The fire had turned into a trail of cold ash, and the air inside the cave was so frigid that every breath hurt the lungs. Haku opened his eyes, shivering, and found him in the same position as the night before: sitting against the rough stone, the Kubikiribocho resting against his shoulder. The man looked like a statue of iron and bandages. As soon as the boy made the slightest noise while sitting up, he opened his eyes. There were no greetings or words of comfort for the hardness of the ground.
"Eat. We need to move," he said in a dry voice, tossing him a piece of dried meat hardened by the cold.
They ate in silence, barely interrupted by the roar of the wind hitting the cave entrance. They stepped outside under a snowfall that barely allowed visibility beyond a few meters. The North Blue had no mercy. They didn't walk far before he raised a hand, signaling an immediate halt. He crouched, examining the snow a few meters from a ridge. There were heavy boot prints and the black trail of a poorly extinguished campfire that the wind had not yet managed to cover.
"Shroud Island soldiers. They've found the bodies in the square," he commented with a coldness that rivaled the weather. "They think I'm a demon they can hunt."
They moved cautiously among the frozen trees, using the trunks as cover. The journey toward the coast was a dance of shadows until the path crossed with a patrol of three men trying to shelter from the wind behind a crag. Before the soldiers could react, the mist enveloped them completely.
It was a swift and silent execution. The man slid between them like a specter; a horizontal slash of the heavy blade split the first in half, staining the snow a violent crimson. Without breaking his momentum, he spun on his heels and delivered a blunt strike with the sword's pommel, shattering the second soldier's skull before he could even raise his rifle.
He knocked the third man down with a kick, pinning him to the frozen ground with the weight of his boot on his chest. The soldier, a youth barely past his teens, gasped in terror. The man looked at Haku and gestured with his chin toward a knife hanging from the belt of one of the corpses.
"Take it," he ordered. "A weapon that has not tasted blood is a useless piece of metal. Kill him."
Haku hesitated. His fingers closed around the cold handle of the knife as his gaze jumped from his master's relentless face to that of the soldier pleading in silence. But the boy remembered the cold of the square, the hunger, and the kicks that had marked his ribs days before. He understood that, in this world, there was only room for the one who struck first. He stepped forward and, with a trembling but determined motion, drove the steel home. The man under the boot stopped struggling, and silence reclaimed the forest once more.
"Let's go. We need supplies and a ship. We can't stay on this rock forever," he said, turning away without showing any emotion.
The final journey toward the harbor was a test of endurance. Visibility was near zero, allowing them to avoid two more patrols shouting orders in the distance, but upon reaching the docks, the atmosphere changed drastically. The air felt charged, heavy. The hair on Haku's arms stood up, and an electric crackle, like an impending storm, broke the silence. The smell of ozone was so strong it stung the nose, choking out the natural scent of salt and snow.
A man with spiky hair and light clothing that defied the winter blocked access to the main pier. He played distractedly with two daggers that gave off constant blue sparks.
"Raiga," Zabuza growled, tightening his grip on his sword until his knuckles turned white. "Still Bastion's lapdog."
"And you're still a traitor with a sword that's too big," Raiga laughed, as his body vibrated with the energy of the Static-Static no Mi. "He promised me a fortune for your head, and you know I don't like letting a good deal pass by."
Without warning, Raiga lunged forward with superhuman speed. But his attack was not frontal; he bypassed Zabuza and headed straight for Haku. The blue streak of his dagger aimed for the boy's neck to end the fight before it even began. Zabuza reacted, interposing the mass of the Kubikiribocho to block the impact. The clash of metal sent a shower of sparks that scorched the snow and the wooden floor.
"Haku, find a vessel! Move!" he ordered without looking back.
The battle became a chaos of steam and electricity. Zabuza tried to dissolve into his mist form to flank his opponent, but the static Raiga emitted acted like an invisible net, ionizing the air and forcing his body to stay solid and vulnerable. In a quick exchange of thrusts and slashes, one of Raiga's daggers bypassed his defense. The electrified steel cut deeply into his shoulder. The pain was sharp and searing, a real burn that pierced through his flesh and sent spasms throughout his arm.
He roared in pain, more out of fury than the damage, and countered with an upward slash so powerful it shattered the wooden dock floor, sending splinters and debris toward Raiga, who was forced to retreat. He took advantage of that single second of distraction to vanish into a thick curtain of mist and retreat toward the small sloop where Haku was already frantically releasing the moorings.
He leaped onto the deck just as the boat began to pull away from the pier, pushed by the grey tide. As Raiga's silhouette faded into the blizzard raging on the coast, he gripped his wounded shoulder. Hot blood stained his bandages.