protect."
Fumiko returned the smile with practiced ease, but I could see the micro-shift in her shoulders, the subtle tightening that meant she had clocked the same thing I had.
Shusei leaned slightly toward me, conspiratorial, and his smile turned a little mischievous.
"But between you and me, nothing should happen, and if anything did, Toga, Akira, Shirogane, Yoru and the others should be able to deal with it."
My eyes flicked over the group behind him.
Yeah, I could see that.
They didn't look like the kind of "bodyguards" Konoha civilians hired when they were worried about bandits. They looked like the kind of people you brought when you expected someone to try to assassinate you with an army and you wanted only bones to remain.
Toga stood with a posture that wasn't stiff, but deliberate, like a blade resting in a sheath.
The first thing that hit me was his skin.
Kit was black, black like ink, black like the void, so dark it didn't reflect, didn't catch the sun. It was black that ate light, that made my eyes slide off him like he was a hole in reality.
If anything, it reminded me of the ink used in seals, that dense black that seemed to have weight. And if I was right, if his skin was seal ink, then the one before me was really dangerous.
His outfit was layered, ceremonial but cut for movement. Metal pieces caught light, rings that looked like more than decoration, bracelets that might have been seal arrays disguised as jewelry. He had an earring that glinted near his jaw, the kind a noble would wear to make a statement.
He didn't smile. Not at Shusei's friendliness. Not at Fumiko's polite greeting. Not at anything.
He looked like a problem.
Akira stood a little to the side, and where Toga was shadow and threat, Akira was something quieter.
His presence was like standing near deep water, calm on the surface, but you could feel the weight underneath. His hair was darker red, more wine than scarlet, and it framed his face in a way that made him look almost elegant. His clothes leaned traditional shinobi but had details that made them unmistakably foreign, patterns in the fabric, reinforced seams, subtle seal marks stitched into places I wouldn't have noticed had I not been looking.
He had a sword, but it wasn't worn like a Konoha shinobi would wear it. It sat on his back at an angle that suggested he drew it differently, perhaps faster, perhaps with a technique that depended on that exact position.
His eyes were pale, lighter than most, the kind that made you think of storms. And when his gaze landed on me, I felt like he was measuring the distance between my throat and his blade out of habit.
Shirogane looked like a story, the kind you found in the corner of a library, bound in leather, full of warnings, a Grimm brother story.
His red was deeper, heavier, the kind that leaned toward wine and dried gore rather than fresh spill. It fell long and didn't fall neatly, loose strands slipping free as if even his hair didn't fully obey him.
He wore robes that felt ceremonial, layered fabric, a high collar, sleeves that could hide hands and weapons alike. There was a belt around his waist, and on it hung scrolls, several, each one sealed shut with tags that looked complex even at a glance.
When he moved, it was slow, deliberate, like he didn't waste energy on unnecessary motion. His eyes were half-lidded, giving him an expression of perpetual boredom or perpetual contemplation. And when he looked at Fumiko, I saw something like recognition flicker through him, not personal, but like he had encountered Uchihas before and had filed them away mentally as "dangerous, emotional, useful."
Yoru was the one who made my breath catch. She looks striking. In simple words, she looked bad as fuck like the kind of girl you knew would ruin your life and still went for.
She had red hair cut shorter at the front and sides, ending in two long braids at the back. The front fell forward in angled strands, partly obscuring her eyes in a way that looked accidental until you realized it was probably deliberate. The red was vivid, clean, more flame than blood, and it framed her face like an artist had decided symmetry was optional.
Her outfit was black, the kind that swallowed light, and on it were patterns, floral shapes in red and gold that curled across the fabric like living things. It was beautiful in the way poison frogs were beautiful, the kind of beauty that existed specifically to warn you.
Her face was sharp, not harsh, but defined. High cheekbones, eyes narrow and focused.
She didn't smile like Shusei, didn't scowl like Toga, didn't stare like Akira, didn't drift like Shirogane.
She watched.
And the way she watched felt like being under a scope.
More than that, the way they all stood near each other told me something.
This wasn't just a group of bodyguards chosen haphazardly. This was a team. Their spacing, the angles, the lines of sight, it was tactical. They were positioned so that Shusei was in front, approachable, while the others created a loose perimeter.
Civilians walked past and didn't notice.
Shinobi would have.
And because I was a genin, because I was an Uchiha trained to see patterns, I noticed.
Shusei's voice pulled me back.
"I was told that Uchihas were as crazy as us Uzumakis when it comes to family, even if probably differently, so you can imagine how much I was being nagged by my aunty to enlist, on top of my usual protection detail, a team."
He grinned, like the word "nagged" held genuine affection.
"What I read said that your jonin sensei here is also your direct aunt, so you must understand the pain that a nagging aunt can be."
I nodded immediately, solemn as if we were discussing a burial ceremony.
"Yes." I paused, then added seriously, "I understand your pain, the pain of nagging, that-should-find-better-things-to-do, aunts."
Fumiko made a small sound, offended, like a cat that had been stepped on.
Yoru's lips twitched, not quite a smile.
Shusei's grin widened, delighted, and in that moment I felt it, chemistry, that strange compatibility some people had when they met, like their humor aligned, like their suffering rhymed.
