AN: Ugh this chapter was insane to write and rewrite, never mind the constant technical difficulties. I'm not completely happy with it, but this is the chapter that answers so many questions and also closes out arc I, and opens up arc II. More in the bottom AN.

Seeking Peace

Chapter X

"I look at the world and notice it's turning. With every mistake we must surely be learning."

My eyes burned. First came blinding white light and then…I saw nothing at all. Darkness. I could see nothing and my chest grew tight with fear and pain – blind and mute, how would I even survive the world now?

I tried to make my way through the darkness of my surroundings, feeling helpless and lost. It took me a little while to calm down enough to realize that I couldn't see anything because there was nothing to see – instead of blindness, it was a world without light, without anything. I didn't even need to breathe despite the crushing tightness in my chest.

For some unknown reason, I got reminded of the feeling I got when I received those strange visions – of being a spectator in some bizarre…world. Whatever this odd state of being was, I had something to compare it with – and that lessened whatever remained of the panic attack I just had.

Slowly, the endless black abyss began to disappear – I could see shapes now, make out light and shadows, and color gradually began to seep back into my vision. It wasn't with the usual clarity – everything looked…not as if it was real. Faded, in stasis. I could recognize my surroundings now; a worn dirt path I knew as being right outside the Hovel, as I took it many times to the fields of flowers outside my home, or to the canyons beyond.

My eyes caught a flash of movement. A thin figure was creeping farther and farther away from me. I automatically stepped forward, glad to see any life in this strange place I'd woken up in. The closer I got the more I realized I knew that back, that hair barely containing itself in a messy bun…

Suiren, but not as I saw her last. Not as she just…

She looked whole, clean – but there wasn't warmth to her either. She also didn't see me.

I mouthed 'Kaa-san' and ran to her, but she began walking faster – and on and on, the moment I'd get close, she'd be feet away in front of me no matter if I tried to run. There wasn't chakra to use either – I couldn't feel it swell up in me like normal when I tried to focus it. All I could feel was the strangely suspended world around my mother and I, and she was so close but yet continuously out of my reach.

I would have ran after her for hours if not for a deep, booming voice that broke me out of my chase.

"Leavest her beeth, wench."

I jumped in the air, hair whipping around as I looked for the source of that voice. I found him a second later, turning my head up to the sky. On first glance, I don't know how I missed him – he was sitting in the air, cross-legged, but I could see how much bigger he was in relation to me. I shrank back as my eyes met his face – a wizened, pale one with a red orb in the middle of his forehead, and curiously lavender eyes, and reddish-brown hair that looked like time had rid it of its luster, topped with stubby horns. I found little humanity in the face – he looked more like a mask of an oni than a man.

"Thee hast finally comest, I worried mine own messages were not received." The old man spoke again, lowering himself slowly to the ground in front of me, though still a few feet in the air. I frowned, not understanding him – words did reach me, but his way of phrasing was stranger than anything I'd ever heard.

"I has't been watching thee, youngling." A hand landed on my head as his feet touched the ground, completely engulfing my head. I looked down at my feet, unnerved by those strange eyes of his – like rings instead of pupils and irises. "Wherefore doth thee not speakest?" I blink up and point to my throat, confused by his words and his question. The man shook his head.

"Thine affliction hast nay power here, thee may speakest as thee prithee." Another barely understandable sentence. My frustration grew as I pondered over his words. My…. affliction. Did he mean my vocal chords?

"Thou art thinking too much."

"I don't understand!" I snapped back before I realized it, "W-wait, what? How can…?"

"We doth not speak here using our throats, nay, our souls." He continued. I blinked – in a sense it was true, when I had spoken it hadn't been exactly sound, per se, or more my mind registered it a combination of sound, pictures, and feelings. But…souls?

"I don't understand," I began again. "Who are you? And can you speak in another way?" I added, feeling a strange sense of courage in me as I stared up at the being talking to me, even as I wondered if I was face to face with a god.

"Thou doest not comprehend my words? Very well, but th-.. you are a mere child, after all."

His quick switch in how he spoke surprised me, suppressing any pout I would have given at being called a 'mere' child, merely lifting my chin up to meet his gaze. The horned man merely chuckled at that and patted my hair not unlike Kojiro would.

