The sudden escape left the burly man stunned for a heartbeat. Then, laughter erupted from his throat—louder, madder, dripping with scorn.
"Hahaha! Did you really pin your hopes on that trash saving you?"
He shook his head, mocking the sheer absurdity of it.
"I know these 'great village' ninjas better than you do. On the surface, they preach justice and the Will of Fire. Inside? They're filth. Cowards who run at the first scent of real blood."
He reached out, his thick fingers clamping onto the woman's chin, forcing her tear-streaked face up to meet his gaze.
"Accept your fate. If you make me happy, maybe I'll kill you quickly. Maybe I'll even leave enough of you for a funeral."
The woman didn't respond. Her eyes were glazed, fixed on the jagged hole in the wall where her savior had vanished.
Come back.
The words looped in her mind, a broken prayer.
She had lived her life healing others. She had never harmed a soul. Yet, heaven seemed intent on crushing her. First the war, then the bandits, and now... this demon.
The man, unsatisfied with her silence, leaned in, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper.
"As for your daughter... I know a place. Rich men in the Land of Fire pay well for young stock. Since you love ninja so much, maybe I'll sell her to one?"
The woman snapped. The despair in her eyes ignited into a feral, white-hot hatred.
"You animal!" she shrieked, straining against the ropes until her wrists bled. "I curse you! Even if I die, I will haunt you! I will tear you apart from hell!"
She lunged, baring her teeth, trying to rip out his throat.
The man only laughed harder, the sound booming off the wooden walls.
"Is that so? I've never tasted a ghost before. I wonder if they scream as nicely as you do."
Outside, under the cover of the mountain's shadow.
Aokawa hadn't run to escape. He had run to find his range.
The cabin was too small. At close quarters, with a fusion rate of barely 10%, he couldn't manifest a weapon fast enough. Within seven steps, the missing-nin would have gutted him before he could draw a single breath of chakra.
He needed space. He needed time.
And he needed the enemy to think he was a coward.
The deception had worked perfectly. Inside the cabin, the man's guard was down, drowned in lust and arrogance.
Aokawa skid to a halt beneath the canopy of a large oak tree on the slope.
Byakugan.
The veins around his eyes didn't bulge yet—he was too weak—but his vision shifted. The cabin walls turned translucent. He could see the chakra signature of the man, burning bright and ugly, completely ignoring the outside world.
Aokawa raised his right hand.
Focus.
He pushed his chakra into the Quincy Cross brand on his hand. It flared with a pale blue light.
In the ninja world, there were no Spirit Particles. So he pulled from the earth. The air around him hummed as Nature Energy rushed toward him, wild and heavy.
A bow materialized in his grip.
It wasn't physical wood or steel. It was pure energy—blue-white, crackling with unstable power.
Heilig Bogen (Sacred Bow).
Aokawa took a deep breath, suppressing the tremor in his hands. This wasn't a simulation. This was his first kill in a new life.
He drew the string.
Creak...
The energy bow expanded, growing until it was nearly as tall as he was. The air distorted around it.
Aokawa channeled every scrap of chakra he had recovered into his left hand.
Condense. Compress. Solidify.
An arrow of blinding white light formed on the string.
Heilig Pfeil (Sacred Arrow).
It buzzed with a low, menacing hum. The Nature Energy made it volatile, harder to control than standard chakra, but far more destructive.
He had to be fast. The moment the arrow left the bow, it would begin to dissipate. Distance was his friend for safety, but his enemy for power.
He locked onto the target through the wall. The man was distracted, his back turned, savoring his victory.
Aokawa's eyes narrowed. Cold. sharp.
Release.
BOOM!
The string snapped.
The arrow didn't just fly; it erased the air in its path. A streak of blue lightning tore through the night.
It hit the cabin wall.
The wood didn't splinter; it disintegrated. The arrow punched through the exterior like a cannonball through wet paper, losing none of its velocity.
Inside the cabin.
The missing-nin was grinning, his hand reaching for the woman's kimono.
Suddenly, every hair on his body stood on end.
A primal scream erupted in his brain. Death.
It was the instinct of a veteran, forged in a hundred battles. The air pressure dropped. A terrifying intent locked onto him.
RUN!
He tried to move. He began to weave a hand sign for the Body Flicker Technique.
But sound is slower than light.
CRASH!
The wall in front of him exploded.
He saw a flash of blue.
"Wha—?!"
His brain couldn't process the image. There was no pain, not yet. Just a massive, concussive impact that slammed into his chest like a battering ram.
His feet left the floor.
Bang! Crash!
He flew backward, smashing into the floorboards and sliding, leaving a thick, wet smear of crimson in his wake.
He came to a stop against the far wall.
The ninja stared blankly at the ceiling. He felt cold. Why was he cold?
He looked down.
There was a hole in his chest. A perfectly circular, cauterized tunnel the size of a rice bowl. He could see the floorboards through his own body.
His lungs tried to draw breath, but only bubbled with blood.
He looked up, his vision graying. Through the hole in the wall, on the distant slope, he saw the silhouette.
The "coward" was lowering a massive bow of light.
"You... brat..."
Rage, hot and useless, flooded his dying mind.
"You... want to die..."
He tried to push himself up. His knuckles turned white as he clawed at the floor.
But his body had already quit. A wave of heat rushed up his throat, and he vomited a torrent of blood and organ fragments.
The woman froze. She pressed her back against the pillar, shielding her daughter, staring wide-eyed at the monster who had been tormenting her a second ago.
Now, he was just a dying animal twitching in its own filth.
She looked toward the hole in the wall.
He was coming back.
The figure stepped through the ruined wall. The moonlight caught his face.
Hyuga Aokawa.
He didn't look like a hero. He didn't look like a victim. He looked like an executioner.
He crossed the room in three strides.
The ninja was still trying to move, his eyes rolling back. Aokawa didn't speak. He didn't gloat.
He dropped one knee onto the man's neck, pinning him to the bloody floor.
His left hand clamped onto the man's skull, holding it steady.
His right hand reversed the grip on a kunai.
Thwack.
Metal sank into the eye socket. A wet crunch. Silence.
The twitching stopped.
Aokawa stood up slowly. He looked down at the corpse.
He waited for the nausea. He waited for the modern-world revulsion to washing his hands in blood.
It never came.
His heart beat steadily. His hands were steady. The memories of the original Aokawa—the training, the indoctrination—blended seamlessly with his own soul.
So this is the Ninja World.
It's hell.
He wiped the brain matter and blood from his kunai on the dead man's vest, his face expressionless.
Then, he turned.
Blood dripped from his cheek, a stark red tear on his pale skin. He looked at the mother and child, who watched him as if he were a ghost.
He took a step toward them.