Part 26 – Danzo’s Death

After making their plans and setting the day of the attack for three days later, the two now-couples retreated to their rooms.

Uzu watched as Naruto took off his jacket and shirt and exchanged his pants for shorts.

She eagerly took in the sight of his muscled body, a sweet smile making its way onto her face.

After he had laid down on his bed, she took off her clothes as well, joining him in her underwear.

She found her usual spot on his chest and soon relaxed, her muscles going soft and she cuddled closer to his warmth.

Just as they were about to sleep, she suddenly opened her eyes again, raising her chest and looking at Naruto.

“I’ve created a nightmare repelling seal for you … I’ve just totally forgotten all about it because we haven’t seen each other for a while. Do you-“ Uzu’s words got stuck in her throat as she was forcefully kissed and her mouth invaded by his tongue.

He gently pulled her back down onto his chest and stroked her hair, whispering: “Don’t worry about it, as long as you stay with me, I won’t need that seal. You are working perfectly fine as a nightmare repellant already~. So if you don’t want me to have nightmares anymore, just sleep with me from now on, alright?”

Seeing the teasing smile on his face, she couldn’t help but laugh quietly.

She sighed, pretending to be slightly unwilling: “I guess if you need me that much, then I’ll need to stay with you, no~?”

She cuddled closer against his chest and enjoyed the feeling of his hand on her waist, holding her in place.

“Damn, I love you.” She heard him whisper into her ear, making her shiver slightly.

Soon after, both of them fell into peaceful sleep, not thinking too much about any trouble that awaited them in the close future.

…

The next day, Naruto and Uzu spent most of their time helping in the village rebuilding things and clearing more debris away.

Uzu sent some clones to the hospital, helping them out after Naruto had requested her to do so.

When they came back to the apartment, Naruto remembered the small fox and the messenger animal that could transform that he had stored in a storage scroll.

When he took them out, the small fox and the currently-cat rushed at Uzu and enjoyed getting pat and cuddled by her.

As Uzu and Naruto finally went to bed, the two animals laid down in a pile on the ground, purring softly.

The sight of those two furballs, caused Uzu to smile happily.

Upon taking off her clothes, she noticed that Naruto had covered the room in silencing and concealing seals. Seeing the grin on his face, she knew, it was going to be a long night.

…

The second day, Uzu woke up feeling sore in places she had never felt sore in and really needing a shower.

Of course, Naruto didn’t miss the chance to join her this time and both of them came out of the shower dressed and ready for some more rebuilding activities in the village.

During lunch, they decided to eat at the barbeque restaurant where they had met after Naruto came back to the village. Surprisingly, that restaurant still stood, and they met some familiar people already sitting at a table.

“Hey Shikamaru, Choji, Ino. Mind if we join you?” Naruto asked the three with a smile while holding onto Uzu’s hand.

To be honest, Uzu felt a bit weird interrupting their meal, but she let Naruto pull her along anyway upon getting confirmation that they were allowed to join.

Naruto sat next to Shikamaru and Uzu, while Uzu sat next to Naruto and Ino, making her the perfect target for Ino’s gossipy questions.

“Uzu-chan … you really need to tell me, since when?!” Ino asked with a dangerous glow in her eyes.

Uzu squeezed Naruto’s hand, feeling instantly more relaxed: “Since when, what?”

Ino seemed surprised for a second but she recovered soon, throwing a barrage of questions at her: “When did you meet? Since when are you in love with each other? When did you kiss each other for the first time? When we found you in the hospital, did you … you know!? And why the hell don’t I know all that already?! You need to come to my flower shop more often~.”

Uzu felt slightly overwhelmed but decided to just get it over with … Ino probably wouldn’t rest until she answered her questions anyway.

“We met a few years ago when I first came to this village. You know, the day where I came to your flower shop?”

Ino nodded fervently, motioning for her to continue.

“As for since when we are in love with each other, hmm … well, I’ve been in love with him for … uh … a long time? I can’t remember. Well, we spent a lot of time together in the forest back then … at some point … I just realized you know … that I love him?” Uzu answered, really unsure of when exactly she had realized that she fell in love with him. She still felt a bit weird, talking about this to someone she just couldn’t directly call a friend just yet.

