Kin Tsuchi
"Have you ever wondered…" the boy mused absentmindedly, staring at nothing in particular. "What does the world outside this facility actually look like?"
Kin gave him a sideways glance. Kentarō was always a strange child. Though she supposed that was to be expected from a genius. They were all messed up in the head, more or less.
"Hell do you mean 'what'? It's… normal! Duuuh."
Kentarō's eyes widened with genuine curiosity. He leaned in close, far too close, studying her face like she was some rare specimen under glass. "Hoo? You lived outside before?"
A shiver of disgust crawled down her spine. 'Too close shitstain, I can smell your breakfast!' She shoved his face away with her palm, pressing hard against his cheek.
She pushed his face away with her palm. "You thought I was born here? Fucking came out of a tube? Been artificially made out of a single wank stain? What kind of dumbass question is that?"
She clicked her tongue, then snickered, roughly ruffling his hair with both hands as if searching for brain damage. "Oh my poor Kentarō-kun… did I hit your head too hard last session?"
He blinked at her, opening and closing his mouth like a stranded fish before slapping her hands away in playful irritation. His gaze drifted toward the other two boys currently trying to beat each other unconscious a few meters away.
"Very well then," he said, a playful smile on his lips, voice overly formal and dramatic. "would you be so kind as to indulge your poor, ignorant teammate? Tell me what you remember."
Kin twirled a senbon between her fingers, humming softly as she considered the question. After a long, teasing pause, she finally spoke.
"Well, I was born in the Land of Rice, where I lived until my parents were killed by shinobi. Most of it were lush, verdant green wetlands and rice paddies. It was undeveloped land cause big nations used it as battlefield, pa said as much… I think. All the villages nearby were mostly dilapidated and abandoned."
She shrugged, eyes distant. "There were rumors about hidden enclaves and mazes where clans allied with Konoha lived, but I never saw them. We stayed far away from that shit."
Kentarō listened in complete silence, eyes unfocused, as if he were painting her words directly onto the barren training grounds in front of him. When she finished, he gave a small, respectful dip of his head.
"Thank you."
Kin flicked her wrist lazily, sending a senbon whistling through the air toward Zaku. The needle streaked straight at the back of his head while he was busy trading blows with Dosu.
Zaku barely twisted in time, smacking the senbon away with a loud clang. He whipped around with a murderous glare, eyes burning with irritation.
"The fuck, Kin?!"
She stuck her tongue out at him, grinning like a brat. "Missed you~"
Before Zaku could return fire, Dosu stepped in mercilessly. A brutal hook powered by the Echo Resonating Speaker slammed directly into the side of Zaku's face with a deep, vibrating thoom.
The sound-enhanced punch lifted Zaku clean off his feet and sent him crashing sideways into the dirt.
Kin couldn't help but laugh, sharp and wicked, as she watched Zaku eat the ground. "Too slow, idioooot."
She turned to Kentarō again, a playful smile on her lips. "Why are you so interested anyway? Want to run away?"
"Yes."
The blunt response and the firmness behind it caught her completely off guard. Her smirk froze and slowly collapsed.
"I want to explore the world outside," Kentarō continued, voice soft but steady, "when I'm strong enough. I want to step through those gates, dive headfirst into everything out there, and swallow all of it. The beauty, the ugliness, the blood and the wonder. I want my eyes to drink into it until they have enough, Kin"
A gentle, almost serene smile touched his lips as he looked straight at her.
"That is my first little dream."
Kin stared into those bottomless black eyes and felt something twist in her chest. There was no end to their depth. It made her wonder if there was truly any limit to just how much they could swallow. Every time she thought she was starting to understand him, he revealed another layer she couldn't reach.
'...Just when I'm this close to figuring out your thoughts… your mind turns into a lock, and I'm getting the combination wrong yet again.'
Not long ago, she had held similar dreams. She imagined herself unleashed upon the world, moving mountains, drowning armies, carving a path of glory for Orochimaru-sama. She had been so arrogantly certain of her own brilliance.
Then this complete newbie showed up and crushed her in a handful of training sessions.
For a brief second, hot envy coiled in her gut like a venomous snake. He had it easier. A genius. Favored. Guided by the Sannin's hand. But before the feeling could sink its fangs in too deep, Kin crushed it mercilessly, smothering it with memories they spent together as a team.
She would be lying if she said she didn't feel a tiny bit grateful to him. While she lost to her teammates, Kin only felt it right as they were strong in their own fields, just like she felt confident in genjutsu.
She was grateful to him. Just a little. Though she would rather die than admit it out loud.
That was why she didn't mock his dream. Didn't laugh in his face and tell him how quickly the outside world would chew him and spit him out. Everyone has a right to dream.
