From the Ashes

𝙿𝚛𝚘𝚐𝚛𝚎𝚜𝚜𝚒𝚘𝚗.(𝙰𝚌𝚝 2)

"Like any good journey...it all begins with a single step forward."

—Saryn Uzumaki,age fourteen.

                                XXXXXXXXXX

Saryn had some very interesting times,between training and the various other adventures she'd sought out on in the years following her exodus of the Leaf.Her first order of business heading out of Wave had been Töka and the Storm Mountain Range.

The Flock Leader all but demanded her presence in the assault to end this cold war,using her knowledge of sealing and her innate human capability to assault many of the Great Serpent's underbosses where they couldn't:The underground network known to those above as the Serpent's Hollow.

It was a solo mission of which would prove whether or not she was truly capable of becoming The One.Of course they wouldn't be sending their sole summoner in there half-cocked,and the birds had awaited her return to Adad just for it.

Usually swords wouldn't last more than a second anywhere in the senjutsu-ridden lands and animals,but the blade crafted by Thel's ingenuity and the very power of the skies above had combined and reformed all the destroyed blades left in Saryn's wake.

One of the Kiba had been joined with the remnants of her original short sword,while the other merged with her broken black katana of old,contorting into a straight double edged longsword primed for versatility.

All that had been left to complete the transformation was for her own personal touches to the nature-embued blades,of which Saryn had many in mind.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The end of her first complete year away from Konoha was capped by an ending battle for the Horned Serpent's hold over the Lower Zone of Storm.Of course,it would have to be done through typical Saryn Uzumaki fashion:Thunder,Rain and Lightning.

It was also through the Great Serpent's death that Saryn had finalized the name of her anomalous blade.The shorter in length tantō was coined as Ether for its malleability to lightning nature,but it'd taken until the time came to deal with the Horned Serpent did she name her other blade.

Aether.The chosen name was beautifully fitting,seeing as she'd defeated the Horned Serpent in reciprocating fashion...She'd lured the creature out of its stronghold by setting fire to liters upon liters of snake skin,fabricated from the scales of many serpents she'd flushed out and cut down in her exploration of the various tunnels of the Hollow.

Such disrespect to those scaly bastards wouldn't go unanswered by the colossal creature and sure enough,it had answered with hellish ferocity on the shoreline shared between the circle of mountains.

From then on it was clear that she would require much more than her usual jutsu,only through the absorption of natural lightning chakra did she manage the power to contend with such a monstrous serpent.The channeling of said energy into her longsword had made slashing through the battle-hardened heads of the beast little more than lightwork for its greatly enhanced ability and reach.Aether had liberated the Mountains and soon not even the Sea Dragon King dared to engage in open combat without the Serpent's near-endless supply of nature energy.Those that did,would remember only the near-translucent trail of energy that followed the slashing motion of the long blade,and then nothing...

Like any good warrior Saryn made sure to subjugate those parasites to their rightful places in this land,beneath herself and the Thunderbird Flock.Talking the fearful Sea Dragon into a psuedo-contract had been easy enough with her right eye,but getting the birds to accept what was essentially slavery had been no easy feat.