Beyond the Sea

Beyond the Sea

Asano Kaoru held a stone pestle, forcefully pounding the seeds.

Bronze-colored oil slowly seeped out with the kunoichi's movements. Twenty seeds yielded only a strand-thin trace of oil, yet Asano Kaoru carefully collected it until she had somehow accumulated half a bowl.

Knock, knock, knock.

A knock sounded at the door. From the rhythm alone, the kunoichi knew who stood outside.

"Come in. The door isn't locked."

With a creak, Takeda Shigen entered the room and locked the door behind him.

Asano Kaoru did not turn around, continuing to use brute force to press the oil from the seeds.

"Captain, coming into your female subordinate's room in the middle of the night is rather impolite, you know."

"Ah..." Takeda Shigen murmured blankly, doing his best to speak in his usual tone. "What are you doing?"

"Pressing oil."

"You're fond of all kinds of flower and grass seeds, but this is the first time I've seen you interested in oil."

"These are Black Palm Flower seeds. They're not pretty, and they don't smell like much, but their oil is extremely useful... Wipe it on metal, and it prevents rust."

Takeda Shigen paused slightly and touched the chakra short blade strapped behind him.

"For me?"

"For the pigs."

The corners of the man's lips lifted instinctively. The cold-hearted resolve he had forcibly summoned before entering the room vanished without a trace.

After a long silence, he softly said, "Come with me."

Asano Kaoru set down the stone pestle and rose. Lacking any awareness expected of a spy, she simply followed Takeda Shigen outside.

They walked for a long time, leaving the Akatsuki base, leaving the underground, reaching the surface, and disappearing into the endless curtain of rain as they went farther and farther away.

At last, they stopped at the edge of Hidden Rain Village.

Takeda Shigen turned back and looked at Asano Kaoru's delicate, flawless face. Calmly, he said, "Hidden Leaf Village ninja, Kaoru. Nice to meet you."

"..." The kunoichi remained silent. She neither denied it nor responded.

"I thought you'd turn and run." Takeda Shigen frowned. He had deliberately brought Asano Kaoru here; a few more steps would take her out of the village. The implication could not have been clearer.

If Asano Kaoru left, he would never stop her.

"Where could I run?" the woman said. Rain soaked her hair, strands of black clinging to her pale cheeks like fragile porcelain. "The three leaders are all incredibly powerful."

"This is the edge of Hidden Rain Village. The leaders wouldn't chase you all the way to the Land of Fire."

"My mission isn't complete. Even if I returned to Hidden Leaf Village, things wouldn't go well for me."

"Mission... mission!" A fierce anger suddenly surged through Takeda Shigen. He stepped forward, seized the woman's shoulders, and gripped so hard that his nails nearly dug into Asano Kaoru's skin. "Your mission was to plot my assassination, then replace me as the organization's number four, wasn't it? You..."

Even if it costs you your life, will you still complete your mission and kill me?

Takeda Shigen hesitated for a long while, yet still did not dare say those words aloud.

He was terrified that the woman would give him an affirmative answer. That would turn everything he had done today into a complete joke.

"Ah... the mission." Asano Kaoru neither confirmed nor denied it, looking to the side.

The sky over Hidden Rain Village was always an awe-inspiring lead gray. It was tolerable in the daytime, but once night fell, looking overhead revealed nothing but boundless darkness, as though the sky had become a deep pool.

Those who entered Hidden Rain were like people who had fallen into an abyss, unable to leave for the rest of their lives. Thinking this, the kunoichi softly said, "Stop saying such childish things... Takeda Shigen." She no longer called him Captain, instead meeting his eyes directly. "Who do you think we are? We're ninja! Killing, gathering intelligence, starting wars... we can do many things, but showing mercy to our enemies is not one of them!"

"You think I'll thank you for letting me go? No, Takeda Shigen. I'll only laugh at your weakness!"

"The Land of Fire and two other great nations have fought here year after year. Many people of the Land of Rain have died at Hidden Leaf Village's hands, and likewise, Hidden Rain has inflicted immense damage on Hidden Leaf Village's forces."

"I'm a Hidden Leaf Village ninja. You're a high-ranking member of Hidden Rain's Akatsuki."

"No matter how well we got along, it was all just an illusion. Once you learned I was a spy, only one of us could live!"

"Blood feuds passed down through generations."

"Hatred... is the strongest bond between people in this world."

Asano Kaoru felt the hands gripping her shoulders gradually weakening.

I still hurt him, Kaoru thought, her heart aching, yet somehow she did not feel afraid.

Dying at Takeda Shigen's hands was an ending Asano Kaoru could accept.

The pressure on her shoulders vanished. The next moment, the kunoichi realized something had suddenly appeared in her hand.

She raised it before her eyes and looked at it, asking in confusion, "This is...?"

"A seashell." Takeda Shigen's voice was gentle, as though it could drive away the gloomy rain. "I've never been to the seaside. Have you?"

"Neither have I... But what does this seashell have to do with our current situation...?"

Takeda Shigen wiped the water from the woman's face and softly said, "In a very distant place, there is a country called the Land of Sea."

"It's an isolated place even farther from the center of the world than the Land of Water, made up of island chains and sparsely populated. I've heard there aren't even any ninja there... [Chakra] has not blessed that place."

"But it truly is a wonderful place. Wandering travelers have told me that in the Land of Sea, sunlight turns the beaches golden and reflects into the sky, dyeing even the clouds into golden palaces. At the tops of huge, straight trees grow strange fruits, their skins harder than iron but filled with sweet, abundant juice. There are no ninja there, no wars. There are only houses built among the mountains and beside the sea, and people living happily together."

The man paused, then said in a low voice, "Let's go to the Land of Sea... together."

The woman suddenly did not know what to do with herself. Though she had long since become an outstanding ninja, at that moment she was as flustered as a little girl caught stealing candy by her mother years ago.

Many, many years had passed. Her mother and father were long gone, yet the man before her wanted to give her a blue sky once more.

Takeda Shigen spread his arms and embraced the woman.

The rainy night was no longer cold.

"Let's leave together... Leave the countries where ninja gather and go to the Land of Sea. Over the years, we've done far too much. I don't owe the organization anything, and you don't owe Hidden Leaf Village anything either."

"I have enough connections to get us out safely, but preparing a secure escape route will take time."

"Give me one day."

"Tomorrow, at midnight, I'll wait for you beneath the red road sign at Exit Six of the base."

"We'll leave together and go to the Land of Sea—to that wonderful place where the beach is covered in gleaming white seashells."

"Kaoru, give me a chance, and give yourself one too... all right?"

In the dark rainy night, no one knew how much time passed.

The woman closed her eyes and nodded, wrapping her arms around the man's waist.

Her voice trembled softly, as though she were setting out on a grand escape.

"Mm."