Akari didn't remember falling asleep.
One moment he was staring into the darkness, waiting for the shadows to move. The next, he was standing in a place that defied time—a crimson sky hanging overhead, and fire burning in the distance.
He stood in a field of ash.
Blackened trees cracked in the wind, and flames danced without heat. Ahead of him, a figure moved slowly through the haze. A woman—tall, robed in silver, her face half-covered by a mask of bone.
He knew her. Not by name.
But by instinct.
> "You wake slower each time," she said, her voice echoing inside him.
"The seal weakens. And soon, you will need to choose."
Akari stepped forward. "Choose what?"
She turned her head slightly. "To burn… or to rise."
Before he could speak again, the ground cracked beneath him—and the dream shattered like glass.
---
He woke gasping, sweat clinging to his skin despite the cold morning air. Raien was already up, sharpening kunai at the doorway. He glanced over but didn't ask. Akari was thankful for that.
The ANBU were gone, but the silence they left behind was louder than any threat.
Later, as the sun rose over Konoha, Akari made his way to the outskirts of the village—where a hidden cavern carved into the cliffside had remained untouched for decades.
Inside, he lit a torch and walked deeper.
It wasn't on any map. Only the Senju and Uchiha elders knew of its existence—and perhaps not even all of them. This was where they had hidden the fragments: scrolls too dangerous to be studied, masks too old to decay, weapons etched with runes in a language even Tobirama couldn't read.
He found what he was looking for: a tablet of obsidian, worn at the edges, and marked with the same sigil that had appeared on his skin.
The mark of the Whispering Flame.
---
Back at the village, trouble stirred.
Danzo had requested a closed meeting with the council. Whispers of Akari's bloodline had begun to circulate—rumors that he was not born of Konoha, but something far older. Tobirama refused to act without proof, but he was already preparing protocols.
Akari had no illusions.
He was becoming a liability.
But he wouldn't run.
That evening, he stood at the training grounds. Not to train. But to let it out.
The energy surged through his veins—fierce and unfamiliar. He activated the seal willingly for the first time, and violet flames licked the air around him.
He felt her presence again.
> "Good," the voice said. "Now burn them down, and they will remember your name."
Akari exhaled sharply and pulled the chakra back.
Not today.
Not yet.
---
Elsewhere, deep in the Land of Fire, a masked figure knelt before a shrine of stone. Flickering candlelight revealed jagged tattoos on his arms.
"She awakens," he murmured.
"And with her… so shall we."
He dropped a single black feather onto the altar.
The sky cracked above him.