He leaned closer, conspiratorial.
"How bad is she?"
I didn't hesitate.
"She makes me run until I throw up, then tells me vomiting is good for building character."
Shusei's eyes widened.
"No way, that's inhuman."
"I wish I was lying," I said, tone dead. "Last week she told me that if I can still see, I can still spar."
He made an affronted noise.
"That's inhumane."
"It is," I agreed, then sighed. "But she smiles when she says it, like she's proud of herself."
Shusei's shoulders shook with laughter.
"My aunt makes me practice seals until my fingers cramp, then she says, 'if your fingers cramp, it means your chakra control is improving.'"
I blinked.
"I don't think that's how it's supposed to work."
"It's not," he agreed cheerfully. "But she says it with so much conviction that you start to wonder if you're the stupid one."
"That's exactly it," I said, pointing at him like we'd discovered a shared truth of the universe. "They gaslight you with affection."
Shusei pressed a hand to his chest.
"Gaslight you with affection, yes, that's it, they act like they're doing you a favor by tormenting you."
"They do," I said, voice rising slightly. "And if you complain, they look at you like you've just kicked a puppy."
Shusei nodded vigorously.
"And then they say something like, 'I'm only hard on you because I care.'"
I mimicked an older woman's tone, dramatic.
"'You'll thank me when you're older.'"
Shusei snorted.
"And you know what's worse?"
"What?"
"They're right."
I stared at him for a beat, then groaned.
"They are."
"They are," he repeated, mournful now. "Because when you're in danger, when you're bleeding, when you think you might die, their nagging will probably be what keeps you alive."
"And then you feel guilty," I added, because that was the ugly part. "Because you wanted to strangle them yesterday, but today you're grateful."
Shusei's grin returned, bright and conspiratorial.
"So you're saying we're trapped in an eternal cycle of suffering and gratitude."
"Yes," I said flatly. "Aunts are like moms and sisters but worse, because moms at least own their authority, and sisters at least admit they're annoying you for fun. Aunts act like they're your friend while they ruin your life."
Shusei laughed again, loud enough that a few civilians glanced over, then looked away because shinobi laughter was something you didn't question.
"Exactly, they're the worst combination, they have the authority of a mother and the teasing cruelty of a sibling."
"And the audacity," I said.
"And the audacity," Shusei agreed, solemn again. "My aunt once told me my posture was embarrassing the clan."
I blinked.
"What does that even mean?"
"I don't know," he said, voice pained. "But I made said posture worse for a week out of spite, even though it really hurt my back."
"My aunt told me my breathing was lazy," I said.
Shusei's mouth fell open.
"Breathing?"
"Breathing," I repeated. "Apparently I didn't breathe well enough for a shinobi."
He pressed his lips together like he was trying not to laugh.
"I think your aunt and my aunt would be friends."
"Or they would try to kill each other," I corrected.
"That's also possible," he conceded, then leaned in again. "But tell me, does she also do that thing where she compliments you right before insulting you?"
I groaned.
"Yes."
Shusei nodded like he'd expected it.
"Mine says, 'You're so talented,' then immediately follows with, 'which is why it's so disappointing you can't do this basic seal correctly.'"
"That's evil," I said.
"It is," he agreed. "But she smiles like she's giving you a gift."
"And if you do improve," I added, "they act like it was inevitable."
Shusei pointed at me.
"Yes, like your suffering was a natural step in your development."
"Like you being miserable is proof they're doing a good job," I said.
He sighed dramatically.
"We're victims."
"We are," I said, and I meant it with the seriousness of a shinobi oath.
We were still nodding at each other, still united in this shared tragedy, when it happened.
Two simultaneous chops on the head.
My aunt's hand came down on my skull with the force of a gentle threat, not hard enough to actually hurt but enough to make my brain rattle just enough to remind me who was in charge.
At the exact same moment, Yoru's hand came down on Shusei's head, crisp and precise.
Ow.
I hissed, rubbing the top of my head. Shusei made a wounded noise, rubbing his own.
Fumiko's voice was sweet, too sweet.
"Ren."
Yoru's voice was quieter, but it had the same deadly calm.
"Shusei."
We looked at each other, eyes watering slightly, and in that brief moment, we understood each other on a deeper level.
We nodded in camaraderie.
Truly, family could so fucking be the worst.
Item Spirit [300 - Hyrule Warriors] Wizzro, the evil sorcerer of Cia's dark armies. Fi, the spirit of the Master Sword from ages past. Ghirahim, an ancient demon general. These are people, yes, but the form you see them speaking in, fighting in, acting in, that is not their true form.
On purchase, you may select a type of item of your choice, a sword, a ring, a harp, a bottle, nothing too complex. This object is in reality, your true form. You are the spirit of a magical object.
Depending on the origin you picked, this object is either heavily empowered by light, pure magic, or darkness, with this nature spreading to the form you use to interact with the world.
That other form resembles the race you selected, with an aesthetic influenced by the energy that empowers your true form. It is empowered as well, but less so. You are freely able to swap between these two forms, though not if your racial choice was taken as a drawback.
