It didn't take long before Karin and Shizune were playing with little Tonton, while Kanna watched over them.
Even if Shizune was a few years older than Karin, they still played well together, mostly because Shizune hadn't really had a chance to play with many kids her age, due to being dragged around by Tsunade. So even if Karin was a bit younger, Shizune was just happy to have another kid to play with for once.
That left Tsunade and me to ourselves, and gave us a chance to talk.
"You know," Tsunade said as we looked at the two playing children, "I heard about you a few years ago, when you went and saved them from Kusagakure… Good job."
I merely nodded in response. "They deserved better than that."
Tsunade sighed at that. "I can only imagine their fate if you hadn't helped them. Two women with bloodlines like that? They don't often have a good ending."
Clearly, Tsunade didn't need someone to explain to her that even life on the road was far better than what one might get in a village if they had a precious bloodline and no ability to protect themselves.
She was, after all, a kunoichi herself, so she knew the dangers. And while I didn't go to the academy myself, I was still taught all about what could happen if you got captured alive.
"Kusagakure didn't know how to care for their treasure, and they had far more greed than common sense, trying to capture me as a breeding project, so I figured I would punish them for it," I explained briefly.
"What do you intend to do now? I expected you to stay put when I heard you had become a guard for the Daimyō; that man is smart," Tsunade asked.
I took a moment before I answered her. "I have things I want to do, goals I need to achieve, and I can't achieve them while staying in one place."
"What about them? Do they have a role in your goals?" Tsunade pushed.
I didn't mind the interruption, because I could hear it in her voice—the care, the concern, the kindness that made her choose the hard and difficult path of a medical-nin.
"I plan to train Karin; she has plenty of potential. As for Kanna, she has little, and her time in Kusagakure ruined her spirit; she doesn't have what it takes to fight." It was sad, but it was true; even now, Kanna still remained unable to stand up for herself.
The wounds she had suffered were something that even time couldn't easily heal.
Trauma was indeed the hardest of wounds to heal; even Tsunade herself, the best healer in the world, suffered from trauma.
"Isn't she too young for that still?" Tsunade asked, as she watched Karin play innocently with Tonton, acting fully like a happy civilian child—one free of worry, one whose world hadn't touched the darkness of the shinobi world.
"She is young, yes, and too young for much training, but she is old enough to learn how to use chakra. That's the key. Once she has mastered that, she can learn more," I answered softly.
Tsunade nodded once. "That makes sense, but even still, having someone that young follow you around—being a rogue shinobi isn't easy, nor is it safe, and certainly not suited for children."
What she said made sense, that much I could admit. "You aren't wrong, but what else should she do? I will not sacrifice my own goals, so either I leave her somewhere, or I take her with me—and where is safer than next to me?"
Tsunade didn't have an immediate answer. Her gaze drifted back to the children, a flicker of old pain crossing her features before she masked it with her usual stoicism. The snort of a tiny piglet followed by a peal of Karin's laughter seemed to pull her back from a dark memory.
"Safe is a relative term in our world," she conceded, her voice lower now, stripped of its earlier challenge. "Next to the legendary Kaguya-hime is probably the safest place for someone with a kekkei genkai. But safety isn't the same as a childhood."
She turned her full attention back to me, her amber eyes sharp and discerning. "What are these goals, then? What's so important that you'd drag a child through the blood and mud for it?"
I let the silence stretch for a moment, weighing my words. The wind rustled the leaves of the trees above us, and the setting sun cast long, dancing shadows across the ground.
"Many years ago, my sons turned against me, and they took something from me, sealed it away, and now, I want it back," I answered her honestly—or as honestly as I could get.
Tsunade couldn't help but do a double-take at my words. I could feel her eyes on me more closely, fully inspecting me.
"You? You have children? And adult ones? You don't look all that much older than that Kanna over there; in fact, I would say you look even younger. And you have adult children?" she said, looking at me in disbelief.
I was not surprised by her reaction. I did, after all, look rather young—and I was young. This body wasn't old at all, even a few years younger than Kanna. And thanks to my chakra slowly molding this body to be closer to my true form, slowly strengthening my bloodline, I hadn't aged a day in the past three years.
"I do indeed have children—three sons in all—with two of them long gone, and the third, the youngest, out there, waiting for me to return." I knew she wouldn't—couldn't—understand, but I didn't mind.
