Amatsu stood before the heavy iron gate, his cold, sharp eyes scanning the mass of imprisoned souls. Hundreds. Thousands. Orphans, dissidents, traitors—forgotten by the village that once used them. Some had been loyal once, only to be discarded like rotting corpses when their usefulness ended. Others were rabid beasts, criminals whose chains were the only thing keeping them from tearing flesh.
Behind him, Ryojin leaned lazily against the damp stone wall, arms crossed, the dim torchlight casting jagged shadows over his face. A smirk tugged at his lips, golden eyes burning with anticipation. "You're really letting them all out? Heh, this is gonna be fun."
Amatsu did not respond immediately. His mind had already calculated every outcome.
The prison, if unleashed in full, would devour itself. The guards wouldn't be able to tell enemy from ally. Their formations would break. Discipline would shatter. Panic would spread like an oil fire, fast and uncontrollable. In that chaos, he and his group would become ghosts—slipping through the cracks, unseen.
He didn't need to fight a war here.
He needed war to fight itself.
The iron gates groaned open.
A breath. A pause.
Then, the world shattered.
Screams tore through the corridors. Footsteps, wild and desperate, slammed against the stone. Shackles rattled as prisoners surged forward—some stumbling, others sprinting, all driven by hunger, hatred, or sheer survival.
A man, gaunt and shaking, collapsed to his knees. His mouth opened in a silent prayer—before a shadow fell over him. A hand gripped his skull.
Crack.
His body slumped, limp.
The killer didn't stop. None of them did.
Ryojin barked a laugh. "Tch. Knew it. Like throwing meat to starving dogs."
Amatsu watched, his expression unreadable.
Scarlet streaks painted the stone.. Fists broke bone. Some prisoners turned on each other, old grudges boiling over.
Others hesitated. The smarter ones—the predators, not the prey. A cluster of former shinobi held back, eyes scanning, minds calculating. One of them, a thin man with scars running down his arms, muttered, "Wait. Watch. Let the fools die first."
A child, no older than eight, clung to an older prisoner's sleeve. "Help us."
The man's eyes were cold. Without a word, his blade flashed.
The child collapsed.
No burdens.
The weaker ones scattered in terror, pressing themselves against the walls, some crying, some too numb to react.
And in the storm steel, and madness—Amatsu moved.
A guard, hidden among corpses, sprang up, kunai flashing toward his ribs.
Amatsu didn't stop walking.
Thud.
The guard fell, a kunai buried in his throat. He hadn't even seen Amatsu throw it.
His body was still twitching when Ryojin's chains lashed out, skewering another two men mid-strike. Their screams were cut short.
A metallic tang thickened the air, clinging to their tongues.
Higanbana stood untouched.
She did not fight. Did not run.
She simply existed.
A prisoner, a hulking man with jagged scars, froze mid-attack. His breathing turned shallow. His fingers trembled. His pupils shrank as he stared at her.
"You—" His voice cracked. "What… are you?"
Others noticed. Some recoiled. Some stared. Some fell to their knees.
And some, those who had nothing left but madness, laughed.
A younger prisoner, barely a man, whispered, "She's not human…"
Higanbana blinked. Her expression was soft, too soft for the carnage around her.
The scarred man staggered back. "No… something like you shouldn't exist."
His breath hitched. Then, he lunged.
Flower flashed toward his throat.
Crack.
His body twisted unnaturally. Bones snapped mid-air. He hit the ground, lifeless.
Higanbana lowered her gaze to his corpse. "Ah… I didn't mean to."
"I'm sorry"
Silence.
Then, chaos resumed.
Amatsu watched it all unfold, eyes cold, mind calculating.
Higanbana...
The fractures were forming.
Some prisoners were beasts, driven by nothing but violence.
Some were cautious, scavenging weapons, waiting for their chance.
Some were broken, unable to move, unable to hope.
And some… some now knelt before Higanbana.
Good.
A broken force was easier to control.
The ground rumbled.
A deep, mechanical groan. The sound of shifting stone.
Amatsu's eyes flicked toward the walls. Hanzo's countermeasures.
Heavy barriers began to rise—reinforced steel and chakra-infused stone, sealing off exits, trapping prisoners in kill zones.
Amatsu turned to Ryojin.
"Change of plan."
Ryojin grinned, golden eyes burning. "Oh? What, you wanna burn this place to the ground?"
Amatsu's voice was calm. Absolute.
"We take everything. Follow Higanbana towards the laboratory"
The words were swallowed by the deafening roar as thousands surged forward, an unstoppable tide of flesh and desperation. The weak were trampled without hesitation, bones crunching beneath the stampede.
Screams of agony were fleeting—lost beneath the violent pulse of chaos. A skull shattered underfoot, sending a splatter of blood across the cracked stone walls. Hands clawed, bodies shoved, the madness spreading like wildfire.
A guard stationed at the outer perimeter barely had time to widen his eyes before cold steel opened his throat.
He collapsed, clutching his throat, fingers slick with warmth as his breath faded to a wet gurgle.