Ino turned to Naruto, waiting for him to talk as well, when Shikamaru said: “You two, you don’t necessarily need to answer her.”

“Yeah! *chew* If you don’t say anything or just tell her to stop *chew*, she won’t bother you anymore *chew*, she will find other ways to know all that though!” Choji added, munching on mountains of meat.

“Hey!?” Ino screamed, looking at her teammates with an angry gaze.

Uzu couldn’t help but smile and laugh softly at their antics, she looked over at Naruto and saw him do the same.

After that, they answered some of Ino’s questions to satisfy the blonde’s curiosity and seeing the grin on her face, they knew that the whole village may soon know about their relationship.

Though, the two certainly didn’t mind.

Ino had also already scheduled their next meeting, though that’d be at the Nara estate. And, Shikamaru didn’t really feel motivated enough to deny any of that, only saying ‘yeah, yeah’ and agreeing to the arrangement.

…

The third day started with Uzu feeling sore again and them taking a shower together.

He really doesn’t need to take a break … I guess having a bijuu inside of you really does increase your stamina by tremendous amounts~, Uzu thought to herself, giggling softly to herself, which only served to motivate Naruto to give her an especially long and deep kiss that made her legs feel weak.

The day ended with a meal with Tsunade and Jiraiya who had also grown much closer during the three days.

Seeing the hickey on her Mom’s neck, Uzu felt happy and warm, knowing that her Mom and Jiraiya (maybe her soon-to-be father) had gotten that much closer and were both happy with the development of their relationship.

Her Mom seemed to practically shine these days.

Also, apparently seeing Jiraiya’s work on her Mom had Naruto come up with the idea that leaving hickeys on her neck was a very good idea.

And, seeing that he stopped her from healing it, she only deemed it right to give him a hickey back as well.

…

Finally, it was the day of the attack.

They waited until late evening hours to sneak into the Root Headquarters.

Uzu had applied chakra concealing seals on all four of them, leaving them nearly insensible. The seals worked perfectly to conceal their chakra presences and since they all knew silent-steps and made it a habit to mostly walk silently, they easily navigated the underground system. Their sage-mode-increased-senses made it easy to find Danzo’s quarters in the deepest part of the cave system.

Danzo seemed to be sleeping as Uzu slowly entered the room, having disabled the seals on the door.

He really is a great sealing master …

She couldn’t help but marvel slightly at the intricate seals he used to keep himself safe and honestly, had she not been an equally capable Fuuinjutsu expert, they might have failed at even getting into his room.

Danzo was a light sleeper, as every shinobi haunted by paranoia was, but it didn’t matter. By the time he woke up and felt Uzu touch him, the curse seal had already covered his body and Uzu’s black chains started sucking out his chakra very, very slowly.

This way, she rendered him unable to use jutsu, talk or even mold chakra.

“Danzo Shimura, Konoha’s cancer.” Uzu said, venom evident in her tone.

She ripped off the bandages on his arm and carefully stored the Sharingan in her storage seal.

Moving on to his head, she undid the bandages around Shisui’s eye and saw its three-tomoed form look directly into her eyes.

She stiffened, feeling foreign chakra enter into her system.

Her surroundings suddenly changed, and she found herself in a dark room, chained to a wall.

She could barely see where she was, and she felt something warm flow down her body.

She heard it slowly drip onto the ground as feeling in her body slowly returned, she felt an ever-increasing pain course through her body, numbing her thoughts and causing her to grit her teeth.

She frantically tried to find her pain reducing seal … but it wasn’t there. In fact, she couldn’t control her chakra at all.

She tried to use her chains, they weren’t there.

In fact, anything she tried did not work.

The only thing that worked were her natural healing abilities.

Her wounds soon stopped hurting and she finally got a good look around.

The cell was dark and damp.

Roaming her eyes around, she noticed that she wasn’t the only one in the room.

The person sitting leisurely in a chair not far away from her was familiar.

In fact, it was the very same person she had attacked just before coming here.

Why can’t I dispel this genjutsu?!

She began worrying, seeing the grin on Danzo’s face.

