Uzushiogakure.
At early dawn, the sun began to peek over the horizon as Uzushio stirred to life. Ninjas flickered from rooftop to rooftop, while down below, shopkeepers swept their storefronts and arranged their wares.
High on the mountain overlooking the village, Medori woke up. She sat on the edge of the bed for a moment, letting the quiet settle, before turning to her son. A soft smile touched her lips at his peaceful expression.
She ran her fingers through his crimson hair, pausing when a slight frown crossed his brow at a few stray strands clinging to his cheek. Medori gently brushed them aside, then leaned down to press a kiss to his forehead.
She stood and did a light stretch, showcasing her toned physique that indicated even if she had retired, she still had not neglected her training. She then headed towards the bathroom to freshen up.
Half an hour later, Medori stepped into the living room.
She was greeted by four girls gathered around the low table.
"What are you all doing together this early?" Medori asked.
"Enjoying Hiyuki's tea," Tenka replied, raising her teacup.
"I can see that. What I mean is, what happened to your usual training routines?"
"Sensei took over the dojo, so we decided to help Tenka and Konan with the morning chores," Hiyuki said with a faint smile, handing a fresh cup to Medori.
Medori accepted it with a nod and settled onto an empty sofa. For a while, the room lapsed into comfortable silence, broken only by the soft clink of porcelain and the quiet sipping of tea.
"Mother," Tenka said suddenly.
Medori raised an eyebrow. 'She isn't even trying to hide it anymore,' she thought, her lips curving wryly. "Hm?"
"I'm sorry," Tenka continued before Medori could speak. "About yesterday morning. I shouldn't have reacted the way I did."
"Fufu... don't worry, I didn't take it to heart. If anything, I should apologize for brushing off your feelings." Medori took a sip, her expression shifting into an amused smirk. "Besides, a little friction is natural between a mother and her daughter-in-law, wouldn't you say?"
A spray of tea, a violent coughing fit, and an immediate plunge in room temperature hit all at once.
Tenka's eyelid twitched as every eye in the room snapped toward her. She shot a venomous glare at Medori—who sat back looking thoroughly entertained—before choosing the only sensible reaction left: she stuck out her tongue, flashed a two-fingered victory sign, and chirped, "Teehee... I remembered something important. Bye Bye."
A shimmering portal tore open directly behind her.
"Oh no, you don't!"
Ribbons of paper chains lashed outward from Konan to bind her, but the portal pulled Tenka backward before they could latch on. The rift snapped shut. Konan bolted instantly, already tracking her across the estate's barrier wards, with Mikasa hot on her heels.
That left only Hiyuki, still seated with her cup raised halfway to her mouth. She couldn't drink even if she wanted to—the tea inside was frozen solid.
"Aren't you going to join the hunt?" Medori asked.
"I don't think that's my place," Hiyuki replied quietly, setting the frosted cup aside to wipe down the stray droplets on the table.
Medori sighed, draining the rest of her chilled tea in one swallow. "Children ought to enjoy being children, not measure what they do or don't have the right to do."
"We aren't normal children, Aunty. We have talents, duties... and responsibilities," Hiyuki murmured, freezing the damp ring on the tabletop with a touch of her finger.
"Whatever duties you carry, Hiyuki, you won't be trapped by them forever. Remember that our doors stay open. You can always come home." Medori collected the empty cups from the table, glancing back over her shoulder with a softer look. "Now come along. Help me start breakfast, will you?"
'Can I really?' she asked herself, uncertain whether she could return once she left.
A small smile broke through Hiyuki's reserve. "Of course."
****
Inside the dojo, Saki was meticulously tracing the seal arrays across the floor. She was repairing the worn-out seals and strengthening the existing ones.
These arrays were the heart of the dojo, made from a combination of different seals all working together to keep the hall in pristine condition.
There were reinforcement seals to strengthen the walls, the floor, and the training dummies, along with storage seals that held various weapons and training equipment. There was even a separate seal array that converted raw chakra into different nature transformations, working with restoration seals to repair any elemental damage caused inside. And if the damage couldn't be repaired, broken targets were replaced with new ones already waiting inside the storage seals.
All in all, this building was a fūinjutsu marvel created by Saki and Medori's combined efforts.
