Just Friends (Kiba Inuzuka Love Story)

Chapter 6

I stirred awake to the sound of Ginji getting up. Soon, Kazuki woke up and we exited the tent to stretch.

"Next time, I'm gonna have to show you how to set up a tent. I felt cramped up in there," I shook my head at Ginji.

He just rolled his eyes in response and packed up the tent. I double-checked for the scroll to make sure that it was safe inside my pouch. Kazuki took the map out of his backpack and we both took a look at it. 

We finally figured out where we were and then started walking back on the correct path.

It was dead silent though. Even though we agreed on getting up at 5, no one actually wants to wake up that early. 

Kazuki looked down at the map again to make sure we were still on the right path. 

As the sun rose up, we reached a spot that Kazuki had marked to take a quick break. 

"Can we eat now?" Ginji asked as his stomach growled loudly.

Kazuki chuckled at how loud his stomach growled, causing his cheeks to turn a light shade of pink. 

"We only have three days' worth of food and that only covers dinner," I said. "It's better if we look around real quick for any berries out here,"

He groaned and we started scouting around for berries to eat. I remembered a time when my dad taught me how to look out for poisonous berries, which was to stay away from yellow, green, and white berries. I also remember the academy teaching us how to avoid poisonous berries.

"I miss tiramisu," Ginji sulked as he ate the berries.

Kazuki shook his head at Ginji. "At least you're eating something on the healthier side this time,"

"Would've been a lot better if it was tiramisu," Ginji shrugged, causing him to roll his eyes.

We finished our short break and continued walking to the house. I took the scroll out of my pocket to inspect it to make sure it was still in good shape. 

"Hey, that coyote is following us," Kazuki pointed out.

I looked up and saw a coyote coming toward me. I got worried, but then to my horror, it snatched the scroll right out of my hand as I was going to put it away.

Kazuki gasped in horror and Ginji's eyes widened.

"Kaori?!" They both exclaimed.

"It was an accident!" I retort.

"Yeah, an accident that's gonna cause us to fail!" Ginji raised his voice at me.

"Well, yelling at me is not going to help, is it?" I yelled back at him.

"Well no, but you still could've been careful, Kaori. Now we're probably going to fail and get sent back to the academy," Ginji retorted.

"Why are you blaming me for this? I didn't ask for that coyote to snatch it out of my hand!" I narrowed my eyes and raised my voice even more.

Kazuki got in between us and pushed us both back lightly. 

"Stop it you two," He looked at us both. "Yelling at each other and fighting isn't going to help us get it back. We have to go find that coyote and get it back,"

Ginji and I both huffed in frustration but didn't say anything. Kazuki was right though, I had to get that scroll back.

We started sprinting in the direction where the coyote was going.

Kazuki was running even faster than Ginji and I was.

"I see it!" He exclaimed and pushed himself to run faster.

"Wait, Kazuki!" Ginji shouted, but he ran off too fast. 

Ginji and I exchanged looks but stayed silent. 

I could tell he was still angry with me and I was not happy with the way he was talking to me. 

We both ran after Kazuki, but couldn't find him anywhere. Damnit, where could he have gone?

Ginji and I spent what felt like hours looking around, but this forest was like a maze to us so we didn't have any luck. We also bickered the entire time because he wouldn't stop bringing up how I should've left it in my pouch or should've been more careful with it.

Ginji leaned against a tree and ran his hands through his hair in frustration. "Damnit, first we lose the scroll and now we can't find Kazuki anywhere. Where the hell did he even go?"

I shrugged.

"And none of this would've happened if you would've kept the scroll secured, Kaori," Ginji glared at me.

"For the last time, would you stop blaming me? I was checking to see if it was in good shape. I didn't expect that coyote to take it out of my hand," I rolled my eyes at him. 

"You didn't expect it? That's careless. You should've been on guard,"

I glared back at him. "If you're going to keep holding that over my head, I'm just gonna go look for Kazuki and that scroll by myself. Hopefully, I'll find it soon too so that can shut you up,"

"Fine, I'll look by myself too then. Maybe I'll even get the scroll before it gets destroyed even more," He retorted and turned the other way.

I turned around and went to go look by myself. 

 I retraced all my steps and even checked bushes and trees to see if I could find Kazuki. I hope that coyote didn't attack him and injure him, or ruin the scroll. I also hoped that I would find it before Ginji does because I don't want to hear it if he finds it.

I heard growling behind me and I grabbed my kunai. I turned around quickly and widened my eyes when I saw it was another coyote. I really didn't want to have to fight off any animals and hurt them.

I must've walked onto their territory if this one is growling at me.

The coyote lunged at me and bit down on my arm. I gasped out in pain and clutched it when I started to bleed where he bit me.

I kicked the coyote away and then looked around for any nearby trees to jump onto. I remembered back in the academy, they told us that if we encounter any wild animals to make ourselves appear bigger and try to scare them off.

I also made sure that I kept facing the coyote because I knew it would attack me if I turned my back.

I spotted a tree in the distance and slowly started backing away. They told us that running is a no-no as well. 

It followed me as I made my way to the tree. My heart was pounding the entire time and I had to ignore the stinging from my wound. I looked up at the tree and then grabbed onto a branch to pull myself up, then jumped onto the higher branch.

That's when I put my arms over my head and started shouting at it to leave me alone. It started to cower when I maintained eye contact and I grabbed some sticks off the tree and started throwing them at the coyote. That's when my plan to "scare" it away started working. It started to back up and I weaved a sign for another wind release.

I used my bursting air pocket technique.

The coyote felt a burst of air next to it and it looked startled and started running away.

I sighed with relief after checking if it was safe to jump down.

I continued with my search for Kazuki.

"Kazuki?!" I called out.

I groaned in frustration now that I couldn't find him anywhere. I continued my search, hoping I would find him or the scroll somewhere. I especially couldn't let Ginji find him first.