Ken hadn’t pnned to escate.

  But escation had a way of finding him.

  The first noble’s death had cracked the political mask of the Wind Daimyō.

  The second?

  It shattered it.

  It started with whispers through the lower courts—nobles avoiding the capital, guard forces doubled, back channels to Sunagakure flooding with accusations. All while the Daimyō screamed behind pace walls.

  Ken watched it unfold from his new identity—a traveling scribe named Riku, now stationed in a poorer quarter of Shiromura. A pce where eyes were cheaper and secrets easier to buy.

  He hadn’t wanted to strike again. Hiruzen’s orders were clear: destabilize, not decapitate.

  But when the second noble, Lord Itsuro, publicly called for a militia purge of all ninja operations in Wind Country—including ties to Sunagakure—Ken made a decision.

  “One more cut,” he told himself.“Then I vanish.”

  But fate had other ideas.

  The second kill was messier.

  Lord Itsuro lived inside the main barracks district, heavily protected by private militia loyal directly to the Daimyō’s bloodline. Ken snuck in beneath a cargo caravan disguised as a water seller.

  This time, there was no whispered threat.

  No emblem left behind.

  Just a fsh of chakra.

  A silenced genjutsu wrapped around the entire building.

  And when the barrier lifted—

  Itsuro’s throat was carved open on his bedroom floor, and all three guards were dead.

  But one thing went wrong:

  Ken was seen.

  A merchant girl, working te.

  Eyes barely catching the flutter of his cloak vanishing over the roof.

  She didn’t get his name. Didn’t see his face.

  But she saw the red-bck kunai pouch—a design specific to ninja-issue gear from the Fire Country.

  That was enough.

  Ken knew he had less than an hour.

  By dawn, the Wind Daimyō had issued a total lockdown.

  Shiromura was sealed. Border checkpoints activated. All local nobility and merchant guilds were brought into controlled security.

  And most importantly—

  Sunagakure was bmed.

  Furious denials came from the Kazekage’s side, of course.

  But words didn’t mean much when two nobles had died with chakra burns around the corpses and ninja bde wounds in their bodies.

  The Wind Daimyō didn’t want proof.

  He wanted revenge.

  So, Sunagakure responded.

  They deployed their elite: several jonin, specialized trackers, and most notably—

  Gaara.

  Jinchūriki of the One-Tailed Shukaku.

  Ken heard the name whispered in fear by traveling merchants. Saw the frightened looks on the faces of militia officers when they received their orders.

  “If they’re sending the Jinchūriki,” Ken thought,“they aren’t just angry.”

  They’re afraid.

  Ken watched the search unfold from a bluff overlooking the western cliffs, where sandstone dunes stretched for miles beyond Shiromura. Hidden beneath yered cloth and heat-diffusing chakra threads, he was practically invisible to normal eyes.

  But Gaara’s chakra?

  It pulsed through the air like a living storm.

  Ken had never felt a presence like that—chaotic, restless, as if the very sand whispered death at his command.

  And yet—

  Ken was amused.

  Not scared.

  Not threatened.

  Intrigued.

  He whispered to himself, “So this is what a living weapon looks like.”

  Then, slowly, he stood.

  His mission was compromised.

  There would be no more assassinations. No more subtle strikes.

  But there was one thing left to test.

  Ken waited until nightfall.

  He tracked Gaara’s search party as it moved through the outskirts of Shiromura. They weren’t subtle. The jonin swept the rooftops, their formation tight, Gaara at the center like a crimson moon orbiting death.

  Ken moved fast.

  He dropped two low-level scouts silently, stealing a cloak.

  Then, just beyond a colpsed aqueduct, he stepped into view.

  Gaara’s head turned immediately.

  His eyes locked on Ken—calcuting, cold, inhuman.

  The jonin with him shouted, “It’s him!”

  Ken raised one hand calmly, chakra threads swirling faintly between his fingers.

  “No more hiding,” he said. “Let’s talk.”

  But Gaara didn’t talk.

  He attacked.

  The sand struck like a whip from the ground—fast, sentient, reacting not just to Ken’s position but his intention.

  Ken flickered left, twisted through a seal, and fred wind chakra into a compressed burst—splitting the sand like a pressure wave.

  But Gaara’s sand reformed instantly.

  From above, a palm of sand dropped like a meteor.

  Ken moved.

  Barely.

  The impact cratered the earth, throwing dirt and chakra in all directions.

  Ken nded in a slide, skidding across stone, then leapt forward—directly at Gaara.

  The jonin tried to intercept.

  Ken moved through them like wind through paper.

  No kill shots. Just crippling blows—chakra pressure to the ribs, dislocating joints, dropping two in six seconds.

  Only Gaara remained.

  The jinchūriki raised his hand.

  A wall of sand erupted between them.

  Ken didn’t hesitate. He unched a chakra-infused kunai, detonating it midair with a wind release spark that tore a hole through the wall.

  He dove through.

  And smiled.

  He wanted to see the source of this power up close.

  Gaara snarled. For a brief moment, the sand around him shimmered like a second skin, reacting not to threats—but to fear.

  Not his.

  The Shukaku’s.

  Ken nded three meters away, Sharingan bzing.

  “Tell me, Gaara,” he said quietly, “does it speak to you?”

  Gaara didn’t answer.

  Instead, he screamed—and the desert moved.

  Ken barely avoided the crushing grasp of a sand serpent, unching himself upward with wind propellers beneath his feet.

  This was no longer a fight.

  It was a test of truths.

  Ken saw it now.

  Gaara was like him.

  Broken. Reforged. Untrusted by his vilge. Feared for a weapon sealed inside him.

  Ken wondered, mid-air, if this boy had ever smiled.

  Then the next attack came—a dome of sand, rushing inward.

  Ken charged forward.

  The csh was brief.

  Explosive.

  Ken used every trick—seal tags, flicker movement, chakra suppression.

  He never tried to kill Gaara.

  Only push him.

  Push the monster within.

  And see what looked back.

  In the final exchange, Ken unched a wind bde, sharp enough to slice stone, straight for Gaara’s shield.

  It didn’t penetrate.

  But it cracked the edge.

  Enough to make Gaara stumble.

  And Ken?

  He vanished into the dunes.

  Gaara stood alone, breath ragged, the sand around him shaking.

  For the first time in years…

  He’d been matched.

  Not by a monster.

  But by a man.

  And that frightened him more.