The heavy iron doors of the central tower courtyard clicked shut behind my back with a dull, metallic echo, sealing off the safe haven of the command center. I maintained a stone-faced posture until my ninja sandals took three dragging paces down the gravel path, completely clearing the field of vision of the Third Hokage and Anko.
The moment the thick undergrowth swallowed my outline, my stoic expression completely faltered, my jaw tightening as the intense, blinding agony from my upper left thighbone flared directly into my hip. I leaned my entire weight heavily onto the carved wooden staff in my left hand, my knuckles turning white against the polished wood as the raw pain made my vision blur.
"Holy motherfucker! I hurt so fucking bad!" I hissed aloud into the quiet morning air, a long, ragged breath escaping my teeth as a cold sweat instantly burst across my forehead.
I stood frozen against a massive cedar trunk for three long heartbeats, my teeth grinding together so tightly that the pressure rattled the bones of my jaw. The extraction wound felt like an active branding iron buried deep within my muscle, a throbbing reminder of the price I had just paid to tear my master away from the Sannin's grasp.
I slowly forced my body forward, dragging my heavily bandaged left leg through the thick ferns while my amber-green eyes scanned the dark, humid canopy above for any signs of movement. According to my memories of the original story, the timeline was shifting rapidly toward the lower trenches where Naruto and the rest of Team Seven were currently resting inside a hollow trunk.
I knew with absolute certainty that Team Ten and the hidden Sound squads were destined to clash in that exact clearing, and I wanted to get there before Ino's naivety caused her body and soul to be severely injured.
Despite her constant, annoying boasting about her love for Sasuke, she was still my childhood friend from the neighborhood, a girl I had known since we were both pulling weeds in the academy courtyard. I refused to let her get broken by a group of ruthless experiments from the Sound Village simply because she didn't understand the true weight of a life-and-death struggle.
I centered my mind's eye, weakly forcing a small trickle of energy through my pathways to activate the basic principles of Toxic Extraction Awareness. My internal body was running a dangerously high fever caused by the severe trauma of the cell extraction, leaving my immune defenses completely compromised and unable to handle large chakra amounts.
The botanical Yang Style sensory pulse unspooled sluggishly through the damp tree roots, my mind tracking the faint, distant scent of scorched earth and broken iron traveling from the eastern ravine. The air in that direction felt heavy, thick with the chemical residue of active explosive tags and the burning smell of fried hair that always accompanied a Sound ninja's trade.
I pushed my body into an uneven run, my breath coming in short, feverish gasps as the fresh movement caused a dark, wet stain of blood to rapidly bleed through the white medical bandages under my trousers. Every single step felt like driving a rusty kunai straight into my upper left thighbone, but I forced my mature filter to block out the physical feedback, keeping my eyes fixed on the path ahead...
The morning mist began to thin out as I descended into the lower trenches, the distant sound of shattering glass and heavy physical impacts echoing off the high stone ridges. The intense fever had left my mind feeling entirely delirious, the tall trunks blurring together like a wall of green paint while my skin burned with a dry, unnatural heat.
I dragged my torso through a thick patch of briars near the edge of the central clearing, my ninja sandals sinking into the soft mud as my eyes finally focused on the chaotic battlefield scene unfolding across the dirt.
Sakura was on her knees near the mouth of a massive hollow tree, her pink hair jaggedly cut and her face covered in heavy bruises, her hands trembling as she desperately raised a single kunai to protect her unconscious teammates. Ino was standing directly in front of the Sound trio, her fingers locked into the hand seal of the Mind Transfer Jutsu while she used Kin's captured body as a human shield.
"Don't move another inch, you freaks!" Ino shouted fiercely, her voice shaking with pure desperation as she held her stance against the remaining attackers. "If you try to blast us, your own teammate takes the exact same damage!"
Zaku merely let out a sadistic, scoffing laugh, his mechanical arm tubes positioning directly toward her chest with an unyielding, predatory amusement. "You think we care about a stupid hostage? In our village, failures are completely disposable!"
I didn't waste a single split second on useless dialogue, my sandals stumbling over a massive cedar root as I pushed my heavy build past the treeline into the open clearing. I reached into my waist belt pouch with a trembling hand, pulling out three specialized senbon needles that I had coated in a heavy, paralyzing botanical poison back at the apothecary shop.
I hated using standard shuriken for open combat trades, preferring the silent, surgical precision of long needles when my energy reserves were running completely dry. With a final, agonizing twist of my hip, I forcefully launched the three silver needles straight across the clearing before my balance completely failed, my body falling forward into the dirt.
The three senbon cut through the air with a faint whistling sound, burying themselves deeply into the neck muscles of Zaku, Dosu, and Kin with absolute precision. The fast-acting paralytic mashing through their blood vessels instantly froze their motor skills, causing the three Sound ninja to lock up like stone statues, their arms dropping uselessly to their sides as the toxin took full effect.
Shikamaru’s sharp mind immediately assessed the sudden shift in the battlefield setup, his dark eyes widening in total shock as his shadow expanded across the soil. "Ren?!" Shikamaru barked out, his fingers swiftly changing into the rat seal to activate his Shadow Possession Jutsu, locking the three paralyzed enemies firmly in place to ensure they couldn't twitch or fight off the poison.