And while she liked to think Kin would be there to help him or their teammates out in need, she had her own dreams to chase, even if the path didn't seem so straightforward anymore.
Oblivious to her thoughts, Kentarō grinned. "Why the sour face, Kin?" The boy poked her forehead with two fingers. "I should drag you to the Land of Laughs someday."
Before she could retort, he was already jogging toward the other two boys, joining them at what the boys did best.
Beating each other up into pulps.
Kin released a helpless sigh, looking fondly at the four absolute buffoons strangling themselves to death and thinking of ways to keep them all alive without sliding her own dreams aside.
'After all, it's my job as his senpai to make sure this dumbass doesn't repeat my mistakes…'
Shooting another senbon at them and charging like a mad gorilla, a fifth buffoon too joined the chaotic fray, and it wasn't until some hours later that this strange bunch went their separate ways.
Kentarō
One of the little things that remained quite clear in the fog of memories from his previous life, was Kentarõ's very unique relationship with inanimate objects.
Oftentimes he would experience how ridiculously spiteful those can be. The sleeves of his shirt would be catching on the door handles every once in a while, small things like keys would hide from him just so he could waste time playing hide and seek with them for like 30 minutes. Don't even let him get started on his nemesis, the corners of the doorframes that would mesmerize his small toe, so he could nail it with full impact, like ship full of reckless sailors heading straight at the isle full of sirens.
So, it was not that surprising, when he did not show much bewilderment as one of his cell walls decided to simply fucking disappear, and be replaced with a set of sturdy iron bars.
At the very least, it was a way less disturbing explanation than potentially being drugged, dragged away from his cell in his sleep, and dumped in some dark corner like a bag of potatoes.
A shaky breath left him in a visible puff of cold air. He staggered forward and examined the bars. They looked ordinary enough, except for the tiny crystalline blue fragments clinging to the metal's curvature like a frost. He wrapped his cold hands around them. Despite the chill against his palms, he felt a warm and pleasant sensation creep its way from his hands straight down into the lower section of his belly.
It was easy for him to recognize this feeling.
'Chakra…'
His eyes swept across the space beyond the bars. It was a circular arena, spinning roughly forty meters wide, its floor covered in pale sand that glittered under cold bioluminescent light. Strange blue crystals protruded from the high ceiling like inverted stalactites, pulsing faintly in time with his heartbeat. The entire place felt cold, lonely, and hauntingly beautiful, in its own unique way. Like the deepest trenches of the ocean, lit only by the strangest creatures that dwelt within.
Encircling the field was a high wall, built with lime bricks and painted in faded orange hue that once could match the intensity of the crystalline light. Patches of damp sand clung stubbornly to its base, while a series of evenly spaced cells were embedded within its curvature, giving him a unclear view of its insides; each one like his own.
Each having a human silhouette within.
'Oh on Orochimaru's sneaky tits.' Kentarō lamented in his mind. 'I know where this is going and sure as fuck I don't like it.'
It was of course the trial he had long expected. Unfortunately, in a form of battle royale.
He narrowed his eyes when his vision finally cleared fully. Most of the other prisoners were still slumped on the floor, either asleep or pretending to be. But it didn't take long for panic to spread like wildfire. Some began pacing frantically inside their cells like caged birds that grew too fond of flying.
He gave them no more thought. Few of them simply sat in silence. Those were the ones that caught his eye. They leaned against the bars or sat cross legged on the stone floors, either watching and appraising others much like himself, or staring distantly at one point.
Some even looked bored, as though they had seen all of this before and had long since run out of new ways to feel about it. Their calm was not comforting; it was unsettling, as if they knew something the newcomers did not.
Welp, not so fucking good, innit?
'I will watch out for those...'
What was left of his grogginess disappeared when a loud, static beep echoed through the arena. The bars of his cell sliding open.
Kentarō stepped out cautiously. All around him, other children did the same. Within half a minute, nearly everyone stood exposed on the sand.
He gave a wary glances at the two people at his sides, both of them seemed anxious, overly so. Their hands trembling, foreheads already full of sweat.
All of the children, along with himself stood rooted, waiting for the signal.
It came eventually, and Kentarō froze as he heard the deep and cold, unfamiliar voice spread throughout the field.
"Kill and die, until only one remains."
If there were any doubts left in his mind, they soon dispersed. At the other end of the arena, a kid a few years older than himself, with a green, wild mane of hair pounced upon his neighbor like an animal. He bit into the neck of the much younger opponent, piercing and ripping out the tender flesh, before spitting it out. The boy then rushed to the closest pray, giving the crying child no more thought.
Kentarō, like many others, watched in shock as the tears slid cheeks of the now grounded boy, as he desperately tried to stop the rivers of blood flowing out his neck.
In a matter of moments, a great chaos took over as everyone jumped to each other's throats, slaying, mangling and incapacitating each other in all sorts of creative ways.
