"I'd heard before that Lady Yugito Nii and that kid had some rumors going around about them. Setting everything else aside, that kid really can run. Back during the Chunin Exams, he was as slippery as an eel."
Several ninja whispered among themselves. They knew how fast Moriyue was at running away, and that had all been a long time ago. Now, the guy could only be even faster.
"So he really showed himself just to bring Lady Yugito Nii's body back? Then that means..."
Someone believed they had pieced together the truth. Looking at Moriyue's slightly hollow, vacant eyes, a complete story unfolded before them.
A young man who had made a name for himself in war and drawn the attention of every nation began an endless life on the run. Covered in wounds, he forced himself onward, evading wave after wave of pursuers. Boundless pressure weighed upon him. He endured loneliness and despair alone, fleeing without end toward a future with no future in sight. All of it filled him with sorrow.
But there had still been a ray of light in his life. Back when he had been weak and no one had believed in him, she had been the only one to reach out her hands to him.
Though she held great status and power, her life had contained nothing but killing. Yet fate brought the two of them together once more.
But just as the young man thought that, fate played a cruel joke on him. He watched with his own eyes as his light collapsed into a pool of blood. Blood stained his hands red as he tightly gripped her cold hands. Until the very end, neither of them said the words they had long understood without speaking, yet had always known in their