Hikari; The Forgotten Otsutsuki

Chapter 23

The morning that came after that night's event was ironically peaceful despite my fragile state of mind. Hitori and I were enjoying our Suimono in the dining room. The birds were chirping cheerily unlike when Danzo's intrusion happened the day before. Somehow it had slipped my attention that the birds were sort of 'in-tune' with Hitori. Their chirpings hypothetically indicated her stress levels, a useful trait if I say so myself.

Both of us were already dressed for our day. She was sporting an above the knee, green and red themed kimono complete with the hair accessories and the violet praying beads that she used as bracelets. The bracelet helped her hid her glow, she had explained it when I pointed it out during our trips around the village. I was sporting my usual Hyuuga Jukengi but without the Fudo Masamune.

"You know, I think I should go back to the mountain today, to get my things," Hitori blurted out after she had finished her soup. I was spacing out as I watched her ate and wondered how she seemed so unfazed by yesterday's event.

"Hmm? Oh, sure. I'll summon you home by the end of the day. Uhmmm, Hitori-san, how are you so yourself? I mean, you had a blade pierced right through your heart yesterday," I began and earned a laugh from her.

"I had stopped worrying about death eons ago. Every time I injured myself too badly, my body would burn into ashes and a new one rose from said ashes. However, things would be entirely different if I ran out of lifeforce to spare. I would need to recharge it back, so to speak and that is where I would really die, in this plane of existence at least. Try not to get into that Divine Mode when I'm gone. At least not until your mental state is much more manageable. I had to lock away your demented Otsutsuki's wrath with my chakra. Don't kick yourself for that though. It is expected of an Otsutsuki to manifest that god complex personality. It won't do much if your mind kept being so fragile all the time," Hitori just had to give me a good bout of nagging before she went on with her day. She rubbed my cheeks slowly after she said it and shot me an apologetic look. I presumed that she was feeling guilty for introducing me to said powers and thus I inwardly flinched and cursed myself for succumbing to the despair of losing her. I hung my head, disappointed at myself.

"I know," I breathed, "I need help, professional help. I'm going to Yamanaka-sama's office today."

My fist was clenched as I hated it so much for I had to resort to therapy and my self-hate was all over the place. I felt her lips on mine and I gladly returned her kiss.

"There's no shame in admitting that you need help. Acceptance had always been the first step to heal. Good luck, my love. Get better," she breathed before she gave me another kiss and then she shunshinned to the lawn. When I heard the giant set of wings flapping away, I stood up and cleaned the table before I made my way to the T&I building.

"Welcome, Hikari-kun. I am grateful that you had decided to follow through with this therapy session. How was your day so far?", Inoichi-sama began as he scrambled out his notepad and a fancy fountain pen before he scribbled some of the snippets of our conversations.

"Thank you, Inoichi-sama. My morning is always peaceful and I hope it will last through the day. Unlike yesterday, of course," my gaze darkened a bit when I answered that. There was occasional scribbling sound as we talked with one another. It was mostly random generic topics before we had to get down and dirty. I was squirming, flinching and droned out throughout the session.

"I am curious about yesterday, if I recalled correctly, you didn't remember it all," Inoichi-sama probed referring to Danzo's death and I knew that he had seen me subtly shifted my weight to the other side.

"Well, for the most part, all that I could hear was my ears buzzing or something and my vision went red and pulsating. When Danzo's men stabbed her heart, something inside of me lashed out and I felt no inclination to either not listen to the emerging personality or repressing it and rather, I was enjoying every minute of it. The rage, vengeance, irritation, and anger. I felt like I wanted to do all of that. At some point, I was virtually lost and trapped inside my mind and thus, Hitori had to fetch me back. Of course, I didn't believe it was her at first but good bouts of nagging could snap someone back to consciousness. When I came to, the ROOT headquarters was in ruins, most of the members were maimed. I remembered delivering the killing blow to Danzo but, what I had done to him afterward was pale in comparison," I half-whispered murmured to the man and he was visibly startled by the amount of information I revealed. He must have wished that if only it was that easy to squeeze out information from either his client or enemy.