Chapter 65 - Arc IX: In Demon's Hands- Chapter 2

Shoki demonstrated what he could do, while Jiraiya evaluated him. Truthfully, his mind was only maybe a third on Shoki. He had other thoughts in his head.

Three months and then Naruto will start his Sage training. Hopefully, being with Yuji, Sakura will level up her genjutsu. That’s Naruto’s weak spot by far, and she’ll be a perfect compliment to him that way.
Maybe a better question is why Yuji decided to entrust Shoki to me. After I made it clear that Shoki’s eye should be used against the Rinnegan, and Yuji vehemently protested. Surely he had options. That Shinmaru fellow, for example, or Azami…

Shoki’s jutsu ended and he stopped, waiting for Jiraiya’s appraisal. The sannin was impressed, even for paying less than half attention.

“I wish I could show you more, but I don’t know enough about my eye to really…” Shoki began, apologizing humbly.

“No, it’s okay. I’m going to help your fundamentals. You’ve got a good grasp on them already. Now, you know your chakra types, right?”

“Yes. Lightning and Earth,” Shoki replied. He paused a moment, deciding to elaborate. “Yuji thinks that this is why I’m able to use the Issekigan. My chakras are opposites, allowing me almost a full range of offense and defense against any chakra type.”

Jiraiya wondered about something right there. He decided to try something.

“Shoki, I’m going to attack you with a fire attack. I want you to block it the way you talked about blocking Yuji’s fire attack.”

Shoki set himself the way he had practiced and waited patiently. Jiraiya used his Toad Oil Flame Bomb attack. Shoki’s eye captured the image of the fire and froze it as if on a mirror’s surface. On the bottom of the mirror was a small character that said ‘fire’.

“Amazing…”
This could be why it affects the other special eye types. Rinnegan can use all six types of chakra. If the conditions Yuji is guessing are correct, then the Issekigan can be used to defend against all six types.
The Sage of Six Paths created new jutsu with his Rinnegan. It stands to reason there would be an opposite to the Rinnegan, similar to the way the Byakugan and Sharigan have similar abilities.
Now, what would happen if…

“Shoki, try defending against my Shadow Clone this time. I want you to block it the same way you did the fire attack.”

Shoki nodded, wondering what this was about. Yuji never had him do that. How could he block a Shadow Clone that way? Freezing the image of a person using the Awasekagami (Opposite Mirror) Jutsu was one thing, but this was different entirely. Still, he had nothing to lose by trying. Jiraiya would not seriously hurt him.

The Shadow Clone came in, straight and moving slowly since this was a test run. Shoki captured the image and immediately felt a strain on his chakra. The clone slowed first, then ground to a complete halt, just like the fire attack.

“Good! Okay, I know this is a hit on your chakra, so we’ll make this the last thing for today,” Jiraiya told him. This was shaping up to be very interesting indeed. “You can physically touch the ‘mirror’ that your eye casts to capture an image in the real world, right?”

Shoki nodded in the affirmative. “But I can’t feel, for example, the heat of a fire. The feeling is…neutral. Like touching my own skin.”

“Mm. That should work. Okay, I want you to smash the mirror that’s holding my clone. Use any attack you want. Taijutsu might be best at this point, since your chakra is being used up with your eye…”

Shoki chose to use a standard kick. His foot shattered the mirror. The Shadow Clone disappeared as if it had taken normal damage.

“Aaghh! Damn, that hurt.”

Shoki spun to see Jiraiya holding a sizeable wound on the center of his chest. Blood was spurting from it. The strange part was that the wound was in the same place that Shoki had kicked the Shadow Clone.

“I thought so,” Jiraiya murmured, rubbing some special ointment on his wound. “There’s always a kick-back when it comes to Shadow Clones, but this confirms my theory.”
Turning to Shoki, Jiraiya smiled in a friendly way, so as not to alarm the boy. He now held a very powerful and dangerous ability within him. With some fine-tuning, it would be a match for almost anything.
“Shoki, you destroyed a Shadow Clone there. It didn’t have a lot of my chakra, so I’ll live. But imagine if you caught a real person in there- you’ve done that before, against Pain, if Yuji is correct-then the person himself would be shattered, just like the ‘mirror’ that holds the image.’