Sounds of crying, screams and laughter filled Kentarõ's ears. He somehow managed to catch a faint sound of footsteps amongst the cacophony of despair. Setting the anxiousness that weighed in his gut like a hundred stones aside, he turned to the right. Taking the viper stance, he deflected the frantic strike of his opponent with pure instinct. He looked Kentarõ's physical age, with dark short hair, and wide blue eyes that were overwhelmed with fear and dread.
He catched the next strike with an ease, internally calming himself down through practiced deep breaths. Even under the pressure, his opponent's skills were too low and wobbly to affect his own performance.
With a slow exhale, he lunged for the joints in his arms, looking to reduce the defence capabilities of his opponent before going for any lethal strike.
He hunched over the desperate kick aimed at his head. Kentarō caught it mid-movement, trapping the boy's own leg with his hand and hoisting it high, leaving him teetering on sole foot as he struggled to gain balance.
Kentarō pushed the leg abruptly to the side, and slammed his elbow on the knee of his opponent. What followed was a yelp of pain, a short distraction he needed to launch two viper strikes one after another that caught the respective joints above the elbows.
Kentarō finished him with a stab towards the dent in the throat.
It hit, and not a moment later, the dark haired kid lied on the ground, with his hands clutched against his throat, trying to catch a breath.
Through the rush of adrenaline, Kentarō's mind went terrifyingly calm.
'Good.' He managed to save his chakra, at the very least. Though from all he learned through the constant sparrings; the taijutsu still was the sole thing he felt confident in, with genjutsu lagging a long breath behind in second place.
The hesitation and tension long gone, his whole body and mind working like one, driven through pure automatism.
He turned his attention to the battlefield, surveying it and calculating. Already half of the contestants lied there unconscious or dead. He searched for an easy opponent, while staying close to the wall, preserving his strength.
He found none, the weakest ones already got themselves killed.
His senses alerted, and only due to sheer luck he managed to avoid getting hit in the head with a flying kick. Kentarō locked eyes with his opponent and his eyes widened, before narrowing with a cold glint.
It was a kid he took down. Now though, it was not fear and anxiety that radiated from his eyes, but sheer determination and will to live, though his breathing seemed to be a little rough.
He did not waste time to berate himself, instead, Kentarō ducked under a second jab, and delivered another strike to the throat; only for it to miss after the desperate tilt of his opponent's head, that made the boy lose his balance.
Kentarō used his adversaries' reduced vision to hit him in the abdomen with an elbow. A groan later, he followed up with an uppercut, once again downing his opponent.
This time however, he had to make sure he stayed in his place. No more mercy.
"Sleep." He delivered punch after punch to the face, until nothing but bloody mess remained.
Even then he could hear the faint sound of breathing.
Kentarō growled in frustration. 'WEAK!' His mind blasted through the multitude of methods to make him stay down, until a memory of the beginning of the fight appeared in his mind.
Dispensing the thoughts of disgust, he savagely bit onto his opponent's throat, ripping out the tender flesh with his teeth. He stood up, spitting out the bits of skin and meat, not giving a glance at the dying person below him.
His blank gaze moved to the right, as he judged the threat of the new challenger approaching him at a fast pace; a girl, a savage grin plastered on her face.
The other, quite older kid swung at him with a sharp end of broken skeletal material that looked like a femur bone. Kentarō ducked under the piercing strike, he hopped behind her back, and pressing his palm against the ground; he delivered a high wheel kick to her spine as hard as he could. The kid stammered to the ground, releasing the bone shard from her grasp. Unfortunately, his body didn't have the strength for such a strike to be lethal.
Still, it brought him time to make a hand sign, as he would be at disadvantage in close combat with a more physically developed opponent.
Another hand sign followed.
The kid quickly stood up, launching herself onto Kentarō. She struck true to the throat with a viper strike. It felt like pressing a knife straight through the hot butter.
Her grin of victory disappeared as soon as Kentarō turned into a puff of smoke. A hand passed through the smoke and a sharp pain came from the front of her throat. The very same bone shard that she had ripped out from the corpse; was now pierced through her larynx.
She fell down onto him with a gurgle. Kentarō held her body up, feeling the air shift around him, Kentarō hugged the dead girl, his hand discreetly messing with her face.
'My chakra is depleted so much just with two jutsu.' Kentarō frowned as he looked at the fresh corpse. He had created a clone, and messed with her senses with genjutsu. Fueling the desire to kill, he used it to focus her attention on the copy while he hid behind, making her forget about the bone dagger and misjudge his clone as his real self.
'Note; find a way to measure chakra. Maybe through clone technique? I need to use up all my reserves later to test my limits.'
Now, about one fifth of his chakra reserves were gone, just like that.
