Anko's Crisis

The corridors of Konoha Hospital's intensive care unit were filled with the mingled smell of disinfectant and despair.

Hyuga Xiao stood before the observation window outside the ward. His Byakugan pierced through the glass, taking in everything inside. Mitaraishi Anko lay on the hospital bed, her body covered in life-support tubes. On her exposed neck, three black tomoe-shaped Curse Marks writhed like living creatures, and every contraction sent Anko's body into violent spasms.

"Third rampage."

The duty medical ninja's voice trembled as he held the medical records. "The Curse Mark's rate of erosion suddenly accelerated yesterday before dawn. We've tried every sealing technique, even the Yamanaka Clan's secret arts. We can only barely slow it down..."

Xiao's gaze fell on Anko's pale face.

This woman, who usually wore a bright smile and loved dango, now looked like a doll drained of all life. Her chakra fluctuations were as chaotic as a candle flame in a storm, liable to go out at any moment.

"When will Lady Tsunade arrive?"

"At the earliest, this evening." The medical ninja wiped sweat from his forehead. "The Hokage has already sent three groups of ANBU to meet her, but Lady Tsunade's whereabouts are unpredictable..."

Evening.

Xiao glanced at the clock on the wall—10:17 in the morning.

Anko would not last that long.

"Let me in."

"No!" The medical ninja hurriedly blocked him. "During a Curse Mark rampage, any chakra stimulation could trigger a complete loss of control. Hyuga, I know you're close to Elite Ninja Anko, but..."

"She taught me Shurikenjutsu." Xiao's voice was frighteningly calm. "When she could still speak normally, she gave me an emergency contact frequency code. She said that if she ever lost control, stimulating her auditory nerves with that frequency could keep her lucid for ten minutes."

The medical ninja froze. "Th-That's far too dangerous! What if..."

"There is no what if."

Xiao pushed open the ward door.

The smell of disinfectant instantly grew several times stronger, mixed with a sickly sweetness like scorched flesh and blood. The ward was at least five degrees colder than the corridor. The air-conditioning system was running at full power, trying to suppress the heat generated by the Curse Mark.

He walked to the bedside.

Anko's breathing was so faint that the rise and fall of her chest was nearly imperceptible. The black Curse Mark patterns had spread from her neck to her collarbone, like parasitic vines greedily devouring her vitality.

Xiao raised his right index finger.

Chakra gathered at his fingertip into an extremely fine thread, following the code Anko had taught him at the training ground three months ago—a secret code used by the test subjects during their time in Orochimaru's Laboratory to transmit emergency signals.

First frequency set: short-long-short.

The chakra thread lightly touched the acupoint behind Anko's ear.

The woman on the bed abruptly opened her eyes!

They were not lucid eyes, but the crimson gaze of a beast. The Curse Mark patterns flared at once, and Anko's body arched as the restraints creaked under the strain. An inhuman growl came from her throat. The skin on her neck began to crack, leaking thick black fluid.

"Second set." Xiao's voice did not waver in the slightest. "Long-short-long-short."

The chakra thread precisely pierced the second acupoint.

Anko's struggle suddenly froze.

Those crimson eyes blinked, and the blood-red color receded like a tide, revealing her original brown pupils. Her gaze focused on Xiao's face, and her lips moved with difficulty.

"...Xiao?"

"You only have ten minutes." Xiao bent down, lowering his voice. "Tell me what happened."

Anko's breathing became rapid. She tried to raise a hand, but the restraints limited her movement. Xiao undid the restraint on her right hand, and it immediately seized his wrist with startling strength.

"Orochimaru..." Anko's voice was as hoarse as sandpaper scraping. "He left... a message inside me..."

"What message?"

"He wants to see me." Tears seeped from Anko's eyes, not from grief, but from utter rage and humiliation. "The Curse Mark isn't out of control... it's an activation program. He's waiting for me... waiting for me to seek him out on my own..."

Xiao's Byakugan suddenly narrowed.

Within his vision, the flow of chakra inside Anko's body became perfectly clear—the black Curse Mark energy was not rampaging without order, but moving along predetermined meridian pathways. With every cycle, it strengthened an "anchor point" near her heart.

This was not an illness.

It was a summons.

"Coordinates," Xiao asked. "Where did he tell you to go?"

Anko's lips trembled. She shut her eyes, seemingly resisting an order coming from within her body. The Curse Mark patterns began to glow again, and black fluid seeped from the corners of her eyes and nostrils.

"Down... downstream of the Naka River... the cave behind the third waterfall..." Her voice grew weaker and weaker. "Midnight... I have to go at midnight... otherwise the Curse Mark will consume me completely..."

"It's a trap."

"I know..." Anko gave a miserable smile. "But he calculated it... calculated that Leaf Village couldn't cure me... calculated that, in order to survive, I would..."

Her fingers tightened, her nails nearly digging into Xiao's flesh.

"Kill me."

Anko stared at Xiao, her eyes filled with despairing clarity. "While I'm still lucid... kill me. I can't... can't become his pawn... can't betray Leaf Village..."

The temperature in the ward dropped several more degrees.

