Chapter 4 – The Red Thread
"Even broken bonds bleed in silence."
The wind had changed.
It carried the dry scent of scorched metal and salt—an omen of memory.
Sasuke and Jūgo had traveled north for several days, crossing desolate plains where the land itself seemed to rot. Every night, the stars looked dimmer, as if the sky refused to watch them anymore.
One evening, as they stopped near the ruins of a burned village, Jūgo suddenly froze.
"I can feel it," he murmured.
Sasuke turned.
"Feel what?"
"A chakra I know... and it's angry."
Before Sasuke could respond, a chain of crimson energy snapped through the darkness, coiling around his wrist like a serpent.
A figure stepped out from the shadows.
Red hair. Broken glasses. Eyes like knives dipped in sorrow.
Karin.
For a long time, none of them spoke.
Only the chain hissed, straining with tension between them.
"Still chasing ghosts, Sasuke?" she asked, her voice cold but trembling underneath.
He didn't answer.
She tugged the chain. Hard. "Answer me."
"Let go, Karin."
"Do you even know what that word means?" she spat. "Let go. Forgive. Breathe. You cut through everything that ever tried to hold you—people, trust, hope."
Jūgo took a hesitant step forward.
"Karin, it's not—"
"Stay out of this!" she snapped, her chakra flaring red.
Her anger burned like sunlight through glass—sharp, unbearable, beautiful.
Sasuke met her gaze. There was no Sharingan now. Only regret.
"You came looking for me," she said. "Why?"
"I didn't," he admitted. "But I hoped… I would."
That stopped her. Just for a heartbeat.
"You tried to kill me," she whispered. "And even when I survived, I kept waiting for you to come. To explain. To apologize. To be human. But you never did."
He nodded slowly. "Because I wasn't human yet."
The chain dissolved. Karin's hands trembled. She turned away, hiding her face behind her hair.
"Do you know what it's like," she said softly, "to heal the man who hurt you? To feel his pain in your own veins and still… want him to live?"
Sasuke lowered his eyes. "You were stronger than I ever was."
She laughed bitterly. "Don't make me your redemption."
"I'm not," he said. "You already gave it to me, back then—when you forgave me without saying a word. I just wasn't ready to hear it."
A long silence stretched between them. The night wind carried the smell of ash and riverwater.
Finally, Karin sighed.
"Jūgo told me you've been helping villages. Saving people."
"Trying to," he said.
"And what then? You think that's enough to erase the blade that went through me?"
"No," he said. "But maybe it keeps me from raising it again."
Her gaze softened.
"You really have changed."
He gave a faint smile. "Not enough. But more than before."
When dawn came, they stood together by the river.
The water reflected the first light—pale, trembling, uncertain.
Karin looked at him one last time.
"Then keep walking, Sasuke. Just… don't look back anymore. You've punished yourself enough for both of us."
He hesitated.
Then, quietly:
"Thank you."
She turned to leave. Her red hair shimmered in the morning sun like a thread of blood—and light.
And for the first time since the war, Sasuke felt the world grow a little less heavy.