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[A/N: We have reached a new goal. we crossed 1000+ collections. Thank you all.]
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A few shinobi blinked. Her voice wasn't hostile. It was just blunt and a matter-of-fact. Like a child correcting an adult on something trivial.
The instructor tried again. "Benihime. Where exactly are you registered?"
"Registered?" She tilted her head. "I'm from Genbu Island. My father never let me leave. I wanted to see the outside, so… I left."
A ripple of unease went through the instructors. Genbu wasn't exactly a civilian zone. It wasn't even meant to be accessible any of the shinobi. Only few know of its existence.
The future Raikage stepped forward and extended his fist. He didn't overthink it. He didn't care about her odd behavior. He only cared about one truth: she had matched his speed and landed a hit.
"From today on, we're partners till death."
She paused, then bumped her fist lightly against his.
"Am I? That sounds fun. You're strong. I don't mind."
Green B exhaled in relief. The Second Raikage simply nodded. Destiny sometimes wore a strange face, but when it arrived.
--
Darkness. Pain he couldn't quite place.
The Third Raikage's eyes opened to a world swaying back and forth. It took him a moment to understand he wasn't standing... he was in liquid of cocoon on Killer Bee's back.
Wind roared around them as Bee sprinted along the mountain ridge, his sandals slapping against stone with desperate urgency.
The Raikage tried to speak, but his throat felt scorched. His skin still hissed faintly with residual black lightning burns, each breath scraping against a chest that felt heavier than usual.
Bee spoke without slowing down.
"Oh good, you're awake. Gyuki says you're hanging on by stubbornness alone, yo'. Dontcha worry."
The Raikage managed a low sound, half a growl, half a cough. He remembered everything... His last move... the Black Lightning Hell series: Hell Rampage, the forest, Hashirama's regeneration struggling to keep up. The desperate sealing. The price he had paid for tapping that level of power.
And the pain. The terrible, bone-deep pain of pouring life force into a technique not meant to be used by mortals.
Bee kept running. His breaths were controlled, but his arms trembled slightly from the Raikage's weight.
"Octopus-bro can stabilize you for now," Bee continued. "But he needs a safe place. Master's the best bet. She can treat you while Octopus-bro reinforces what's left of ya life force."
The Raikage's vision blurred again. He forced it steady. He wondered how bad it was... how much his body had cracked, how much black lightning residue was still eating at him from the inside. Bee wouldn't be this frantic otherwise.
The path narrowed, forcing Bee to leap across a long ravine. Despite carrying a man twice his size and three times his muscle mass, he cleared it without hesitation.
The Raikage closed his eyes. He wasn't afraid of dying. But he hated the idea of collapsing before a battle was truly finished.
He forced his voice out, raspy and faint. "Did we win?"
Bee nodded and said using his normal voice. "Yeah. You did it, Raikage-sama. But you almost died doing it. Don't do that again."
The Raikage didn't answer. Mostly because he didn't have the breath. Partly because he knew he would do it again if needed.
As Bee sprinted toward Kumogakure's distant silhouette, the Raikage's thoughts wandered back... unbidden... to a different mountain plateau, years ago. To a girl with a pacifier. To a fist bump that marked a lifetime alliance.
Benihime. His Bee. His partner.
She'd kill me if I die now... I miss her, he thought.
And despite the agony threading through his body, the Raikage almost smiled.
--
The sea around Genbu Island never stayed quiet. Waves didn't crash violently, but they hummed... a low, constant vibration that felt like it came from the island's bones. The mist in the air clung to skin and clothes alike, and the light that filtered down from the clouds always seemed a little dimmer than it should be.
Benihime liked it that way.
She stood barefoot on the soil, holding a naginata lazily across her shoulder, pacifier moving up and down in her mouth with each slow bite. Her lean, wiry muscles shifted under her skin with the easy precision of someone who had long since mastered their body.
She had lived back in her birthplace, letting her husband handle village politics. But for the past ten months she had to deal with something more delicate.
A jinchūriki. A very determined one.
Across from her, restrained by an elegant but brutal combination of chakra chains and suppressing seals, Kushina sat on a stone slab carved directly into the island's ridge. Her hair was longer now, thicker too, from the months of combat conditioning she hadn't expected to be forced into. Her breathing was steady. Her eyes sharp and her chakra calmer than it had been in years.
Benihime tapped the edge of her naginata against the rock.
"You're still planning to escape," she said, tone flat, as if stating the weather. "Ten months and counting. Or worse, release the fox and hope the mess kills us before it kills you. You know that won't work."
She tilted her head, pacifier shifting.
"Or maybe you're still hoping your prince will swoop in and save you with that seal he placed on your ass. Strange spot. Creative man, I must say. I would have never known if not for little one telling to check your body for a seal."
Kushina's jaw tightened. She didn't rise to the bait. Ten months had taught her that Benihime didn't get angry if provoked; she just got bored, and bored Benihime meant unpredictable Benihime.
She'd learned the hard way.
The first month was nothing but constant fighting. Kushina had gone berserk. She'd let the Nine-Tails leak through her chakra pathways until her body felt like molten metal. She'd used technique after technique... adamantine chains, water style, fire style... everything she could weaponize.
Benihime had broken every attempt with the same annoyance someone uses to swat mosquitoes.
By month two, Kushina had tried subtlety. Quiet chakra twists. Micro-break patterns in her restraints, hoping to wear them down over time and trying to unseal the fox completely in a last-ditch gamble.
None of it worked. Later, she placed her own seal on top of Eight Trigrams Sealing.
--
A/N: Kushina also improved fighting against benihime for close to a year.
aizenDuchiha0 said:
The FTG (Flying Thunder God) mark he had placed on Kushina during that spicy night still burned in his mind
Minato, sure is a man of culture to put the FTG seal on such a spot.