"Ah, there's some bravery in you. Can you understand me now, child? I have been trying to speak with you for some time."

"You…the sounds in the static during visions, that was you." I said, the realization finally hitting me.

"Yes, that was me, Heiwa. I was trying to reach you, to warn you. Come, we have much to discuss." And as soon as the man said that, the world changed, warping into an endless expanse of water and blue sky, on which a bench stood. I followed him over the water, somehow, and we sat down.

"You never answered me when I asked who you were." I spoke first as I sat myself on the bench, my short legs kicking around in the air.

"That shall be answered now. Do you remember Kojiro telling you about humanity got chakra?" I nodded, as that had been a favorite story of mine – Kojiro had spun a beautiful tale about a wise sage who stopped wars and blessed humanity with chakra, only to see humans using it for wrong. Then the sage's sons had to take the mantle of helping humanity, and Kojiro told that both he and I were descendants of the sons, and thus shared their burdens. It seemed fanciful, the man completely mythic, but I was a little girl filled with the need for adventure, so it made my spirit burn brighter to think of such a tale.

"In your stories, I have many names – often the Sage of the Six Paths. But I was born with the name Ootsutsuki Hagoromo."

"But…what are you?" I asked, watching Hagoromo. He seemed taken aback by my question as something troubled flashed over his face.

"A seed, a curse, and a man. I am sure you may be…discomfited by my appearance but do not dwell on it – I am mostly as mortal as you are."

My eyebrows went up in disbelief. The beginning of that answer had been strange enough, how was one 'a seed', but I really didn't believe he was as…mortal as me.

"Mostly?"

"Those who are fully mortal rarely end up here as long as I have." Hagoromo said, sweeping his hand across the horizon. The water rippled around us, as if in agreement. "My birth was, unfortunately, a perversion of 'balance', of life as the spirits who made everything decreed it. As my soul was created from meddling with Order, I am unable to…pass on."

I gasped, mind rushing to fill in the gaps of where we must be… That burning in my eyes as I… saw Kaa-san die, was that… death?

"W-where are we?"

Hagoromo looked grim as he answered. "Many names for it, but I'll be short about it. You may call it 'Hell' or 'Naraka', but I call it the in-between place."

I gulped. "Does that mean I'm…dead, too?"

"No, child," I gave a sigh of relief too soon for Hagoromo continued talking. "- but you aren't completely wrong. You see there is a place after this one, named 'Joudo', the pure-land. It is where souls go once they finish whatever they must do in Naraka, if they finish it at all. But those like me find themselves forever torn between the three: the land of the living, the land of the newly dead, and the land beyond. For the past millennium, it has only been my brother and I that have lived between all three. But five years ago, that changed."

"Changed?"

"Five years ago, I became aware of another soul, a soul who flickered between the worlds, coexisting in them, not fully alive nor dead. Part of the soul remained in the pure land and with it, memories of another life. And yet the soul had been reborn into a child."

"It's me, isn't it?" I asked despite knowing the answer to come.

"Yes, even if you can't tell or completely remember your past life. Five years ago, you left parts of yourself, of a previous life, scattered around. I found memories of this world – it seems in the dimension you journeyed from, this dimension is recorded as if a play, a common twist of fate in other dimensions, I have found. But finding these visions, I grew concerned of the future, and decided to send you on a path to change these visions."

My mind could barely keep up with what he was saying. Previous lives, dimensions – these were alien things, too surreal to be…well, real. Even this place felt surreal, so malleable since Hagoromo could alter it with a mere raise of his hand - the waters bubbled this time, as if something was being drawn out from the depths. "The piece of you left behind is…unresponsive, though I could see her memories by a mere 'touch' of my hand… And finding you was easy when I traced the rest of the soul to the Living world. Meanwhile, I keep her safe here."

I wanted to ask what exactly he was keeping her safe from when a figure rose from the water, limp and unmoving, as if a puppet made of flesh. A girl? No, a young woman only a few years younger than my mother. Hagoromo flicked his wrist and she sat down on the water, staring back at me and I instantly felt a tug of recognition although I've never seen her in my life.

"My…previous life? Is that… her?" Her black eyes stared back at me blankly, the water she'd just appeared out of leaving no trace of dampness on her dark brown skin and neatly plaited hair – she gave me the impression of an orderly, maybe even stern, person, with her plain and collared grey dress and shoes.

