It had been three days since we left the capital. So far, nothing had happened — but I knew it was only a matter of time.
And the reason I was so sure of that was my Byakugan, hidden under the blindfold. I no longer deactivated them. Or rather, after removing the seal, my chakra had moved closer to that of my original body, and that pushed my current bloodline closer to it as well.
So my Byakugan didn't really have the same powered-down state anymore. What normal Hyūga saw when they activated their eyes was now my baseline vision, and once I did activate my Byakugan, it reached a level where it could project chakra.
That still hurt my eyes, but even so, it made sneaking up on me all but impossible.
Which was why I knew we were being followed.
We had been, ever since leaving the capital.
They had no idea they were tailing someone with the Byakugan, so they didn't even do all that much to hide. Sure, they weren't careless — clearly well-trained in stalking — but they were far too close to hide from any Hyūga I knew about.
And they were creepy. Cold and damp, like all life had been squeezed out of them.
The Byakugan saw chakra, and chakra was more than just the energy for ninjutsu; it carried within it one's will.
It was how Zetsu had been born, after all.
So seeing someone's chakra could give you an idea of who they were as a person. If they were wild, their chakra would show that. Calm, their chakra would show that.
These?
These felt dead.
Which meant it wasn't hard to figure out who they were, and who had sent them.
Danzo.
Of course it would be him.
He was the first to act, the most greedy for not just the Uzumaki, but anything and anyone he thought could help him — or was a danger to Konoha.
And I represented both.
He would capture me if he could; Kanna and I would no doubt end up as breeding slaves, forced to make him a new generation of obedient soldiers with powerful bloodlines.
Karin, still being so young, would no doubt end up being brainwashed and prepared to host the Nine-Tails at some point, so that weapon — as he saw it — would end up in his hands, his control, and with it, he would become Hokage.
Or at least, that's what I imagined he was thinking right now.
Well, it was too bad he wasn't here himself, because I wouldn't mind killing that piece of scum. Yet while he was hiding in Konoha, I knew I had no chance.
Konoha wasn't like that Grass village. Those two just weren't on the same level at all.
One had hundreds of shinobi, with the best being normal Jōnin. The other had tens of thousands, with plenty of S-rank mixed in.
If I attacked Konoha now — this early, this weak — I would lose.
I hated admitting that, even to myself. But it was the truth.
And so Danzo felt safe.
Safe enough to send his little worms after me.
Safe enough to assume I would run, or hide, or crumble under numbers.
He truly had no idea.
We continued down the road, the wind rustling through the tall grass, Kanna humming softly to Karin in that timid, motherly way of hers. She thought we were alone.
We weren't.
I had been tracking them for nearly a day now — three teams trailing us in a staggered formation, rotating positions every hour, clearly trained in stealth and pursuit.
And like all his little brainwashed slaves, assassination.
They thought they were hunting prey.
I stopped walking.
Kanna almost bumped into me. "Kaguya-hime?"
"Hold your child tightly," I said.
"My—? What's—?"
"They're here."
The words had barely left my mouth when the shadows shifted.
They emerged silently from between the trees, as if peeling themselves off the bark — faceless masks, blank and emotionless. Grey porcelain eyes stared through us without recognition or hesitation.
Root.
I didn't need to see their insignias to know. Their chakra was enough. No warmth. No voice. No individuality. Just a hollow, poisonous void carved into human shape.
Seven of them.
A reasonable number for anyone who didn't realize what I was.
The leader stepped forward, his voice flat, mechanical — like a puppet reading from a scroll.
"Stand down. You will accompany us to Konoha."
Kanna froze, eyes widening, clutching Karin so tightly the child squeaked.
With my Byakugan, I knew the other two teams were getting into position to attack us if things went sour. From the voice of their leader, I felt complete certainty. He was as sure as one could be that we would follow his commands.
It was madness — but to him, not following orders was the height of madness. Truly, Root was the mad leading the mad.
The operative continued, "The child, Uzumaki Karin, will be taken into custody. The adult Uzumaki will also be secured."
He didn't mention me.
He didn't have to.
Men like him didn't speak to threats.
They eliminated them.
I tilted my head beneath the blindfold.
"You all carry Danzo's scent," I said quietly.
One of the Root flinched — a tiny movement, almost imperceptible.
The leader did not.
"You will comply peacefully," he stated. "Resistance is inefficient and will result in injury."
Injury.
I almost laughed.
"That depends," I murmured. "Are you prepared to lose more than your masks?"
None answered.
Their formation shifted.
Four around me.
Two behind Kanna.
One preparing a sealing jutsu in the back.
Predictable.
"Do not move," I told Kanna softly.
She obeyed instantly, trembling so violently I could hear her heartbeat spike.
The Root leader raised his hand.
"Engage."
They all moved at once.
Six shadows lunged.
Bone tore through the ground beneath me like blooming ivory flowers — jagged, spiraling pillars ripping upward with impossible speed. The earth itself convulsed as my Shikotsumyaku answered the threat with instinctive violence.
Two Root operatives died before they touched the ground, bodies impaled clean through.
A third tried to circle behind me.
A rib burst from my spine and skewered him mid-step.