Tsunade indeed didn't understand the truth, as there was no possible way she could. But she also didn't feel me lying, and she believed in herself, in her ability to know when someone was lying to her face.
So she took my words as true. "Damn," she said, sounding impressed. "What is your secret? How do you look so young?" she asked me.
I couldn't help but chuckle at that. "My bloodline has a unique trait, that's all. So I'm afraid that I can't help you there," I said.
She sighed at that. "That's a shame," Tsunade said, a genuine, wry smile touching her lips for a second. "Though I shouldn't be surprised. The truly good secrets are never for sale."
She shook her head, as if to clear it of the tangent, her focus sharpening once more. "Alright, let's circle back. Your sons sealed something away from you. What was it?"
I gently shook my head. "That is a secret."
Tsunade clicked her tongue. "Well, can't blame me for trying."
I appreciated her directness. It was a quality I valued, a stark contrast to the webs of deception I so often navigated.
"Anyway," Tsunade continued, "you have already guessed that someone arranged for us to meet here, so I might as well ask, and hope that it will make him back off." She paused for just a moment. "What do you think about Konoha?"
I turned my head slightly, listening to Karin's laughter, the soft snorts of Tonton, the sound of grass crushed beneath careless feet.
"Konoha is also a village built on compromise," I went on. "On sacrifice. On the quiet understanding that someone will always pay the price so that others may sleep safely."
Tsunade's jaw tightened.
"You mean like every village."
"Yes," I agreed. "Which is why I don't trust any of them."
She huffed—wanting to disagree—but she understood where I was coming from, where I was going. She herself had seen the darkness of the village, and it had turned her away.
Her love for Konoha was strong; it was the village her clan had built. Her beloved grandfather had founded it, her grand-uncle had given his life for it, her brother, her lover, and everyone she cared about had given their lives for the village.
How could she not understand the essence of it?
The village is a great black hole, devouring others to stay alive, to grow.
Even the Will of Fire said it: that some must burn for the tree to grow.
It was built on sacrifice.
"Konoha wouldn't do anything, wouldn't expect anything from them. They owe that much to the Uzumaki clan, and if necessary, I would bring them there myself, and tell the old man that he shouldn't try anything," Tsunade said firmly.
I couldn't help but turn my head to look at her, shocked that she was willing to go to the village. Even if it was only for a short visit, the fact that she was willing to do it spoke for itself.
Yet I could only shake my head. "The very fact that you feel you have to go there yourself clearly shows that, deep down, you know the village has problems. For the good of the village, they would be pressured. Even if not forced, what would the difference be when they can't say no?"
Tsunade sighed deeply, hanging her head low.
"…You're not wrong," she admitted quietly.
That alone was more than most would ever concede.
She straightened again, folding her arms, gaze distant. "Konoha has always been good at justifying itself. Turning pressure into duty. Calling sacrifice 'choice' and pretending that makes it clean."
Her fingers clenched slightly. "I walked away because I was tired of watching good people burn and being told it was for the greater good."
I nodded once. "And that is why you survived."
That earned a short, humorless huff. "That, and a lot of alcohol."
Our attention drifted back to the children again.
Karin was laughing now, genuinely laughing, as Tonton chased her in clumsy circles. Shizune hovered nearby, half-playing, half-guarding, unused to responsibility that didn't involve bandages and medical charts.
"They're happy," Tsunade said softly.
"Because someone is willing to make the sacrifice for them," I countered gently, letting my words sink in.
Tsunade flinched, the truth of them hitting harder than she'd expected.
"I don't know if I would call it sacrifice… I honestly feel that Shizune is the one sacrificing her childhood for me," she whispered.
"That's one way to look at it, but we would be far freer without them—yet we still take them along, walking at their pace. That too is a sacrifice. We are strong, and we sacrifice for the weak; that is what gave birth to Konoha, an idea you still embody."
That earned a long silence.
Tsunade didn't argue.
She couldn't.
Instead, she watched Shizune kneel to let Karin climb onto her back, laughing as the girl clung on like a little parasite, Tonton squealing in outrage nearby.
She shook her head, lips pulling into a tired smile. "Damn it. You make it sound noble."
"It is noble," I replied.
(End of chapter)
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