Parting Is Always Silent

Drip...

Drip...

Blood stained his black casual wear a dark, bruised red. Uchiha Chiba leaned against a nearby tree trunk, coughing up a mouthful of blood as the Three Tomoe Sharingan in his eyes spun frantically.

Then.

He returned to the small hut where he had first met Konan. He pushed the door open; everything inside was clean, and even the leaking roof had been repaired. This was something Katsuzuki had specifically ordered beforehand.

"Really now..." Uchiha Chiba leaned against the wall. Pale green chakra gradually coated his body, and his wounds and scars began to heal.

"Right, I should have had a Summoning Scroll on me... If it's a combat-type summon, I'll just leave it here to protect them..." Uchiha Chiba reached out to touch his ninja tool pouch, and a blood-stained Summoning Scroll appeared in his hand.

It was covered in red and black gore.

He didn't even need to think about it; this scroll was likely already unusable.

"Come to think of it, I recall that the way to contract a summon is through the contractor's own blood, right? Since there's so much blood on this scroll... does that mean..." Uchiha Chiba took a deep breath.

The next second.

Snap!

Sharp teeth pierced his finger.

Blood dripped down.

"Summoning Jutsu!"

Uchiha Chiba pressed his hands to the ground. Just as he had expected, dense, intricate runes crawled out from beneath his palms, spreading across the floor like a spiderweb!

Poof!!!!!!

As the smoke cleared.

A silver-haired girl stood quietly before him, her gaze gentle.

"You are...?" Uchiha Chiba blinked. He had only wanted to see if he could actually summon something; he hadn't expected to stumble into a stroke of blind luck and succeed! But... his summon was a person?

"Uchiha Chiba, this should be our first meeting in the true sense since you signed the contract with me." The silver-haired girl's tone was soft, her eyes filled with admiration for him. She paused before continuing, "Nice to meet you, Chiba. I am... Katsuyu."

The silver-haired girl's words made Uchiha Chiba look up in disbelief.

Katsuyu?!

The one from Shikkotsu Forest?

The original story stated that the Katsuyu of Shikkotsu Forest were all fragments of the Great Katsuyu Sage, and their size upon summoning depended on the amount of chakra the summoner possessed. As far as Uchiha Chiba knew, no one in the entire ninja world had ever been able to summon the entirety of the Katsuyu Sage—not even the God of Shinobi, Hashirama Senju, who was synonymous with a vast ocean of chakra.

Although his own chakra was a bit lacking.

It shouldn't be so low that he'd summon a girl, right?

"Chiba, are you wondering why I'm in human form?" The girl's figure flickered, and Uchiha Chiba suddenly felt a slight change in weight on his left shoulder.

He turned his head.

He saw a pair of fair, jade-like feet stepping onto his shoulder, one above the other.

"I do have that question." Uchiha Chiba forcefully restrained himself from looking up at the girl. If nothing else, this was the Katsuyu Sage; although she was known for her gentleness, if she got angry because he accidentally saw something he shouldn't, it would be game over.

"What an interesting little one. You don't need to worry about that. I'm certainly not afraid of being seen by you; after all, my original form doesn't have any clothes to cover it anyway, hehehe." The silver-haired girl smiled, seemingly able to read his inner thoughts.

Chiba: Oh, give me a break!

"First, I am indeed the Katsuyu Sage you imagine. Second, I don't have the ability to read minds. It's just that our compatibility is so high that my essence has remained within your body. The green light radiating from you is my chakra~" The silver-haired girl spoke softly, curling a lock of her silver hair.

"In other words, natural energy remains within your body... Oh my, little Chiba probably can't understand the concept of natural energy... Well, in short, it's just a rare type of energy." The silver-haired girl said.

Natural energy.

The purest energy in the world, composed of the essence of heaven and earth. It was scarce, and if absorbed to a certain degree, it could be guided to produce Sage Mode chakra, which allowed one to enter a special state—Sage Mode!

"Oh? Little Chiba actually knows about Sage Mode?" By now, the silver-haired girl had appeared directly in front of him. The girl transformed from Katsuyu was a head shorter than Chiba, forcing her to tilt her head back to look into his eyes.

"Uh... I saw similar information when I was with Hanzo the Salamander." Uchiha Chiba's mouth twitched slightly. He certainly hadn't gotten that information from Hanzo.

"Eh? Even a summon like a salamander, which hasn't awakened its intelligence, knows about absorbing the natural energy of heaven and earth?" The silver-haired girl touched her lips, seemingly in thought.

"Ah... well, anyway, let's not worry about that. Lady Katsuyu, could you tell me why you were the one I summoned?" Uchiha Chiba shook his head and asked the question on his mind.

The silver-haired girl remained silent for a long time.

"Oh, this? Little Chiba, do you know that when you humans perform a blood contract, all summons can sense your chakra?" The silver-haired girl said lightly, blinking.

"..." Chiba looked at her in silence.

"I felt your blood contract at the time. A normal contract only requires a tiny drop of blood. When the other summons saw that your contract was soaked through with blood, they were all unwilling to sign with you. I was just curious what kind of idiot would perform a contract like that, so I came." The silver-haired girl laughed.

Chiba: Was it my choice to bleed like that?

"Right, right, I've been chatting too much. Sorry, little Chiba, did you have any business for me when you summoned me?" The silver-haired girl suddenly remembered.

"Uh... no, nothing in particular."

"Then I'll be heading back."

"Goodbye, Lady Katsuyu."

With that brief exchange concluded, the silver-haired girl's figure vanished, leaving Uchiha Chiba standing there in a daze.

It seemed he had just formed a contract with someone truly extraordinary.

Uchiha Chiba looked up at the ruined landscape outside and gave a faint shake of his head. "If I stay here... the three of them will be caught in the crossfire. It would be better to follow the original path..."

With that thought in mind, Uchiha Chiba picked up a pen and scribbled a few lines on the remaining scraps of paper.

The gist of it was that he was not suited for Amegakure and was heading to another village. He told the three of them to take care of themselves and reminded them, above all else, never to trust the deceitful faces of others. Peace was only something one could grasp with one's own hands; it was never something to be granted by the whims of others.