#Uzumaki Kyoho

[a-world-in-grey]

Sola/Calling for Rain IV

@secret-engima Naruto's POV!

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Naruto stares wide-eyed at the woman effortlessly balancing Karin's weight. He can guess that this is Kyoho, Karin's older sister. Karin had told him that Kyoho took more after their mom than Karin, Karin apparently looked more like their non-Uzumaki father despite having the Uzumaki coloring, but Naruto hadn't really thought about what that proclaimed difference in appearance would look like.

She- she looks like his mom. The blood-red hair, the sun-kissed skin, the wide face. The shape of her eyes and jaw, even the shape of her hands-

She looks like an Uzumaki.

And she's here.

He doesn't realize he's spoken out loud until Kyoho's expression softens and she kneels to his height as though Karin isn't clinging to her like a limpet. She's smiling, a soft curl to her lips, but there's a knowing sorrow to her blueblueblue eyes, one that speaks of pain and grief and loneliness and Naruto knows that look because he's seen it in the mirror and she knows -

And her simple affirmation that yes, she's here, and she's not leaving him makes Naruto bawl. He launches himself at her, and she catches him and doesn't let go, even when his momentum causes them all to crash into the floor and he sobs into her free shoulder, Kyoho rubbing soothing circles into his back and humming a lullaby in his ear.

Embarrassment burns when he finally pulls back from Kyoho and realizes the Hokage is right there - and Naruto wants to kick himself for not noticing, of course the Hokage would be in his office. He busies himself helping Kyoho to her feet, offering her a hand and sticking his feet to the floor so she can stand up without setting Karin down.

Kyoho bows her head to the Hokage. "Thank you, for the privacy of your office, Hokage-sama."

Naruto grimaces. Yeah, he's really glad he didn't have that breakdown in public.

The Hokage smiles. "You are welcome. I won't keep you any longer, I'm sure you all would like the chance to catch up. We can speak later about that list."

Huh? List? What list?

"Of course, Hokage-sama."

Once they are outside the Tower, Naruto voices his question. "What was he talking about?"

Kyoho shifts Karin so her sister is instead clinging to her back, shoving her hair forward over one shoulder so it doesn't get caught. Naruto's gaze catches on Kyoho's braids. The bandana and long hair hides most of the beads, but not all of them, and as Naruto peers at the beads he can see on the Widow and Hero braids-

"Naruto?"

And he completely just missed what Kyoho was saying. "Sorry! Could you say that again?"

Over Kyoho's shoulder, Karin gives him a knowing look, confirming Naruto's suspicions. He's not imagining those familiar beads.

Kyoho's smile is gentle, reassuring that she's not upset at his wandering attention. "The Hokage wants me to teach."

Naruto imagines Kyoho in his old classroom, dressed like Iruka-sensei, and feels a spark of jealously. He would have liked Kyoho as a sensei. Not that he doesn't like Iruka-sensei! But it would have been nice, learning from Kyoho those first few years. "At the Academy?"

She shakes her head. "Fuuinjutsu apprentice."

Oh. That's not so bad. "So the list is for potential students?"

Kyoho nods.

"You won't teach them anything else, though, right?" Naruto asks petulantly. It's childish of him, but Kyoho's his family. His clan. He doesn't want to have to share her yet.

Kyoho wraps an arm around his shoulders, pressing him into her side. Naruto basks in the warm feeling, like he sitting in front of the hearth, wrapped in a thick blanket. "Not unless they're Braided," she promises.

Good. Naruto takes a deep breath, trying to memorize Kyoho's scent. There's lingering traces of burnt chakra, similar to the smell that lingers on Nyx after he's been practicing his fire ninjutsu. Also like Nyx is the persistent scent of something distinctly feline, though Kyoho's scent lacks the feathers and ozone aspects Nyx's has. Underneath all that, Kyoho's scent is warm, like sunshine on a summer day, with a tang to it that reminds him of the air along Nami's shores.

Kyoho patiently lets him cling for as long as he likes. He knows they're making a spectacle of themselves, can feel the stares prickling across his skin uncomfortably. He does his best to ignore them - he refuses to feel ashamed of showing affection for his family.

Only, Kyoho sharpens beside him, and the prickly feeling abruptly disappears. When Naruto pulls back and glances around, he finds everyone studiously looking away from them.

There's a smile on Kyoho's face when she looks down at him. "Where to, cousin?"

Cousin. Naruto beams.

"You gotta meet my friends!" He declares, tugging Kyoho in the right direction. "Nyx isn't here right now, but Jun and Niko should be at the training grounds while Aoba-sensei has his one-on-one day with-"

He cuts himself off as Kyoho laughs, bright and fond and full of affection.

Naruto has family. He's not the only Uzumaki anymore.

It still feels like a dream. Don't get him wrong, Nyx is his brother and Naruto will always be grateful for him, but… Kyoho and Karin look like him.

And they want him.