Your true form is more than just a magically empowered object though. It has an ability relating to its form, like a sword being extra great at cutting, or a bottle being exceptional at sucking up and containing things. You are also able to manipulate in this form, though it's not as comfortable as your normal form.
"There are no chances I'm going in that thing."
Shusei turned to look at me, his expression caught somewhere between amusement and genuine offense, like I'd just insulted his cooking or questioned his taste in music.
"Common, it doesn't look that bad, right?"
He turned in the direction of the others, his gaze sweeping across Toga, Akira, Shirogane, and Yoru, clearly searching for support, for backup, for someone to tell me I was being ridiculous and that his creation was perfectly safe and functional and not at all a death trap waiting to happen.
He found none.
Toga looked away, suddenly very interested in something happening down the street, his dark form a silhouette of deliberate avoidance.
Akira's pale eyes flicked upward, tracking a bird that probably didn't exist.
Shirogane examined his fingernails with the kind of intense focus usually reserved for defusing explosive tags.
Yoru turned her head entirely, her braids swaying, her posture screaming "I have no opinion and you cannot make me have one."
The silence stretched, heavy and damning.
Shusei's shoulders sagged, genuine hurt crossing his features, theatrical and exaggerated but also, I suspected, a little bit real.
"It is true then," he said, voice mournful, tragic, like he'd just discovered a fundamental truth about the universe and it had disappointed him. "Worst betrayal comes from blood at the most crucial of moments when one should be able to rely on it."
Toga, still not looking at him, raised one hand in a gesture that was half apology, half dismissal.
"Being bound by blood and contract doesn't equal accepting death's grasp," he said, his voice deep and steady and utterly unapologetic. "I am not ready yet to go back to the wheel of Samsara."
I pointed at Toga, emphatic, vindicated.
"See? I am not the only one to think like that. We all think like that." I looked at Shusei, trying to inject reason into this conversation. "You're sure you don't want us to find a carriage or for you to backpack one of us?"
The suggestion was practical, logical, sensible.
Shinobi could move fast, absurdly fast, the kind of fast that defied physics and common sense and made humans without chakra look like they were moving the snails amongst the snails.
I'd seen it in the show, in the manga. When they weren't fighting, when they weren't using jutsu or reinforcing themselves with chakra or really pushing themselves the way they sometimes did in battles, shinobi could cross countries at speeds that would make cars jealous.
Tree travel, when done right, when done by exceptional genins, competent chunin or jonin, was terrifyingly efficient.
I remembered Naruto and the others reaching Suna when Gaara was kidnapped during the early parts of Shippuden. They'd crossed from Konoha to Suna in what, a day? Maybe two? The distance should have been hundreds of kilometers, and they'd done it on foot, leaping between trees, moving at speeds that made Olympic sprinters look like toddlers learning to walk.
Or when Naruto left Turtle Island during the Fourth Great Ninja War, racing across the ocean and then across land to reach the battlefield. He'd crossed what should have been days of travel in hours, maybe less, moving so fast he'd arrived in time to make a difference.
If Shusei rode on the back of one of his bodyguards, if we moved at even a moderate pace, not pushing, not sprinting, just maintaining a steady travel speed, we should be able to reach Ame from Konoha in, what, three days? Four at most?
I ran through the geography in my head, pulling from what I knew of the Naruto world's layout, the map I'd memorized because knowing my geography was the least if I wanted to survive, to live long into this world.
Konoha sat in the Land of Fire, roughly central, surrounded by forests and rivers and terrain that was, all things considered, pretty easy to traverse if you knew what you were doing.
To reach the Land of Rain from Konoha, you'd head northwest, cutting through Fire Country's northern territories, skirting the border regions where Fire met Grass and Rain. You'd pass through smaller settlements, minor villages, maybe a few trading posts if you were traveling the main roads, but shinobi didn't use main roads, they used trees, they used speed, they avoided civilization when they could because civilization meant witnesses and a lot of time for foreign shinobis, complications.
The Land of Grass sat between Fire and Rain, a buffer state, neutral territory that got stomped on every time the major villages decided to have a war. You'd cross through Grass quickly, efficiently, because lingering there was asking for trouble, asking to get caught in someone else's conflict.
And then you'd hit Rain.
The Land of Rain, perpetually soaked, perpetually grey, a country where the sun was a myth and the sky wept endlessly. It was smaller than Fire, more compact, more concentrated. Interestingly enough, it was not yet ruled by Hanzo the Salamander, a man whose reputation would make a lot of grown shinobi reconsider their life choices. Right now, from what information I was able to get when I learnt of this mission in Ame by my aunt was that while he was a lord, nobility, he was not yet like in canon the lord of the entirety of Ame.
Right now, the ninja world was in peacetime.
Or at least, that's what people called it, what they pretended it was.
But I knew better.
Peacetime in the shinobi world was just a polite word for Cold War, a fragile ceasefire held together by exhaustion and mutual distrust and the knowledge that nobody had recovered from the First Great Ninja War yet. Villages were rebuilding, licking their wounds, training their next generation of child soldiers, preparing for the next conflict because there was always a next conflict.
