I pressed my back against the cold stone wall outside the Council chambers, my heartbeat a thunderous drum I was certain would give me away. What had begun as a simple scroll delivery to the administrative wing had transformed into something far more dangerous when I'd recognized the chakra signatures gathering behind those heavy oak doors. Now, with my ear practically flush against the wall and a minor sound-enhancing seal hastily drawn on my palm, I was committing an act that could be classified as treason – eavesdropping on Konoha's highest strategic council. But the fragments of conversation filtering through had frozen me in place, each word like a kunai to my gut as I recognized the details of an event I shouldn't possibly know about yet.
"The Northern Pass outpost reports increased activity along the Ridge border," came a voice I recognized as belonging to Councilor Shimura. "We need to send a specialized team to reinforce their defensive capabilities and gather intelligence on potential incursions."
My fingers twitched involuntarily, smudging the listening seal on my palm. Northern Pass. Ridge border. The words echoed in my mind, triggering fragments of memory that couldn't possibly be mine – flashes of blood-soaked earth, bodies scattered across a ravine floor, a massacre that hadn't happened yet.
"I recommend departing three days from now, during the new moon," another voice suggested. "Darkness will provide additional cover for their approach."
Three days. New moon. My breathing quickened, the date matching precisely with the images burned into my consciousness. This wasn't vague déjà vu or analyst's intuition – this was specific, detailed foreknowledge of an event that would claim dozens of lives if it proceeded as planned.
I shifted position, crouching lower to maintain my concealment in the shadows of an ornamental column. My sandals scraped against the floor, and I froze, but the conversation continued uninterrupted. The council members were too absorbed in their planning to notice the subtle sound.
"Who do you recommend for team leader?" This voice belonged to the Third Hokage himself, instantly recognizable even through the stone barrier.
"Kohei Yamamoto," came the immediate response. "His wind-nature chakra is ideal for the terrain, and his team has experience with infiltration scenarios."
My chest tightened painfully. Kohei Yamamoto – the Steel Wind. My mentor, who in my impossible memories died during this very mission, sacrificing himself to save his team from an ambush that should have claimed all their lives. A man currently very much alive, whom I'd seen training younger shinobi just yesterday.
Sweat beaded on my palms, diluting the listening seal and forcing me to reapply chakra to maintain its effectiveness. I pressed my trembling fingers harder against the wall, fighting to control my breathing as I whispered seal formula components under my breath – "Five-point containment, nested diversion array, chakra suppression circuit..." – the technical litany a comforting ritual that helped order my chaotic thoughts.
"We'll need to send at least eight operatives," someone was saying. "Four for perimeter defense, two sensors, Yamamoto, and a medic."
Eight. The exact number from my memories. The exact number of coffins that would return to Konoha if I did nothing. My legs began to shake from maintaining the crouched position, or perhaps from the weight of knowledge bearing down on my shoulders.
A flash of red hair and violet eyes intruded abruptly into my thoughts – Kushina bending over to pick up a dropped kunai during yesterday's training session, her form-fitting shorts stretching tight across her perfect—
I shook my head violently, appalled at my brain's capacity for inappropriate tangents even in moments of crisis. The momentary distraction actually stabilized my breathing somewhat, though the flush of embarrassment added to the heat already burning in my face.
Focus, damn it. Lives are at stake.
"There's a narrow pass five kilometers north of the outpost," continued a tactical specialist whose voice I didn't recognize. "Our team can use it to approach undetected, avoiding the main routes where enemy scouts have been reported."
That narrow pass. In my memory, that exact pass became a killing field. An enemy force with earth-style users would trigger a landslide, blocking retreat while specialized assassination squads descended from hidden positions above. A perfectly executed trap that exploited the very secrecy Konoha's forces thought would protect them.
I felt a warmth in my chest, an uncomfortable heat that I recognized as panic mingled with terrible foreknowledge. My hands had gone clammy, leaving damp prints on the stone wall. The seal formula muttering had accelerated without my conscious intent, becoming a barely audible stream of technical jargon that helped dam the flood of emotion threatening to overwhelm me.
"Differential barrier matrix, calibrated flux inhibitors, temporal anchor points..."