The sealing specialist threw a tag — only to have a shard of bone tear through his throat before the paper even ignited.
Three remained.
They showed no reaction to their comrades' deaths, to the devastation I had instantly unleashed.
They shifted seamlessly into a coordinated strike — one aiming a kunai for my neck, another weaving silent ninjutsu, the last preparing a paralysis tag.
Futile.
My chakra pulsed.
For a brief moment, the very air around me warped.
My hair instantly grew and lashed out like extra limbs, thick white tendrils reaching for all three of them. Before it reached, countless sharp needles of hair shot forward.
"Rabbit Hair Needle."
My hair rippled like a living storm, tendrils twisting outward before snapping straight — thousands of gleaming white needles bursting forth like a hail of death.
The Root operatives reacted instantly, bodies moving with mechanical precision. One substituted with a log, another flipped backward to evade the first wave, and the last raised an arm to shield himself as paper tags ignited between his fingers.
But my attack wasn't meant to be gentle.
It was meant to kill.
The first operative reappeared behind a tree — and was immediately pierced through the skull as a second volley of needles curved mid-flight, bending as if guided by instinct.
The second tried to weave hand seals, but my hair tightened around his ankle like a snare. A small tug — barely a thought — and his leg snapped with a clean, wet crack. He didn't even scream as the tendril whipped him upward and drove a dozen needles through his chest.
The third — the one with the paralysis tag — flickered behind me with flawless silent movement, kunai raised to strike at the base of my spine.
He didn't reach me.
A bone spear erupted from the ground beneath him, impaling him from pelvis to sternum in a single brutal thrust. His kunai clattered uselessly to the dirt as his body twitched once… then stilled.
Silence fell.
The grass swayed gently again, as if nothing had happened.
Kanna stared at the scene with hollow eyes, lips parted, clutching Karin so tightly the child whimpered. "K-Kaguya-hime… is… is it over?"
"No," I said simply.
Because it wasn't.
My Byakugan tracked them easily — the remaining two Root teams who had been waiting for their commander's signal.
They were frozen.
Not out of fear — Root soldiers did not fear — but out of pure, total disbelief.
Seven operatives.
One perfect strike.
Eliminated in under ten seconds.
Danzo didn't have many elites; he had mostly just Chūnin, who were dangerous only because they were willing to die to fulfill their missions. Most shinobi would be caught off guard by a sudden suicide attack.
Danzo's Root could take down Jōnin and elite Jōnin, but to those beyond that level? Danzo's Root were little more than toys.
Yet Danzo clearly hadn't bothered to tell his men this fact.
The difference between a true S-rank threat and an elite Jōnin wasn't something dedication alone could bridge.
Information could bridge it somewhat, as it allowed one to plan around it, but these Root agents didn't have much information. They didn't know about my Byakugan, so they had no way to know that I was ready for them.
They hadn't seen the bones extend from my legs and spread out around me as I stopped and waited for them. They didn't know that the moment they showed themselves, they were dead.
Nor did the remaining ones know that I saw them — and that I would have them dead.
"Rabbit Hair Needle." Once more, I attacked, my hair shooting countless deadly needles toward their hidden positions as I shifted, just a little. Without so much as taking a step, I showed that I had earned my S-rank reputation.
The trees answered with screams they never got to voice.
The needles tore through bark, flesh, and bone with equal ease. Leaves fluttered down like green snow as bodies toppled out of the canopy, lifeless before they hit the ground.
One operative managed to leap aside at the last second.
A mistake.
Dodging meant he survived long enough for me to focus on him.
A bone blade burst from the ground beneath him, cutting cleanly through his ankle. He didn't cry out — Root agents didn't scream — but his chakra spiked in a sharp burst of survival instinct.
The only spark of life any of them ever had.
I extinguished it.
A twist of my wrist, a shift of chakra, and a bone whip lashed out, wrapping around his midsection. It tightened just enough to crack ribs before dragging him violently across the dirt.
He tried to stab at the bone. Futile.
A single hair needle pierced his throat, and he went still.
The last one — the farthest, the slowest, the one who hesitated when the others died — bolted.
For a brief moment, I considered letting him run.
Letting him carry the message back to Danzo, letting him deliver the fear himself.
But no.
Danzo needed to learn something important.
Not through rumor.
Through loss.
A bone spike erupted from the earth fifty meters ahead, timed perfectly. The fleeing operative landed on it mid-step, momentum carrying him forward until the spearhead pushed out through his back.
He twitched once.
Then nothing.
The world fell silent again.
Kanna trembled, her breath shallow, eyes darting from corpse to corpse. Karin, sheltered against her shoulder, stared wide-eyed but oddly calm — too young to understand, too innocent to fear.
I dusted a needle from my sleeve.
"Now," I said, voice even, "it is over."
Kanna let out a breath she didn't realize she'd been holding. "You… you killed them all…"
"If I had not," I replied, "all three of us would be on our way to Konoha right now — in chains."
Kanna swallowed hard. "But… will they send more?"
I turned my head slightly, blindfold shifting with the motion.
"Oh, absolutely."
Even standing in a field of dead Root, I felt no urgency. No fear. Only annoyance.
Danzo's reach was long.
But his understanding?
Laughably short.
(End of chapter)
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