It was peacetime until something happened, until some spark ignited, until someone decided they wanted something another village had, and then, if I remembered my past life memories correctly, the Second Great Ninja War would erupt, and the world would burn again.
But for now, for this moment, the roads were relatively safe, the borders relatively open, and travel was—
"Ren."
My aunt's voice cut through my thoughts, sharp and deliberate.
"Enter the death tra—" she paused, reconsidered, "—device."
I looked at her, my eyes half-lidded, unimpressed, the kind of look that said I see what you did there and I am judging you for it.
Then I said, flatly, seriously, with the kind of conviction that came from deep within my soul:
"This is why you'll never get a boyfriend."
The effect was immediate and devastating.
Fumiko sputtered, her eyes widening, her mouth opening and closing like a fish gasping for air. She clutched at her chest like I'd physically stabbed her, like I'd reached into her ribcage and squeezed her heart, like I'd committed an act of violence so profound it transcended the physical.
"I—you—that's not—how dare—"
Akira's lips flickered, a tiny movement, barely there, but it was a smile, a genuine smile, quickly suppressed.
Shirogane coughed, a sound that was clearly covering a laugh, his shoulders shaking slightly as he turned away.
Yoru hid her face behind one hand, but I could see her eyes crinkling, could see the smile she was trying to conceal.
Shusei didn't even try to hide it. He laughed, open and loud and delighted, the kind of laugh that made other people want to laugh too.
Toga, still facing away, reached over and patted Fumiko on the shoulder, the gesture almost comforting, almost sympathetic, like he was consoling her after a great loss.
I felt no remorse.
She'd asked for it.
The death tra—the device in question had come out of one of Shusei's sleeves, seals probably at work to store the thing in a pocket dimension or compressed space or whatever fuinjutsu bullshit made it possible to pull a vehicle out of your clothing like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat.
For me, it looked like the unholy child of a chariot, a hoverboard, and witchcraft that should have been aborted but had survived said abortion to make it everyone's problem.
It sat there on the ground, humming.
Not a pleasant hum, not the kind of sound that suggested competent engineering and quality craftsmanship. It was the kind of hum that suggested malfunction, that suggested something inside was vibrating at frequencies it shouldn't, that suggested components were one bad day away from giving up entirely.
The frame was black, but not clean black, not uniform. It was mottled, streaked with what looked like ink, like someone had painted it with seal arrays and then forgotten to stop, layers upon layers of symbols and formulas overlapping until the metal underneath was barely visible. Some of the ink shimmered, catching light in ways that made my eyes hurt, made my brain itch, made me think of things that existed in too many dimensions and didn't care about Euclidean geometry.
The wheels, if you could call them that, didn't quite touch the ground. They floated, suspended a few centimeters above the dirt, spinning slowly, lazily, like they were bored, like they were waiting for something interesting to happen. They glowed faintly, a sickly purple-blue that reminded me of bruises, of things that were alive but shouldn't be.
The body of the thing was angular, sharp, all hard edges and aggressive lines, like someone had designed it with the philosophy that if it looked dangerous, people would take it seriously. There were protrusions, bits sticking out that served no obvious purpose, maybe structural, maybe decorative, maybe the remnants of failed experiments that had been welded on and never removed.
And yet.
And yet, despite all of that, despite looking like it was on the verge of catastrophic failure, there was something about it that suggested genius, that even I who didn't know much about seals suggested someone who understood fuinjutsu on a level most people couldn't even imagine. The seal arrays weren't random, weren't haphazard. They were deliberate, intentional, layered in ways that suggested redundancy, fail-safes, backup systems for the backup systems.
It was a marvel of engineering.
It was also a nightmare I had to step in.
It was the kind of thing that made you wonder if the creator was brilliant or insane, and then realize the answer was probably both.
"Well," I said, staring at it, feeling my resolve crumble under the weight of inevitability. "If I die, I die."
I stepped forward, reached for the door, pulled it open, and entered.
My eyes widened.
The inside looked bigger than the outside.
Not slightly bigger, not "oh, they used the space efficiently."
Bigger.
Much bigger.
The inside was a living room, a full, proper living room, with couches, big comfortable-looking couches that could seat half a dozen people, with space to move, space to breathe, space that should not exist given the size of the exterior.
The walls were paneled, dark wood, polished, expensive-looking. There were lights, soft ambient lights that gave the space a warm glow. There was a table, low and wide, positioned between the couches. There were shelves, built into the walls, holding scrolls and books and what looked like decorative objects.
It was bigger on the inside.
Like a TARDIS.
Like someone had looked at the laws of physics and said "no thank you" before doing their own thing.
Shusei entered behind me, closing the door with a soft click, and immediately launched himself onto one of the couches, sprawling across it like he owned the place, which, to be fair, he probably did.
He turned, grinning at me, his expression smug and delighted and entirely too pleased with himself.
"Impressive, no?"
I stared.
"Seals already make it possible to put things that have no right being able to fit into little scrolls and the like," he continued, gesturing expansively, "so I kinda went from there and tried to use this concept differently and boom, here we are."
He sat up slightly, still grinning.
"I keyed it before entering to Yoru's chakra, which means we should be able to travel without holding the other back due to a lack of speed. She'll pull us along, and we can sit here in comfort while she does the work."
