Tsunade's Choice

In the tavern, Tsunade slammed her cup onto the table.

Amber liquor splashed onto the dice, onto the knife marks on the tabletop. The marks were old, not carved by anyone else—they were carved by her own kunai. She made one every time she lost money. There were hundreds of them now, packed tightly together like tree rings.

"Jiraiya, did you bring two genin here because you wanted me to soften up?" Tsunade looked at Naruto and Ringo, her gaze passing from Naruto's face to Ringo's. It paused when it reached Ringo. Not because he caught her attention, but because he felt familiar. There was something in Ringo's eyes she had seen in the Third's eyes, in the First's photograph, and in Nawaki's eyes in the final second before his death. It was not courage—it was a gamble. A gamble that someone cared about him, that someone would be happy he was alive.

"Not to soften you up." Jiraiya placed his hand on the table. There was a fresh scar on the back of it, burned by the violet flames of the Four Violet Flames Formation. "We need you. Konoha's Hokage is dead, and the fire has gone out. But the embers remain—in Naruto's hands, Sasuke's hands, and Ringo's hands. But the embers need someone to kindle them. If not you, then who?"

"The First's granddaughter." Tsunade's voice trembled as she spoke those five words. Not from tears—from rage. "I hate it when people call me that. The First's granddaughter, the Second's grand-disciple, the Third's student. What am I? I am Tsunade. Not anyone's continuation. But all anyone sees is the First, the Second, the Third. No one sees me. No one saw me holding Nawaki's corpse. No one saw me holding Dan's corpse. No one saw the blood dripping from my hands. Not the enemy's blood—their blood. It ran over my hands, into the gaps beneath my nails, into my veins, mixing with my own blood. It would not wash away. Their blood and mine, impossible to tell apart."

She clenched her fist. Among the knife marks in the tabletop was one her nails had just scratched out when she clenched it. Her nails were new, not painted—they were chakra. Tsunade's chakra gathered at her fingertips. Monstrous strength, not born of rage but grief. Grief driven to its limit, chakra spilling uncontrollably from her fingertips, seeping into the tabletop, into the wood, into that die she had lost with hundreds of times.

Ringo's card slot trembled. "Monstrous Strength Fragment, orange, automatically collected. Source: Tsunade. Drop trigger—not anger, but remembrance."

Naruto wanted to speak. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. It was not that he was afraid—he simply did not know what to say. He lowered his head and looked at his hands. Nine-Tails' claw marks were on his palm, left there when he had gripped them in the ruins of the examination arena last night. When the Third died, Naruto had not been there. He had been chasing Gaara. By the time he returned, the Third was already dead. He had knelt in the center of the arena, staring at the adamantine staff that had rolled from the Third's hand. The Third's sweat was still on it, not yet dry.

"I don't understand either." Naruto finally spoke, his voice so soft it did not sound like Naruto. "I don't understand why Granny Tsunade is afraid of blood. I don't know who Dan was, or who Nawaki was. But I understand one thing. When the old man died, I couldn't make it back. I owe him a life. Not his life—mine. I'm alive because he let me live. So I'm going to become Hokage. Not just to become Hokage—I want the old man to know he didn't die for nothing. The person he saved will become Hokage."

Tsunade looked at Naruto. Naruto's eyes were blue—not the Nine-Tails' red, but Naruto's own blue. There was something in that blue she had seen in Dan's eyes and Nawaki's eyes. Not a dream—an obsession. An obsession strong enough to stake one's life on an unwinnable outcome.

"You can't become Hokage." Tsunade's voice turned cold, not from indifference but protection. She wanted to protect this child from becoming another Dan, another Nawaki, another Third. "Hokage die. They die on battlefields, die inside barriers, die in the moment they sacrifice themselves to protect others. You're too much like them. Too much like Nawaki, too much like Dan, too much like the Third. You'll die. You'll die. You'll die."

The tavern door swung open.

It was not the wind—it was a snake. Orochimaru stood in the doorway, his arms hanging at his sides, black like two charred branches. His face was paler than usual, so pale it was bloodless. It was not a skin condition. Without his hands, his chakra could not circulate, and his body was rotting away. The Sound Four stood behind him, while Kabuto Yakushi stood beside him with a syringe in hand.

"Tsunade, heal my hands. In exchange, I'll help you bring Nawaki and Dan back to life."

Tsunade's hands trembled. Her fingers rubbed back and forth over the knife marks in the table. Her nails scraping wood made a sharp, grating sound, like cat claws on glass. Her eyes were fixed on Orochimaru, not with hatred but struggle. Struggling over whether to agree, whether to trade today's betrayal for the return of those from yesterday.

"Impure World Reincarnation." Orochimaru's tongue slid from his mouth and licked across the corner of his lips. There was blood there, not his own, but from a Mist shinobi he had bitten to death on the road. "Not resurrection—recall. Recall their souls, let them speak to you, let them call you Sister again, let them call you Tsunade again. Don't you want to hear Nawaki call you Sister? Don't you want to hear Dan call you Tsunade?"

Tsunade closed her eyes. Tears ran from their corners, not from crying but pain. Pain that had lasted twelve years, pain she had grown used to, pain so familiar she no longer knew what it felt like not to hurt. But whenever she closed her eyes, Nawaki's face before his death appeared before her. Dan's face before his death appeared before her. Their blood mingled, flowing over her hands, beneath her nails, into her veins.

Ringo stood. Not out of impulse, but decision. He walked before Tsunade. He did not sit or lower his head. He stood before her at the same height, eyes meeting hers. Tsunade opened her eyes and looked at him. There was something in Ringo's eyes—not sympathy, but understanding. Not understanding why she feared blood, but why she was still gambling. Gambling for twelve years, losing for twelve years, and still gambling. Not because she loved gambling, but because it was the only thing she could control. She could not control who died, who lived, or the feeling of blood slipping through her fingers. But she could control the dice, the cards, and how much she wagered on the next hand.

"Lady Tsunade, I'm not here to persuade you to become Hokage." Ringo's voice was even, as though he were stating something simple. "I want to ask you one question. Before the Third died, he asked me whether I could still fight. I said I could. Not for the Hokage, but for the people who were in Konoha with me. At the end, he looked into my eyes and said, 'Not for me. For yourselves.' So, Lady Tsunade, not for the Third, not for Konoha—for yourself. Are you willing to gamble one more time? Not on whether you'll lose something, but on whether you'll win."

Tsunade fell silent.

The liquor in the cup rippled. Not because her hand was shaking, but because the natural energy underground was responding. Ringo's false Sage Mode had not fully shut down. Natural energy spilled from him, seeped into the tavern floor, into the ground beneath Tsunade's feet, and into Tsunade's chakra. Tsunade felt it. Not chakra—warmth. A faint warmth, like the Third's pipe, like the First's smile, like Nawaki's hand, like Dan's lips. Not heat, but warmth.

"Who taught you," Tsunade rasped, the words sounding as though they were forced from the depths of her throat, "to talk so much like that old Third?"

Tsunade set down her cup and rose. She tossed the die onto the table. It rolled three times and landed on six. But this time, she did not look at the die. She looked at Ringo. Reaching up, she removed a necklace from around her neck. The necklace was green, not jade but crystallized Wood Release chakra. The First Hokage's necklace, passed down through three generations, each one carrying death. Nawaki had worn it and died. Dan had worn it and died. Now she took it from her neck, not to abandon it—but to pass it on.

"Kid, this is for you. Not for your system—for you."