Normally, these seals didn't need constant repairs like what she was doing now; however, the people living inside this household were anything but normal, so once in the month Saki or Medori would repair the damaged seals and restock the storage seals.
But today was different, which was why Saki was not only repairing the seals, but strengthening them as well. Today they would be tested to their absolute limit, especially the suppression and storage seals.
After another half hour of intense concentration, Saki finally stood up and looked at her work.
The whole dojo was covered in black fūinjutsu scripts, with her at the center. Saki activated the seals, and the ink began to shift, rearranging itself across the wood. It finally settled into a spiderweb formation, locking into place with her at its center, surrounded by an outer ring.
She nodded to herself and deactivated the array. The black lines sank beneath the surface, dissolving cleanly into the building's walls, floor, and ceiling.
Turning on her heel, she walked out of the dojo.
The first thing that greeted her sight made her blink.
Out in the garden, Konan and Mikasa were stringing Tenka upside down from a tree. Wrapped head-to-toe in paper like a mummy, Tenka dangled from a branch, squirming uselessly.
Saki sighed and decided to ignore the spectacle for the sake of her own sanity.
She headed into the main house and found Medori and Hiyuki talking in the kitchen. Medori caught sight of her from the corner of her eye.
"Oh! Saki, you finished?" Medori asked.
"Hm. I repaired the damaged seals," Saki replied, pausing in the doorway. "Where is Haru?"
"Still sleeping."
"Hm... I should wake him, or he'll fall behind on his morning routine," Saki said, turning back down the hallway toward the bedrooms.
"Okay, you do that. I'll finish up breakfast in the meantime."
A few moments after Saki left, Medori glanced toward the window with a mischievous smile. "I wonder how Tenka is holding up out there?"
Hiyuki looked at that devious expression and simply shook her head.
*****
Out in the garden, Konan looked up at the dangling bundle.
"Are you done?" Konan asked Tenka, who had finally stopped thrashing. "Now, answer our questions."
"Mmph! Mmmph!" Tenka squirmed again, letting out muffled protests through the paper sealed over her lips.
"Oops," Konan said with zero remorse, peeling the strip back from Tenka's mouth.
"Phew! Geez, you two! You could have just asked like normal people!" Tenka gasped, swaying slightly from the branch.
"If you hadn't run from us, maybe we would have," Konan replied, giving the paper bindings an extra squeeze. "Now, explain what's going on between you and Aunty. You started calling her 'Mother,' which was weird enough, but we let it slide. Now Aunty is calling you 'daughter-in-law.' Care to explain?"
A tense staring contest dragged on for several seconds before Tenka groaned, letting her head hang back in defeat.
"Fine. I'll explain..." Tenka grumbled. "It's exactly what it sounds like. I proposed to Aunty that I marry Haru."
"..."
There were a few seconds of stunned, breathless silence.
Mikasa broke it, her eyes narrowing. "When? When did you propose to him?"
Tenka's cheeks flushed crimson. She averted her eyes, mumbling bashfully into the upside-down air.
"Um... a few weeks after that incident with me."
"Predator."
"Groomer."
The words hit one after the other, delivered with completely flat, judgmental stares.
Each remarks hit their mark as Tenka began to wriggle hard in her binds.
"Oof... guys, I'm serious about him! I love him and want to stay by his side forever. Even if it means being the second one..." She mumbled the last part with a trace of quiet melancholy.
"Wait, wait, wait. What did you just say?" Konan demanded.
"I love him?"
"No, the other part."
"I want to stay with—"
"Ugh! The part about being the second one!" Konan interrupted.
"Right. You wouldn't know," Tenka replied sheepishly. "Apparently Haru was already engaged. So, yeah... I accepted being second."
"What? He's already engaged? To whom?" Mikasa pressed, her tone sharpening.
"To me," came a voice from behind them.
Mikasa and Konan spun around to see Kushina perched casually on one of the thick tree branches overhead, a white cloth blindfold wrapped around her eyes.
"What happened to your eyes?" Mikasa asked, her gaze narrowing as the talk of marriage was instantly shoved aside.
"No need to be worried, Mikasa," Kushina said dismissively. "Just a minor accident. While Dad was unsealing the second layer, I accidentally forced it all the way to the final seal. It caused some slight nerve strain, but it'll heal in a few days as long as I don't stress my eyes."
