Naruto: Threads of Crimson

"What the fuck was that Shiro?" Shisui grabbed the handle of my ninjato and stabbed it into the ground.

Giving him a hard stare back I narrowed my eyes "What did it look like? I was ending the fight."

"You were ending the fight. Oh yeah, of course, you were ending the fight. Here I thought you were just causing unnecessary harm. My bad Shiro!" His eyes became slanted as he looked me up and down.

Feeling the ridicule and sarcasm oozing from his voice I scoffed and turned towards my sword to pick it back up. "Why do you even care Shisui? Why could you possibly care about the way I kill my enemies?" My voice rose as it matched his tone.

Before I could pick up my sword or even blink, he was right in front of me again grabbing the collar of my shirt. "Do you seriously not see an issue with what you just did? Is your head so far up your own ass that you can't see what just happened?"

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN?! Shisui, we are SHINOBI what does it matter if they die slowly or if I inflict some pain on them? It helps me become a better fighter." I jerked myself free from his grip and pulled my sword out of the dirt. "Besides, Reika-sensei has already said this was normal and I don't have anything wrong with me."

Shisui looked at me with squinted eyes and turned away. "Next time just kill them and get on with it, there's no reason to cause unnecessary pain and suffering to these people even if they are our enemies." 

My eyes hardened as I turned my attention back towards the dead bodies lying on the ground. 'If they aren't strong enough to beat a couple of kids, then why should they have an opinion on how they die?'

Walking towards the cabin standing in the middle of the clearing I glanced over at Shisui who currently had his sword in his hand as he opened the door to the cabin. 'He just doesn't understand it. Each kill gets me closer to being stronger and being stronger means I can protect my loved ones. I would rather lose my mind to depravity before I let anyone else close to me die again because of my weakness.' 

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Taking a deep breath, Shisui watched as Shiro turned around and yanked his sword out of the ground. 'Usually he just mentally messes with people but this was such an abrupt switch. I don't think I've ever seen him take joy in harming someone physically before.'

After the little spat Shisui expected to see short and clipped movements coming from Shiro. Maybe a cold stare here or there or a roll of the eyes. Who wouldn't be at least a little upset from a fight with their friend?

Instead what he saw was the movements of a tired and sad person reflected in his sharingan. Something that he hadn't really ever seen on Shiro's silhouette since they became friends. 'I suppose this is probably just the lingering emotions from his dad's death, maybe he won't be as cruel in the future.' 

Frowning, Shisui went to make his way back to his friend before he paused and pivoted on his heel. 'Perhaps now is the time to give him a little space. Maybe it would help him come to grips with reality a little bit.' He thought as he put a hand on the doorknob to twist it.

Shisui walked into the cabin to see a passed-out ninja with a leaf headband on sleeping on the ground with his hands tied behind his back and a strange-looking paper on his forehead.

"What in the world is this thing?" Shisui whispered as he looked at the intricately spiraling ink of the paper with his sharingan. "It's almost like it's absorbing all his chakra, or at least keeping it all centered on this one slip of paper."

Shaking his head and placing his fingers on the forehead of his fellow shinobi he let out a short burst of chakra that hit the paper and caused it to explode into millions of different microscopic pieces that even his two tomoe sharingan couldn't keep up with.

"Hmm, so it's meant to self-destruct if anyone tampers with it, that makes sense considering how powerful it looked. But how would the Stone have gotten such an advanced seal and why would they be using it on such a menial task like keeping an informant tied up?" Shisui thought as he began to untie the man's hands from behind his back.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Looking back at the corpses on the ground a slight upturn came to the corner of my mouth as I felt, not the thrill of battle anymore, but the joy of being able to have a hand in my own fate. It felt good to be able to stand on my own and kill someone before they had a chance to think about doing it to me.

'This just means I'm gaining more strength. Whatever I need to do or learn, I will, in order to protect the ones I love.' The smirk went away a little as I thought of all the different growing opportunities.

'I think next on the list is to learn a specific form of kenjutsu in order to refine my skills because, evidently, my skills aren't up to par yet. Right now, I just have the basics of the leaf style of kenjutsu, but there are much more powerful techniques out there that I should explore before locking myself into a specific one.' 

Glancing back at the opened door, I sighed as I began to walk over to the cabin. 'This war is really getting in the way of my training too; I could be studying a new form of genjutsu, refining my fire-style ninjutsu, or even getting more battle experience against stronger shinobi, but here I am doing this mission because some guy got caught by our enemy.'

Sighing I smacked my cheeks with both hands. 'I shouldn't be thinking this way towards my comrades, I would want someone to do the same for me as well.'

Stepping into the building, there wasn't a change in the lighting because of the sharingan, it's like seeing during the day, everything is perfectly lit and I could see the smallest of details on the person we were rescuing.

The man was on the shorter side, with dark brown hair and closed eyes. There was a smattering of freckles all over his face and spreading down to his arms and he only had 8 fingers. The last 2 fingers of his right hand were missing and in their place were just bloody stumps. 

"He's not in too great of shape is he?" I sighed as I walked over to crouch next to Shisui and take a look at the other very visible wound on his body, the open gash running down his left cheek, through his neck, and down to his collarbone.

"Just barely missed his carotid artery as well, he's lucky to still be living with an injury like this," I added and pulled out a couple of gauze pads.

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(A/N: A little more edge, but this should be the most you'll get for the foreseeable future. I don't enjoy writing him this way too much [You know the 'everyone must die for me to get stronger' way] but it is necessary to show his growth in the future.

Powerstone Goals:

25 by Sunday = Extra Chapter

50 by Sunday = 2 Extra Chapters