No one has ever wanted him. Not immediately and without any strings attached. Naruto loves Nyx and Iruka-sensei, he really does, but even they didn't like him at first. But Karin took the chance to defect to Konoha because of Naruto, and Kyoho came too. Despite not knowing Naruto at all, just because he's family.

"You've got the Uzumaki energy." Kyoho notes fondly. "They your team?"

Naruto shakes his head, but pauses. "Kinda? Nyx and Sakura-chan are on Team 7 with me, but we're always training with Aoba-sensei's team 'cause Kakashi-sensei's kinda lame."

He's not bitter about that, really. Even though Kakashi-sensei gave that speech about not abandoning your teammates - as though Naruto or Nyx needed to be told that - he still left them to wait on him for hours every morning and then couldn't be bothered to give more than a half-hearted effort training them.

Nyx put more effort into training them. As an Academy student.

Aoba-sensei's done more to train Team 7 than their own sensei.

Kyoho hums. "Should let them know there'll be ANBU watching us."

Naruto stops dead in his tracks. "What?" Why would there be ANBU watching them?

"I've got ANBU tailing me." Kyoho says simply. On her back, Karin's stiffened in alarm, and Kyoho places a reassuring hand on her arm. "Security measure. Not watching you."

"They shouldn't be watching you either!" Naruto protests. Kyoho came here to get away from Kusa, why is she being treated like an enemy?

Kyoho sighs. Pats Karin's arm. "Go let them know we're coming?"

Karin reluctantly drops from Kyoho's back. But she hesitates, looking at Naruto before glancing deliberately back at Kyoho.

No, not Kyoho, Naruto realizes. Kyoho's braids.

He shakes his head at Karin. Better to let it be a surprise. Especially if Kyoho really is who they think she is, Naruto thinks with rising anticipation despite how upset he is.

Karin nods. "Don't take too long, nee-chan." Then she's off.

Naruto turns back to Kyoho. Kyoho inclines her head towards the trees lining the path. They aren't in the populated part of the village anymore, but the trees will offer a modicum of privacy from passersby. Naruto follows Kyoho up the tree, settling beside her on a branch about halfway up.

"Why?"

"I'm a jounin." Kyoho tells him.

Naruto scowls. He knows that, but what does that have to do with the Hokage treating her like she's an enemy?

Kyoho shakes her head, like she can sense that thought. "Jounin are dangerous, Naruto. A team of genin can take on a chuunin. A team of chuunin cannot take on a jounin." Her eyes meet his, blue dark like the ocean depths. "I've killed teams of jounin."

Naruto startles. "Really?" Kakashi-sensei had a hard enough time with Zabuza. Kyoho can fight multiple Zabuza's at once?

Cool.

"Really." Kyoho says, fond and exasperated all at once. "I'm dangerous, Naruto. The Hokage does not know me. He worries I am an assassin or infiltrator."

"But you aren't!" Kyoho's Clan. She came here for help!

Another fond smile. "You know that. I know that. Hokage-sama does not." Kyoho shrugs, looking like it's no big deal to her. "Hokage-sama has no reason to trust a foreign jounin. Of course he will take measures to protect the village. I'm glad he is taking such measures."

That brings Naruto up short, angry response dying on his tongue. "You're glad for the ANBU?"

"They're to protect you." Kyoho says. "To protect the Clan. I would do the same, were my children at risk." She rests a hand on his head and gently ruffles his hair. "It won't be forever."

Naruto sulks. But when Kyoho puts it that way… "I still don't like it."

Kyoho nods. "You don’t have to." She rises from the branch, holding her hand out to him. "Let's go meet your friends."

#ffxv #naruto #Shadow of Heaven's Light #Calling for Rain verse #fusion #Sola Lucis Caelum #Uzumaki Kyoho #Uzumaki Naruto #Uzumaki Karin #poor naruto's learning some hard truths #shinobi don't trust easily #because shinobi as a general profession are not really trustworthy #shinobi are trained to exploit trust #and Kyoho is a jounin #jounin are scary #jounin are good enough that only other jounin have the ability to handle them #and Kyoho is like Kakashi in that only multiple jounin working together stand a chance of taking them down #Hiruzen absolutely does not trust Kyoho around the Last Uchiha and the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki #especially because Kyoho is a fuuinjutsu mistress

[a-world-in-grey]

Sola/Calling for Rain III

The next part! Had this sitting in my docs for a while, but @secret-engima’s recent updates gave me the motivation to finish this part up.

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“You do not wish to continue your shinobi career?”

The girl standing across from his desk gives him a pointed look of skepticism. It's odd, Hiruzen muses, to see a jounin so expressive. Shinobi who reach that rank reflexively mask their thoughts and feelings behind a façade, the consequences of so many years of rigid self-control around those they don't trust completely.

Hiruzen would think Kusa pushed young Kyoho's promotion for the prestige of having their own 'prodigy,' but no. Hawk-taicho, Ibiki, and Jiraiya's reports of Kyoho refute that idea.

Uzumaki Kyoho, it seems, is simply not a reserved person.

It seems to be a persistent Uzumaki trait.