The council was now discussing equipment provisions and contingency protocols. Every detail aligned with my impossible knowledge – knowledge I shouldn't have, couldn't have through any conventional means. The same mission, the same personnel, the same route, all leading to the same bloody outcome I'd seen in visions that felt like memories.
I had perhaps thirty seconds to decide. The meeting was concluding; soon the doors would open, and my presence would be discovered. Two paths stretched before me, each with consequences that rippled through time in ways I couldn't fully calculate.
If I remained silent, history would follow the course I'd glimpsed. Kohei and most of his team would die in that ravine. The survivors would bring vital intelligence about enemy capabilities that would ultimately save hundreds of lives in the coming months by forcing a strategic recalibration of Konoha's border defenses. My timeline would remain intact, predictable.
If I intervened, warned them of the specific trap awaiting their approach... what then? Lives saved immediately, but strategic knowledge lost. Future events deviated from my foreknowledge, rendering my advantage increasingly useless. Unpredictability. Chaos theory in action.
My fingernails dug into my palms as I weighed human lives against temporal stability. Kohei's face flashed in my mind – not the one from my memories, bloodied and still, but the living man who had guided my early training with patience and kindness.
The scraping of chairs announced the meeting's end. Decision time.
I stood, my legs protesting after being cramped for so long. My hand reached into my equipment pouch, fingers closing around a small scroll – standard issue, but enough for what I needed. With quick, practiced movements, I sketched a basic concealment seal and applied it to myself, then pressed my body flat against the wall beside the council chamber doors.
As the heavy oak doors swung open and Konoha's leadership filed out, I made no move to reveal myself. Instead, I watched silently as they dispersed, memorizing faces and calculating the most effective approach for what I now knew I had to do.
Not here. Not now. But soon, and carefully. A precise surgical intervention rather than a blunt warning. My hands finally stopped shaking as clarity of purpose replaced uncertainty.
I slipped away down the corridor, already drafting and discarding plans. Kohei would not die in that ravine. Not this time.
——————————————
I slammed my apartment door so hard the faded protective seals along the frame flared momentarily in protest. Only now, in the safety of my private space, did I allow the full weight of what I'd overheard to crash over me. My legs finally gave out, and I slid down against the door until I hit the floor, head in my hands as the impossible choice before me crystalized into painful clarity. Save Kohei and risk the timeline, or preserve the future I knew and condemn him to death? The walls of my tiny apartment seemed to press inward, the scrolls and seal diagrams that covered nearly every surface a physical manifestation of the knowledge that both burdened and defined me.
"Damn it!" I slammed my fist into the floor, the dull thud barely satisfying the storm of emotions raging inside me. The pain helped focus my thoughts, grounding me in the physical present while my mind spun through possible futures.
I forced myself to stand, taking in my surroundings as if seeing them for the first time. My living space was barely large enough to qualify as an apartment—a single room with essential functions crammed together with ruthless efficiency. A narrow bed pushed against one wall, always perfectly made with military corners. A small kitchenette occupied one corner, the single burner clean but well-used. The bathroom was little more than a closet with a shower nozzle and toilet.
But the workspace dominated everything—a broad desk beneath the room's only window, constructed from three salvaged doors laid across trestles. Its surface disappeared beneath layers of parchment, open scrolls, ink pots of varying sizes, and brushes organized by function rather than appearance. The walls around it bloomed with seal diagrams in various stages of completion, some simple practice exercises, others complex theoretical constructs that would make even jonin specialists scratch their heads in confusion.
I began pacing the narrow path between my desk and bed, five steps one way, turn, five steps back, a physical manifestation of my internal circuits of logic and emotion. My lips moved constantly, whispering calculations and seal formulas.
"If Kohei dies at point A, intelligence reaches Konoha at point B, defensive strategy shifts at point C, saving approximately 327 lives at points D through F..." I rubbed my temples. "If Kohei lives, intel may never arrive, defensive weakness persists, potential casualty increase of 212 to 415 percent across multiple sectors."
The cold arithmetic of human lives made me sick, but I couldn't stop running the numbers. My right fist lashed out, connecting with the wall hard enough to dent the plaster. Pain shot up my arm, but I welcomed it. Physical discomfort was simpler than the moral agony of playing god with the timeline.
Three more circuits of pacing, then I dropped to my knees beside the bed. With practiced movements, I released a complex sequence of seals hidden in the wooden frame, revealing a compartment that would have impressed professional security specialists. From within, I extracted a journal bound in plain black leather, the edges worn from frequent handling.
