"You're absolutely impossible." Tsunade had long since accepted she'd never truly get a read on whatever chaotic nonsense was spinning inside Azula's skull.
Azula smiled like she'd just been handed a compliment. "Thank you."
"Seriously, though." Tsunade's tone shifted. "You didn't, by any chance, just threaten the Daimyō, did you? Because I just saw Sensei, and he didn't say a single word about stepping down."
'Would be hilarious if Azula just announced Hiruzen resigned and the Daimyō already signed off on it,' Tsunade thought. She'd pay good money to see Koharu's face, that old witch loved sticking her nose into business that wasn't hers.
Azula reached up, idly running her fingers through Tsunade's hair. "I came back so late precisely because I had to 'convince' Hiruzen to resign. Which he did, of his own free will, I might add. If that meeting hadn't just wrapped up, I'd have already announced my inauguration as Hokage."
She paused. "Still. Even if it happens tomorrow, it doesn't change much. Just a little... sad, I suppose, that Akiko gets to be the first female Kage among the five great villages. I would've liked that title for myself."
Tsunade stared up at her, eyes flat with exasperation.
"If she heard you right now—" She stopped, searching for the right word and coming up empty. "You know what? Never mind. She probably wouldn't do anything anyway. But you destroyed her village, forced her into an unfair treaty, and the only thing rattling around in that head of yours is some meaningless title?"
Azula looked down at her, utterly serene. "Isn't that exactly why you're head over heels for me?"
The question was purely rhetorical and it left Tsunade with absolutely nothing to say.
•••
(Tajima's POV)
I wonder how this'll end up, I asked myself, thought deep down, I already know the answer, but here's an interesting question. Can Hiruzen last a week against my daughter?
With the way she seems completely determined to get the position, probably not.
But then thinking about something, I couldn't help but frown. Today, Asami wasn't in the house.
The original premise was since me and Azula are going to the meeting very early, she planned a visit to her remaining friends alive.
This means the house is all for myself, something that's quite rare, after all, it's not every day I have the honor to enjoy wine instead of tea (As for Fugaku, who is he?).
I know when she comes back, she will complete about it, but it's for the greater good, it's to dispel the sorrow that my daughter doesn't trust me.
"Am I a bad father?" I let the question hang in the open air instead of burying it inside my skull where it usually lived.
Because if I'm not, then why doesn't my own daughter trust me enough to tell me she awakened her Mangekyō?
Did she honestly think she could hide it from me? Something I unlocked long before she ever drew her first breath?
The more I drank, the lighter I felt, even knowing full well it was just an illusion I could shatter anytime I wanted.
My Mangekyō... I awakened it during the clan conflict.
All I wanted was to bridge the gaps between us, to let us actually talk to one another instead of circling each other like wolves.
My first technique lets me link the chakra of others and pull them into my own spiritual space. Because of that, I'm absurdly sensitive to the chakra signatures around me.
If someone has so much as a single Tomoe in their Sharingan, I know the second I lay eyes on them.
Azula's always been the exception, something about the nature of her Yin chakra makes her damn near impossible to read.
But when she used the Flying Thunder God technique, her chakra slipped its leash, probably meant to intimidate Hiruzen, Danzō, and the rest.
I felt the difference. Compared to when we attacked Kiri... it's unmistakable.
I'm one hundred percent certain she's awakened the Mangekyō.
•••
Tajima had let himself get carried away by that feeling of 'freedom' for hours, right up until Azula came home.
From her perspective, she'd just walked through the door and found her father in a state she'd never seen him in before.
It wasn't that he never drank.
Sure, he was a tea man through and through, but every now and then, when a comrade died, or the anniversary of one rolled around, that sort of thing, he'd pour himself something.
But even when he was mourning, he never let himself sink this far. He hadn't even noticed her standing there.
'What could possibly put him in a state like this?' she wondered, her face more serious than it had been facing down Hiruzen.
She understood, on a bone-deep level, that nothing in this world mattered more than family. Not even the Hokage's seat.
Titles were power, sure, but that's all they were, llusions.
Unfortunately, no matter how hard she racked her brain, she came up empty.
So she announced herself. "Ahem."
That was all it took for Tajima to snap back to something resembling sober.
"Azula, huh?" He tried to play it off like nothing was wrong. "When did you get back?"
That only made her stare at him harder. Then, without a word, she sat down beside him.
Azula didn't like drinking. But she spent enough time around Tsunade, and she was a shinobi besides, so it wasn't like she'd never touched the stuff.
Different from her usual approach, she poured herself a cup before downing it. The actions might've seemed trivial, but Azula had a sharp mind for psychology.
What she'd just done?
Tajima wasn't going to be thrilled watching his daughter drink, but it would pull him a little closer and make him drop his guard just enough.
She'd noticed how tense he'd gotten the second she announced her presence, like he was hiding something he desperately didn't want her to know.
"So. Can you tell me what's got you in this state, Father?" She asked, cutting straight to the heart of it.
'She noticed, huh?' Tajima thought, though deep down he knew, with her powers and observation, there was no world where she wouldn't have noticed after finding him like this.
He raised a hand, ready to wave it off, to tell her to drop it. Then he paused.
He remembered exactly who his daughter was. The kind of person who would tear through anything to get what she wanted, who never stopped until she had it in her grasp.
If she wanted to know, no amount of deflection would save him. She'd push until the truth came out. He let out a long, tired sigh.
After a moment's thought, he asked her something else entirely. "Tell me, Azula. Was I a good father to you?"
Of all the responses she'd been expecting, that one clearly hadn't made the list. For a split second, she looked like her brain had short-circuited.
"What kind of question is that?" she demanded. Then, without a shred of hesitation: "Of course you were. If you weren't... only I know what I would've become if I'd been raised by another man."
She remembered that man and that woman from her first life. If her father hadn't been Tajima, if he'd been someone else, someone like him, layered on top of a past life on Earth where familial love had been nothing but a distant fantasy...
She didn't even want to imagine what she'd have turned into. Stronger, maybe, with no chains left to hold her back.
But far more likely? A hollow shell without feeling or attachment. Just a slow, inevitable drift into complete apathy.
(END OF THE CHAPTER)
Otherwise, what do you think of an Azula with her memory on Earth raised as an orphan or a family that didn't care about her in the ninja world? I strangely feel she'll be stronger even if she was born in a civilian bloodline without Sharingan and resources, because an Azula only concentrated on herself with her meta knowledge would be too terrifying.