"Does it matter?" Kyoho says after Hiruzen lets the question stand. "Your shinobi won't trust me."

Hiruzen acknowledges that point with a hum. Kyoho is right, none of the jounin or chuunin will trust her for at least a couple years. Hiruzen won't trust her for a couple years, not enough to give her access as an active Konoha jounin. "What do you plan to do then?"

The jounin is in civilian clothing. Sturdy black shorts and a high collar shirt in brilliant orange, yellow, blue. Her arms and shoulders are bare, displaying the cloud and wave patterned tattoos in stark black ink on her forearms and the wing-like tattoo peeking out on her shoulders. A black bandana with gold and blue and orange wave embroidery replaces the hitai-ate formerly keeping her hair out of her face.

It's a stark difference to the black, grey, and green of her shinobi gear. He'd wonder if Naruto had an influence on the color choice, but Kyoho has yet to meet Naruto or reunite with her sister.

Kyoho shrugs. "Get a job. Not going to make the kids support me."

That would be difficult for two genin to do. Even with three - Hiruzen has no doubt Sasuke would help - the fact of the matter is genin salaries are too small to support more than a single person. Naruto may become a chuunin in the coming weeks, but Karin won't be eligible for a promotion until her year of probation as a former foreign shinobi is over.

Karin has expressed an interest in working as a medic-nin in the interim, which will at least provide a steady pay that mission-work lacks. Her application isn't likely to be denied. The hospital is delighted at the prospect of a medic with Uzumaki-level chakra reserves and Hiruzen has no doubt his Head Medic will murder anyone who steals Karin away from them.

The Head Medic would take Kyoho in a heart beat if Hiruzen allowed it. Jounin medic-nin don't just land on their doorstep fully trained. Hiruzen will have to deny them though - at least until he's certain Kyoho isn't an infiltrator.

"Have you considered earning your Fuuinjutsu Mastery?" A fuuinjutsu apprentice, to pass her unique sealing style on to those of Konoha.

Kyoho eyes him. "I have to teach, right?" Hiruzen nods. There's also a level of skill expected, but Jiraiya's report provided ample detail of Kyoho's competence.

She frowns, fingers tapping out a restless rhythm against her thigh. "I'm teaching Karin already. Anyone else…" She shrugs. "I can try. If they don't believe it won't matter."

Ho? "Believe?" Hiruzen asks.

"I invoke my clan's gods. Without belief in their power, the seals won't work." Kyoho pauses, then fixes him with a pointed look. "Or they'll explode."

Yes, Hiruzen is aware of that particular hazard of fuuinjutsu. "Can your seals be adapted to another style?" Even if they can't get her teleportation seal, the regeneration or chakra storage or even the poison filter would be worth the gamble of stealing the Kusa jounin.

"Maybe?" Hiruzen can practically see the gears turning in Kyoho's mind as she thinks it over. "Theoretically it's possible to adapt any seal to another style. In practice you have to understand both your own and the other style well enough to understand how the seal works. Which is horrendously difficult and time-intensive even if you know the person who created it and what their thought process was, because there are a hundred different variables to take into account-" Kyoho cuts herself off. "Not by myself." She says firmly.

Hiruzen tucks away his surprise at the sudden deluge and makes a mental note to recommend Kyoho to Research and Development. Kyoho said as many words in her tangent as the entire conversation before it.

"I'll compile a list of potential students for you to meet after the Chuunin Exams conclude." And leave notes behind for his successor if the worst should come to pass. Hiruzen doesn't know what his traitorous student plans, but it will happen then. Hiruzen is sure of it. "Until then, you and Jiraiya-kun can teach each other."

Jiraiya has plenty of free time after Naruto dismissed his training in favor of Team Aoba's. Unfortunate, but Team Aoba is running Naruto through his paces so Hiruzen has no doubt Naruto will be ready for the Finals next week.

Kyoho twitches. "Yes, Hokage-sama."

"Is there a problem?" Hiruzen asks mildly. He can guess at her reticence - Jiraiya hasn't bothered to reign in his foibles in years.

Kyoho's lips purse, and for a moment Hiruzen wonders if she'll deflect, but then she scowls and mutters darkly, "If he touches my hair I'm setting him on fire."

What.

"Your hair." Hiruzen repeats slowly.

"Yes." There's a defiant glare in those blue eyes, daring Hiruzen to say something.

Hiruzen hums. "Will you heal him after?" Kyoho isn’t known as the Inferno for nothing.

"…yes." Grudgingly.

Very well then. "No maiming." He doubts Kyoho could maim or kill Jiraiya, but it’s always good for his student to be reminded that personal power doesn’t allow him to get away with everything.

Kyoho nods sharply.

Good. “Then there’s someone I believe you should meet.”

A subtle pulse of his chakra signals the ANBU masquerading as his secretary. The dark haired woman in a chuunin’s uniform - a classic beauty with ample curves, Rabbit is a Seduction specialist when not pulling guard duty and she doesn’t hesitate to use her cover to flirt with every shinobi that passes her desk - opens the door, and a blur of red slams directly into Kyoho.