“Finally woke up, huh. I see that my men really roughed you up. Enjoyed your little dream?” Danzo said, chuckling coldly.

Uzu just remained silent, staring at the man with hateful eyes.

She couldn’t dispel the genjutsu … that either meant that she was in a very strong one or … that everything before this had really been a dream.

“Aha, see, you’ve healed already. Maybe you aren’t totally useless after all.” Danzo said before snapping his fingers.

Four Root Anbu appeared next to him and awaited orders.

Uzu looked down at herself, intending to check on her injuries, only now realizing that she was actually naked.

Eh?

She watched as Danzo stood up and moved towards the cell door before saying: “Hah, you four have some fun. She’s become useless by now … although, test her healing ability a bit more, she could be used once more, since the next experiment subject isn’t ready yet.”

After that, Danzo just left and the cell door closed behind him again.

Uzu watched as the four men stepped towards her, fear rising in her stomach and making her squirm.

She saw one of them take out a kunai and throw it at her.

Feeling it impact next to her head, she had never felt so much horror before. She couldn’t even see it move, that’s how fast it was.

It cut off a few strands of her much longer than normal hair.

This needs to be a genjutsu, right?!, she screamed in her mind.

Another man coated his hand in lightning chakra and touched her stomach, letting it freely rampage through her body.

She shook and she screamed and she burned. Her eyes rolled up into her head and she felt her knees give out when the man finally let go of her.

The same hand moved to her chin and lifted it up.

She heard the man grunt in appreciation: “Damn, it’s been too long since we last had a high-quality woman like this, does anyone still have those drugs that make them go crazy? They should work on this thing too, right? Even though it’s just a failed experiment, maybe she will scream for us~.”

She heard the men chuckle evilly and one man started unbuckling his pants and taking out his …

The next moment, she was suddenly somewhere else again.

Staring back at her was a mangekyo Sharingan that had lost its light.

Her eyes widened, realizing what this dead man in front of her had done.

He had still been able to use his Sharingan even in her chakra draining chains.

The experiences of the last few minutes would never leave her mind again, that’s what made her memory so great in other cases, but this time …

She could still feel his hand on her chin, and it made her shiver and vomit onto the corpse of the Root Leader.

The physical pain, she didn’t care much about. That’s something she had gotten accustomed with during her time in this world and she actively created a seal against it … she just didn’t think that she would ever really get caught in a genjutsu like that.

What even was that?! I couldn’t do anything …

She looked back the Sharingan still in Danzo’s eye and ripped it out of its socket before storing it in her storage seal.

No one else must get this eye … Shisui’s mangekyo is frightening …

She vowed to either use it herself or destroy it.

If Danzo had been prepared for this … she shivered at the thought. That would have been the end of her.

And if she hadn’t bound him with her chakra draining chains … then who knows when someone would have finally come in here to interrupt whatever he was doing.

That insect nearly took out his …

She couldn’t explain the horrors that she felt at not being able to do anything against them. And if they had drugged her, then … wouldn’t she have even enjoyed what they would have done to her?

A rage and wrath she had never felt before rushed up from the deepest parts of her stomach. It numbed her thoughts as she put a seal onto Danzo’s body after scanning his chakra pathway system and altering the seal to fit it.

She made it look like he had a normal arm and that his eye had somehow been injured.

She stepped out of the room, feeling slightly faint.

She heard screams and fighting a distance away, but she didn’t want to see anyone right now, she went the other way … away from the fighting.

“Tri-seal, release. Pain reducing seal, release. Sage Art: Corrosive Chakra Cloak.”

Feeling the familiar strength of her Sage Mode envelop her, she sensed a few presences approach.

They looked similar to the ones that had tortured her, even if it lasted only seconds before Danzo’s chakra ran out.

They wore the same masks and the same gloves and even the same pants.

Hearing their heartbeats thump in their chests, wrath rushed into her mind …

She disappeared and reappeared in the group of four, four chains securely binding their bodies and raising them into the air.

“Insects.” She said quietly, touching each of them with her palm and applying the same seal onto them.

After that, she absorbed 99% of their chakra, leaving them alive and breathing, but unable to move.

