The Land of Frost is exactly what it sounds like, a place where even your thoughts feel cold.
It's famous worldwide for weather that makes you regret existing outdoors, and as if that wasn't enough, it shares a border with the most aggressively territorial village in the Ninja World: Kumogakure.
Tucked deep inside this frozen wasteland, just a stone's throw from the Land of Lightning's border, Kumo-nin are already scattered around like uninvited guests who refuse to leave.
The main camp is barely a kilometer behind them, and they're technically on patrol duty. But even if they are ninja, patrol duty in this weather is less about vigilance and more about surviving until lunch without losing a toe to frostbite.
They're not exactly worried about an attack. Konoha? Come on.
According to them, Konoha's Hokage is the kind of guy who apologizes to chairs he accidentally bumps into. A pacifist through and through. So yeah, no chance those leaf-huggers are showing up.
"Tsk. This is so boring," one of them groaned, dragging his feet like they were made of lead. His name is irrelevant, but his attitude is not. He's a Chūnin. They all are, five of them, freezing together in a brotherhood of misery.
Another one sighed dreamily. "Honestly? I'd rather be wrapped around Nanami right now than standing in this frozen hell."
Nanami. Just the mention of her name made all five men pause, exchange glances, and break into the kind of greasy smiles that would make any respectable person uncomfortable.
Memories of good times flooded back.
A third ninja nodded vigorously. "For real. Kento and the rest back in the village are probably living the high life right now. So unfair."
The first guy smirked. "Pfft. You guys can keep dreaming. Me? After today's patrol? I've got Michiko waiting. Warm, soft, eager Michiko."
He said it on purpose. And sure enough, the envy in the air was so thick you could cut it with a kunai. Michiko was a catch—beautiful, smart, and way out of most Chūnin's league.
But well, among the five of them, he's got 'future Jōnin' written all over him. In about five years, when he's in his mid-twenties, he'll probably make it.
Michiko's just betting on the right horse.
What none of them noticed was the two women walking toward them with Konoha headbands in an area where the only living things for five kilometers should've been them and maybe a very lost rabbit.
Azula, for her part, was very happy.
This little scene confirmed something she'd been suspecting for a while: her Yin Release was getting dangerously good.
A few years ago, she could project her thought to reality and now, she's basically a bootleg version of Kyōka Suigetsu, able to manipulate what people perceive through scent, sound, sight, even the subtle flicker of her Sharingan as long as her Yin Chakra affects them.
She can make them smell smoke, hear whispers, see things that aren't there. It's like directing a movie inside their skulls.
But she calls it a 'castrated version' for a reason. If someone figures out they're under her spell, all they have to do is disrupt their chakra flow, surge it suddenly, and poof, illusion gone.
And Kumo-nin coincidentally love Lightning Release, which is basically nature's way of saying 'screw your genjutsu'.
Lucky for her, these five idiots weren't just unaware, but they were also lazy, distracted, and mentally undressing Michiko instead of being alert.
Neither Azula nor Tsunade wasted breath on nonsense.
One moment, five Kumogakure shinobi were doing their patrol route, the next moment, they were very, very dead.
Azula claimed three before their bodies hit the snow, Tsunade took two, and the only sound was the soft thump of fresh corpses decorating the landscape.
"From this point forward," Azula said, watching the steam rise from her fingertips, "every second that passes is a second they might figure out we're here."
Which was funny, because they hadn't exactly been trying for subtlety. It's just that slaughtering a few scouts before the alarm got raised seemed like common courtesy. Why waste a perfectly good tactical advantage?
Tsunade nodded, though inwardly she was already doing the math. Azula was being optimistic, and Tsunade had seen enough battlefields to know optimism usually meant someone was about to die horribly.
Here's the thing about ninja, even lazy ones on a boring deployment in the middle of nowhere. You give them a job, like patrol duty, they usually do it. And when five of them suddenly stop checking in, they notice it pretty fast.
The Kumo camp noticed.
They just didn't have time to do anything about it.
Because Azula and Tsunade moved through that forest like the Four Horsemen decided to show up early for dinner, painting the white snow red with anyone unlucky enough to cross their path. One hit, two hits, done. Clean, efficient, and absolutely terrifying.
"They're just ahead."
Azula's familiar smirk appeared as the tree line began to thin. Tsunade braced herself for whatever waited beyond.
Turns out, what waited beyond was a lot.
The trees gave way to an open space that wasn't really open at all, not with the sheer volume of Kumo-nin spread out before them like a convention for people who really hated visitors. Tsunade's blood went from room temperature to ice water in about half a second.
Following Azula into enemy territory, she thought bitterly, best decision I never actually made.
From within that sea of enemies, a figure emerged. D, commander of the main Kumo force while the Raikage was off doing whatever Raikages did when they weren't home. He looked at the two women standing at the forest's edge like they were particularly amusing insects.
"What guts," he called out, voice dripping with something between admiration and disbelief. "Two brats actually attacking our camp. I'd say you're either the bravest shinobi in the world or the stupidest."
Azula ignored the compliment-slash-insult entirely. "Where's the Raikage?"
Her sensing abilities had already told her he wasn't within fifteen kilometers, but she wanted to hear it from someone who knew.
D tilted his head. "Why would a dead person need to know about A-sama?"
Smooth words. Confident delivery. But here's the thing about D—he wasn't stupid, far from it. He knows Azula had escaped from the Raikage himself, completely unscathed.
She had that Flying Thunder God nonsense that let her teleport wherever she wanted whenever she wanted. You couldn't kill someone who could simply decide to leave the moment things got spicy.
Unless.
Unless she couldn't react fast enough.
Unless it was a one-hit kill.
Unless she got arrogant.
And weren't the Uchiha famous for exactly that?
D's eyes lit up with the beautiful warmth of a man who just found his opponent's weakness, which stunned Azula for a while.
(END OF THE CHAPTER)
It's two in the morning, feeling so sleepy but I delivered my promise of a chapter after iftar, although it's short, hope you enjoyed it.