I sat down on a chair opposite him, slowly, carefully, still processing.
Then I looked at him, really looked at him, and said:
"I was already suspicious of it before, but now, I am sure. You are more than an average Uzumaki civilian, aren't you?"
Shusei's grin widened, sharp and knowing.
"The same way I am sure that you are different from the average Uchiha."
I kept my face neutral, blank, giving him nothing.
"What makes you think that?"
He leaned back, casual, relaxed.
"Just a feeling. And I am pretty confident when it comes to feelings."
I lifted an eyebrow, letting skepticism drip into my expression.
"Really?" I said, my tone making it clear I didn't believe him, not even a little.
Shusei laughed, bright and unbothered.
"If you think this is special, you would find Uzushio either wonderful or horrifying. You should visit one day."
"Pass," I said immediately.
He blinked.
"Pass?"
"Yes," I said, nodding. "I don't want to see horrors beyond comprehension before twenty, and something tells me I would if I go to that island."
"Something?" he echoed, curious.
"Indeed," I said, allowing a small smile. "And this something is a feeling."
Shusei stared at me for a beat, then his eyes narrowed.
"You're messing with me, aren't you?"
My lips curved slightly, and I deployed the traditional inherited smug Uchiha response:
"Hmm."
His mouth fell open slightly, mock outrage filling his features.
"Stop messing with me!"
I looked him in the eye, completely serious, and answered with another:
"Hmm."
Shusei deflated dramatically, burying his head into the couch cushions and screaming into them, muffled and theatrical. After a moment, he pulled back, hair slightly disheveled, looking both annoyed and amused.
He sighed, then his expression shifted, becoming more serious.
"More seriously though, when I asked for protection through a C-rank, a part of me feared that the protection would be not interesting at best and inconvenient at worst."
I frowned.
"Inconvenient?"
He shrugged.
"I am Uzumaki, for the best and the worst. Let's just leave it at that."
I let that sit for a moment, then shifted gears.
"So, I know we're supposed to protect you until whatever you're doing in the Land of Rain is finished, but I wasn't told more than that."
Shusei took the change of conversation with a smile, visibly relaxing.
"It's mostly that. Tell me, Ren, did you know that most of the seals in the ninja world originate from us?"
I blinked.
"Originate from you?"
I frowned.
"Originating from the Uzumaki clan?"
"Yep," Shusei said, his smile bright, proud. "This is why we are filthy rich."
I processed that, then said slowly:
"I thought the Uzumaki clan was the sister clan to the Senju, the same way the Fuma is with the Uchiha clan. I thought Uzushio was allied with Konoha."
In other words, how would Konoha allow what could be seen as an outpost, an extension of itself, trade with its enemies?
Why would Konoha allow shinobi from Kumo, Iwa, Mizu, Suna to have access to what could be life-changing resources, what were essentially weapons of mass destruction?
It didn't make sense.
It was like handing nuclear codes to people who wanted to hurl nukes at you.
Shusei nodded, understanding the unspoken question.
"We're allied to Konoha. Let's just say that there was an agreement signed in place with Konoha, so you don't have to worry about being surrounded by traitors."
He leaned forward, his expression shifting into something more thoughtful, more serious.
"We sell to those Konoha considers its enemies for two main reasons. Can you guess why?"
I thought about it, running through the logic.
If the Uzumaki clan was the source of most seals used in the shinobi world, if they were the ones selling them, then the most obvious answer was—
"You do it for the money."
Shusei snapped his fingers, pointing at me.
"Bingo. For the money, because who does not like gold? I cannot say we all agree with the way our creations may have been used, but better weep on gold than as a beggar in the street."
He paused, his expression becoming more calculating.
"Still, it is not the second yet most important factor."
He leaned back again, watching me.
"Tell me, how many ninja do you think Iwa has on average?"
I pulled from my memories, from canon knowledge, from what I knew of the world post-First Great Ninja War.
"Probably around ten thousand active shinobi, maybe twelve thousand if you count reserves and trainees."
Shusei nodded.
"What about Kumo?"
"Similar numbers, maybe slightly higher. Twelve to fifteen thousand, depending on how you count."
"And Mizu?"
"Harder to estimate because they're more isolated, but probably eight to ten thousand combat-ready shinobi."
Shusei spread his hands.
"You see, my friend, ninja villages, great ninja villages, have something hard to win against. They have numbers."
His tone became more serious, more pointed.
"What's the point of having a shinobi able to destroy three cities at the same time when they have five shinobi each capable of destroying one city?"
He let that sink in.
"A mature Uzumaki with a basic mastery of seals, with our inherent chakra reserves, our strong bodies, our ability to summon chakra chains, heal others by giving them our yang by letting them bite us, it makes all of us grown monsters in our own right. And that may have been enough in the warring clan period. It may be enough to deal with minor villages like Takigakure or minor kingdoms."
His expression darkened slightly.
"But we still are one clan with a few vassals. We lack quantity. And quantity, when nurtured like it is in a great ninja village, can become quality."
He paused, letting me absorb that.
"There are hundreds of us. But there are dozens of thousands of them."