Kushina vaulted down from the bough, landing lightly in front of them without a wobble.
"As for the blindfold, my eyes are kinda sensitive right now, so I had to cover them. Don't worry, though—I can still 'see.' Just not the way you think."
"Are you using the Mind's Eye of the Kagura?" Konan asked, intrigued.
"Yeah! It's wild—I'm still getting used to it. It feels like there's a complete mental map projected inside my head."
With that settled, Kushina turned her face toward Tenka, who was still dangling upside down like a cocoon from the branch.
"Well, well. Look what we have here," Kushina began, crossing her arms lightly. "So, when were you planning to tell me?"
"It wasn't my place to tell, now was it?" Tenka retorted.
"I suppose you're right," Kushina said lazily. Then her tone flattened, all humor vanishing. "So... you want to marry him, too?"
"Yes. I do," Tenka answered, her voice dead serious.
"And what if I disagree?"
"Then you and I are going to have a serious problem."
They faced each other in silence—one suspended upside down, the other staring through a white blindfold. Despite the ridiculous setup, the tension between them was anything but a joke.
After a long, unyielding stare-down, Kushina spoke again, her tone unchanged.
"If you love him that much, why agree to share? Why not demand to be his only wife? Or is this whole thing just to spite me?"
"Spite you? Girl, I'm not petty enough to stake my life on a stunt just to annoy you!" Tenka snarled, speaking through gritted teeth. "As for why I'm not demanding to be the only one? Kushina, do you really think I don't want that? I do, dammit. I want to be his only one just as much as you do. But that's life, isn't it? You can't have everything."
Tenka's glare softened, her voice dropping into quiet, earnest conviction.
"Besides, I refuse to make him choose between any of us. I love him and this family of ours. We bicker, we tease, and we beat each other half to death, but I know when push comes to shove, you'll all stand by me. I won't bring bitterness under this roof. As much as I love Haru, it would hurt far worse to watch our home crack down the middle."
The garden fell completely still.
For several long seconds, the only sound was the faint rustle of morning leaves overhead.
Kushina stood motionless. The blindfold concealed her eyes, making her expression impossible to read, but the corner of her mouth had tightened into a flat, rigid line.
Konan and Mikasa exchanged a brief glance, tensing slightly to intervene.
Instead, Kushina let out a long, dragging exhale that fluttered the stray bangs over her forehead.
"You really are a hopeless idiot, you know that?" Kushina said, lifting a hand to scratch the back of her neck.
The sharp defensiveness in the red-haired girl's posture faded, replaced by something far more grounded.
"Look... if you had come at me trying to push me aside or steal him away, I would have beaten you until you couldn't hold chopsticks for a month," Kushina said, her voice dropping into quiet sincerity. "Haru isn't someone I'm just going to hand over. But..."
She crossed her arms over her chest, her shoulders relaxing.
"I know who you are, Tenka. I know you'd throw yourself in front of a blade for him—and for the rest of us under this roof. If your reason was selfish, I'd never forgive you. But knowing you'd swallow your pride and settle for second place just to protect this home from splitting apart..."
Kushina reached out and sharply poked Tenka right between the eyes with two fingers.
"Ow! What was that for?!"
"That's interest on proposing behind my back," Kushina huffed, though the bite was gone from her voice. She turned toward Konan without looking back. "Put her down, Konan. Before what little brain she has left cooks from the blood rush."
Konan didn't move immediately, her amber eyes flicking between the two of them. "So you're actually accepting this?"
"I'm accepting that she's stuck with us," Kushina corrected, and suppressed the burning feeling in her chest and gave a familiar, competitive grin breaking across her face. "Besides, she said it herself—she's second. That means seniority applies."
"Aren't you all forgetting something—or someone—very important?" Mikasa said in a levelled tone.
Everyone turned to look at her in confusion. Mikasa folded her arms and pressed on.
"I don't mean to burst your bubble, but aren't you forgetting Haru's opinion? Whether he'd even agree to any of this in the first place?"
And just like that, another heavy silence stretched over the garden.
Even Kushina's smug grin froze. Because regardless of clans or arrangements, the entire agreement was only valid if Haruto also agreed to it.
"Fuck."
Those were the only words left in Kushina's mouth.
******