I sat cross-legged on the floor, the journal heavy in my lap as I leafed through pages of encrypted text. My personal cipher stared back at me—a combination of three ancient languages overlaid with a numerical substitution system that shifted according to the date of entry. Even if discovered, it would remain indecipherable to anyone but me.
My fingers traced entry after entry—predictions of events both minor and significant, each marked with the date of recording and, for those that had already occurred, the date of fulfillment. The pattern was undeniable. Assassination attempts, diplomatic breakdowns, strategic realignments, even weather anomalies that affected military operations—all recorded before they happened, all unfolding exactly as I'd foreseen.
And in the back, the pages I reviewed least often: the Crimson Moon Event. The catastrophe that drove all my preparations, the future apocalypse that kept me working through exhaustion and ethical boundaries.
"The future is not fixed," I muttered, repeating Takumi Sensei's words from yesterday's training session. "Every action creates ripples through the timeline. The greater the deviation, the greater the uncertainty that follows."
His warning had been philosophical, part of a lesson on the responsibility that came with power. He couldn't have known how literally I took those words, how they formed the mathematical framework for my every intervention in the natural flow of events.
I set the journal aside and moved to my desk, pulling blank parchment toward me. With brush in hand, I began drafting a warning message to Kohei, my brush strokes precise despite my inner turmoil.
*Ambush awaits at Northern Pass. Enemy forces with earth-style users will trigger landslide...*
I studied the message, then set it aflame with a minor fire jutsu. The paper curled and blackened, the ashes floating in the beam of late afternoon sunlight that streamed through my window. Too direct. Too unexplainable. A warning that specific would raise questions I couldn't answer.
I drafted another:
*Avoid the narrow pass north of the outpost. Take the eastern route instead...*
This too I burned, watching the flames consume my handwriting. The eastern route had its own dangers—different from what I remembered, but potentially just as lethal. I couldn't shift death from one path to another and call it intervention.
A third attempt:
*Request additional sensor-type backup for your Northern Pass mission...*
The flames consumed this one more slowly, the edges of the parchment curling inward like dying petals. Better, but still problematic. Administrative questions. Budget allocations. Justifications required.
I pushed both hands through my hair in frustration, noticing the ink stains that extended past my wrists and the calluses that had hardened my palms from years of seal work. My fingers were the tools of my art, but also the physical evidence of my obsession—permanently marked by the substances and techniques that had come to define my existence.
Takumi's words echoed again: "The ink becomes part of you."
So too did the knowledge, the burden of foresight. It had seeped into my very being, becoming inseparable from who and what I was. I couldn't shed it any more than I could remove the ink that had penetrated below the surface of my skin.
I returned to my journal, flipping through the pages to find a specific entry from months ago—a minor border skirmish that had unfolded exactly as I'd foreseen. I'd made no intervention then, allowing events to proceed as remembered. The outcome had been three casualties rather than the potential dozens if the engagement had escalated.
But none of those casualties had been people I knew personally. None had been my mentor.
Was that the line, then? Intervene for those connected to me, allow fate to claim strangers? The selfishness of such a standard repulsed me, yet the human heart didn't calculate losses with mathematical precision. Kohei's face returned to my mind—his patient instruction when I'd struggled with basic techniques, his quiet encouragement when others had dismissed me.
"Damn it," I whispered again, but this time without heat. The decision crystallized not with a flash of insight but with the slow inevitability of water finding its path downhill.
I wouldn't try to change the mission parameters. I wouldn't send anonymous warnings or manipulate the council. Those approaches disrupted too many variables, created too many questions.
Instead, I moved to my desk and selected a small, blank scroll from my collection—high-quality paper with chakra-receptive fibers woven into its structure. My hands were steady now as I began crafting a tracking and communication seal of my own design. Not to warn, but to monitor and intervene directly if necessary.
Three hours later, I sat back, examining my work with critical eyes. The seal appeared simple—a standard tracking array any chunin might recognize—but concealed within its basic structure were components that would allow me to project a limited barrier across considerable distance if activated with the correct chakra sequence.
I rolled the scroll carefully and secured it with a band that contained its own subtle seal—one that would alert me to any attempt to open it by someone other than myself.