Kyoho catches her sister with ease, spinning to bleed off momentum. Karin clings to Kyoho with arms and legs wrapped tight, her face buried in the side of Kyoho's neck and shoulders heaving from her sobs. Kyoho holds Karin up with one arm and cards her free hand through her hair, tears streaming freely from closed eyes.

Both girls are silent. Their expressions and body language are blatant with emotion, but no sound escapes either of them.

Not until Kyoho opens her eyes and sees the second arrival.

A blink of surprise at the blonde hair. But then Kyoho's eyes land on Naruto's face and her lips twitch into the first smile anyone in Konoha has seen from her. "Hello cousin."

“You’re really Uzumaki, dattebayo.” Naruto breathes. Wide eyes dart from the Uzumaki-red hair, to the sun-kissed skin just a few shades darker than the rest of Fire and the wider face, and Hiruzen doesn't have to be a Yamanaka to know Naruto sees the features they so clearly share. “You’re really here.”

Oh Naruto…

Kushina would be so furious with him, Hiruzen thinks. That Naruto didn't think an Uzumaki would come for a long-lost clansman? Unacceptable.

Kyoho's expression softens. Ignoring Karin still wrapped around her, she kneels to Naruto's height. “Yeah. I’m afraid you’re stuck with us now.”

Naruto launches himself at Kyoho. Unbraced, Kyoho falls backward, taking Karin and Naruto with her. It cannot be comfortable, Karin still wrapped around her like a koala and Naruto flattening them both, but Kyoho just wraps her free arm around Naruto's back and rubs circles across his back while he cries into her other shoulder.

Hiruzen turns to the window to give them some privacy, and ignores the guilt weighing him down when the soft hum of an Uzumaki lullaby fills the room.

#ffxv #Shadow of Heaven’s Light #Calling for Rain verse #fusion #naruto #Sola Lucis Caelum #Sarutobi Hiruzen #Uzumaki Karin #Uzumaki Naruto #Chuunin Exams are coming up! #need to decide if I want to squeeze in one more pov before that or not #hmm… choices choices choices #any povs y’all really want to see?

[a-world-in-grey]

Sola/Calling for Rain II

@secret-engima Not the meeting between Sola and Tenzo, but a meeting between Sola and a certain pervert Sage.

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Jiraiya gets pulled away from peeping on the hot springs spying for local gossip by T&I requesting his skills as a Fuuinjutsu Master. Jiraiya grudgingly goes. He's never been a fan of the place and looking over whatever prisoner they've got instead of the lovely ladies down below isn't his idea of a good afternoon.

But orders are orders, and these came hand-delivered via ANBU.

He arrives at T&I, only to discover the request isn't for a prisoner.

Uzumaki Kyoho. Vicious tempered Kusa kunoichi renowned for cutting her opponents into pieces or burning them alive with the white-hot fire that earned her the moniker 'the Inferno.' Youngest shinobi to earn the rank of jounin since the end of the Third War at fifteen, and the youngest shinobi to earn themselves an entry in a Bingo Book ever. At age eleven.

Killing a dozen Kiri genin at their own Chuunin Exams while brandishing her Uzumaki heritage as sword and shield will do that. Killing the team from Kumo started up whispers of Uzushio's ghost come to seek revenge. The Iwa team was just collateral. Supposedly. Iwa didn't have any hand in Uzushio's destruction, but Jiraiya doesn't doubt every non-Kusa and Konoha genin tried their hardest to kill the young Uzumaki.

The only confirmed Uzumaki Jiraiya's found outside Konoha.

Now one of two, according to the report on one Uzumaki Karin, Kyoho's younger sister. Defected to Konoha during the second phase of Chuunin Exams after encountering a long lost cousin in Naruto, being abandoned by her team, and then rescued by the Last Uchiha, who'd recognized Karin as a potential Uzumaki and sought her out on Naruto's behalf.

Oh, the kid apparently had pictures of Mikoto and Kushina and recognized the Uzumaki red hair that way. Which raises concerns if he has pictures of Naruto's other parent but that's something to investigate later.

Uchiha-brat vouched for Karin and petitioned the Hokage to recruit her older sister Kyoho. Who, by her younger sister's testimony, wouldn't hesitate to defect to Konoha with Karin there.

Reading Karin and Kyoho's testimonies of their treatment at Kusa's hands, seeing the reports from the medical ninja of the scars littering both sisters, some that are almost ten years old, Jiraiya can believe it.

Kusa are idiots.

But the reason for Jiraiya's presence are the seals.

The explosive tag, swiped from the alarmingly large stash Karin had on her, is nothing like Jiraiya's ever seen, and he's familiar with all the standard and not-so-standard tags used by every shinobi village. Oh, the concept is simple enough. Water-nature chakra storage with a converter to Fire-nature for the actual explosion. Common enough, though most Uzumaki favored a Lightning conversion over a Fire one, but given Kyoho's marked affinity for Fire it made sense her sister would also use that.