He again made a hand sign for the body replacement technique and another genjutsu, lowering his reserves to two thirds.
'I need to find a way beyond physical stimulation to enlarge it.' Kentarō stopped the flow of his chakra, and the illusion around him dispersed, revealing another boy, this one of fragile build, attempting to pluck out his left eye.
The red haired boy got a hold on the eyeball and swiftly ripped it out. He opened his palm and the eye with a black iris turned into the green one with a small puff of smoke.
What stood before him now, was not Kentarō but a corpse of the girl with a pierced throat that instantly fell to the ground with a thud. He got only a moment to reign in confusion before he felt a firm chokehold from the back. His vision twisted violently, before turning completely black.
Kentarō let go of the corpse. With his reserves meagre as they were, he still had enough for a few bouts if he kept them short. 'Or maybe it's just my chakra control that is not up to the standard?
'Either way, I need to thank Kin and Dosu for teaching me about genjutsu.' He noted in his mind. Kentarō took a long time in-between sparrings to learn that forbidden technique Dosu and Kin seemed so fond of.
The results were amazing, as he now could influence the senses of his opponent more than one way, as long as they weren't better than him in genjutsu.
He gambled here with that girl, but it paid off.
Kentarō finally turned around, only to see bodies upon bodies scattered around the field creating an image of absolute carnage. The air stanched of piss, shit and death. He analyzed the battlefield, catching numerous patches of sand mixed with water and blood, along with small mounds of earth that weren't there earlier.
'Elemental jutsu. Not good but within expectations.'
Only nine participants remained still standing. Seeing that nature transformation was at play, Kentarō did the only reasonable thing while facing such opponents.
He released two layered genjutsu upon himself and his surroundings, in hopes of hiding and learning the extent of their abilities while they killed each other off.
As soon as he did that, a senbon was thrown his way, followed by a sound of approaching footsteps at a quick pace.
Kentarō did not have the leniency to lament the waste of chakra as he dodged a series of incoming projectiles that came after him one by one, while the other boy closed the distance.
Just as he was about to pounce on the kid and rip him to shreds, his opponent made a few quick hand signs and spit a smear of mud which captured his foot below the ankle, sticking it to the ground hiding beneath a thin layer of sand.
Kentarō's mind raced while he fell forward, senbon swishing just above his hair. With his hands supporting his weight, he slid his foot from the boot that flowed in crescent motion through the air, delivering a cartwheel kick with all the power his little body could muster.
A grunt of pain left his lips as senbon pierced his heel.
Seeing him injured, the movement of his strikes no longer as precise as earlier; the other boy decided to indulge in a bout of taijutsu, being confident enough to preserve his chakra for later.
Kentarō left behind a trail of blood as they fought, exchanging strike after strike. Though injured and tired, his superiority in close quarters was clear to see, there was still no clear winner between the two even while the fight dragged on.
The savage grin on the boy's face faded as minutes passed by, replaced by a tired frown while his lips pursued in annoyance. As minutes passed by, Kentarō caught several glances of his eyes that fell on his injured foot.
Kentarō lashed out with a flat of the hand to the liver that was reflected with the palm of the grunting kid. It took him by surprise when instead of retaliating, the child interlocked his hand with his own, mimicking the snake hand seal.
What's supposed to follow, were two more hand signs he used earlier to unleash the mud jutsu.
Kentarō relaxed his fingers and let him manipulate the hand freely.
Boar. Ox.
He prepared mentally for the pain and memories he despised, while pouring his whole chakra in, fueling the jutsu further. The rage, hate and loathing, sorrows and downs of a grown man filled and overwhelmed both Kentarō and the unsuspecting child. The tears of anguish slid from the brat's cheeks, though was it from the myriad of negative emotions or the huge lump of mud that stuck in his throat as he grasped for air; Kentarō did not know nor cared.
With no opponent to occupy his attention for now, he noticed numbness that took a root in his leg and slowly spread upwards. 'Oh, that's why he was so upset. The poison did not work as fast as he hoped for.'
Kentarō turned around from the corpse he finished with a senbon through the eye, his gaze settling on the last foe that remained; a silver haired kid, chuckling his way and playing with a freshly ripped out heart in his hand.
"You sure took your time here." The brat giggled, throwing the organ under Kentarō's feet.
He didn't dare to look at it, his eyes remained glued to the white haired boy.
All Kentarō gave him was a neutral stare.
"Boooring!" He pouted, though the bright glint in his eyes exposed nothing but amusement.
Blank eyes of black ink held the deep blue ones of the ocean in a tight deadlock, before both of them pounced upon each other without a word.
One silent with a cold glint gleaming in his eyes, not fit for a kid so young, while the other laughing like an innocent child at the playground.
The final bout has just begun.