The weight of that statement hung in the air.
"Which gave us two choices."
He lifted one finger.
"One, we leave our ancestral ground, where we had buried our family since generations, our home, and join Konoha. Doing so would have meant sooner or later being absorbed into the Senju clan. And while we love them, there is a reason why our two clans split eons ago."
He lifted a second finger.
"Two, we could do the only thing that could ensure our survival, our independence. And that thing is make the world need us, for the best and the worst. And it is thus a good thing that we had something unique to us, that the world had always lusted for, that we could automate the production of the lesser among it so that it may not come back to bite us."
He looked at me, his eyes sharp, assessing.
"Can you guess?"
My eyes widened as the pieces clicked together, as the logic became clear, as the strategy revealed itself.
"Seals," I said slowly. "You're talking about Fūinjutsu."
The roll of Ren if it had enough point would be really ironic and fitting with the situation. All the bullshit Orochimaru did in canon, even the Edo tensei, summoning and binding the literal God of death, putting part of your soul in a seal that is aware in and out of himself like Kushina and Minato or make the equivalent of horcruxes with the cursed seals like Orochimaru did, sucking the a sword and a gourd that can seal anything, seals that stop your chakra etc. I wanted to flesh out why multiple villages would target one clan especially with what we were shown in canon and nerding about Chakra is always cool and fun. Last time, I had asked what kind of seals people would make if they were Uzumakis but I only saw basic bomb or absorb seals. I expected people to be creative, to create things straight from Lovecraft's bowel yet it wasn't the case. Like I had said in an earlier chapter, things I find interesting in the seals you propose may well appear in the future chapters.Anyways, tell me what you think of the chapter, what you liked or didn't like.
PS: I got two more advanced chapters on my p.a.t.r.e.o.n.c.o.m / Eileen715 that together are at least 15000 words. With less than 5$ a month, you have access to everything I write in a month so don't hesitate visiting if you want to read more or simply support.
Failed roll: Sorcerer's Sutra Scroll [300 - Touhou
Project: Parasol Paradise] A limitless magical scroll that can accommodate as many spells as the user wishes to inscribe upon it. This scroll can automatically recite chants or undergo rituals in place of the user, and being a magical item, will not function for anybody except for its rightful owner.
"Exactly. Because of our seals."
Shusei's words hung in the air, heavy with implications I was still processing, still trying to fit into the framework of what I knew, what I'd learned, what made sense.
Outside, I felt more than heard the device begin to hover, rising smoothly off the ground with a hum that vibrated through the floor beneath my feet. Through the windows, I could see the others begin to depart, moving with that effortless shinobi speed that made things look like slowed down, blurs of motion that would carry them, and by extension us, across countries.
The device followed, tethered to Yoru's chakra like a balloon on a string, pulled along without resistance, without friction.
I looked back at Shusei, frowning.
"I know seals are important, can be versatile and strong, but strong and needed to the point where the entire ninja world allows neutrality for one clan? That's something hard to believe."
Sure, I'd seen in canon how powerful seals could be. I'd seen Minato use the Flying Thunder God to teleport across battlefields, seen Hagoromo and Hamura stop their mother using a seal, seen Orochimaru use cursed seals to turn people into monsters, warping their bodies, corrupting their chakra, making them stronger and more broken in equal measure. I'd seen storage seals compress matter, barrier seals protect entire villages, explosive tags level buildings.
But still.
This was shinobi land, a world of punch wizards masquerading as ninjas, a world where people could breathe fire and summon tsunamis and crush mountains with their bare hands. I was sure that while impressive, while versatile, there must be or must have been things existing in this world, things most people had access to, that would not make seals so singular, so irreplaceable, so valuable that an entire clan could leverage them into neutrality.
Shusei smiled, reading my skepticism like it was written on my forehead in ink.
"It seems you don't believe me, that you're skeptical, which is understandable."
He leaned forward slightly, his expression shifting into something more teacherly, more patient.
"Tell me, Ren, what do you think seals are?"
I gave him the textbook answer, the kind you'd find in an academy primer, curt and clinical.
"Seals are methods of inscribing formulas using chakra-conductive ink or blood to create effects that manipulate, store, or redirect chakra and matter. They're tools for achieving results that would otherwise require sustained chakra expenditure or specialized techniques."
Shusei nodded, acknowledging the definition.
"Indeed, this is true, but what does it really mean? It's like when people are told that some hand signs correspond to a technique, but most seem satisfied with not trying to understand why."
I frowned.
"People know about hand signs, their capabilities, how they've been studied since the dawn of the shinobi world. There are entire libraries dedicated to the theory, entire branches of study focused on optimizing sequences, reducing signs, increasing efficiency."
Shusei waved a hand dismissively.
"They were studied just to be studied, not to be understood, not to understand chakra. People memorize the signs for Fireball Jutsu, but they don't ask why those specific signs, why that specific order, what the signs are actually doing to the chakra pathways, to the chakra itself."
He paused, letting that settle.
"Anyway, what makes seals so important, what makes our innate talent for them so important, is that it is less that we created them and more that we discovered them and made something of them, the same way a carpenter takes wood to make shapes or a painter takes ink to make paintings."