No, what's unusual are the kanji used to invoke the seal's power. All the sealing styles Jiraiya's ever seen invoke beings of power - dragons, phoenixes, other mythical beasts. Truly powerful seals invoke the gods, a precarious endeavor because gaining the attention of the gods was never safe.

'Tide-mother' he could sort of see, given the kanji for Tide was the same as the kanji in Uzushio, and the Uzumaki had never named their sea and storm gods to those outside the clan. But 'Cleansing Fire'?

The explosive seals from Kyoho's stash are purely Fire-natured, but they use the same kanji.

Well, if there's anyone who knows the answers, it's the woman sitting fearlessly across the table from Morino Ibiki.

There's no better insight into the thought process of another fuuinjutsu user than an up close and personal look at their sealing style, and the lovely Kyoho-chan has half a dozen seals inked into her skin. And to think he'd have to deal with an ugly mugged prisoner!

Today's looking to be a good day.

Jiraiya enters the room by throwing open the door. Ibiki doesn't twitch, but Kyoho's hand drops to an empty weapon holster. He grins at her. "I'm here to look at those seals of yours, Grape-chan. Shirt off."

The seals on Kyoho's face lend themselves to a truly menacing scowl. Jiraiya's grin widens and he ruffles her hair. Kyoho ducks away from his hand before he can tug at her braids, her deep snarl showing some impressive Summons-Marked canines. Cute.

He starts with the seals on Kyo-chan's face. Though he has to unpack the seals from their compacted, tattoo-like state first. Which means he has to slap one of his own seals on Kyoho so he can actually see her scriptwork. She's none too pleased about that, but grits her teeth, clenches on hand on the table, and stays carefully still while he gets to work.

The seals at her mouth and nose - a single line down the nose and three on her chin - filter the air against airborne toxins. Fair enough, her Chuunin Exams were in Kiri. It's a passive seal, continuously drawing on Kyoho's chakra instead of having invocation and power components.

The seal around her eyes - tiny scales fanning out from the sides, not at all like Orochimaru's purple markings - is meant to redirect light within the eye. Why?

"Kiban. Also known as Eyeshine." Kyoho sighs when Jiraiya doesn't understand the technical term. "A reflective film at the back of the eye that reflects light back through the retina, increasing the amount of light available to the eyes' photoreceptors."

Ibiki speaks up while Jiraiya's still trying to translate that into normal language. "Night vision."

"After a fashion."

That's a seal Kyoho has to consciously activate and hold, similar to a dojutsu if Jiraiya remembers Tsunade's long ago lectures on the subject during the Second War.

The black band circling her throat unravels with another unusual kanji. "Earth Smith?"

"Land-Forger." Kyoho corrects, but doesn't offer further detail.

"Earth chakra conversion." Jiraiya notes. Drawing on its hardening properties as protection. He pulls away from the seal and doesn't miss how Kyoho relaxes.

Ibiki doesn't miss it either. "Don't like anyone near your throat?" He asks, because he's an asshole.

Kyoho shoots him a withering look. "You've never had your throat slit." She retorts.

Jiraiya pauses where he's examining what looks like a regeneration seal over Kyoho's heart that might rival Tsunade's Strength of a Hundred. Glances at the black tattoo around her throat. If there's a scar, he can't see it beneath the ink.

Ibiki raises a brow.

Kyoho's smile is not friendly. "Shinen killed them for it."

Ah, yes, her giant cat of a Summons, currently on a mission of revenge for Kyoho, and capable of killing jounin according to Hawk-taicho's report. Might have been when Shinen killed one. Jiraiya idly wonders which village they were from. Kyoho's got a dozen dead jounin to her name.

A-ranked threat in three Bingo Books, and all of them want her very, very dead.

Explains the regeneration seal. It's a well crafted piece of work, even if the conversion used for it makes no sense. How does Divine Dragon of the Sky relate to healing? 'He's a god of life' helps only slightly, and Jiraiya chalks it up to it being one of the Uzumaki gods and leaves it at that. It also features the Cleansing Fire - which Kyoho translates as Purifying Pyre - for the power invocation.

The seals on her forearms though - those are fascinating. Purifying Pyre again, probably Kyoho's default invocation, but the conversion this time is 'Heavenly Light,' and the other components include both a physical converter and one for memory. He has no idea what it does.

Kyoho's explanation is long and technical and far too much like Orochimaru whenever his old teammate explained about his newest jutsu experiments. Jiraiya had happily forgotten how incomprehensible R&D types could be.

"So instead of creating a pocket dimension," like literally everyone else, "you use the seals to store objects as light? How is that even work?"

Kyoho opens her mouth, looks at him, then sighs and gives up on an explanation. "It just does."

Shifting to look at the seals on her back - taking one more look a her chest, Kyoho's no Tsunade but it's still a lovely view - Jiraiya starts at the one over the center of her spine. It's a straightforward chakra storage seal. An Uzumaki having a store of extra chakra to draw on is frankly overkill in Jiraiya's opinion, but Jiraiya recognizes that it's a trauma response to nearly dying from chakra depletion as a child.