"Choji! Form a defensive circle right now!" Shikamaru commanded loudly, his sweat-stained face twisting with a sudden, intense panic. "The Sound guys are completely frozen, but Ren is bleeding out!"
The sudden paralysis of the enemy squad allowed Ino to safely cancel her technique, her consciousness snapping back into her own physical body without taking a single drop of feedback damage. She collapsed onto her knees for a brief second, her lungs gasping for air as her mind reoriented itself within her own flesh.
The moment her blue eyes locked onto my bloody, trembling leg and the burning fever flaring across my face, her breath caught completely in her throat. "Ren!" Ino screamed, her voice completely cracking with a sudden, horrifying panic as she abandoned her defensive posture to rush straight across the dirt to my side.
Choji moved instantly to position his heavy build in front of our huddle, his arms raised to function as a physical shield while Ino frantically tore open her medicine pouch to apply basic battlefield first aid to my hemorrhaging thigh. Her hands were shaking violently as she pressed a clean white cloth against the deep wound, her heart hammering against her ribs as she felt the immense, unnatural heat radiating from my skin.
"Hold still, Ren! Please, just hold still!" Ino sobbed softly, her fingers turning red as the warm blood continued to seep through her bandages. "What did you do to yourself?! Why are you out here running through the forest in this condition?!"
Sakura let out a heavy, breathless sigh of pure, overwhelmed relief, her knuckles tightening around her kunai as she dragged her bruised body to stand right in front of me and her unconscious teammates. A deep mix of profound gratitude and bitter guilt twisted inside her stomach; she couldn't understand why another classmate had pushed through a deadly fever just to throw a saving blow for her team, and she swore she wouldn't let anyone else get hurt on her watch.
The comfortable relief in the clearing vanished instantaneously as a suffocating, freezing purple chakra suddenly erupted from the mouth of the hollow tree, the raw malice of the energy causing the surrounding grass to wither instantly. Sasuke Uchiha stepped slowly out of the shadows, his entire left shoulder and face completely covered in the dark, twisting flame markings of Orochimaru’s Curse Mark.
His eyes were glowing with a terrifying, unholy light that radiated pure, misdirected rage, his physical posture carrying a cold, predatory pride that made the onlookers freeze in absolute terror.
"Sakura," Sasuke murmured, his deep voice dropping into a distorted, chilling frequency that sounded completely demonic. "Who did this to you?"
He stepped into the bright moonlight, his gaze scanning the clearing until his eyes locked onto the scene of Team Ten huddled over my bloody, feverish form, while the three Sound ninja stood completely frozen and helpless under Shikamaru's shadow lock. The overwhelming confusion of his rage driven mad by the Curse Mark made him perceive everyone as an immediate threat, his dark chakra churning the dirt beneath his sandals as he walked up to the paralyzed Zaku like a predator approaching a trapped prey.
Because the Sound trio couldn't actively fight back or boast due to my poison, the absolute lack of a struggle made Sasuke's subsequent actions feel even more cold-blooded and horrific to watch. He calmly stepped behind Zaku, planting his sandal firmly onto the boy's shoulder blades before grabbing both of his arms and pulling them backward with a sharp, sickening crunch that echoed violently through the quiet woods.
"Sasuke! Stop! Please stop!" Sakura screamed fiercely, tears streaming down her bruised cheeks as she ran forward to forcefully wrap her arms around his torso from behind, pressing her forehead against his back. "The fight is already over! Ren saved us! Please don't become a monster!"
The raw, desperate urgency of her weeping pleas combined with the sight of my bleeding state finally caused the dark purple markings to recede, the malicious chakra dissolving back into his skin before Sasuke collapsed flat onto the dirt from total exhaustion. Dosu managed to force a few words past his paralyzed vocal cords, his teeth clicking as my remaining poison held his muscles in a tight grip.
"We admit... complete defeat," Dosu rasped out weakly, his dark eyes staring at the fallen Uchiha and the unconscious Leaf boys. "We will leave our Earth Scroll... on the dirt. Just let us retreat from this place."
Shikamaru slowly released his shadow lock, allowing the three broken Sound ninja to painfully gather their equipment and vanish into the deep canopy, their retreat leaving the clearing completely silent once more.
When the dust finally settled, our remaining group was left in an incredibly desperate tactical alliance, facing a long night with three unconscious or exhausted boys packed into a single camp.
We huddled deep inside the hollow tree trunk for hours, Choji keeping a strict watch near the entrance while Ino and Sakura worked continuously to nurse me through the intense extraction fever. Ino used a damp cloth to gently wipe the heavy sweat from my brow, her blue eyes filled with an uncharacteristic, tender worry that she had never shown to anyone outside of her old crush.
As she watched my stoic, calm features remaining rock-solid even while my body was writhing in physical agony, her heart began to shift slightly, the old childhood bond reawakening with a fierce, confusing intensity that left her torn between her superficial crush and the handsome strength of the guy currently bleeding on her lap.
I opened my amber-green eyes for a brief, delirious second, my deep voice dropping into a flat, ragged whisper as I looked up at their tired faces. "The person... who did this to my leg... was Orochimaru," I gasped out slowly, my vital energy stabilizing the scraped bone before my mind drifted back into a deep, healing sleep.