"Aye, that was you. Lorna was your name in your previous life. I have been trying to reach you with it."

She looked so young. I didn't reach out touch her and she sank bank into the water around us.

"Why couldn't I understand you in the visions?" I asked, breaking the silence that had filled the moments of me looking at Lorna.

Hagoromo pulled at his goatee, twisting the strands around his figures as if in deep contemplation. "I have some ideas as to why that happened; I am sealed in your realm, and only certain conditions can bring me back with my power. I thought our connection in this world could work around that as I was talking to your soul but it seems I couldn't reach you until…" He broke off, sighing. "Your eyes – their powers are what your kind would call 'developing'. The Sharingan was 'created' as a way to ward off users from gaining all its powers – that the cost would be too great, and that would deter any other sacrifices. That was what I had hoped would happen when I changed the way it worked on my s-son's eyes, hoping to prevent him from further heading down a dark path." There was palpable guilt in his voice, and I saw the beginnings of tears as he mentioned his son.

Hagoromo merely took a deep breath before continuing, trying to shake off whatever he was thinking of, "As you might guess you are indeed one of my descendants, and your father's family have been very preoccupied with keeping inherited powers and strength within the clan. I assumed that was enough to communicate with you, in addition to the contact I had with part of your soul but… only the strongest of Sharingan, like my son's or my own, can see how thin your reality is, or warp it. They can play with space and time and transcend the realms. Your mother's act, as…" He broke off and there was nothing but pity and regret in his eyes. "You are too young for what you have gained. Maybe one of the youngest, and the cost is great, and will be greater. Your mother, in her selfishness –

"She wasn't selfish!" I finally broke in, angry at the suggestion… Kaa-san had suffered so much, I was merely doing as she asked… how could he… but I felt angry at her too.

"No, Heiwa, she… What kind of mother asks a child to do that?" Hagoromo grimaced, hand curling on my shoulder. "You may not see it now but know it was not right for you to bear that burden."

My eyes narrowed at him.

"But if it is too great of a 'burden', then why are you asking a little girl to change things, as you said earlier?" My whole being felt heated, wanting to defend Suiren. It's not like I could say he didn't know as he had apparently been watching the whole thing, but he couldn't feel what I felt, the love, the fear in that little room as my mother pleaded with me. The realization that she was gone came crashing down on me and I got more frustrated, shaking off his hand roughly.

"I did not… Heiwa, what I meant was that it was wrong, nothing more than that…" The old man started fumbling, probably not expecting this sharp turn in conversation. I didn't care I was insulting a sagely being who was trying to look after me.

"I don't know what happened with your son," I started, suddenly spiteful. "But I don't think I want my mom insulted by a man who manipulated his son instead of trusting he'd make the right choices."

Hagoromo gaped at me, looking stung. There was deep hurt in his curious-looking eyes and I almost felt a little guilty – I never insulted someone like that, especially when I didn't know them.

"You're right, I'm sorry." His head bowed, and he no longer sounded so powerful and commanding, now frailer, much more like an old man. The sage seemed to shudder beside me before speaking once more. "I have made many mistakes over the course of my life, mistakes that humanity continues to bare. I wish to change the world, repent for what I contributed in making it the way it is… But it is wrong of me to expect you to resent what your decision was, or your mother for making you choose. You are wise beyond your years, Heiwa, and whether you come to agree with me, or regret your decision, or resent yourself or your mother for it, that is your choice to make. I have no say in it – all I ask is that you help me prevent someone else from making a similar choice."

Having grown calmer since he apologized, I merely fold my hands across my torso expectantly, waiting for him to finally spit out what exactly he wanted me to do.

"I mentioned that the Sharingan and all its forms, including the one you gained for killing the person you care for most, require sacrifice and come with drawbacks. There are others in your time who have such eyes. One seems truly consumed by hatred, though I cannot say he shall always be so. Another is lost, hurt by the world around him, pulled by the torrents of fate more than his will. And the third has decided to martyr himself for the sake of his brother."

I blinked at the descriptions.

"Sasuke?" I guessed, unsure of how the word 'martyr' worked here. Didn't that mean sacrifice?

