Saints and Suffering: A Naruto Fanfiction

Chapter 28- Meeting the Elders

After Domaru left Yama alone in the training grounds, Yama stood there for a couple moments, completely still.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

His hands were clenched and trembling, and he fought to control himself.

A small pebble a few feet away jumped up from the ground, untouched, as if by magic.

Soon more and more pebbles joined in and started to skitter along the ground and ring out as they bounced into each other.

Yama took another deep breath and counted to himself as he cycled through the process.

  In, two, three, four.

  Hold, two three, four, five, six.

  Out, two, three, four.

  Rest, two.

  In, two, three, four...

After a couple more breaths, the pebbles fell back to the ground and laid still.

Yama's fists unclenched, and the hidden tension was shed from his shoulders as his posture eased a slight amount.

Yama looked west, narrowed his eyes, and all the birds in the village stopped singing for a half beat.

West, beyond the village, a small, silver fox rested in the crook of a tree as it lazed around.

Ginou was napping comfortably when it hit.

A momentous spike of killing intent wrathed its way through his psyche, shattering his previous peace and solitude.

Ginou instantly jumped to his feet, almost losing his form and reverting to his normal size and appearance from the sheer shock of the mental blow.

Ginou, hackles raised, heart beating rapidly, looked east, back towards the village.

He had never felt Yama's true killing intent before, and it had shook him to his core.

However, as soon as it had appeared, it withered away, and sank into the earth as if it had never happened in the first place.

The birds sang again, and all was well in the world.

Ginou lept down from his perch, and started making his way back to the Hatake compound. A single thought crossed his mind as he remembered what he had done to rude boy who Yama had claimed to care for.

  Shit.

Yama, back at the academy ground, brought his gaze back, tearing his eyes from the west, and turning his attention back to his surroundings.

No one was around, and the training grounds were empty.

He found a nice tree to sit next to and plopped down as his thoughts wandered.

  Healing Iruka of Ginou's blow has taken the absolute last of the dregs of life energy I had left.

  If I keep it up like this, it will never return. I might have to put a seal on the power, even if that causes problems here and there.

  Maybe Shijin will have some ideas? Anything I do myself might be too heavy handed. Can't really talk to him right now with the house arrest and all that Kakashi told me about.

  If I keep on using the power as its convenient, it will never recover, and it won't be there when it's actually necessary.

  Kinda wish I had someone like Sakura or Tsunade around right now. They would've been able to heal Iruka with only chakra.