Amamiya Gen staggered to his feet, his vision spinning. His left shoulder still bled through the bandages—half-healed from last night's ambush.
The forest around him was dead quiet. Not even the crickets dared to speak.
Then came the voice.
A laugh—wet, broken, like bones grinding under a smile.
"Gluck… so this is the great Amamiya Gen? You should've died sooner."
Gen froze, eyes narrowing. A black silhouette stood several meters ahead, its form rippling like heat haze. He couldn't sense chakra—none at all.
That alone chilled him to the core.
"Who are you?" he demanded, slipping into a defensive stance. His chakra was faint, unstable… one wrong move, and his body would give out.
The shadow tilted its head. "Who am I? Heh. Just the one sent to erase your little clan's mistake."
"...Mistake?" Gen's breath quickened. His right hand twitched toward a kunai pouch. "I've never even seen you before."
"Of course not. You were never meant to."
The voice warped, multiple tones folding over one another—male, female, mechanical, beastly—all in one. "But your clan's child disrupted things. Kill you, and everything resets."
Before Gen could blink, the figure vanished.
Gen's heart jumped. His instincts screamed—behind!
He spun, but too late—something cold and oily pierced through his back.
A black sludge, like tar infused with chakra, crawled across his body.
"Ghh—! You… coward!"
He tried to weave hand signs, but his fingers froze mid-seal. The sludge swallowed his skin, his face, his breath.
"Gluck… the flow of history can't be rewritten," the voice hissed beside his ear. "But I can… prune it."
Gen's eyes dimmed. Then—suddenly—they flared red for a moment, his chakra flaring violently… before going still.
The forest fell silent again.
Hours later, at noon.
The Amamiya camp was unusually calm, their watch trained toward the distant Kaguya camp. A patrol was returning when they saw movement in the forest.
"Hey… isn't that the patriarch?"
The youngest of them squinted. "Looks like him…"
Amamiya Gen stepped into view, limping slightly. His face pale, his eyes… empty.
He reached the edge of the clearing, then stopped.
"Gluck…"
The same inhuman laughter ripped from his throat as a dark shape burst out of his body—splitting away like smoke.
Gen collapsed instantly. His lifeless form hit the dirt. The shadow lingered a moment longer, whispering words no one could hear, before fading into the forest once more.
"Oi, Itsuo, smell that?"
A middle-aged ninja on patrol raised his hand. "Everyone stop."
Two younger ones halted beside him, eyes scanning the plains.
"Smell what, sir?"
The man sniffed again. The faint scent of iron reached his nose. His pupils shrank.
"…Blood."
They dashed forward.
Moments later, they stumbled upon a corpse half-hidden in grass. The middle-aged ninja crouched, brushed away the leaves—then froze.
"...No. No, it can't be…"
The two younger ones approached, puzzled. Then they saw the emblem—the Amamiya crest—carved into the dead man's armor.
And the face beneath it.
"P-Patriarch Gen—?!"
The boy's voice cracked. His knees buckled. The world seemed to tilt sideways.
All three of them stood there, numb, as if time itself had stopped.
Back in camp, Amamiya Itsuo sprinted through the tents, panting hard, ignoring the startled looks of the sentries.
He burst into the patriarch's quarters—no, the young patriarch's.
Inside, Amamiya Raizen sat cross-legged, refining chakra in silence. His eyes opened at the sudden intrusion, cold and sharp.
"Itsuo? What the hell are you doing barging in like that?"
The scout fell to his knees. His voice trembled.
"Raizen-sama… it's… the Patriarch. He—he's dead."
Raizen froze.
For a moment, nothing. Just the soft hum of chakra in the air.
Then his hands lowered slowly, his face shadowed.
"...Repeat that," he said quietly.
Itsuo's shoulders shook. "We found his body in the forest… it's definitely him."
Raizen stared past him, into the darkness beyond the tent wall.
Inside his head, the reincarnator part of him screamed every curse word he knew.
Not now. Not when I just started fixing things. Not when the clan was finally stabilizing…
His fist clenched.
"…Get everyone ready. We'll confirm it ourselves."
And as Raizen stepped into the daylight, he felt it—the faint residue of a chakra that didn't belong to any human.
Something ancient… something watching.