As Ninja, Our Fate Is...

Takeda Shigen opened the door. As he passed Hyuga Yuto's room next door, he hesitated for a moment but ultimately did not knock to say goodbye.

My departure is "defection." Better not drag unrelated people into this.

With that thought, Takeda Shigen left without looking back.

Yet after he had gone barely a dozen meters, a paper crane folded from white paper landed on his shoulder.

The crane carried a chakra signature Takeda Shigen knew well. He understood what it meant.

He tossed the paper crane into the air. Guided by chakra from afar, it fluttered forward, and Takeda Shigen followed behind it.

The folded paper finally stopped before a door. Takeda Shigen knocked, entering only after receiving a response.

"Leader Yahiko. Lady Konan. Lord Nagato."

Takeda Shigen bowed respectfully, just as he always had.

"Shigen." Yahiko spoke, his handsome face expressionless. "You're leaving?"

"Yes, Leader."

"Where to?"

"Somewhere very, very far away. A peaceful place far from the center of the world."

"Ah... you've really got nerve saying that." Yahiko shook his head. "As the organization's fourth-ranking member, taking the organization's secrets and a female spy from Hidden Leaf Village as you leave the Land of Rain... Takeda Shigen, have you really thought this through?"

"My apologies, Leader." Takeda Shigen lowered his head, instinctively gripping the two sharp chakra short blades, Flying Wings.

The small hidden chamber fell silent as a graveyard.

"It seems that, as a ninja, you have chosen and accepted your fate." Yahiko closed his eyes and spoke calmly. "Konan."

The icy beauty with short purple hair silently walked toward Takeda Shigen.

Takeda Shigen felt his heartbeat quicken, and his grip on Flying Wings tightened ever further.

Yet he remained where he was, head lowered. He neither fled nor resisted.

Konan reached out and patted Takeda Shigen's shoulder.

Something heavy suddenly appeared in his hands—so heavy it nearly threw out his back.

"Shigen." The corners of Konan's lips lifted, like an iceberg melting into spring. "If you're eloping with a girl, you can't let her suffer."

Takeda Shigen lowered his head and looked at the large bundle now in his hands. Inside were precious metals, sophisticated machinery, and rare medicines—valuable goods that could be exchanged for vast amounts of local currency anywhere.

"Lady Konan..."

Takeda Shigen's nose suddenly stung. A grown man in his thirties, he nearly burst into tears on the spot.

"You've worked tirelessly for the organization all these years. You're covered in scars, and several times, you nearly died in battle. The three of us have seen it all, and we haven't forgotten for even a moment."

Konan oversaw Akatsuki's intelligence, finances, and logistics. She was usually rather stingy, but when it mattered, she spent money with remarkable generosity. "You said you were going somewhere remote, far from the center of the world... I can roughly guess where. In a place with little or even no chakra, money is always the most practical thing. Take it. I know neither you nor Asano Kaoru has much savings—you buy blades, she buys seeds. Ha... you really are made for each other."

Takeda Shigen raised his head and saw encouragement in Yahiko's eyes, while Nagato stood with his arms folded, smiling softly.

These are the leaders I've served faithfully for the past few years. I have never regretted giving my life to the organization...

The man clenched his teeth, bowed deeply and solemnly, then slowly backed out of the room with the bundle in his arms.

Just before closing the door, Takeda Shigen took a deep breath and suddenly shouted, "Leader! Your wish will come true! One day, through Akatsuki's efforts, peace will descend upon the world... From far away, I will wait for that day to come!"

The laughter of the three young leaders drifted from the room until the door fully closed.

He had come openly and departed with dignity. Takeda Shigen's years in Akatsuki had come to a perfect close.

The man wiped his face, turned, and headed straight for the base's sixth exit.

He could now run toward happiness without any burden on his heart.

Asano Kaoru did not carry an umbrella, allowing the rain to soak her face.

She was already twenty-five this year, no longer a little girl. Yet tonight, beneath the continuing rain, she skipped along the street. Whenever she saw a cat or dog, she would go over and pet it.

Like a child, the female ninja observed and appreciated the world to her heart's content. Everything had become different; everything had become more beautiful and meaningful.

Before long, she arrived beneath the red road sign.

The sign was scarlet and very tall, visible from far away. In Hidden Rain Village, it was considered a minor landmark. As long as someone born and raised here mentioned "that red road sign near such-and-such place," locals immediately knew which one they meant.

Standing beneath the red sign, Asano Kaoru looked left and right, unable to stop the smile curling up her lips.

She had to wait, because she had arrived too early.

The time she and Takeda Shigen had agreed on was midnight. It was only ten o'clock now—there were still two hours left.

At that thought, the female ninja's cheeks flushed. She touched them and found they were indeed burning hot.

"Oh dear... I came so early... a whole two hours early... If Shigen sees this, won't he make fun of me? Hmph... it's not like I'm so eager to elope with you... I-I just..."

Beneath the road sign, Asano Kaoru began to giggle.

I just wanted to see you sooner, that's all.

Suddenly, her fingertips touched her pocket.

Hmm?

Asano Kaoru frowned and searched carefully, but found nothing.

The bottle of blade oil she had spent two whole months making had been left behind at her residence outside the base.

The female ninja lightly bit her lip. Takeda Shigen was a man who loved blades. Once they reached the Land of Sea, where there was no chakra, the only things that could remind him of their past would be those two sharp Flying Wings.

The Land of Sea probably doesn't have such good black palm flowers...

Thinking this, she calculated the time.

Going back to her residence outside the base and returning would take, at most, half an hour.

If she went back for the blade oil and then returned here to wait beneath the road sign, she would still have a full hour and a half before their appointed time.

Takeda Shigen might not even have arrived by then.

"Hmph... that annoying guy, making me work so hard to go back for something."

Asano Kaoru stroked the seashell Takeda Shigen had given her, turned into an alley, and began walking back.

There was not the slightest trace of unhappiness in her.

"Ah... did I come too early?"

Takeda Shigen emerged from the base's sixth exit and looked up. There was no one beneath the red road sign.

"Of course I came too early. There are still two hours until midnight."

The man sighed, then strolled over and leaned against the road sign, looking up at the sky.

He still carried the heavy bundle in his hand.

I'll use part of the money to buy a big courtyard by the beach in the Land of Sea first. His heart was filled with an unprecedented sense of fulfillment. I'll buy Kaoru lots of flowers and plants. Oh, right, and seeds too...

A ninja's fate was... a broken scale.

Sacrifice and reward, happiness and disaster—none of them would ever be equal.

For a man and woman from hostile factions to fall in love, it took three full years, more than a thousand days and nights spent together, one hundred and fifteen battles through shared hardship, thirty-four late-night talks with hands clasped together, sixteen embraces and laughs after surviving calamity... and one heartfelt confession on a rainy night.

Yet beneath that scarlet road sign, for two people in love to miss each other forever by a margin that could almost have been avoided, all it took was... six seconds.