Chapter 12: Chapter 11, Beginning of the Journey
A C-rank, huh? Kaguya muttered to herself, a flicker of excitement flickering in her chest at the thought. It had been some time since she last left the village. The idea of it felt distant, like something she'd once dreamed of but never expected to come true.
She sealed her bag away into a small scroll with a puff of smoke, its cool surface momentarily grounding her in reality. As the clutter of her apartment disappeared into the scroll, the emptiness of the small room seemed to expand, mirroring the unsettling feeling that lingered deep inside her.
For a brief moment, she let her fingers trace the edges of the scroll, as though connecting herself to something solid. Something she could control. With a heavy sigh, Kaguya slipped the scroll into her jacket and turned toward the door, ready to leave. But as she reached for the handle, her mind wandered. The memories—the dreams—began to surface again.
They always started the same way. The void.
She found herself in that familiar, endless space, a blackness so deep it felt like it could swallow her whole. In the distance, the silver light of the moon illuminated her silhouette, casting eerie shadows across the empty expanse. The air was thick with a coldness that seemed to wrap itself around her very being, suffocating her.
But this time, it wasn't just the usual isolation that gnawed at her. It was the weight. The feeling of being someone else.
Kaguya could feel it, could feel the essence of her—the other Kaguya, the one whose face she wore, whose body she inhabited. She could feel her memories swirling in the recesses of her mind, fragmented and strange. The emotions were there too, but they were not her own. Her heart beat to a rhythm that didn't belong to her, pulsing with an overwhelming sense of power—yet it felt alien. Like something that was never meant to be hers.
She wanted to scream, but the scream was trapped in her throat, a suffocating realization pulling her deeper into the abyss. Her fingers twitched, moving against her will, as if she were a puppet, bound by strings she couldn't see, controlled by forces beyond her comprehension.
This body is not mine.
It was a thought she had before, but it hit her harder now, as though it were an undeniable truth. She felt the alien weight of this existence—her existence. The memories of battles, of power, of being Kaguya—they were hers, yet they didn't belong to her. They didn't feel like they belonged to anyone.
I don't know who I am.
She couldn't remember who she had been before this—before becoming someone else entirely. There was only the overwhelming sense of power that pulsed beneath her skin, like an ocean that threatened to drown her in its depths. But that wasn't the most terrifying part. The terrifying part was that she didn't even know who she was anymore.
The familiar moon loomed overhead, glowing impossibly large, its pale light casting long shadows on the ground where she stood. She looked up at it, as she always did, but it didn't comfort her this time. Instead, it made her feel even smaller. The void around her was infinite, and she, a small speck in that infinity, could feel herself slipping further into the weight of it.
Who am I?
She had no answers. No name, no identity of her own. She was Kaguya, but she wasn't. She was trapped in this unfamiliar existence, surrounded by the echoes of memories that weren't hers to claim.
The other Kaguya never spoke. She didn't need to. The silence between them was more oppressive than words could ever be. It was the silence of knowing that Kaguya—the other Kaguya—had once been something beyond her reach, something unreachable.
Kaguya reached out with a trembling hand, desperate to touch something solid, to make herself feel real. But the void swallowed everything she touched, every piece of herself that she tried to grasp.
No one can hear me.
And in that silence, her mind screamed. She wanted to escape, wanted to feel like herself again. But there was only the weight—the weight of being someone she didn't even recognize. The weight of power that wasn't hers to control, and a life that wasn't hers to live.
The darkness closed in, suffocating her, and for the first time, she wondered if she would ever escape it. Would she ever know who she truly was, or would she forever be trapped in someone else's skin?
Her vision flickered, and she was back in the apartment, her hand still on the door. Kaguya blinked, the remnants of the nightmare clinging to her thoughts like cobwebs, cold and oppressive. The air felt heavier now, thicker with the remnants of what she had just experienced. But this wasn't real. She was awake. She had to be.
With a deep breath, she forced herself to step out into the real world, the door closing quietly behind her. But even as she walked away from her apartment, the weight lingered, a constant reminder of the person she could never fully be.
…
The sight of her teammates waiting for her at the gates brought her back to the present. Sakura, Kakashi, Sasuke, and the old man Tazuna stood together, the late afternoon sun casting long shadows across the path ahead. The air between them felt thick with the unspoken tension Kaguya carried.