She let them fall onto the ground in front of her, each of them soon starting to squirm and shiver.

They let out no sound as the spots at where the seals were, suddenly grew bigger and bigger, deforming their skin.

After that, there were four *pop* sounds and the four men exploded into masses of blood and flesh.

The blood flowed down Uzu’s chakra cloak and she felt totally apathetic, watching these four former Root Anbu die and their blood and flesh dissolve until nothing was left of them.

That wasn’t nearly enough … Danzo’s dogs … they’ll pay.

She moved through the corridors of the Root Headquarters, slaughtering several tens of Root that rushed at her with swords drawn, intending to kill her.

She loved the way that their insides burned when she pushed her hand into them as if they weren’t even there.

The way some of them screamed when she ripped off their limbs at times.

Though, most of them, she just drained with her chains, increasing her own chakra pool by lots and lots.

At some point, she had somehow made it to the entrance of the Root Headquarters again.

It was then, that her anger slowly faded, and reason began ruling her mind again.

Memories of what Danzo had made her see ran through her mind and she felt bile rise in her throat again, but she managed to press it back down.

She no longer felt anger. She just felt …

…

She sent out her senses and saw that Naruto, Jiraiya and Tsunade were talking to a group of Root Anbu that had taken off their masks.

The ground around them was littered with corpses of other Anbu and Naruto looked slightly pained.

How many did he kill? Did he know any of them?

She felt concern run through her mind.

God, did I kill any of his former friends?

…

Naruto watched the group of former Root Anbu in front of him.

Some of them kind of looked like people he might have once knew … but the years had changed them, and he wasn’t quite sure anymore as to what those people really looked like in the first place.

He himself hadn’t killed any of his past friends and he hadn’t seen any of them yet.

He began to wonder: Were they even here in the first place? Who knows what happened to them across the years …

He turned to Jiraiya who had a serious look on his face and his gear was covered in blood: “Have you seen Uzu?”

“No … but … let’s take this group with us and look for her, she is strong enough to fight her way out herself but who knows what happened after she went to Danzo.” Jiraiya said and Tsunade nodded as well, concern evident on their faces. It had been planned for Uzu to join them and she clearly took too long …

Soon enough, they led the group of former Root Anbu towards their leaders room, finding it open and Danzo dead on his bed.

“He looks … as if he just died in his sleep and his arm … it looks normal.” Naruto observed, looking at Jiraiya questioningly.

Jiraiya stepped closer and observed the body, soon finding a seal engraved on Danzo’s tongue.

“It’s an appearance altering seal … the princess really worked hard to make it look like a peaceful death? This makes it easier to explain to the council though … I don’t think they knew of his Sharingan experiments.” Jiraiya said, storing the body in a storage scroll.

They soon exited the room and walked further along the path that would lead them out.

At first, the corridors seemed eerily quiet.

Since all of the shinobi here knew how to not make footsteps, it was eerily quiet.

Then, they came upon footsteps burned into ground by acid.

Uzu?

Naruto moved a bit faster, soon coming into a larger room.

This seemed to be a place where the Root Anbu ate and one of their group’s Anbu confirmed that.

The ground was littered with blood and corpses, most of them missed limbs or were completely drained of their chakra with skin that seemed old and dry.

Most of their masks were smashed in and hands cut off if they wore gloves.

Just what the hell happened here, Uzu?

He hadn’t ‘actually’ really seen her kill anyone before … at least not in this way.

All of the corpses were unrecognizable, so he didn’t know whether there was anyone he knew from his time in the orphanage … and honestly, he didn’t care at all anymore. He just wanted to find Uzu, wherever she was. He was never really comfortable with blood or killing and he knew that Uzu wasn’t normally like this, so he just wanted to hug her right now …

Acidic footsteps burned into ground led them through the corridors, more corpses every few steps, killed in the same manner.

Something must have happened …, he thought.

He sprinted ahead, the others also moving quicker behind him.

Corpses along the path, he finally reached the entrance again and saw Uzu stand not far away from him.

There was smoke around her, as if a clone had just popped.

