Extreme Ambiguity by the Sickbed and a Touch That Brought Tears of Heartache

Inside the dim hospital room, the fluorescent light tube had already shattered.

The only source of light was the churning red Nine-Tails chakra radiating from Kushina. That eerie crimson glow cast long, grotesquely distorted shadows of the two figures against the mottled walls.

Kushina knelt on one knee on the hospital bed, her other leg draped over Baishi's body, her inner thigh pressed firmly against his hip bone. It was a posture of immense pressure, yet filled with a lethal allure.

High heat fermented in the cramped space. The scent of disinfectant had long since evaporated, replaced by a pungent odor of sulfur, the metallic tang of blood, and the unique fragrance of Kushina's hair, reminiscent of oranges under the sun.

Baishi's breathing grew ragged.

He was forced to lie flat on his back, his bare chest completely exposed to the air. The long, stitched incision on his abdomen throbbed in rhythm with his rapid, shallow breaths.

Kushina's fingertips finally came to rest on the blood-soaked bandage over his left collarbone.

There was none of the violent, scorching sensation of Nine-Tails chakra that he had expected.

Her movements were incredibly gentle, as if she were terrified of shattering a priceless piece of porcelain. Her scalding fingertips traced the contours of the wound, bit by bit, through the coarse gauze.

"It hurts, doesn't it..."

Kushina's hoarse voice was thick with a heavy, sobbing tone.

A single, searing tear fell, landing squarely on Baishi's chest. The temperature was terrifyingly high, almost as if it would brand a mark into his skin.

"Lady Kushina..." Baishi's Adam's apple bobbed with difficulty as he tried to shrink away. "You really have mistaken me for someone else. I am just an ordinary ANBU, and this injury was caused by an Iwagakure Earth Style ninja..."

"You're lying."

Kushina cut him off sharply.

Her dark golden slit pupils were misted with moisture, yet they burned with a paranoia that made one's scalp tingle.

"I saw it. In my dreams, I saw everything." Kushina's fingers slid slowly down from Baishi's collarbone, tracing over his taut pectoral muscles before coming to a rest where his heart beat.

"That man in the fox mask, to protect me, was pierced right here by a black iron rod." Her fingers suddenly tightened, bunching the bedsheets over Baishi's heart, her knuckles turning white from the force. "When the Nine-Tails went berserk, when the barrier rose... it was also you who used your last bit of strength to push me out of the barrier."

Baishi's heart skipped a violent beat.

Damn that Simulator!

At the time, he had only been trying to hijack the ultimate fortune of Namikaze Minato during the "Night of the Nine-Tails." He had staged that tragic, desperate sacrifice just to farm an S-rank rating in the simulation.

Who could have guessed that the Simulator would shove those harrowing memories into the real Kushina's mind, completely intact!

"That line, 'live on with my share too'..." Kushina bit her lower lip until bright red blood seeped out. "Did you think that by saying such things, I would just obediently listen? Did you think that pushing all the credit for saving me onto Minato, while you hid in the dark corners as a piece of cannon fodder to be sacrificed at any moment, was doing me a favor?!"

Baishi's scalp went numb.

The logic had come full circle.

In this madwoman's delusions, he, Baishi, had become a "deeply devoted man" who, to fulfill the love between his beloved woman and the genius Hokage, was willing to hide his identity, silently endure all suffering, and even take on suicidal missions!

"I didn't..." Baishi opened his mouth, attempting to defend himself.

"Shut up!"

Kushina suddenly leaned down.

She gave Baishi no chance to argue, throwing her arms around him and holding him in a death grip.

"Ugh!"

Baishi let out a muffled groan.

Kushina's cheek was pressed tightly against his sweat-slicked chest, her long red hair cascading down like a waterfall, covering his neck and shoulders.

She held him so tightly that it seemed as if, should she loosen her grip even slightly, the man in her arms would vanish like a dream, dissolving into the roar of the Nine-Tails.

"You bastard... you big idiot..." Kushina buried her face in Baishi's chest, her voice muffled but filled with a suppressed, agonizing sob. "Do you have any idea how terrified I was when I saw that look in your eyes at Ichiraku Ramen, the look of someone preparing to die?"

"Do you have any idea how much it hurt just to breathe when I heard that the ANBU vanguard squad had been ambushed by Iwagakure and wiped out?"

The tears broke through completely.

Large, heavy drops of water, mixed with the scorching heat of the Nine-Tails chakra, soaked through the bandages on Baishi's chest.

Baishi froze.

He was an exquisitely refined egoist.

In his worldview, the ninja world was a giant farm, and everyone was merely an NPC to be utilized. Namikaze Minato was a tool to hijack fortune, the Third Hokage and Danzo were vicious dogs to be guarded against, and Kushina... was originally just a stepping stone for him to farm survival rewards.

He was accustomed to calculation, accustomed to watching the life and death of others with cold indifference. He had sold out his teammates in the canyon without a second thought, and he had shattered the throat of Venom Fang with an Explosive Tag in the mire without even blinking.

But now.

This woman, hailed as the Red Hot Habanero of Konoha, the high-and-mighty fiancée of the Hokage, the woman who held the strongest Tailed Beast sealed within her, was curled up on his chest, weeping in despair like a lost girl who was about to lose her entire world.

That heavy, crushing emotion contained no impurities, no hypocrisy of the Will of Fire, and no calculations of high-level political maneuvering.

There was only a pure, pathological paranoia that would allow her to defy the entire world for his sake.

The heart inside Baishi's chest, which had always been encased in cold rationality, suddenly skipped a beat, beyond his control.

"Kushina..." Baishi's voice softened, involuntarily.

Upon hearing that call, Kushina's body shuddered violently.

She slowly raised her head.

The distance between the two was less than three centimeters.

Baishi could clearly see the bloodshot veins in her eyes, the tip of her nose slightly reddened from crying, and those soft lips, bitten so hard they were beginning to bleed.

The Nine-Tails' chakra intertwined around them, forming an absolutely sealed domain.

Within this domain, there were no undercurrents of Konoha, no watchful gaze from Namikaze Minato, only the sound of their rapid, ragged breathing.

Ambiguous hormones collided and burned violently in the air.

The look in Kushina's eyes gradually changed.

It was the madness of a drowning person clutching at a final piece of driftwood, and a possessiveness that sought to grind the other person into her very bones and blood.

She stared into Baishi's deep, dark eyes, her breathing growing heavier and heavier.

Then, she slowly closed her eyes and tilted her head slightly, her warm lips trembling as they inched toward Baishi's.

The soft, fragrant scent of a woman, mixed with the salty tang of tears, instantly overwhelmed Baishi's senses.

The monitor by the bedside let out a sharp "beep," and Baishi's heart rate soared to its limit at that very moment.

His right hand jerked up from the bedsheets.

If he only leaned in, he could completely possess this most dazzling Red-Haired Witch of Konoha, turning that perfect Yellow Flash into a laughingstock.

But just as Kushina's lips were about to touch his.

The brief flicker of confusion in Baishi's eyes vanished instantly, replaced by an abyssal, absolute rationality and coldness.

His palm did not reach for Kushina's back; instead, it wedged precisely between them, pinning Kushina's shoulder down.