Creating seals to protect herself isn't the worst coping method he's seen.

The last and largest tattoo takes the form of a blade-like shape along her spine from nape to the chakra storage seal, lines fanning down across her shoulders and upper back like sun rays or wings. The seal itself has the Purifying Pyre invocation and both the Heavenly Light and Divine Dragon of the Sky conversions. The Heavenly Light is paired with the physical converter and memory combination like her storage seals, while the Divine Dragon links with the Pyre-invocation. The last component is the… Four Winds?

"Cardinal Winds." Kyoho explains. "Power to convert mass into light and provide the needed force, the Cardinal Winds to direct that mass and force along the desired vectors, and the memory component to reassemble at the end."

Jiraiya rolls his eyes. R&D types. "And in normal language…?"

"High velocity movement."

Oh, yeah that makes… wait a minute. Jiraiya runs the process through his head again. Invocation for power for the speed and direction, by what's… converting into light… "Tell me you aren't using the Heavenly Light on yourself."

"I'm not using the Heavenly Light on myself." Kyoho says dutifully, the liar. Jiraiya whacks her upside the head. "Ow!"

"Are you insane?! Why would you do that?" Of all the block-headed, ill-conceived, reckless ideas- Scattered in a burst of light never to reform, reformed in pieces, running into something with enough force to kill herself. He can think of so many ways that could have gone wrong. He whacks her upside the head again.

Kyoho swears back at him. "How else was I supposed to do it?"

"Any other way! How did that not kill you?"

"Because I know what I'm doing, obviously-"

Ibiki clears his throat, pointedly. "Your opinion, Jiraiya-sama?"

Jiraiya huffs, but stands up from behind Kyoho. He'll continue to yell at the brat later. "The brat's lucky to be alive." He says, and tries not to pout when Kyoho redresses herself.

Ibiki's expression doesn't shift, but he radiates a flatly unamused air that conveys how unimpressed he is at Jiraiya not answering his question. Kyoho looks fascinated. Jiraiya rolls his eyes. "Grape-chan's not lying about being self taught. Her style isn't anything like the Uzumaki Clan's, or any of the shinobi villages. She'll need to train an apprentice before she can claim the title, but she's certainly skilled enough to be a fuuinjutsu master." Kyoho glares at him for the nickname.

"And her other seals?"

He waves a dismissive hand. "Fine. Nothing that will harm anyone." Not that Kyoho isn't capable of using those seals to be lethal, but the seals themselves aren't combat seals. And nothing that trips concerns about her being a spy.

She could have something hidden in those storage seals of hers. Jiraiya doesn't know how he'd go about forcing them to release their full contents like a standard storage seal, so they're stuck at taking Kyoho's word that she's handed everything over for analysis.

She'll have an ANBU watcher for a while. She's a foreign, jounin-ranked shinobi. They can't keep her away from Naruto once she's a citizen, not when Kyoho's an Uzumaki and under the protection of the Uchiha, but they're sure as hell not going to risk Naruto's safety.

Hmm, he should drop by a couple times. He needs to finish lecturing the brat on appropriate safety with fuuinjutsu experimentation. Maybe pick her brain a bit more - the way her imagination works is vastly different than any other fuuinjutsu user he's encountered and she's a much prettier conversation partner to boot.

And maybe poke his godson a bit more. The brat looks so much like Minato it's painful, but he reacts exactly like Kushina and it's hilarious.

#ffxv #Shadow of Heaven's Light #fusion #Calling for Rain verse #naruto #Sola Lucis Caelum #Uzumaki Kyoho #Jiraiya #Morino Ibiki #yes Shinen is Abyssus #no Sola doesn't have any of her scars from her past life #it was Axis who slit her throat during the Fall #and living in a village that didn't care if they killed her brought back the old paranoia #but a look at all of Kyoho's seals! #the armiger and warping and her self-healing #the Summons-Marks are an idea from Vixen Tail #her story Deja Vu no Jutsu #pre-canon fix it fic with very well done world building #highly recommend #no Jiraiya has no idea the explosive tag he's gonna set off if he manages to actually touch any of the Galahdians' braids

[a-world-in-grey]

Sola/Calling for Rain

@secret-engima and, months later, the snippet I promised!

.

Karin’s first memories are her mother’s grave and her sister’s sick bed.

She knows more than that of course. She knows how her mother died, forced to use their family’s healing ability until they’d drained her chakra dry. She knows her older sister nearly followed their mother that night, eight years old and already scarred across her arms and shoulders.

But that knowledge isn’t seared into her memory the way her mother’s gravestone is, the bamboo marker plain and unmarked, nothing like the stone markers bearing carved names for the village shinobi. That knowledge doesn’t paint itself across her closed eyelids like Kyoho’s frail form, skin too pale, breaths too shallow, wild hair tumbling across the pillows like a splash of blood.