Her eyes were closed, but when she opened them again, the sight of her eyes mesmerized him.

Sharingan … and a pattern I have never seen before too …

He moved up to her and watched as the pattern in her eye spun.

Seeing her not moving towards him, he moved towards her instead and hugged her. Though, she remained strangely unmoving.

After a while, he spoke again: “Uzu are you o-“

He was interrupted by Uzu: “So … that was a genjutsu after all. Frightening … to think there truly are genjutsu around that are nearly unbreakable. To think that once you connect the Sharingan to your brain, you get information about its abilities … or maybe that’s a specialty only applying to mangekyo sharingans.”

She looked at him and the Sharingan in her right eye disappeared and changed into a normal raven-black eye. Something that his former teammate Sasuke had also had, though this one was a bit darker yet.

“Uzu?” He asked, when she still didn’t hug him back.

“Did you find those that you were looking for?” He heard her ask, her voice even and quiet.

She’s purposefully suppressing her emotions again …

He moved his hand under her chin, trying to lift it up and kiss her … but the moment his hand touched her chin, he suddenly found himself flying into the wall and crashing into it. He gasped in pain.

The bones her single punch had broken were already starting to heal though.

He slowly got up and looked at her again, his eyes wide in surprise.

What’s going on? …

He saw her grab at her mouth and stomach as she vomited and knelt on the ground.

He saw her eyes wide and bloodshot as she mumbled: “Sorry … sorry …”

“Uzu, what happened?” Naruto asked, moving a bit closer to her again, his broken ribs already healed again.

He carefully inspected her face, seeing that the Sharingan had activated itself again and the black lines below her eyelids indicated that her sage mode was still activated.

Slowly he moved towards her and knelt on the ground in front of her.

He reached out his arms and said: “May I?”

He saw her nod and pulled her into his arms, rubbing her back.

She stiffened, then shivered and finally relaxed as he heard sobs escape her throat and felt tears fall onto his neck.

A few minutes later, when she relaxed enough to go limp in his arms, he asked: “Uzu, do you want to tell me what happened?”

He felt her fingers dig into the fabric of his cloak, the sheer force of the grip would bruise his skin a little later on.

“Danzo. He put me under a genjutsu and made me believe that … everything that happened after I woke up was a dream. He made me feel powerless and if his chakra hadn’t run out, four of his Root would have … would have drugged me and …” Uzu stammered into his shoulder.

He shivered, feeling anger bubble up inside of him.

A deep voice in his mind growled: “Haha kit. See, that old coot is even worse than any of the tailed beasts. At least we just kill and eat, but we never rape or put anyone under a genjutsu!”

Kurama … leave it …

After that, it was quiet again. Naruto knew that as long as he said the fox’s real name, he would know that he really should shut up.

Holding the shaking girl in his arms, anger rushed through his body … but there was no one to blame. Danzo was already dead, he could only curse himself for letting her go in there alone. He had not once believed that she couldn’t easily kill Danzo … but who knew that the old man still had something up his sleeve.

He had never seen her this small and fragile before and he hated it.

He hated it.

From now on, he would protect her, even if she was strong and actually much stronger than him right now, but he would protect her. He wouldn’t just blindly trust in her ability to do literally everything.

…

Tsunade and Jiraiya arrived not much later and Naruto carried Uzu towards their apartment, laying her down on her room’s bed and watching as she slowly fell asleep.

The Root members that weren’t too far gone in terms of mental state, were led into the Anbu headquarters where they were looked at by psychologists, mostly from the Yamanaka clan.

It was only hours later that Jiraiya and Tsunade came back and the instant Naruto heard their footsteps in the apartment, he watched as Uzu shot up and glared at the door with her Sharingan activated and wildly spinning in circles.

He grabbed her hand and made her focus his attention on him.

The smile on his face seemed to calm her and he felt a wave of chakra run through his body, searching for … something. As the chakra wave returned to Uzu, she seemed to have found what she needed and relaxed again soon, laying back down and staring at the ceiling.

Her Sharingan deactivated, something that he knew only people with Uchiha blood could actually do … but somehow, she seemed to be able to do it anyway. He didn’t know whether she also had Uchiha blood or whether there was something else going on …

…

And indeed, Naruto wasn’t exactly wrong.