Another shinobi, still half-lost in the stupor of boredom, reached for his kunai—a fatal hesitation. Five prisoners slammed into him at once.
His scream barely left his throat before they dragged him down, teeth snapping, fingers tearing. A wet crunch, then silence
Alarms blared.
Red torches flickered wildly, casting grotesque shadows that danced in the rising smoke. The fortress trembled under the weight of its own undoing. Barracks ignited in a flash of crimson and black, the acrid scent of burning flesh seeping into the stone corridors.
A unit of Amegakure shinobi scrambled to form ranks, desperately barking orders. Useless. Tactics held no meaning in the face of this sheer, rabid force. The tide crashed against them, breaking formations, shattering discipline.
Their kunai flashed, slicing flesh, but for every prisoner that fell, two more took their place, clawing, biting, ripping. One shinobi, throat slashed, gurgled as he sank to his knees, hands clutching at the wound in futile disbelief. Another was dragged down, vanishing beneath a swarm of hands and teeth.
Amatsu moved through the storm, orchestrating destruction.
Smoke curled around him, veiling him in shadow. He stepped over a fresh corpse, barely sparing it a glance. His mind sliced through the noise, calculating, adapting, shifting the pieces in his favor.
Ryojin trailed behind, golden eyes burning with exhilaration. Higanbana was a quiet presence at Amatsu's side, untouched by the chaos, her crimson gaze calm amidst the inferno.
They neared the final corridor.
Then—
A shift. A presence.
An unnatural silence amid the slaughter.
Not the frantic desperation of a dying man. Not the blind charge of another fool seeking glory.
No. This was something else.
Amatsu turned just as Kurogane stepped forward. He did not rush. He did not posture. He simply exhaled, slow and measured, the air leaving his lungs in a controlled release. His fingers flexed, cracking one by one, the sound barely audible beneath the slaughter. Then, he adjusted his grip on the massive cleaver resting on his shoulder—a practiced, familiar motion. The ease of a man who had done this a thousand times before.
His eyes were dead. Not empty, not wild, but steady, calm. The gaze of a professional..
Ryojin's grin widened. "Oh? Looks like we got a tough one." chains crackled along his arms, but Amatsu lifted a hand—a silent command.
Not yet.
An unnatural silence amid the slaughter.
Yet standing in the way was one man.
A lone shinobi, clad in dark armor, unmoving. His mask bore the symbol of Amegakure's elite—the Kurogane, Hanzo's personal executioners.
The air felt heavier.
Even Ryojin's ever-present smirk faded for a split second. "Tch. That one's different."
Kurogane shinobi exhaled slowly. A flicker of lightning chakra danced along his fingertips. Not a lowly guard.
An elite.
Amatsu calculated instantly. Retreat was impossible. The only path forward was through.
A sharp whistling sound—
Kunai, faster than any human hand should have thrown them.
Ryojin dodged left—barely. A thin line of blood trailed down his cheek. "Shit, he's fast!"
Amatsu didn't move. He didn't need to.
A flick of his wrist—three shuriken flew.
Kurogane did not dodge.
He deflected them mid-air with a single hand, his free palm forming a half-seal.
Lightning erupted from his feet. A flash-step.
Too fast.
He was already upon them.
Ryojin's chains lashed out, aiming for his ribs—but the Kurogane twisted, slipping through the gaps, untouched. His hand shot toward Amatsu's throat—
Amatsu stepped one inch to the side.
The strike whiffed past his ear, missing by a hair's breadth.
A trap.
The Kurogane had overextended.
Amatsu's kunai was already in his hand, already stabbing toward the unguarded ribs—but then lightning pulsed from the shinobi's skin, sending a shockwave outward.
Amatsu's grip loosened. A minor paralysis. Predictable.
But effective.
A second kunai, unseen, was already in his other hand.
The first was a feint. The real strike came half a second later.
A thin, precise stab—straight into the inner elbow. A fraction of an inch off from a main artery. Deliberate. Control over his arm—lost.
Ryojin did not waste the opening. His flames surged, his chains struck—
The Kurogane dropped to one knee, stunned, his body spasming from both the wound and the relentless burning heat.
It took three more seconds before he collapsed, smoke rising from his body.
Ryojin exhaled sharply. "Fucking hell. That was one guy."
Amatsu didn't spare the corpse a glance. His mind was already ahead.
A new calculation.
The timing was too close. More would come.
Their window had shrunk.
"Hurry," Amatsu said, voice calm. Absolute. "We don't have time."
And so they vanished.
A presence descended upon the scene. Heavy. Suffocating. Unstoppable.
The chaos faltered.
Step by step, boots echoed against the blood-soaked stone. The fires flickered as if cowering. The pressure in the air became unbearable.
The prisoners froze.
A lone figure emerged from the darkness, his presence a death knell.
Hanzo.
His gaze swept over , unreadable. He saw the corpses. He saw the blood. He saw the broken chains and the shattered order of his prison.
And he saw that Amatsu was no longer here.
A slow exhale left his lips. His fingers curled, then unclenched.
"...Interesting."
The word was quiet. But in that moment, it was the only sound in the world.