"Child," Hagoromo said, voice firmer and commanding. "You must cast aside all your assumptions on who Uchiha Itachi is."

"What?" That small flame of temper from earlier rose back again. "Besides a murderer? Who killed his entire clan? Who tortured his brother for hours?" I got reminded of the cold floor back in Saboten, how it felt as I vomited due to the fear and pain I felt from watching Itachi torture and kill his way through Konoha. "So, what he's a good actor? None of that killing and scarring his brother for life was real?"

I didn't bother to hide how much I disliked this idea from my words.

The sage sighs, pulling his beard once more.

"Patience. I shall eventually explain the full story to you, but… it is too long of a story for me to tell now. Itachi made a choice that he probably wrestles with every day, one that was far from easy. His treatment of Sasuke stems from guilt and regret – he has created his own way of bringing himself to justice with his brother, a mistake from what I have gleamed from your memories. For now, Heiwa, know this; vengeance is not the same as justice, and chasing it will only add more to the world's misery. What I want you to change is the cycle I have watched over the past millennium – and to do it you must help Itachi and Sasuke overcome what divides them and keep them from listening to the words of those who wish to change the world into something dark, empty, and yet full of lies."

The water started warping once more, and I could something tug at me, at my eyes.

"It seems it is time for you to return to the living once more. Your master is pulling you back." The sage said, and I could feel him and the realm slipping away from me.

"But I have so many questions!" I called out, vision growing dimmer.

"All in due time, Heiwa. Your part shall come, now, rest for you shall have a long journey ahead of you…"

And suddenly, darkness.

It was chilly, the day we burnt her pyre.

Rei and Kojiro had found me passed out next to her body, my eyes bleeding out on the futon. Rei thought I was dead until Kojiro had checked my pulse. Neither had been pleased to learn of what actually happened when I woke up. Rei cried and screamed about it all night, cursing my mother before collapsing into sobbing.

As I looked over her, she didn't look any better today – dark circles around her eyes, her face pinched tightly and I could even see in the strain from clenching her jaw. She kept a tight grip on my shoulder as we stood for the burning, as if I could run from her and into the fire. As if I would.

Kojiro has been unusually quiet but had placed himself in the position of arranging everything so Rei and I remained undisturbed. In our shock and grief, his gestures were like a soothing balm to us, and I couldn't be more thankful for the man I called my shishou. The sogi, or funeral, was quick and simple – we were too far and poor for priests, temples, nokanshi, and any pomp and ceremony besides the barest of rituals we could conduct ourselves. Yet, some traditions were sacred and burning my mother's remains was one of them.

The rest of the Hovel came. All of us, barely more than two dozen, faced the bundle of sticks my mother was currently laid out on, dressed in a simple white katabira we'd found among Suiren's things – unbeknownst to us she'd prepared for her death by making the plain garment generally reserved for corpses.

I watched as the men lit the pyre with a blank expression, having barely heard any of the words spoken by Rei or the others in memory of her. It was just a soft murmuring, my focus only on my mother's unmoving corpse and the gnawing lack of…feeling in me.

I was numb; a worse affliction of that feeling than the one I had following the incident on the road to Saboten. I could hear other people outright sobbing or wailing for Suiren – my mother had been popular, in her way. Whether it was the fact that she was a very beautiful young woman, regardless of the toll hardship took on her body, or her generally calm, demure manner, for she had played a working man's parody of an actual noblewoman… I didn't know. Maybe it was her way of hiding smiles behind her hand, or all the freckles that dotted her skin, especially in the summer. There were other stories, stories of her and Rei and their skill with needles, or the fact that she brewed the best shochu in the area if asked to.

I had five years of stories, memories, and yet I didn't cry. I couldn't.

A day later found me sitting at the edge of the canyon, looking out into the expanse past the other side of them, into Kaze no Kuni and the desert beyond the canyons. I'd made myself scarce since the funeral, not wanting to spend time at home. It was no surprise when I heard the sounds of Kojiro arriving, his wooden leg rough on the packed, dry dirt.

"You know Rei is lookin' for you."

I shrug, tracing shapes and spirals into the dirt with my finger, the picture of apathy.

Kojiro gave a big, deep sigh at my reaction and came forward to sit down next to me. He eyed me warily, apparently searching for something before frowning.

