The walk had been long. The boat ride, even longer.
Mist drifted like smoke across the still surface of the water, curling around their legs as they stepped off onto land. Kaguya's sandals pressed into damp earth—soft, spongy, and nothing like the stone paths of Konoha. She stood still for a moment, uncertain.
This was her first time outside the village. The stories she'd heard growing up in the orphanage, the training fields, the missions she imagined—all of it had painted a world that was larger, louder, brighter. But here? Everything was silent. Wet. Grey. The air clung to her skin, heavy with moisture, thick with the scent of moss and old wood.
She looked around slowly, taking in the swaying trees, their trunks half-swallowed in green lichen. The canopy was too high, the sky hidden in fog. Shadows clung between branches like waiting hands. It was a strange feeling, walking through a place that hadn't been carved and shaped by familiar footsteps. She wasn't used to the unknown pressing in from all sides.
Each step sent cold dew brushing against her ankles, and she felt it too vividly—her senses unfamiliar, raw. Her body still didn't feel like hers, not completely. It moved differently. Quieter. Her hair brushed her back when she turned her head, too long, too light. She missed the weight of her old self. She missed knowing who she was.
"So, Tazuna-san," Sakura's voice cut through the silence, too loud in the mist, "what's your village like?"
The old man didn't turn back. "Peaceful, once. Now? It's just surviving."
Kaguya's gaze flicked to her teammates. Kakashi moved like he always did—easy, unreadable, but with a quiet alertness in the way he watched the path ahead. Sasuke walked just behind Tazuna, his eyes scanning the trees, hand resting near a kunai pouch. Sakura trailed close behind, brushing her wet bangs out of her eyes.
None of them said anything about her anymore. Not directly. But she caught their glances when they thought she wasn't looking. She could feel the gap between them widen with each step they took into the unknown.
And the world... was unknown.
She hadn't expected it to feel so different outside the walls. The sounds were strange—no shouting vendors, no clanging of forge hammers or rushing footsteps. Just birds, far off. The splash of water. The creak of wood as the boatman pushed off behind them.
Her fingers twitched at her side. She thought about activating her Byakugan, just to get a better sense of what lay beyond the mist—but something held her back. She didn't want to see too much. Not yet.
Not while she still didn't know what she was becoming.
A cold breeze whispered through the trees.
She stopped walking.
There it was again—that hum beneath her skin. Faint. Like chakra brushing against chakra.
Kakashi halted. One hand lifted in signal.
"Stay close," he said quietly.
The fog thickened until it felt alive.
It wasn't natural anymore—this wasn't just morning mist from the sea. It was heavy, deliberate. Chakra-laced. Kaguya could feel it coiling around her like fingers, seeping into her lungs, muting every sound.
Then, just like that, the forest went quiet.
No birds. No wind. Nothing.
She stopped moving.
Ahead, Kakashi's voice dropped low. "Everyone. Get down."
She obeyed instantly, crouching, her heart suddenly hammering against her ribs. It wasn't panic. Not exactly. It was something tighter, colder. Like an instinct waking up. Sasuke dropped beside her without a word. Sakura hesitated for half a breath, then mirrored them.
Tazuna froze. "Wh-What is it—?"
A sound sliced the air.
Steel, massive and spinning—whistling through the mist like a thrown executioner's axe.
It embedded itself in a tree a few meters from them, the trunk splitting with a hollow, cracking groan.
And then... someone stepped out of the fog.
No—stood atop the embedded blade, like he belonged there. His presence alone made the air heavier. Tall, broad-shouldered, wrapped in dark wrappings and bloodlust. A large sword—that sword—rested in the wood beneath his feet. The bandages over his lower face made him look more weapon than man. And across his forehead, the symbol of the Hidden Mist—slashed clean through.
Kaguya's breath caught.
She'd seen that face before—not in person, but on paper. Page 73 of the bingo book, left side. The sketch hadn't done justice to the weight of his chakra, but she remembered the name:
Zabuza Momochi.
Missing-nin. Former member of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen of the Mist. Known for silent killing techniques and a kill count that had earned him the nickname Demon of the Hidden Mist.
She hadn't realized names from the bingo book could step out of the fog like this. That they were real.
"So," the man said, his voice like gravel dragged across stone, "which one of you wants to die first?"
Sakura's breath hitched. Sasuke's eyes sharpened. Kakashi hadn't moved.
Kaguya didn't blink.
The name, the sword, the presence—it all lined up. But it didn't feel distant, like it had when she flipped past the page during training. Now the bloodlust crawled across her skin. Her chakra stirred on its own, an involuntary twitch beneath the surface
Zabuza didn't move.
Neither did Kakashi.
The air was a taut thread stretched between them—one that could snap with the slightest motion. Kaguya crouched low in the wet grass, every sense on edge. Her fingers curled in the dirt. The mist pressed in like a second skin, and somewhere deep in her chest, something stirred again—like a door creaking open in a house she didn't remember entering.
