Arashima wasn't like his brothers.
While they performed hand signs with elegance and efficiency he stumbled, sweated, and failed. While they trained under the stern gaze of their father, Butsuma, he was shunned, sent away, dismissed with the simple phrase: "You are worthless and dull."
And perhaps Butsuma was right.
The frigid wind atop the jagged mountain bit into Arashima's skin, his legs folded in seiza position upon a flattened stone platform carved into the cliff face. The sky above was darkening with dusk, streaked with bruises of crimson and fading gold, clouds drifting lazily as if mocking his efforts. He sat with his eyes closed, spine straight, hands resting gently on his thighs, focusing entirely on the ebb and flow of the energy within.
Chakra… feel it… breathe it… he repeated like a mantra.
But each time he tried to mold it, to sense the warmth and density that his tutors spoke of, it slipped through his grasp like sand through a sieve. Instead of becoming one with his body, it felt alien, distant—like trying to grab sunlight.
His shoulders began to tremble, not from the cold, but from within. A storm brewed in his heart, fierce and unrelenting. Frustration, grief, and helplessness surged like a tide too strong to contain. And then—he snapped.
His eyes opened, wild and glistening with tears. His breath hitched in his throat, and his hands clenched into fists.
"Why?!" he cried out to the sky, to the gods, to the wind—anything that might listen. "Why am I like this?! What did I do wrong?!"
Silence answered him.
His voice echoed off the stone and disappeared into the vast nothingness of the mountain. Shaking, chest heaving, Arashima fell forward, his forehead resting on the cold stone, tears dripping down and disappearing into the cracks.
But then…
Something stirred.
A whisper of breath. A shifting of shadow. A ripple through the air like a pebble dropped into a pond.
Arashima froze.
His instincts—though dulled compared to his kin—screamed. He didn't understand chakra well, but danger? He knew that intimately. Eyes darting, he slowly reached into the folds of his robe and drew the small kunai he always kept hidden. The cold metal was reassuring, grounding.
Where…? he thought, scanning the rocky walls around him. The cave nearby had always given him an eerie feeling, but now its gaping maw seemed to pulse with something darker.
He stepped toward it, blade ready, knees bent in a cautious stance. The shadows danced and twisted inside, mocking him.
Then—nothing. Stillness.
He let out a shaky breath. Was it just nerves? Stress?
And then a hand closed around his neck.
Another clamped over his mouth.
He thrashed instinctively, trying to scream, but the iron grip did not loosen. His eyes widened in horror as he glimpsed the figure behind him: entirely cloaked, wearing black from head to toe. A masked face. No insignia. No emotion.
'An assassin?!' his mind shrieked.
But then… as suddenly as the panic rose, it melted.
A strange calm washed over him, like warm honey seeping into his bones. His limbs weakened, vision blurred, and his body went slack in the man's arms.
'Let's… just… sleep for a while…' he thought.
---
Arashima awoke.
His neck ached. His mouth was dry. His limbs—immobile.
The world around him was dark. Cold. Unfamiliar.
He tried to move, but his hands were tightly bound. His legs too. Something thick and heavy was lodged in his mouth—wooden. He gagged, coughing against it. With effort, he spat it out, the chunk of wood clattering to the floor.
Then came the pain—numbness turned sharp tingling in his fingers. His back pressed against something hard. A wooden pillar, wide as a tree trunk, almost as thick as he was. He twisted his neck and looked around.
Shadows cloaked the room, but faint outlines of crates, scrolls, and broken furniture told him it was some sort of storage. No windows. Only darkness and dust.
"Where… am I?" he croaked aloud.
No response.
He tried to muster up some chakra around his hands but....
"That won't work."
His heart jumped. He looked toward the source, but it was too dark.
"Who's there?!" he barked, panic edged in his voice.
A moment of awkward silence. Then, the voice came again, clearly nervous. "Uh… um… I don't have to tell you that…!"
He blinked. 'A girl?'
"Are you also trapped?" he asked cautiously.
"…Yes," she answered after a pause.
Something about her voice—measured, calm, with an undertone of fatigue—made him believe her. But he remained wary.
A silence fell between them, thick and suffocating, before he broke it again.
"What did you mean… 'That won't work'?"
"I can s— I mean, feel your chakra. You're not using it right. I have a better way since I can see in the see ev— well!"
He paused for a while. 'Weird....'
"Why didn't you free yourself if you knew...."
"I don't have enough strength ot chakra left to break out. You need to free us both."
"And why should I?" he asked coldly.
Another silence. This one longer.
"…That's a dumb question," she muttered, almost too quiet to hear.
"What?"
"Nothing."
He groaned. "Fine. Just tell me how."
"Are you flexible?"
"…Yes." Thanks to Butsuma's cruel training regimens, his body was practically a contortionist's tool.
"Then bring your legs back. Slide them under you and push your body off the ground very fast. Friction will make it easier to loosen the ropes and if it doesn't you can atleast squirm out of better."
It took several tries. In the suffocating dark, every motion was a guess. He scraped his back, twisted his joints, cursed under his breath. But eventually, his feet pressed against the floor, and he grunted as he pushed, rocking back and forth.
He gripped the coarse ropes and strained with every muscle. Sweat dripped down his temple.
And then—
Snap.
The ropes loosened.
He fell forward, catching himself with a gasp. His wrists burned, raw from the struggle, but he was free.
"Yes!" he shouted, almost laughing.
"Now free me," came the girl's voice.
He paused. Suspicion returning.
"How do I know you're not an Uchiha trying to trick me?"
"Turn on the light," she said simply. "You'll see I'm not."
"…Where?"
"Right wall. Six meters up. On the shelf."
He groaned, fumbling through clutter. Crates, scrolls, old blades. Dust rose like ghosts from every touch. Finally, he found a lantern.
"Help me light it," he muttered.
She instructed him on flint placement and wick control. A spark caught. Flame bloomed.
The room illuminated.
It was a large storehouse, walls lined with ancient scrolls, armaments, masks, torn banners. A cache of forgotten relics.
And there she was.
Tied tightly to a pillar across the room. Her robes were torn in places, but she held her head high. Black hair cascaded down her shoulders like midnight waterfalls. Pale skin, almost porcelain, bruised around the wrists. Her expression—nervous, yet undeniably beautiful—betrayed the glint of intelligence in her gaze.
But what struck him most…
Were her eyes.
Pale lavender. Bordering white. With veins faintly visible around them.
"Wait…" Arashima stepped closer, stunned. "You… You're a Hyuga!"
She looked away. Silent.
"…A Hyuga. Here? But why—"
"I was kidnapped," she said softly. "Same as you, maybe."
Arashima knelt beside her, confusion spiraling in his mind.
The Hyuga clan was one of the noblest in the shinobi world. Why would one of them be bound in a storeroom.
He looked at her again. Despite the ropes, despite the dust and gloom, she looked unbroken. Resilient.
He exhaled slowly. "Alright. I'll free you."
As he reached for her bindings, she tilted her head.
"You're not as bad at chakra as you think," she said.
He stopped. "What?"
"You're just not using what you should."
A pause.
"…What's your name?" he asked.
She smiled faintly, the first smile of a girl his age he had seen.
"Himari."
'Pretty....' he thought.
---
And so began the strange bond between the failed son of a Senju… and a girl with ghost-pale eyes who could see what he could not.