"I had this whole long speech for you, kid." He said, scratching his head. "Rehearsed it on my way here, was gonna tell you about how it ain't your fault, that things…will better eventually… But, I don't think you wanna hear that, do ya, Heiwa-chan?"

I shook my head, not in the mood to dig my fingers out of the earth to sign to him, content as I was with merely gesturing and feeling grit between the fingers. It was nice to feel. Nice to feel something other the numbness in my chest.

Kojiro squeezed my shoulder when I didn't respond further.

"It's fine to not talk about it," He added. "But…we need to talk 'bout a few odd things..."He

Feeling slightly irritated at Kojiro's persistence, I lobbed a displeased stare at him as I moved to face him. Unfazed, he merely held up two fingers.

"Assumin' this hasn't killed any of your desire to be kunoichi, we have a little under two months to go to Amegakure, convince them to take us, and let you into the Academy for the new year, startin' April. That is… if you still want to go." He trailed off, clearly hoping I'd start reacting, and quickly picking back up when I didn't.

"Daichi's papers for us are all ready to go. Amegakure takes in a few refugees/migrants each month, but they can't get back out easily and the process is grueling. We're lucky since you're such a promising conscript…" Kojiro explained, stroking his beard. "I can offer freelancin' for seals… And I think some relatives of mine are still around there – might as well see if the community could help us settle in. I'll be sellin' the main house in the Hovel, you know."

This made me twitch. The Hovel itself was Kojiro's.

"But! The Hovel!" I finally signed back to him, using my usual 'home' sign for the Hovel.

Kojiro gave me a very weary, weathered look.

"Heiwa, I knew from the moment you accepted being my student we'd eventually have to leave. I've made my peace with that. Plus, I…kinda miss bein' around shinobi, and city life. I've had a good decade out here, but I ain't dyin' anytime soon so…" My shishou trailed off, and I could have sworn his eyes looked misty.

I bit my lip, unsure. Part of me knew I had to leave, knew that it would eventually be unsafe for everyone here if I stayed. Kojiro said the best way to hide was in a crowd, and to learn things that I could rely on that weren't my Sharingan so I didn't risk exposing my kekkai genkai.

And then there was the matter of finding Itachi, like Hagoromo wanted me to. The idea of fate had still not hit me as much it should have. Perhaps it was the numbness – I knew that talking to some interdimensional sage should have been earth-shattering, but with Suiren's funeral there was just too much to bear besides this additional weight on my shoulders.

On the other hand, there was Rei.

Rei, who had held me through the funeral all while her body wracked with sobs she unsuccessfully tried to muffle.

Rei, who was my second mother, and loved me as her own and saw nothing of continuing to raise me.

How could I just…leave her?

I knew that bringing her to Amegakure was out of the question. She already had no love for the 'mizuno', for the people on the other side of the mountain who ruled over us. And shinobi frightened her. Rain was dangerous for her, and asking her to give up the house she had built…

I felt a hand on my shoulder and a knowing glance from Kojiro confirmed he knew what I was thinking of.

"We'll talk to her, Heiwa. I know this is hard, but…"

I took a deep breath, exhaling loudly enough to interrupt him.

I knew he was right.

It was time to leave the Hovel, my home.

Kojiro and I sat there together, comfortably watching until the sunset turned the canyon purple.

It was if Rei had anticipated me talking about leaving.

"Now you listen here, Heiwa!" Rei shouted, turning to face me, her raised voice practically rattling the dishes in the kitchen.

"Your mom's dead and you wanna go hightailin' it outta here? Out of your only home?"

"Rei-san, you don't need to be yellin'-" Kojiro interjects from his seat at our table. We'd waited a day after the talk in the canyons to approach her, but the olive-skinned woman had a way of cowing him into meekness. It was kind of amusing, since he was a shinobi and had around thirty years on her.

Rei cut him off with a raised finger and voice.

"No, I will, and I thank you, Kojiro, to shut up and sit down while I talk some sense into her. Heiwa, you ain't your mother and you ain't Kojiro. They weren't raised here. Suiren's from the other side of the mountain and Kojiro's shinobi ass is from Kami knows where! But you? You're a child of the Dust country, girl. You could be safe here, safe like your mom wanted you to be! You can have a life here!"