Xiao looked at her. He remembered her hearty laugh when she first taught him how to throw shuriken. He remembered her sticking out her tongue after secretly taking him out for dango and being caught by the Third Hokage. He remembered her returning badly injured from a mission, yet still patting his shoulder and saying, "Branch House brat, don't always look so miserable."

And now, she was asking him to kill her.

"Seven minutes left," Xiao said.

"What?"

"Your time of lucidity." Xiao took three specially made silver needles from his ninja tool pouch. The tips glimmered with a pale blue chakra aura. "Teacher Anko, you taught me that a ninja's battle was never just a contest of strength."

The silver needles fell.

The first needle pierced the center of the Curse Mark on her neck.

Anko's body shook violently, but Xiao pressed his left hand against her shoulder. Gentle Fist chakra precisely sealed the relevant acupoints. The black Curse Mark patterns contracted as though burned, making a sizzling sound.

"What are you doing..." Anko's voice was full of pain.

"Reverse analysis." Xiao's Byakugan was fully activated, his vision reaching the cellular level. "Orochimaru's Curse Mark is essentially a degraded variant of Sage Chakra, activated through a specific frequency. Since he could set an activation program—"

The second needle pierced the "anchor point" near her heart.

Anko suddenly vomited a mouthful of black blood. When the blood hit the floor, it wriggled like a living thing for several seconds before losing its vitality.

"—then I can set a dormancy program."

The third needle pierced her forehead.

Xiao injected his chakra through the silver needle. He was not fighting it, but imitating it. He drew upon the Curse Mark data he had obtained from Kimimaro, the sealing techniques analyzed from the laboratory chip, and the embryonic "Cursed Seal Simulation Technique" that the system had just prompted.

Three forces converged within Anko's body.

Not brutal suppression, but precise deception.

The black Curse Mark patterns began to change. Their writhing eased, their glow dimmed. The chakra flow inside Anko's body was forcibly redirected, and the predetermined meridian paths were overlaid with "false paths" created through Xiao's Gentle Fist.

It was like quietly laying a switch track onto a predetermined railway.

The final second of the ten minutes arrived.

The clarity in Anko's eyes began to fade, but this time, no crimson surged forth. Her pupils returned to their normal brown, her breathing gradually steadied, and although the Curse Mark patterns remained on her neck, they lay still like tattoos.

"I..." she said weakly. "I feel... much better..."

"Only temporarily." Xiao pulled out the silver needles, their tips now completely black. "I simulated Orochimaru's dormancy command, making the Curse Mark believe that you have already 'answered the summons' and entered standby mode. But this state will last no more than forty-eight hours."

"Forty-eight hours..." Anko smiled bitterly. "And then?"

"Then you need real treatment." Xiao put away the needles. "Lady Tsunade will arrive this evening. I'll ask her to prioritize your condition. Until then—"

He bent down and whispered one final sentence into Anko's ear.

His voice was so soft that even the medical ninja outside the ward could not hear it.

Anko's eyes widened slightly.

Then she nodded, closed her eyes, and slipped into a drug-assisted sleep.

Xiao walked out of the ward.

In the corridor, the duty medical ninja hurried over. "How did it go? The monitors showed that her vital signs suddenly stabilized! What did you do?"

"Temporarily suppressed it." Xiao did not elaborate. "Prepare to receive Lady Tsunade. Elite Ninja Anko's condition requires top priority."

"Understood!"

The medical ninja hurried away.

Xiao stood before the corridor window, looking out at the streets of Leaf Village. The sunlight was pleasant. Children practiced shuriken at the training grounds, while villagers went about their lives as usual.

No one knew that beneath this peaceful facade, a Branch House boy had just snatched an Elite Ninja's life back from the hands of death.

Nor did anyone know that the boy's own neck bore the same Level-Two Caged Bird Seal, soon to activate.

A double crisis.

Anko's, and his own.

Xiao raised his hand and looked at the bruise Anko had left on his wrist. The pain was sharp, but it kept him lucid.

Orochimaru was summoning Anko.

The Main House was forcing him into a corner.

Time had never been on his side.

But—

The corner of Xiao's mouth curved into the faintest smile.

—who said prey could not set a trap in return?

He turned and left the hospital, his Byakugan sweeping toward Hokage Rock in the distance. The Third Hokage's statue stood solemn and majestic beneath the sunlight, as though guarding the entire village.

Xiao knew that the man behind that statue was currently sitting in his office, weighing the "Level-Two Caged Bird Seal application" submitted by the Hyuga Main House.

Weighing the fate of a Branch House boy.

"Soon."

Xiao murmured to himself, his voice dissipating into the wind flowing through the corridor.

"Soon, you will know—"

"A cage cannot hold a beast destined to tear it apart."

He walked through the hospital gates, and sunlight fell upon his face, warm enough to sting.

Fourteen hours remained until midnight.

Eight hours remained until Tsunade arrived.

Less than three days remained until the final judgment of the Level-Two Caged Bird Seal.

Every second was counting down.

But Hyuga Xiao's steps were steady.

Steady as a chess player who had already seen the endgame.

And the board had only just been set.