The sky outside my window had darkened to deep indigo. Tomorrow at dawn, I would need to be in position. Not to prevent the mission, but to ensure its outcome differed from my memories.
I knelt on the floor, assuming the meditation posture Takumi had taught me, and began the breathing exercises that would prepare my body and mind for what was to come.
"I'm sorry," I whispered to the timeline I was about to alter, to the future I could no longer perfectly predict. "But some prices are too high."
——————————————
Dawn painted Konoha's eastern gate in watercolor shades of amber and rose, the massive wooden doors already swinging open to greet the day's first travelers. I crouched in the shadows of a merchant stall not yet opened for business, my body perfectly still save for the slight movement of my lips as they formed silent calculations. The small scroll in my hand—innocuous in appearance but complex in design—pressed against my palm like a burning coal, a physical reminder of my decision to alter fate. Fifty meters ahead, the eight-person team assigned to the Northern Pass mission gathered in a loose circle, checking equipment and exchanging quiet conversation, blissfully unaware that in my memories, only three of them would return alive.
Kohei Yamamoto stood at the center of the group, his worn blue haori fluttering slightly in the morning breeze as he reviewed a map with his second-in-command. Even from this distance, I could see the easy confidence in his posture—not arrogance, but the natural authority of someone who had earned his position through competence rather than politics. His prematurely graying hair was tied back in its usual messy ponytail, catching the early light like strands of silver wire.
"You see that ridge line here?" he was saying, pointing to a section of the map. "We'll approach from the western side to avoid being silhouetted against the skyline."
The western approach. In my memories, that decision had seemed tactically sound until the earth-style users collapsed it, creating a landslide that funneled survivors directly into the waiting ambush. My fingers tightened around the scroll, the paper crinkling slightly under the pressure.
I continued my mental calculations, lips moving in their familiar pattern of seal formulas and probability assessments. "Distance factor of 27.3 kilometers, barrier projection degradation approximately 4.6% per kilometer, effective range for intervention..." The numbers flowed automatically, a comforting litany that helped steady my nerves.
The scroll contained a modified tracking seal of my own design—one face of it standard enough to avoid suspicion, the reverse side containing an intricately compressed barrier projection array. Once attached to Kohei or his equipment, it would allow me to monitor their progress and, if necessary, remotely deploy a protective barrier around him at the critical moment. Not enough to save everyone, not enough to prevent the ambush entirely, but enough, perhaps, to alter the outcome for the one person I couldn't bear to lose.
A sensor-type shinobi in the team suddenly straightened, her head turning slightly in my direction. Too late, I realized I'd allowed my chakra to fluctuate with my emotions, creating a ripple that a trained sensor could detect. I immediately suppressed my signature, but the damage was done.
She leaned toward Kohei, whispering something while gesturing subtly toward my position. Kohei nodded once, then resumed his briefing while casually signaling to someone outside my field of vision.
I sensed the presence behind me a fraction of a second before a hand clamped firmly on my shoulder.
"Interesting place to spend your morning, Akira-kun."
I turned to find Junko-sensei standing there, her expression a careful blend of curiosity and suspicion. Not in uniform, but the kunai holster strapped to her thigh suggested she was on some kind of duty.
"Junko-sensei," I acknowledged, straightening from my crouch but making no attempt to conceal the scroll in my hand. Deception now would only increase suspicion.
"Most young shinobi are either training or sleeping at this hour," she said, her eyes flicking to the scroll and back to my face. "Yet here you are, watching a specialized team prepare for departure. Care to explain?"
My mind raced through possible responses. A direct lie would be easily detected. A partial truth might work, but which part to reveal?
"I know Kohei-sensei," I said, the words carefully measured. "He was my instructor before you."
"That explains the who, not the why or the what." Her gaze dropped to the scroll again. "Especially not the what."
I could feel the weight of her assessment—the jonin who had seen my impossible foresight during our mission to Midnight Pass, who knew I possessed knowledge I shouldn't have. The memory of our conversation after that mission hung between us. *When you're ready to talk about what's really going on, I'll listen.*
Was I ready? Could I trust her with even a fragment of the truth?
Kohei glanced in our direction, his expression shifting to recognition when he saw me. He said something to his team, then began walking toward us.
Decision time. Again.