I looked away from her, towards one of windows, dusty as always. I could see the landscape outside of it as usual, sparse with vegetation and a familiar beige-brown as far as my eye could see.

Home?

Yes, this was it.

The Hovel was the only home I'd ever known. But it wasn't the only home I'd know.

I shook my head, black hair bouncing – messy ever since Suiren died. It was harder to communicate now, without my mother. Rei was somewhat literate, which was a problem as it made communicating harder. She often forgot what signs meant what so my signing to her was just the most basic things like, 'I'm hungry' or 'Heading out'.

I felt the same itch I felt over a year ago, an anger at myself for not having a voice, for not being able to say just what I wanted to her. Rei-oba-san deserved to understand, deserved to be talked to face to face. Even having Kojiro translate wouldn't work in this case.

My frustration was clear to both of them, with my nervous glancing to a notepad. Eventually I snatched it up and began scribbling.

"Rei, you know I have to leave. I can't learn to protect myself here… and what if someone finds out? I'll put you in danger."

She glanced over the notepad I was holding up for her, folding her arms in response after taking a few seconds to read it.

"You won't need to protect yourself if you stay," She gestured to the window, showing the wide expanse of the flatlands. "There ain't anyone for days but the rest of the Hovel. No one is gonna come lookin' for you here, Heiwa."

A dry, bitter laugh came from the direction of the table.

"Come on, Rei-san. You wanna keep her here forever? I'm sorry to say this about my own settlement, but we have little to do here, and she'll have to leave eventually. You and Suiren wanted a trade for her, didn't you?"

Rei's breath caught at the mention of my mother, and her face flushed a deep, enraged red.

"Don't talk about Suiren as if you knew what she wanted! None of us knew what she wanted, given what she made Heiwa do!"

I felt myself want to shrink back, slip back into the room where said act happened.

Kojiro looked at me as I leaned back, shaking his head, his hands springing into a sign used to tell ninja to hold their current position.

"None of that changes the fact that Heiwa needs to leave, Rei. If there's another war again, Rain and Sand will come to these parts to fight and shinobi don't give a shit about a couple dozen dead peasants from other lands. If some young, hot-blooded idiot from Sand comes here looking to loot, you think either Heiwa or I will stand down? They'll get me quick, wooden leg and all, but Heiwa's got her Sharingan. And once they see that, the squads will come. And then whoever the highest bidder is – what's Konoha's threats these days when Kumogakure will pay millions for Doujutsu? You know what that means, Rei? Huh?"

Rei-oba-san was shaking, eyes wide with fear and unshed tears as Kojiro had gone. It was made worse by the way he said all of that, so frankly, in a voice like that of someone merely reading weather predictions. As if it was commonplace.

"Of course not." Kojiro answered for her. "It means breedin' pens, Rei. That is if Uchiha Itachi doesn't get to her first."

Chills ran down my back.

Breeding…pens? I still didn't understand what those words meant, but they sounded…terrible and my aunt hadn't stopped trembling at hearing about them.

"Sick… Just sick… And that's the world you want her to enter? One where if she makes the wrong move, it's to some place where she'll be raped until she gives out enough children? What's to stop Amegakure from doin' the same thing? You gotta be fuckin' kidding me if you think I'm gonna let Heiwa step one foot outside the Hovel knowin' what's waitin' out there for her!"

I dropped the notepad and lunged at Rey's while she yelled, hugging her as she began sobbing at the end of it. Slowly, she returned my hug and I raised my face to send Kojiro a displeased look.

He wasn't helping, riling her up like this. I leaned out of the hug and took Rei's hands in mine, squeezing them as I looked into her eyes. Her warm brown eyes looked near devastated, and I could see my calm, pale face reflected in them.

I moved my mouth, knowing no sound would come out, but I hoped she'd understand what I was mouthing.

'I have to.'

Rei shook her head, eyes closing and small droplets falling down her cheeks.

"N-no you don't, Heiwa-chan. You can stay here, be safe, be with me."

I squeezed her hands a little tighter, not enough to hurt, just to make her open her eyes again.

'I'll come back.' I mouthed again.

"She's stronger than you think, Rei." Kojiro spoke up again. Both of us were startled, having not noticed that he'd stood up and come near us. He clapped a hand on my head, messing up my hair, as usual.