His tone shifted, becoming more intense, more focused.
"What makes seals so interesting, so versatile, so important, is how they circumvent the rules of chakra itself."
I blinked, processing that, turning it over in my mind.
"Circumvent the rules of chakra?" I said out loud, testing the words, trying to understand what he meant.
Shusei's smile widened, sharp and pleased.
"Exactly. Chakra itself has already few rules, but the few rules it has, its limits, can be broken. And so far, the Uzumaki clan with their seals were the ones to find how."
He leaned back, watching me.
"Tell me, what do you know of Yin and Yang?"
Yin and Yang?
I thought about it, pulling from both lives, both sets of knowledge.
From my past life, Yin and Yang were feminine and masculine, negative and positive, cold and heat, push and pull, one in two, separate, opposite, yet one part of a whole. Dualities that defined each other, that couldn't exist without each other, that created balance through opposition.
From what I knew of this world, both from past life memories about the manga and anime and the memories of the original Ren, Yin was spiritual and Yang was physical. Yin was shape, lifeless form, potential without substance. Yang was content, life, substance without definition. It was only when the two were together that anything became possible, and that was literal in this world.
Banbutsu Sōzō, the Creation of All Things.
The technique that had supposedly been used by the Sage of the Six Paths to create the Tailed Beasts, to shape reality itself, to bring imagination into existence. It required perfect balance, perfect mastery, both Yin and Yang working in harmony to turn thought into matter, concept into reality.
In canon, I'd seen fragments of it. The Izanagi, used by Uchiha and later by Danzo, could rewrite reality for brief moments, turn death into illusion, undo injuries, reshape events, all at the cost of a Sharingan. It was said to be an incomplete version of Creation of All Things, using only Yin chakra, shaping reality without the Yang to give it permanence, which was why it required sacrifice, why it cost an eye, why it was temporary.
The Izanami, the counter to Izanagi, trapped people in loops of cause and effect, forced them to confront their actions, their choices, their nature. It was also incomplete, also Yin-dominant, also cost an eye.
You grew your Yang by physically training, by pushing your body, by breaking it down and building it back stronger. Muscle, bone, blood, all Yang, all physical, all tangible.
But for your Yin, your spirit, you needed to break yourself mentally and reforge yourself again and again. You needed to read until you couldn't take it anymore and still continue reading. You needed to experience life-changing, life-altering things. You needed to be spiteful, angry, mad, jealous, envious. You needed to experience heartbreak, to come as close to death as possible, to suffer, to hate, to grow stronger through pain.
The power of hatred was literal in this world.
Someone fucking kill me.
It was in doing all those things that you trained Yin, which would explain why clans like mine, clans like the Uchiha, people with high Yin, were all a little mad, because it was requisite if you wanted to be stronger using Yin. You had to break, had to shatter, had to rebuild yourself from fragments, and every time you did, you lost a little more of whatever made you stable, made you sane, made you normal.
Wasn't it said in canon that the more an Uchiha hated, the more powerful their Sharingan became?
Hadn't I awakened my own Sharingan, three tomoe in each eye, mature and fully developed, because in a way I had died twice? The part of me from a past life where this world existed only in a manga, and the part of me, the original Ren, who died because he tried to make his parents proud, doing something stupid when they were already proud of him.
Two deaths.
Two lives.
One body.
I looked at Shusei, choosing my words carefully.
"I know that your clan and the Senju clan thrive when it comes to Yang, and my clan does when it comes to Yin."
I thought about the Izanagi again, about how it was incomplete, about how if Yang could be used at the same time, in perfect balance, maybe the need to sacrifice an eye wouldn't exist. Maybe you could rewrite reality without cost, without sacrifice, without burning out part of your soul to pay the toll.
Shusei nodded, his smile turning sharp.
"Exactly. We Uzumakis are Yang-natured, our chakra is Yang-dominant, which means what we are able to do should have stopped at our powerful bodies, our vitality, our longevity, our healing."
He spread his hands.
"Yet when you look at my clan, at our creations, what does it seem to you, Ren?"
I thought about it, really thought about it.
The Uzumaki clan was Yang-favoring, that was obvious, documented, proven. Their bodies were strong, their chakra reserves massive, their life force potent enough to heal others through transfusion, through bites, through sheer vitality.
But their specialization, their seals, didn't seem Yang.
If anything, seals seemed Yin, because Yin chakra was what went against the rules of the world, defied them, warped them, perverted them. Yin was imagination made manifest, reality rewritten, physics made optional.
And seals did all of that.
Seals stored things that shouldn't fit. Seals created effects that shouldn't exist. Seals manipulated chakra in ways that should require constant focus and control but instead operated autonomously, independently, like programs running in the background.
That was Yin.
That was shape without content, form without substance, given permanence through formula and ink.
Understanding hit me like a punch to the gut.
"Your seals allow you to use Yin chakra without needing to grow it yourself inside of you, to be able to use Yin as much if not more than someone with naturally high Yin chakra like people in my clan."
I stared at him, feeling something between awe and resentment.
"That's so fucking unfair."