Sakura noticed her approach first, her eyes softening with concern. "Are you okay, Kaguya? You look like you just had a panic attack," she asked, her voice gentle, yet full of genuine worry.
Kaguya didn't even slow her pace as she shot a sharp glare at Sakura, her eyes colder than usual. "I'm fine," she muttered, her tone clipped and dismissive. The words felt foreign, but she said them with practiced indifference, forcing her emotions into a tight box.
Sakura blinked, taken aback by the sudden shift in Kaguya's demeanor. She wanted to ask more, to press for an answer, but she could sense that Kaguya wasn't going to offer anything more. Her lips pressed together tightly, but she bit her tongue, stepping back and letting the matter drop, not wanting to push her further.
Kakashi, who had been observing the exchange from the side, noticed the abrupt change in Kaguya's behavior. The warmth that had usually followed her was completely absent, replaced by an eerie coldness. It reminded him of how she had acted on team placement day—distant, guarded, as if she were trying to keep everyone at arm's length.
He couldn't help but wonder about the toll the nightmares were taking on her, as Lord Third, Hiruzen Sarutobi, had told him. "Be mindful of Kaguya. We still don't understand the weight of her transformation." The words rang in his mind again. "The nightmares she's been having have only grown worse since the change, but they've been haunting her for longer than that. You need to keep an eye on her, Kakashi."
His fingers brushed the headband on his forehead, a habitual gesture, as his thoughts wandered back to Hiruzen's warning. He looked over at Kaguya, who remained rigid and silent, and couldn't help but feel a little more worried.
"Maa maa, Naruto," Kakashi said, his voice light, trying to break the tension. "You sure are excited for our mission, aren't you?" He gave Naruto a playful grin, trying to keep the mood light, though he kept the reminder from the Hokage at the back of his mind.
Sakura looked around at the group, her hands instinctively brushing the straps of her backpack. "Yeah, I've got everything ready," she said with a nod, holding it up for them to see. But her eyes quickly darted to the others, suddenly a little more self-conscious. "I, um... didn't get a sealing scroll, though." Her voice faltered slightly, as if admitting a mistake.
Kakashi raised an eyebrow at her, concern flashing in his eyes. "Didn't get one?" he asked, his voice still light but with a note of curiosity.
Sakura gave a sheepish shrug, looking a little embarrassed. "I didn't have enough money to buy one," she admitted. "I'll make do with what I have."
Sasuke, standing a little apart from the group, let out a low grunt of annoyance as he held up his own sealing scroll. "I brought one," he said flatly, his tone dismissive, as though he found it hard to believe someone wouldn't have the foresight to prepare properly. The scroll was tucked under his arm, the seal on it visible.
Kaguya, who had been silent up until that point, reached into her pocket and pulled out a smaller sealing scroll of her own. She unfurled it briefly, showing it to the group, before tucking it back into her jacket. "I'm prepared," she said coolly, her voice as distant as ever, her gaze focused somewhere off in the distance.
Tazuna, who had been impatiently tapping his foot by the gates, suddenly spoke up, cutting through the quiet. "Are you all done yet?" he grumbled, his voice gruff and irritated. "We're wasting time here! The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can all head back. I don't need to remind you how long this mission might take."
Sasuke muttered under his breath, clearly irritated with Tazuna's constant complaints. "Could've just gone alone if you're that impatient."
Kakashi chuckled, though there was a slight edge to his laughter. "We're all set now," he said, stepping forward and leading the group. "Let's get going then, before Tazuna turns into a human-sized storm cloud."
The group walked in silence for a time, the sound of their footsteps mixing with the rustling of the evening breeze. Sakura, trying to break the stillness, glanced toward Tazuna and spoke up, her voice cutting through the calm. "So, Tazuna, what's your village like?"
Tazuna, glancing back over his shoulder, seemed to relax a little at the question, grateful for something to talk about. "It's a small fishing village," he said, his gruff voice softer as he began to speak more warmly about his home. "The people there, they work hard. We've got a lot of fishermen, merchants—nothing too fancy, but it gets by."
Sakura nodded, genuinely interested, her eyes bright with curiosity. "Is it mostly just fishermen? Do you have any ninjas there?"
Before Tazuna could answer, Kakashi's voice interjected, a little too quickly. "Not every village has ninjas, Sakura," he said, offering a small smile. "Not every place needs them."