Karin remembers when Kyoho first opened her eyes, how her sister had looked to find Karin first, and hadn’t settled until she could clearly see Karin was well.

.

Karin doesn’t know how much Kyoho’s near death changed her older sister. She can’t remember what Kyoho was like before, can’t remember a time when Kyoho didn’t braid their hair with little painted beads and thin cords of braided thread. Can’t remember a time when Kyoho didn’t hold her close at night and whisper bedtime stories in words that sound like thunder and rain.

Stories and Songs and meanings just for the two of them. Braids and beads hidden beneath hair and cloth, Clan secrets told in the dead of night in a tongue only they knew. Teaching Karin to dance, to fly.

Teaching Karin to survive. 

Kyoho trains with the determination not to learn, but master every skill she can. Taijutsu, weapons, healing, ninjutsu. She claws her way up the ranks of Kusa’s shinobi, genin at nine, chuunin at eleven, jounin at fifteen.

Kusa’s own little prodigy. A match for Konoha’s Uchiha Itachi or Hatake Kakashi. Or so Kusa likes to think.

There’s a lot Kusa doesn’t know.

They don’t know of the fuuinjutsu, of the basics learned from their mother that Kyoho took and reinvented on her own. The black tattoos spiraling across Kyoho’s skin hidden from sight under dark green clothing. 

They don’t know about the chakra chains Kyoho painstakingly learned to use. Chains Kyoho learned to modify, to shrink to the size of a fine gold chain, to enlarge to the size of the massive chains that once rose from the waves to close Uzushio’s ports.

They don’t know of Kyoho’s sensory abilities, so fine tuned she can pick out a shinobi’s specialization from the feel of their chakra alone. They don’t know of the weapons Kyoho can wield beyond her glaive and curved shortswords.

They don’t know Kyoho’s taught Karin everything she knows. They don’t know Karin isn’t the fumbling, lackluster genin overshadowed by her prodigal sister’s brilliance.

.

“My name is Uzumaki Naruto, and I’m going to kick all of your asses!”

The room goes silent, every genin present turning to stare, and Karin feels her breath freeze in her lungs as the chakra signatures around her spike with anger and disbelief.

Karin buries her own chakra, smothers it down to a spark so small even Kyoho has difficulty detecting, hiding the surprise and recognition and the tangle of emotions she can keep off her face but not out of her chakra. And she knows she shouldn’t focus her attention solely on the loud Konoha genin as his teammates and comrades converge to scold him for his recklessness. There are others in the room far more dangerous than the rookie too dumb not to draw the ire of the rest of the competition before the Exams have even begun. And yet-

Uzumaki.

He doesn’t have the red hair. But that’s the mon on his shoulder, black and purple instead of the black and blue variant Kyoho’s stitched into their clothes, in places easily hidden because there’s Clan Pride but then there’s announcing to all the Elemental Nations that they’re female kekkai genkai bearers.

Karin lessens her hold on her chakra, reaching her senses past the thunderstorm-shadow-river feeling of the three genin standing beside him.

Warmth. Bright encompassing warmth, intense but not painful, the ocean breeze across her skin on a clear sunny day. Swirling reserves deeper than she’s ever sensed, even deeper than Kyoho’s hearth-fire chakra.

Karin suppresses her chakra the moment the blond’s thunderstorm teammate glances her way, glancing away and digging her fingernails into the back of her hand so hard she’s surprised she doesn’t break skin.

She swallows back a sob.

Uzumaki. He’s Clan.

But not Galahdian. Not a child of the Storm-Father, not someone who grew up with the Clan Laws and the certainty in their bones that even if the world fell apart, the Clan would always have your back.

The Uzumaki are a shinobi clan. Karin can’t… how can she know if she can trust this wayward Uzumaki? How can she know if he will hold that same fierce loyalty that blazes in her and Kyoho’s souls?

She shouldn’t. Oh, but by the Storm-Father, Karin wants to. This long lost kinsman who wears Freedom and Protection across his shoulders. Who looks at the world with Protection in his eyes and crowned with Love.

Karin knows the Colors don’t apply to the natural world. To things that are mere happenstance and genetic chance. But-

(‘Sometimes the Gods paint us with specific Colors,’ Karin remembers Kyoho telling her, ‘A message and a warning, for souls so strong the physical has no choice but to reflect it.’

Karin had looked into Blue eyes framed by Red hair, and never asked if Kyoho spoke from experience.)

For the first time in nearly ten years, Karin hopes.

She has to try.

And that means staying in Konoha long enough to get a measure of Uzumaki Naruto.

.

Karin is perfectly happy not knowing how something gets named the ‘Forest of Death.’

Unfortunately, as the location of the Second Exam, Karin’s not going to get a choice.

Kyoho would love it, Karin thinks as she miserably fills out the liability waiver. Kyoho had spoken of many places in her past life, but none so fondly as Galahd, deadly and wild and all the more beautiful for it.  