Jiraiya didn’t need to elaborate further. The way to defeat, or at least severely weaken Pain, was now evident.

“But-” Jiraiya added, thinking of Yuji as he did, “This power is yours. If and when you use it is up to you. You don’t need to become a weapon. There’s good and bad about that decision, but Yuji is right. Now that I’ve met you, I understand what he was saying. It’s your choice now, Shoki. To fight or not. You’re intelligent and more than competent. But don’t let that stress you out. If you need help making the decision, you should ask whoever you trust.”

Shoki stayed silent for a moment, turning his thoughts over in his head. When he finally spoke, he spoke slowly, as if tasting each word as he said it.
“Master…what if I don’t want to do what I thought? I mean…there’s something else I’d like to do. …”

“Oh? Like what?”

Shoki drew himself up, looking at the ground even as he tried to sound certain. “I want to be a medical shinobi. Yuji keeps getting hurt, and Lady Sakura is so amazing…”

“Lady Sakura?”

“If Yuji serves them, I do as well. And maybe I can learn from them, since I can’t teach them…”

Jiraiya chuckled to himself. If only you knew, Shoki. You could probably teach us all a thing or two.
“Well, then that’s what you should do. Shinobi like Sakura are rare, but I think you’ve got the talent to pull it off.”

“Will you keep training me? I don’t want to be useless in combat. If anything, I’d like to know more. The more I know, the more I can help people, and the less people need to be hurt by me not wanting to be a weapon.”
--
--

Asuna and Sarutobi approached Miko carefully. Of all the souls tortured in the stomach of the shinigami, she seemed the most miserable. Her hair and clothes were tattered, and her face held no life. The only flicker of emotion was fear in her eyes that never subsided.

“To bring someone back to life…from death…it’s amazing that such a jutsu exists…”

Asuna shook her head to Sarutobi’s comment. “It’s amazing, and so wrong. Death is natural. This place is wretched, but it’s the reason this works.”

Sarutobi held a question in his eyes. Asuna didn’t need to look to know it was there.

“This technique works because these are the souls that did not die a natural death. To have your soul swallowed by a god of death is not the same as dying naturally. The souls here are condemned to suffer. Which is the only reason that I, as a miko, can interfere and perhaps help put you to real eternal rest.”

Kneeling down, she gently pulled the chain off of Miko’s neck. Miko reacted by jumping backward on all fours, curling up into a ball and covering her ears, eyes shut tightly, with incoherent gurgling coming out of her mouth.

Asuna knelt down and put both her hands under Miko’s chin, cupping it and forcing their eyes to meet. Miko breathed out, stunned at first, then her eyes slowly calmed, and her body relaxed.

“This…is truly hell.”

The first words she spoke. She held on Asuna’s sleeve, even as Asuna forced her into a gentle hug, rubbing Miko’s hair and back soothingly.

“Hell is not your place, Miko. Neither is it yours, Sarutobi.”
Lifting Miko’s chin, Asuna again looked her in the eyes.
“You have to go back. Fight. One more battle. Then your body and soul will know true peace. You know that I speak the truth, Miko. It was you who taught it to me.”

Sarutobi still smiled serenely. “This hell…my death was unnatural, but of my own design. I must return here. I’ve condemned my own soul.”

“Yuji won’t like it…” Asuna warned him.

“Yes, I know. But he is an upright man who understands duty, if nothing else.”

Asuna smiled a little at the description. Yes, that was Yuji to be sure.
“I expected I’d have to yank his soul out of here by now.”

“Were he the Yuji of old, you would have,” Sarutobi admitted judiciously. “It may seem contrary to the visible eye, but his will to live is stronger now. He is self-sacrificing, but when his time comes, he will not die foolishly. All the better if he never uses the last jutsu I was able to teach him…”
--
--

Yuji was surrounded by what had to be the entire Church of Jashin congregation. And not one of them looked unhappy about it. Since he didn’t have to hold back or worry about killing, he could just let off his frustration now. If he survived. The tricky part was that he didn’t know the nuances of their abilities. For all he knew, Hidan was a special case with the blood eating deal. Immortality was in the church’s doctrine, so that was a definite yes. Best to fight as efficiently as possible.