Uzu, during the operation, had found out that she could control the Sharingan as if she were an actual Uchiha. But that would only make sense if she had Uchiha blood …

Tests that were done when she had just come to Konoha proved that she did not have Uchiha blood … but how else would she explain that she could somehow completely control the eye as if it always had been hers? She could potentially just say that she uses a seal to hide the eye, but … that wasn’t the truth.

The only possible explanation is that she also has Uchiha blood.

But how?

…

Naruto watched as she slowly fell asleep again and he continued holding her hand.

Tsunade’s head had peeked in for a few seconds, meeting his eyes. She looked at her daughter before looking at Naruto again. He nodded and she nodded back before closing the door again.

He figured that she and Jiraiya would stay up late to discuss what to actually really tell the council about the now disbanded foundation …

And he was so damn glad that he did not have anything to do with that.

Also, he might have once wanted to become Hokage, but now … he just really wanted to stay with Uzu and that was literally all he wanted. He would never let anything like today happen again.

Watching the girl asleep on the bed and looking extremely peaceful, having no nightmare, he also felt sleepy and laid down his head on the bead, falling asleep not much later.

…

The next morning, Uzu awoke, feeling a lot better than before.

Her thoughts inevitably wandered, again, to what Danzo had shown her. But, she … really felt less and less every time she looked at those images. They were just another memory and … Naruto’s actions yesterday had shown her that she … didn’t need to worry about what he thought about her killing those Root Anbu.

She still worried, a lot even. But it would be okay, she knew that. His hug yesterday had told her everything she needed to know.

Sitting up, she noticed that she was still holding Naruto’s hand.

Sigh, that looks really damn uncomfortable …

She looked at the way he had fallen asleep and decided that that wouldn’t do.

She gently let go of his hand and crawled off the bed.

Lifting him out of the chair, she sat him down on the bed and gently lowered him until he lay on his side.

She marveled at his ability to stay asleep even now.

And he even shifted and moved until he had found his usual sleeping position.

Uzu wanted to walk away but was suddenly pulled backwards and found herself lying on his chest, being squeezed and cuddled like a pillow.

She had wanted to slowly untangle herself but feeling his iron grip on her, as if he worried that she, or whatever he was holding, would vanish the next second if he didn’t hold on hard enough, made her relax and instead let him hold her as much as he wanted to.

She felt guilty for having hit him yesterday, so viciously as well. At that moment, the unreal image of that man had swapped with Naruto and she couldn’t help but try to stop him in some way.

It was only afterwards that she realized that the person whose bones she had broken was Naruto and not whatever imaginary man Danzo had shown her.

Thinking about Danzo made anger rise in her stomach … another old and familiar face flashed in her mind.

Humura.

She’d ask Naruto about Humura again soon and then they’d deal with her. There was no one to protect her anymore. They did not even really need any evidence to just do whatever they wanted to her.

Across the months, Uzu had found out that Humura only had connections to Root or Danzo, but not anyone else. There was no one to protect her and if they managed to gather some more Children of Iron, then they could easily win a law case against her. Though, the word of Tsunade, Jiraiya, Naruto and her together could easily, very easily, sway the opinion of everybody in Konoha.

However, no matter how angry she was, dealing with Humura was not her right. That was something that Naruto needed to do and decide for himself. She would help and she would gladly help in getting that woman into hell itself.

She felt Naruto’s hand run across her back and rest on her waist as her anger slowly faded again.

Looking at the wide and satisfied smile on his face, she chuckled lightly and soon closed her eyes again, deciding to rest a bit more.

…

A/N: Well, there we are … lots of things happened. This was a bitch to proofread and summarize.

Either way, let me know what you thought about it :3

And yes, she does have the Susanoo now and she does have Kotoamatsukami, though she won’t really use it tbh … or I at least don’t have much plans on having it be used by her.

Also, I'd appreciate any new ideas that I could focus on in the coming chapters! The war will still happen, but I'll first need to get somehow figure out what happens when ... that sucks, but yeah, I'll need to anyway. So chapters will be slower! :c