Shusei laughed, bright and unapologetic, and then, with the most infuriating grin I'd ever seen, said:
"My aunt taught me one thing to say in case I was in such a situation: get good, scrub."
I glared at him.
"Fuck you," I said in English.
One thing I knew was that the language spoken in the Elemental Nations wasn't English. The best way to describe it was that it was akin to being the mixed cousin of Hindi, Chinese, and Japanese with a lot of other weird linguistic influences thrown in, a pidgin that had evolved over centuries of clans and cultures colliding. Which meant that Shusei didn't understand my words, at least not literally.
Still, I was pretty sure the Uzumaki understood what I meant by tone and context alone.
But at least, like this, it couldn't be argued that I insulted a client, even if I was sure, deep down, that the boy before me wouldn't snitch.
Shusei tilted his head, curiosity replacing smugness.
"What's that language? It sounds strange yet, fascinating. Can you tell me more?"
I answered with the second Uchiha signature response:
"Hmm."
He leaned forward.
"Common."
"Hmm."
"I was just teasing," he said, half-pleading now.
"Hmm."
Shusei's expression shifted, mock-threatening.
"I will kick you out of this device and make you walk the rest of the way."
I shifted my tone, speaking in a polite yet sarcastic way, channeling theatrical offense.
"Oh, my poor heart, such a disgraceful thing, indeed, I should fare better outside, exposed to the elements, abandoned by those I trusted."
Shusei snorted.
"You're not as good an actor as you think."
I reverted back to normal, sighing.
"It seems I'll have to work on that."
Shusei grinned, then his expression shifted back to serious, back to the topic at hand.
"Anyway, this is why we are left alone, because we found a way to cheat, and thus we cheat, and thus others who need to cheat come to us."
He gestured expansively.
"What a seal can do can probably be done one way or another by someone good enough at using chakra, but those people are rare. Most ninjas, warriors, they focus on simple elemental chakra natures instead of the esoteric ones like Yin or Yang. And when they do master those, and they die, they can't transmit their knowledge to the next generation as easily as we can, because we don't need to have a strong Yang or a strong Yin to make something only someone with a strong Yang or a strong Yin should be able to make."
His tone grew more intense, more passionate.
"Why rely on medic-nin when their numbers are not enough and you can instead buy seals that can do the same anywhere? Why sacrifice Suiton specialists on the front when you can buy a seal that creates, in the hand of even the weakest genin, floods in a desert? Why train hard when you can use a seal that triples your muscle gain? Why not buy a seal when you can use it to change how you look?"
The Uzumaki looked almost crazed as he spoke, eyes bright, voice rising, caught up in the implications of his own words.
I stared at him, my mind racing.
If what Shusei was saying wasn't false, if it was truth, if the Uzumaki could through their seals use both Yang and Yin without needing to necessarily cultivate either, didn't that mean they were encroaching on the domain of the Creation of All Things the same way Uchihas did with the Izanagi and the Izanami, but with seals instead of dōjutsu?
Didn't that mean that an Uzumaki proficient enough with seals could theoretically do anything?
But if this was true, how could they have been genocided in canon?
Sure, they'd fooled multiple villages, multiple Kages, fought against more than half of the great ninja villages and gave them a pyrrhic victory if not a two-sided defeat. Their fall had been apocalyptic, costly, devastating to everyone involved.
Still, if what I was hearing was true, they shouldn't have lost.
They should have been unstoppable.
They should have been gods.
Even then, there was something I felt was missing, something I knew Shusei wasn't telling me.
I could believe that seals could do all those things, could cheat reality, could bypass the normal rules of chakra.
But I was sure there must have been a cost, something sacrificed, some price paid, the same way the Uchiha lost an eye using the Izanagi and the Izanami.
Nothing that powerful came free.
Nothing that broke the rules didn't demand payment.
There had to be a catch.
There always was.
I looked at Shusei, watched him settle back into the couch, watched the passion fade from his expression into something more controlled, more guarded.
He wasn't lying, I was sure of that.
But he wasn't telling me everything either.
And that, more than anything else, made me wary.
Made me curious.
Made me realize that maybe, just maybe, my aunt wasn't wrong.
Maybe this mission would be interesting.
Oh, we live in a magical land where bloodlines, convenience and the ability to kill the next motherfucker matter over everything and where grudges are seemingly endless creating an endless cycle of hate. Let's become merchants of death in such a world while being few in numbers and connected to the place that everyone hates or envy for one reason or another. It's not as if anything could go wrong. Canonically, the Uchiha clan had the Izanagi and the Izanami and every other bullshit they could come up with their eyes and they were still the equals of the Senju clan before Hashirama. I kinda wanted to show this a little through the Uzumakis. They are descendants of the sage and I wanted it to kinda be felt if it makes sense because again, you don't bind the literal god of Death to a mask, one amongst many others by the way which probably meant that they were summoning other things without being able to cheat with Yin and Yang or in other words, the creation of all things
PS: I got at least three more chapters, together easily over 20000 words, one of those three if not more even free. With less than 5$ dollars a month, you have access to everything I write. There are also 7 chapters of my original story Gnosis that are free and there are also advanced chapters for all of my other stories. Don't hesitate to visit if you want to simply read more or just support me.