Sunagakure did not merely endure the war; it was being slowly, inexorably consumed by it. The conflict raging across the continent was a distant thunder, but its famine-bringing winds had swept deep into the heart of the Village Hidden in the Sand, scouring away any pretence of prosperity. The very air was a punishment, a fine, gritty dust that coated everything – the towering, curved architecture designed to deflect sun and storm, the empty streets, the gaunt faces of its inhabitants.
It invaded lungs with every breath, a constant, abrasive reminder of scarcity. The great shield dome that usually shimmered over the village was perpetually dimmed, its chakra reserves diverted to more critical defences, allowing the oppressive, ochre haze to settle like a shroud. Water, that most precious commodity, was rationed with a severity that bordered on the brutal.
The famed canals that once glittered through the village were now little more than damp, cracked trenches, their meagre flow a closely guarded secret. The war had not brought glorious battles to Suna's gates; it had brought a silent, strangling siege of deprivation.
In a narrow, dust-choked alley where the sandstone buildings leaned together as if for mutual support, the silence was broken only by the mournful sigh of the wind.
"Woooo-osh…"
Most of the shops here were shuttered, their windows boarded up or covered with tattered, sun-bleached cloth. Only two showed any signs of life. In one, two old women huddled over a single, shared bowl of a thin, gritty porridge.
"Another day, another spoonful of sand," muttered the first woman, Aoi. Her voice was a dry rasp, like stones grinding together. Her hands, gnarled and scarred – the hands of a former kunoichi who had once woven chakra strings with deadly precision – trembled slightly as she lifted a meagre portion to her lips.
She didn't eat it; she just stared at it, her eyes, seeing past the gruel to a broader absurdity.
"You'd think by now," she continued, her tone laced with a sarcasm so bitter it could curdle milk, "after so many cycles of this madness, the great minds of the continent would have carved the futility of war onto their very bones. They see the fields burn, the children starve, the rivers run red and then dry… and their only answer is to sharpen another kunai. A collective insanity."
The other woman, Fumi, merely sighed, a sound of profound exhaustion. She slowly, methodically ate her portion, savouring each minuscule bite. "What else is there, Aoi-san?" she asked, "The strong take. The weak endure. It is the shinobi world's oldest song. The notes change – Konoha's hypocrisy, Kumo's brutality, Iwa's stubbornness, our own… desperation – but the melody of violence remains the same. We are just grains of sand in the hourglass, waiting to be buried."
She gestured vaguely with her spoon towards the shuttered windows. "Resignation is the only peace we can afford."
A few doors down, a figure moved with the slow, deliberate pace of the elderly. This was an old man, seemingly bowed by the weight of years and the relentless sun. His face was a roadmap of wrinkles, his eyes hidden in deep shadow beneath a dusty headscarf.
He approached the other open shop, a tiny stall barely more than a hole in the wall, protected by a faded awning that flapped wearily in the wind. Behind a counter of scarred wood stood the shopkeeper, an old woman with a face like worn leather and eyes that had seen too many droughts.
The old man coughed, a dry, rattling sound. "A pack of Desert Blooms," he wheezed. He placed a few worn ryo notes on the counter.
The shopkeeper, Yuriko, didn't move to retrieve the cigarettes. Her gaze was flinty.
"Price has gone up," she stated flatly. "Again. The caravan from the River Country was ambushed last week. That pack is twenty ryo more."
The old man's shoulders slumped.
"Cursed war," he spat, the venom in his tone not entirely feigned. He fumbled in a hidden pocket, adding the extra notes to the pile with a show of immense reluctance. As he did, he leaned forward slightly, "The wind-scoured dune still remembers the shape of the leaf that sheltered it."
Yuriko's hands, which had been reaching for the pack of cigarettes, froze for a fraction of a second. It was a micro-expression, a hitch in her breathing, a slight widening of her pupils before her carefully maintained mask of indifference slammed back down.
Without a word, she snatched the money and placed the pack of cigarettes on the counter. The old man pocketed the pack with a grunt of thanks and shuffled away, his performance complete, leaving the dusty alley behind.
He navigated the near-deserted streets, moving with the ingrained habit of one who knew every crack and shadow. Sunagakure lived in a state of perpetual twilight, not by choice, but by necessity. The frequent, violent sandstorms that battered the village forced its inhabitants to seal their homes, to shutter their windows and to live by the dim, flickering light of oil lamps.
The old man entered a small, single-room dwelling carved into the base of a large rock formation. He moved unerringly to a low table where a single, guttering oil lamp cast a tiny pool of jaundiced light, its flame dancing nervously.
With practised, unhurried movements, he opened the pack of Desert Blooms and took out a single, thin cigarette. He leaned forward, lighting the tip in the lamp's flame.
It caught with a soft crackle, emitting a thin, acrid plume of smoke that did little to overpower the room's other smells. He took a shallow, perfunctory puff, not inhaling, before placing it carefully on a ceramic dish to burn itself out.
His real focus was on the pack itself. His gnarled fingers, which moments before had trembled with age, now moved with surgeon's precision, tearing apart the cheap cardboard lining.
From within, he extracted a small, tightly rolled slip of parchment, no larger than a matchstick.
As he did, a voice echoed not in the room, but directly within the confines of his own mind.
"Shin, you know that you do not need to actually smoke the cigarettes, right?"
Shin didn't startle. His mental reply was as smooth and dry as the desert outside.
"Itoh, the old man I am portraying, was a two-pack-a-day smoker for fifty years. Suddenly quitting, especially under the stress of wartime scarcity, would be anomalous. Suna's counter-intelligence may be stretched thin, but they are not fools. We cannot risk a single thread unravelling."
He unrolled the tiny parchment, squinting to read the minuscule script in the poor light.
There was a moment of silent mental processing from Itoh. A full minute stretched, then, the voice returned, "Did she recognise the phrase?"
"Yes," Shin replied mentally, his focus on decoding the message. "I am certain she did. I was very subtle."
"If you doubt my assessment, you can ask Chuko yourself. I left her out there in the alley, gossiping with another grandmother." He finished reading the parchment, committing its contents to memory before holding the edge to the lamp's flame. It blackened, curled, and vanished into a wisp of ash.
The levity and scepticism vanished, replaced by a cold, hard edge that made Shin's spine straighten instinctively, as a cloud of smoke revealed the elite Root operative beneath.
Itoh's mental voice was now a razor. "Prepare yourself. After sunset, when the third watch changes and the sandstorm from the west reaches its peak, we move."
Shin's eyes, no longer those of a weary elder but of a hardened shinobi, glinted in the lamplight. "Of course," he replied, his mental voice just as hard, just as focused.
"The fate of this war depends on this mission."
=====
Bless me with your powerful Power Stones.
Your Reviews and Comments about my work are welcomed
If you can, then please support me on Patreon.
Link - www.patreon.com/SideCharacter
You Can read more chapters ahead on Patreon