Sasuke, who had been walking with his usual scowl, suddenly seemed to lose interest in the conversation. He shifted his gaze forward, the fleeting mention of ninjas failing to capture his attention. His mind was elsewhere, and it was clear he wasn't particularly interested in learning about the village or its people.
'Not a ninja village, huh?' Kaguya thought absently as she watched the sun slowly dip beneath the horizon. She wasn't sure what that meant anymore—whether it mattered or not. The idea of who she was, of what she had been, seemed so far removed from where she was now. It wasn't a question she felt the need to answer. She would find out in time, or perhaps never at all. All that mattered now was the road ahead, the mission ahead. The future was what would define her.
Her thoughts drifted further as the road stretched ahead of them, lined by trees and the occasional distant building. The air was crisp with the promise of nightfall, but it wasn't the chill of the night that kept her from focusing. She felt an emptiness, a disconnection she couldn't shake. It wasn't about who she was or who she had been—it was about the unknown that lay ahead, the uncertainty of the path that stretched before her.
As they walked, the conversation continued around her, but it felt distant. Sakura was talking with Tazuna, asking more questions about the people and customs of the village. Her curiosity was eager, too eager, to know everything about the place. Kaguya's gaze flickered over to her for a brief moment. What was it like, to care so much about the unknown? It felt foreign to her. She couldn't summon that same energy. It was all too exhausting.
"Are we really going to stop when the sun sets, Kakashi?" Sakura asked, fidgeting with the straps of her backpack. "It's not that far to the village, is it?"
Kakashi looked up at the sky, noting how quickly the sun was setting. "We'll need to set up camp. We've still got some distance to cover before we reach Wave Country, and it's not safe to travel after dark. It's better this way."
Tazuna grumbled, tapping his foot impatiently. "We're wasting time. Can't we just push through? I don't want to spend the night out here in the middle of nowhere."
"We'll camp for the night," Kakashi said smoothly, his voice unaffected. He glanced over at Kaguya, her silence noticeable as always. "We'll make up for lost time tomorrow."
Kaguya said nothing. She barely reacted to the exchange, her thoughts still distant, her mind caught in the current of her own quiet storm.
The group began to settle, preparing for the night. Kaguya stepped aside, moving to a spot slightly apart from them as they gathered firewood. She wasn't interested in idle conversation. It wasn't that she was angry or upset—it was just easier this way. Easier to let the night fall around her, to let the moment pass.
Kaguya, gathering some firewood herself, silently dropped it into a pile. The walk had cleared her thoughts a bit, but the weight still lingered. She had no words for it, no desire to say anything to anyone. Her hands worked mechanically, gathering wood, stacking it with a methodical precision.
"Kaguya, huh?" she muttered quietly to herself, the name rolling off her tongue in a way that felt strange, almost foreign.
Sakura, who had been walking nearby, glanced over at her, hearing the mutter but unsure if she should ask. "Did you say something?" she ventured, her voice laced with curiosity.
Kaguya glanced over, meeting her gaze for a brief moment before looking away. "It's nothing," she replied, her voice flat and distant, not wishing to elaborate. She didn't feel the need to explain herself. Not now.
Sakura hesitated but nodded, accepting the answer, even if it didn't feel like one. Without further words, she turned her attention to setting up her tent, the materials neatly placed beside Sasuke's.
Kaguya watched Sakura for a moment, her movements as fluid and practiced as ever. The sight of her, so engrossed in setting up her tent, made something stir within Kaguya—a feeling she didn't want to acknowledge.
Her gaze shifted back to the pile of firewood. She let her fingers brush against the rough texture of the wood, grounding herself in the simplicity of the task. But her thoughts, stubborn as always, began to wander.
Would Sakura even be this way around me if she knew? Kaguya thought, the question lingering like an unwelcome shadow. Knew that I used to be… Naruto?
The bitterness of the thought coated her mind like a thick, sour veil. She couldn't help but picture it—Sakura's face, the confusion, maybe even the disgust that would follow if she knew the truth. Would she still offer the same small kindnesses, the same quiet companionship, if she knew who Kaguya had once been?
A pang of something—regret, anger, perhaps both—flashed within her. But she quickly tamped it down, unwilling to dwell on it. The truth felt too heavy to carry right now, and she didn't have the energy to deal with it.
"Sigh." Kaguya's breath left her in a soft exhale, and her gaze drifted upward to the sky. The moon, hanging low and luminous in the darkening sky, caught her attention. She felt something stir within her as she looked at it.
The moon seemed so much more gentle today.