She lets her ‘teammates’ take the lead as they scout through the forest. Her head’s busy planning her next step. Should she focus on passing the Second Exam? Kyoho told her how the Third Exam was always an exhibition for clients, so she’d have plenty of time during the preparations to track down and try to get to know her kinsman. Perhaps with Kyoho’s help even - surely her mission would be finished by then?

But that assumes Karin and the two idiots she’s assigned to play chakra-battery for can pass at all. They aren’t the weakest team in the forest, even counting Karin’s careful pretense, but there are a lot of teams stronger than they are. Stronger, and all too willing to kill.

Karin could ditch the idiots. She’s kept track of where she last sensed Uzumaki Naruto’s chakra, so she could find him and get to know him in the time before the Second Exam ends. Maybe even steal the Earth scroll and bring it as a good faith gift. 

But she’d be on her own, carrying a high value target, and gambling on her kinsman caring enough about a cousin he didn’t know to trust and protect her.

Karin tugs on the loose ends of her hair in frustration. Why is this so hard?!

Kyoho would know what to do.

Kyoho’s not here, Karin firmly reminds herself. She has to figure this out on her own.

In the end, she chooses to stay with her teammates. There's too many unknowns for her to risk running now.

.

Two days later, staring up at the bear taller than her house, Karin's regretting her decision to stay.

They left me!

Stay and hide, they said. You'll be fine.

If they're still alive when Karin finds them, she's going to throttle them. Hiding her chakra doesn't matter when enemies can find her by her scent! The bear snarls, and Karin gives up any pretense of hiding her abilities. She's out of her depth, anything less than her full skill will only end up with her dead-

("Above all else," Kyoho had whispered the night before Karin left for Konoha, "survive.")

She reaches for her supply of explosive tags (way more than anyone thinks she has, way more than she probably needs, but they're the easiest seal to make and Kyoho always says there's no such thing as overkill) and prepares to turn the bear into a pile of charred meat and fur.

Only, there's movement above her, a blur of black and purple, a flash of silver-

Thunder. Lightning and rain and the howling storm as she huddles by the warmth of hearth, each flash of light in the sky accompanied by the rolling drums that echo in her chest; an invitation, a challenge, to face the storm and laugh in the embrace of the sky.

Uzumaki's dark haired teammate lunges from the trees like one of the jungle cats of Kyoho's stories, dropping down onto the bear with a spinning, flying kick, and Kyoho freezes.

Kyoho knows that kick.

(Karin stares wide-eyed as Kyoho all but flies through the air, leaping and spinning with the grace of a breeze through the prairie grasses. Kyoho's been teaching her how to dance, but those jumps have nothing on the ones Kyoho is doing!

"Will I learn to do that too?" Karin asks. Nerves flit in her gut like butterflies. She's trying to learn everything Kyoho can teach her, but those leaps are so high.

Blue eyes soften as Kyoho ruffles her hair. "You don't have to - it's not part of the Ostium Dance."

Karin blinks. "It's not?"

"It's Ulric, our sister Clan." Kyoho says. Her gaze grows distant. "Clan of Sky and Storm, Coeurl-kin, first of the Storm-Father's children."

Karin's touch on her arm brings her back to the present. "Were you Ulric first, before you were Ostium?"

Kyoho laughs. "I was Furia, Clan of Sea and Horizon, but I learned the Ulric Dance because I was Sky-born instead of Sea-born.")

She can't see a braid, but- Black and purple. A pair of well worn kukri at his back. The aerial combat she's never seen anyone but Kyoho use.

Her fingers tremble around the string of explosive tags as the genin checks to make sure the bear is dead. Then he turns to her with an easy grin. "You're an Uzumaki, right? Do you want to meet your cousin?"

And Karin has been so keyed up over possibly having Clan, over being in hostile territory with no one to watch her back, with desperate hope dogging her heels for the past three days of finding someone she can trust- 

(“You can always trust the Clans. Even the most bitter rivals will protect a Clan child, if they are threatened by Outsiders.”)

"Are you Ulric?" She blurts.

Dark eyes sharpen. "How do you know that name?" But his gaze flits to her temple, to the black braid joiner peeking out from her hair. Karin removes the grey hitai-ate and pulls her hair back to show him her braids. The Ostium Braid and the Mourning Braid for her mother, unlike Kyoho who also wears Marriage, Hero, and Revenge Braids. Braids Karin and Kyoho have never shown anyone but each other.

But the boy's eyes widen in shock and recognition, and pale fingers pull the Ulric Braid threaded with the purple ribbon of a Chief from its hiding place behind his ear.

("And if you get the chance, run. Before Kusa kills you too.")

Karin sobs.

This boy is Clan. He's safe.

#A Shadow of Heaven's Light #fusion #naruto #Calling for Rain verse #Uzumaki Karin #Uzumaki Kyoho #Nyxsuke #Kusa doesn't know how badly they screwed up #Kyoho's worn a Revenge Braid since Kusa killed their mom #she's just been waiting until Karin is safe to be able to take that revenge #Kyoho's not had a Braincell for almost ten years #she might be a touch feral