"It's a tracking seal," I said, holding up the scroll for Junko to see. "Modified with a barrier component."
Her eyebrows rose. "Planning an unauthorized field assistance?"
"No," I lied, then immediately corrected myself. "Yes. Maybe." I took a deep breath. "I have... concerns about their route."
"Based on what intelligence?" The sharpness in her tone made it clear she knew this wasn't standard procedure.
Kohei was halfway to us now, close enough that I could see the curious expression on his face. My former mentor, alive and vital, not yet the bloodied corpse from my memories.
"Based on the same thing you questioned me about after Midnight Pass," I said quietly, meeting Junko's eyes directly. "I can't explain it fully, but I know—I *know*—there's danger waiting for them at the Northern Pass."
Something shifted in her expression—not quite belief, but not dismissal either. Before she could respond, Kohei reached us.
"Akira," he greeted me with genuine warmth, his hand landing on my shoulder with a comfortably solid weight. "Up with the sun to see us off? That's dedication."
Our fingers brushed as I impulsively extended the scroll toward him, and I felt a spark – static from the dry air, but it jolted me nonetheless. Or perhaps it was the weight of what I was about to do.
"A good luck charm, Sensei," I said, the half-truth bitter on my tongue. "A protection seal I've been working on."
Kohei took the scroll with a surprised smile. "You've come a long way from the quiet kid who couldn't form a basic barrier." He examined the visible face of the seal, his expression impressed. "Beautiful brushwork. I'll keep it with me."
"The inner seal activates automatically if... if there's danger," I explained, hyperaware of Junko's intense scrutiny. "It's keyed to respond to sudden chakra spikes or earth-style jutsu in your vicinity."
Kohei's eyes narrowed slightly at the specificity, but his smile remained. "Earth-style, hm? Any particular reason for that focus?"
I met his gaze steadily. "Just a feeling about the terrain you're heading into."
A silent communication passed between Junko and Kohei, the subtle language of experienced jonin assessing a situation. Kohei tucked the scroll carefully into his equipment pouch.
"I appreciate the concern," he said, his tone turning serious. "And the gift." He glanced back at his waiting team. "Any other... feelings... I should know about before we depart?"
The moment stretched between us, fraught with potential consequences. Tell him everything? Tell him nothing? Find some middle ground that might save his life without revealing my impossible knowledge?
"The western approach to the ridge," I said finally, the words coming out in a rush. "There are reports of unusual geological activity in that sector. Perhaps the eastern route would be safer."
"Reports?" Kohei's eyebrow rose. "From whom?"
Junko stepped in smoothly before I could flounder. "I believe he's referring to the seismic assessment I mentioned to you yesterday. Remember? The one suggesting potential instability in the western quadrant."
There had been no such assessment, no such conversation. Junko was providing cover for my inexplicable knowledge, a fact that stunned me into momentary silence.
Kohei considered this, then nodded slowly. "I'll take it under advisement. We have some flexibility in our approach vectors." He squeezed my shoulder once more. "Thanks for the seal, Akira. I'll see you when we return."
*When* we return, not *if*. The confidence of a man who had no conception of his fated death.
He returned to his team, already adjusting the map and giving new instructions. I couldn't hear the details, but the gesture toward the eastern section of their route told me enough. They wouldn't approach from the west. The timeline was already changing.
"You're going to explain this to me when they return," Junko said quietly beside me. Not a question, but a statement of fact. "Whatever this is, whatever you know that you shouldn't—I want the full story."
I nodded, unable to form words past the tightness in my throat as I watched the team finalize their preparations. The tracking seal was in place. The route was altered. I had done what I could without completely exposing my secret.
The team departed minutes later, passing through Konoha's massive gates and vanishing into the forests beyond. I stood watching long after they'd disappeared from view, my analytical mind already calculating new probabilities based on the changes I'd introduced.
New variables. New uncertainties. New potential futures branching from this single point of intervention.
"Be safe," I whispered to the empty road, the weight of my decision settling across my shoulders like a physical burden. "Come back alive, Sensei."
For better or worse, I had changed fate. Now all I could do was wait to see how fate would change in return.
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A/N: I am finalizing my first 75 chapters this week and then plan for 2 chapters daily after we get past the 9-tails attack arc. Please feel free to leave any suggestions or comments below along with your power stones!