“SHOUKYAKU JUTSU!” Yuji roared, exhaling neutral chakra at the crowd. A small tornado of fire opened up in the center of the bar, then exploded outward, shattering the windows and sending the tables and chairs flying. People scrambled around, trying to avoid the sudden burst. By then, Yuji was in the midst of the confusion, dealing damage at a rapid-fire pace. By the time his jutsu calmed down, he had removed two-thirds of the opposing force. The remaining group wasn’t as excited to fight as before.

“Why do you want to know about the Issekigan?” called out one of those who had avoided the blast. She was an older woman, gone gray and gaunt. Due to the fact that everyone shut up when she began to speak, and judging by the ceremonial-looking shawl across her shoulders, Yuji guessed she was of some importance.

“I cannot say. It’s not for my own gain, nor is it to wage war on your church. Beyond that…” Yuji made an ‘I can’t say’ gesture.

The old woman nodded, holding up a hand. Everyone’s weapons were stowed back into their clothes, and they all shuffled away, heads down.

Leaning close, the old woman asked Yuji if he would be interested in making a deal.

“What kind of deal?”

“If I tell you the conditions of the Issekigan, you take my son and his wife and kids with you when you leave. They’ve seen too much senseless bloodshed already…”

Yuji readily agreed.

“Follow me, then,” the old woman requested, beckoning Yuji toward a building roughly half a mile away. Yuji had noticed it right away when coming in to town; it stood out somehow, without him ever knowing what it was.
“To our church, where the records are kept. There I can give you answers.”
--
--
Naruto and Sakura were training, punching and kicking back and forth, when Jiraiya approached them, Shoki in tow. Shoki stayed back while Jiraiya spoke quietly to Sakura. Naruto wandered over to Shoki to talk, and they started a little sparring match of their own. That was Naruto’s way of giving Sakura and Jiraiya room to talk.
-

“So he wants to be a medical ninja, like you,” Jiraiya finished. “He’s trained with Yuji, and frankly, were he to pursue that line of training, he would be jonin level in a short time. But he looks up to Yuji, and is determined to stay by his side. And Yuji’s place is by your side. Yours and Naruto’s.”

Sakura hadn’t yet considered taking on an apprentice. She hadn’t really felt like she mastered all of Lady Tsunade’s teachings. But, then again, sometimes teaching was the easiest way to learn. And besides, if she taught Shoki, then Yuji might be forced to stay friends with her. Even in a serious relationship with Naruto, Sakura wanted to maintain a friendship with Yuji.

“Well, okay, I guess. It would be kind of nice to train someone,” she said to Jiraiya.

Then the Sannin got more serious.
“Sakura, in a couple months, you realize Naruto needs to go to finish his training. I know it’ll be hard on you, but if he doesn’t go, he won’t stand a chance.”

Sakura lowered her eyes. “I know. I’ve promised myself I’ll be strong. And if I’ve got an apprentice, then I’ll be busy and won’t worry so much.”
She tried to smile bravely at the end.

“Yuji will be back at that point. To train you, actually,” Jiraiya added. “In genjutsu. We can tap that ability further. You’re built for genjutsu, but you aren’t making the most of that potential. Tsunade was never stellar at genjutsu herself, which is probably why it hasn’t come up.”

“Yuji…Master, are you sure? Lately I’ve realized just how hard it must have been for him. To be in love with me, to be forced to not only sit back and watch, but encourage my relationship with another man, and then have to watch it blossom. I can’t even imagine…”

Jiraiya gave her a grin. “Well, I think that you thought like that would make Yuji’s day. But whatever you do, don’t waver. You’re with Naruto; as long as you’re serious, stay true to him. If it turns out he’s not the one, well, then it turns out that way. But the most painful thing for Yuji would be to see you break up with Naruto over feelings of misplaced guilt.”

You are not authorized to comment here. Your must be registered and logged in to comment