"I know she's...strong! I know she's smart too, scarily so! But she's…a little girl, Kojiro. Just a little girl!" Rei pleaded.

"I know she is," And Kojiro sounded so old saying that, so tired. "But she won't always be."

"…"

"I'll take care of her until she is."

Just like that, Rei broke, giving out heavy tears as we once more embraced and comforted her. Despite the numbness, I felt something so heavy in my chest at seeing my Aunt cry like that.

I wanted to whisper that'd I come back one day to Rei, but silence embraced us in our grief instead.

We took a few days to pack and say our goodbyes. Most of the time was spent on cleaning out Kojiro's house – filled with junk as it was. Sealing a bunch of things into scrolls and then into one major scroll, the shinobi way of moving, apparently. The system for organization was fairly complicated when Kojiro showed me how he had placed everything – my head swam looking at the diagrams he'd drawn.

The bag that Kojiro had gifted to me almost two birthdays ago was now fairly full with all things that had come to be mine over the years. Rei had presented me with the kimono and obi Suiren had made before her death, sighing over the lost chance to go and see me in it in a year's time – the trip would be too much to make, especially alone. I promised I'd try to get a photograph somehow – hopefully we'd have the money in Ame.

There was one more thing to take.

"Your ma's remains." Rei whispered, handing me a tightly sealed tin box. I wanted to drop it.

Seeing my hesitation at holding it, she put a hand on it.

"Heiwa, we promised your ma we'd scatter her remains on the banks of Awaumi. Ame's right there and you'll pass the countryside your ma hailed from on your way. She…Suiren really screwed up, y'know? With you, with a lot of things. But the dead need to rest in peace and we can do that for her, can't we?"

With great reluctance I packed away the box, frowning at the thought of carrying it all that way. It wasn't about the weight, more just… the feelings I had towards Kaa-san. Or lack, at the moment.

After stuffing it with everything else, I quickly looked over my things to make sure I hadn't left anything. With my bag slung over my shoulders I gave my home one last long look before stepping out into the road.

Kojiro was waiting, and with him the rest the Hovel. Rei stood in front of everyone, teary once more.

"Let me have one more look at you," and she bent down to adjust my pigtails and straighten my collar before planting a kiss on my forehead and pulling me into a tight, warm embrace. My eyes closed as I tried to take in this feeling of Rei hugging me one last time.

"Be strong, Heiwa." She said into my ear. "Come back, you hear me? And you can write me… I'll ask Kiminori-san for help with them letters, okay?"

I nod, feeling my nose twitch in a telltale sign that I might cry despite not feeling able to.

Released from her arms, I watched as all the other people bid Kojiro goodbye, some stopping to ruffle my head and wish me luck in my studies.

"Ready, kid?" Kojiro asked, once they'd given us a minute of space.

I turned back to look at Rei, who waved at me through the tears she was shedding. I looked at all the people in the Hovel, the wide expanse of dry, reddish dirt that had been my only home. And then I looked back at Kojiro, softly smiling down at me.

I nodded and he took my hand, walking away together from the place I called home, and towards a place I didn't know but would hold my destiny.

AN: Pretty heavy, this chapter, right? No one really guessed our first canon-character would be Hagoromo, but here he is. I already have up to chapter 14 planned out in the sense of plot, so there's a pretty good arc ahead of us, one that's far more focused on shinobi and yet somewhat light-hearted at the same time. We'll get much more out of Hagoromo and Kojiro in the next few chapters, plus the addition of a few more important people. Lorna's life is veeery slowly revealed but we won't get much until we're in the late twenties' in these chapters.

The next chapters will be delayed by a few weeks only because the writing style and inconsistencies across the story are bother me so I'll do a quick cleanup while I can. Thankfully, chapter 11 and 12 are kind of shorter for pacing purposes. I was thinking of posting a guide I have finished up, to the places and people of this story, but I think i should do it on tumblr or somewhere else I can host a document. Please let me know if you have an idea where you want to see it. Lastly, I made a soundtrack to this arc of the story and will probably post it with the guide!

Thank you for everyone still sticking to this story and its insane hiatuses. Thank you to everyone who reviews and I don't respond to. Please message me on my tumblr, Baezetsu, for questions or if you want something clarified in the guide to this story - like definitions, concepts, etc. See you next time.