Parallel Lines | Naruto

𝟏| The lonely means of an end

Death was a common occurrence.

The sight of rotting corpses with steam emanating from scorched skin and pooling blood no longer turned heads. Instead, it was instinct to move forward and mind your own business; especially in the rural outskirts of the lands that had been decimated by the Departure five years ago. Any human and any village that lingered within a twenty metre radius between the coasts and the ocean ceased to exist. Whilst the tsunamis and earthquakes were enough to flatten the Earth, it was the aftermath that remained the biggest challenge.

Humans would do anything to survive. That notion soon engraved itself into the minds of those who continued to live even after the Departure had taken everything away from them. One could even argue that society had become even more advanced and developed than it ever was before, Sasuke believed otherwise. However, he was never one to ruminate over the 'what if's', not when he spent the past couple of years trapped in his own mind and seeing things he'd never seen before.

The Aftermath, as it was called, referred to the shift in priorities as well as morality. Not many were capable of rebuilding themselves, but those who managed to climb their way back up from rock bottom developed a common belief that the world would no longer be able to heal and move on when the war had hardly begun. The Departure was a one-sided onslaught. Some even viewed it as divine retribution— where a higher power refuted what became of humanity in the form of a series of punishments, cults emerging as a result. Sasuke never dared to indulge in the semantics— in fact, he couldn't find it in himself to care about what the future could mean for the rest of the world. All his agendas remain contingent, while his goal had not once wavered.

Those who weren't able to rebuild themselves, gave into the chaos the new world demanded. He had seen it himself, people travelling in hoards, leaving mayhem and bedlam in their stead, numbers soon dwindling as they turn their backs on each other and lose themselves to the destruction they'd ensued.

Destruction. Sasuke scoffed at the word. The world had seen destruction, but they'd never felt it. They'd never felt its power course through their veins, a fast-flowing and never-ending river with a source so infinite its boundary surpassed the very laws of this universe. One that he now wielded, but struggled to control.

Oldpass was a merchant village known for its hotbed of piracy situated near the Hanguri gulf, Orochimaru had sent him along with a team (who'd proven to be much more of a hindrance) in order to retrieve an ancient artefact. It'd been stolen from a pilgrimage site that had existed a millennia ago, its ruins now buried beneath the sand as the result of time's gradual dissolution and the aftermath of the First Shinobi World War. This wasn't the first time Orochimaru had made him an errand boy nor was it the first time he felt a surmountable rage that urged him to burn the bastard into rotten flesh either.

"You'll thank me for this later, Sasuke." Orochimaru had assured him with the same despicable smirk on his face that had always got on his nerves. "This mission is essential to you."

Thank him? He gritted his teeth, he was unable to differentiate between his anger and the heat pulsating onto his skin. The Sand Lands required of him to don a loose, brown poncho, a scabbard unlike his usual blades and a black cloth headband— although the outfit ensured obscurity, it made him equally as uncomfortable.

"You know..." Suigetsu began, his hands resting behind his head as he leisurely strolled through the bustling streets. "Considering I turn into a literal blob of water, it makes me wonder why Orochimaru sent me to a place where I can essentially evaporate. I mean- it has never happened to me before, but hey? Anything's possible these days."