Naruto: Tango with Death

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[Yami's POV]

Today was like any other day.

I woke up, hunted for a bit, ate, meditated…

But in the afternoon, as I was tending to my feathers, I felt spacial fluctuations at the top of the mountain, warning me of Sukaina's arrival.

However, before I could get there and great her, I felt a great tremor travel through the mountain. I felt Sukaina's aura from afar, and it alarmed me.

She was losing vitality, fast, but that wasn't too big of a problem in itself, she was going for the Sacred Water Pool, and with the upgrade it received after it received the sap of the tree, restoring her to health shouldn't be a problem.

However, what worried me was the trace of energy I felt from her. It was Senjutsu Chakra. But it felt wrong.

Not wasting a second, I unfurled my wings, and flew towards the pool, feeling both curious and alarmed.

When I arrived at the pool, I saw the water was quickly turning red. However, her aura had stabilized, and was slowly healing.

At the same time, I saw Jashin leaning over the water from the side, looking worriedly into the water.

"What happened?"

Jashin, who was biting his nails bloody, replied, "She tried making Senjutsu Chakra."

I sighed, "Just as I feared. So, is it impossible?"

That had been a fear of mine since I heard she wanted to become a Sage. Us Sages were innate, and it was folly to think that one could become a Sage through effort. In the end, humans had a limit to themselves, and were inferior creatures. Without the support of a superior being, they couldn't…

"No, you should have seen it. It was beautiful."

I paused, and asked incredulously, "What?"

Jashin turned to look at me, and I finally noticed his face did not match with his actions. He didn't show worry, or sadness. Instead, he showed more craze than usual.

"She did it. She managed to create Senjutsu Chakra, and turn into a Sage. Not just any Sage either."

Frowning, I asked, "What happened then? How did she end up in this state?"

Jashin smiled and turned back to look at Sukaina as he said, "It was her Authority. It looked like a mix of mine and Shinigami's."

I tilted my head and asked, "A Sage that lords over Blood and Death… Hell?"

Jashin shook his head, "No, it didn't feel like Yama."

"Then what?"

Jashin shrugged and replied, "It wasn't like anything I felt saw or felt. It was her own thing."

I sighed and asked, "What happened then? Did her Authority harm her? That shouldn't be possible."

Jashin revealed, "Her Authority flooded the area around her, and started making everything decaying. Hadn't she stopped, she would have killed everything around her. So she forcefully stopped her transformation. The clash of energies damaged her body."

Finally feeling relief, I asked, "So all we need to do is wait for her to heal, and she will be able to turn into a Sage in a place where she won't kill anything with her transformation."

However, Jashin once again shook his head, and said, "Her Authority is imperfect."

I rolled my eyes and replied, "Those are divine powers, of course they are imperfect. Even we, who were born with this power, had to work for years to perfect and master our Authority."

Jashin said, "Yes, but our Authorities could be filled up, could evolve. She is human, not a Sage. Who's to say that transforming with a faulty Authority won't have negative effects? Maybe she won't be able to work on it. And even if that is the case, knowing her, she is not going to accept having something imperfect. Not after everything she went through."

I paused, before saying, "Considering the nature of her Authority, she can't really stroll around with her unsuppressed aura can she?"

Jashin shrugged, "Unless she wants to kill everything around her."

I sighed and said, "Do you have any idea of how she came to acquire that specific Authority? And how strong was it?"

Jashin replied, "Stronger than either mine or Shinigami's. Almost reached the peak, I would say. As for how she came to acquire it… Do you remember Gamamaru's theory on the Authorities?"

I nodded, "I believe he theorized that each Authority was an understanding of the world. That it wasn't a power per se, but rather the ability to manipulate a rule of the world. Why?"

Jashin kept staring into the water as he replied, "The Authority she awakened, it felt similar to her killing intent, back when she had one. Not exactly the same, but still, it felt like it. So I'm wondering whether that theory could have been true."

Not really getting his point, I asked, "What if it is?"

Jashin explained, "We all had to deal with what we were born with, and evolve from that. As we gained our Authority before gaining consciousness, it was only innate. But what if she could change that? Maybe she could perfect her Authority before even condescending it."

I frowned and said, "It took me 76 years to perfect my Authority through faith. Many of our kind never even managed to perfect their Authority. Do you think she can access the level of Faith we used to have? And that's assuming she found a way to use the coalesced faith to change her Authority."

Jashin chuckled, "You've always lacked creativity. The idea isn't for her to use faith to perfect her Authority, but to perfect her Authority by understanding it."

I froze for a moment, before exclaiming, "Are you mad? It is impossible to understand an Authority through understanding alone, we…"

"The Otsotsuki God did."

My frown deepened as I replied, "She isn't the Otsotsuki God."

He merely shrugged, "No, she's better. Did you ever expect a human to do half the things she did, in barely a few years?"

Frustrated, I added, "No matter how great her capacity to understand Authority is, if she cannot feel her Authority, then how is she supposed to understand it?"

Jashin grinned as he replied, "Who said she can't feel her Authority?"

Titling my head, I asked, "You can't possibly be saying that you believe she understood enough of her Authority in the instant she was in contact with it to continue her comprehension, are you?"

Jashin snorted, "I don't know if I would be surprised if she did… but no, that's not what I was thinking about. Instead, I was thinking of the small bead of condensed Senjutsu Chakra within her Gate of Opening."

Narrowing my eyes, I called out, "Bullshit."

Jashin snorted, but as he was about to reply, the Sacred Water Pool started churning. Jashin's grin considerably widened as he voiced out what we both thought, "She woke up."