Kakashi's voice broke the silence, calm and absolute.
"You three protect Tazuna. I'll handle this."
No one argued.
Then, with practiced ease, Kakashi reached for the band of cloth covering his left eye.
Kaguya watched, wide-eyed, as he peeled it back.
Beneath it, glowing faintly red in the mist, was an eye unlike any she'd ever seen—three tomoe spinning in a sea of crimson. The air seemed to hum around it.
Her breath hitched.
That eye—something about it itched in her memory, like a loose thread she couldn't pull free.
Sasuke, beside her, spoke quietly.
"That's the Sharingan. A dōjutsu," he said. "It's a bloodline limit of the Uchiha clan. My clan."
A pause. His voice softened, almost resentful.
"Though he's not one of us."
Kaguya didn't respond right away.
The Sharingan. That name stirred something, but not from lectures or scrolls. Something older. She felt like she'd seenthat eye before—somewhere hazy, long ago. Not in training, not in books.
A face? A crowd? A memory of standing beside someone with eyes like that, watching her from the shadows?
Was it before... the massacre?
Did I see it as a child?
She couldn't tell. The memory was too far gone, half-sunk under other thoughts, other lifetimes.
But it made her feel cold.
Not afraid—just... disconnected. Like she was watching a scene she'd already lived once before, in a dream that didn't belong to her.
Zabuza's smile widened. "Well, now this is getting fun."
And then he was gone—vanished into the mist without a sound, like he'd never been there at all.
Kaguya blinked. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears..
The fog swallowed everything.
She barely made out Sasuke crouched nearby, and Sakura gripping her kunai behind them. Even Kakashi was gone, his chakra just a faint pulse somewhere in the haze.
Then came the voice.
Low and calm. Close enough to feel on her skin.
"Eight points," Zabuza said quietly.
"Liver. Lungs. Spine. Clavicle vein. Jugular. Kidneys. Heart. Brain."
"Which one do you want to lose first?"
Kaguya's chakra surged without her thinking.
Her eyes burned.
She activated her Byakugan.
Her vision expanded—wide and clear. But the mist wasn't natural fog. It shimmered with chakra, thick and twisting, distorting everything she tried to focus on. Shapes blurred, movements warped.
Even with Byakugan, she couldn't see clearly.
He's using the fog to confuse even me.
Zabuza's voice came again, closer this time.
"If I strike from behind, you won't have time to scream."
Sakura gasped. Sasuke's grip tightened on his kunai, eyes searching the fog.
Kakashi's calm voice cut through.
"Don't listen. That's part of the technique."
Kaguya strained to track Kakashi's chakra, but even that flickered and shifted in the mist.
Suddenly, Kakashi moved—a flash of movement barely visible—clashing steel with something darker and heavier.
The sound of blades ringing out echoed through the trees, sharp and sudden.
Kaguya stayed low, trying to steady her breathing.
She didn't understand the technique, but she felt the danger—how the mist warped perception, hiding the attacker and forcing them to guess
A sharp clang echoed through the mist as Kakashi's kunai collided with Zabuza's massive executioner blade. The force behind the swing was overwhelming, but Kakashi's grip remained steady, his wrist flexing to absorb the pressure.
The heavy sword's momentum dragged Kakashi backward, but he pivoted on his heel, turning the pull into an advantage. With a swift motion, Kakashi slashed his kunai upward, aiming for Zabuza's exposed side.
Zabuza barely flinched. He blocked the strike with the flat of his blade and responded with a brutal horizontal swing aimed to cleave Kakashi in two.
Kakashi rolled beneath the blow, the sharp edge slicing through the air inches above his head. Springing to his feet, he propelled himself forward, launching a rapid series of strikes—kunai flashing like silver lightning through the haze.
Zabuza parried each one with ease, his movements precise and fluid despite the blade's weight. Then, with a sudden step forward, he closed the distance and swung the sword in a deadly arc.
Kakashi twisted, barely avoiding the slash, and countered with a well-placed kick to Zabuza's knee. The strike connected, forcing Zabuza to stagger, his blade tilting dangerously close to the ground.
Kaguya's eyes narrowed, focusing on the subtle shifts in their chakra signatures through the obscuring fog.
Zabuza recovered quickly, spinning the executioner blade overhead before driving it down in a crushing overhead strike. Kakashi blocked with the flat of his kunai, arms straining under the impact.
Without hesitation, Kakashi stepped back, his Sharingan eye flickering as he analyzed Zabuza's patterns. He darted forward again, this time feinting a strike to the left before sliding low and aiming a sweeping kick at Zabuza's legs.
Zabuza leapt back, evading the sweep, then disappeared into the mist for a heartbeat.
A moment later, the fog parted with a spray of water as Zabuza materialized behind Kakashi, swinging his blade in a deadly backhand.
Kakashi twisted sharply, catching the blade's edge with his kunai once more. Sparks flew.
The two fighters locked eyes, breath misting in the cold air.
Neither backing down.