1 Painful Lost

A group of people were sitting around a bonfire in a forest. They were dressed in ancient armor with weapons lying around them. Many of them had bandages on their bodies, seeming injured from a previous battle.

In this particular group, one person stood out among all the other people; it was a youth no older than 15 years old, but he seemed to be the center of this entire group. This person had blood red eyes with three tomoe, however, despite how evil and eerie his eyes seemed, he had a gentle smile and demeanor around him.

One person approached the youth, raised his glass and said: "Squad Leader Akimitsu, thank you again for saving our lives." All the other people followed the first person and saluted the youth.

Akimitsu smiled before answering: "As your Squad Leader, it is my duty to save all of my men."

However, one person shook his head: "I have served in four different Squads before this one, and I can say without a doubt that you are a very kind leader.

"That's right," added another person. "As branch members of the Otsutsuki Clan, our destiny is to fight for the clan in different planets and dimensions; essentially, we are nothing but cannon fodder."

The ambiance suddenly became somber and suffocating, followed by an uncomfortable silence.

However, seeing the loss of morale of his soldiers, Akimitsu's mouth turned into an infectious smile as he said: "There is no need to be depressed. Although the rule of the Main Branch is cruel, there is still hope for us. As long as any of us open our Dojutsu Abilities, we can slowly be promoted until we reach the stage of proudly bearing the name 'Otsutsuki'."

All the other soldiers woke up from their depression, and with a newfound vigor, raised their glasses: "To one day bearing the name 'Otsutsuki'," their voice echoed throughout the forest.

Then, everybody went back to eat something in order to preserve their strength for the next battle. Meanwhile, a young man that looked about one or two years younger than Akimitsu approached him.

"Nii-san, how can you always keep the morale of your man so high?"

Akimitsu smiled as he caressed the hair of the last living family he had in this god-forsaken world. "Akio, as long as you treat them with sincerity, they will believe in your words. One day when you have your one squad, you will understand."

Akio looked at his older brother's red eyes with envy, then he said: "Only if I manage to awake a Dojutsu."

"Since I can awaken mine, then you will surely do so as well," replied Akimitsu, then he sighed melancholy. "Hopefully, you will not have to suffer the way I did for your awakening."

Akio looked in confusion at his brother's words, however Akimitsu did not explain. He took out a loaf of bread and a piece of meat and handed it to his little brother. "Eat to conserve your strength; I do not know how long we will have to stay on this planet."

"What about you, nii-san?"

"You should know that my body is much stronger than you, so I do not need as much food for energy."

Akio nodded as he was used to his brother always giving him the best ever since they were young and had lost their parents in some unknown world. However, he still secretly vows to one day protect his big brother at all cost.

After these groups of low level warriors had their meal, they set up tents to rest, while a team of people were chosen to be on guard.

The night appeared to be peaceful, unfortunately it was not. In the middle of the night, Akimitsu suddenly woke up as he felt something was wrong. Without hesitation, he activated his Sharingan to look around.

'We're surrounded? How is it possible for the scouts not to notice anything? Wait, these things do not have chakra,' thought Akimitsu. Then, he roared out loud. "Everybody on alert: The Alloy Race is attacking."

All the soldiers immediately got up and formed a circular formation; all of them were fast and efficient as if they had practiced this method for years. Although the soldiers did not see or sense anything, they did not doubt their Squad Leader's words.

"Damn those Alloy Races. Since they are made of metals, they do not have any life energy or chakra, so it is impossible to see them when they enter invisible mode," said one of the soldiers.

"Squad Leader what do we do?"

Akimitsu had a frown on his face; he appeared as if he was thinking deeply about the next course of action. However, a sudden change occurred in the situation.

Countless chakra threads appeared from the ground and attacked themselves to these Alloy Races, who were essentially sentient metal puppets or automatons. However, these chakra threads did not try to control them, but left a bright blue spot in their foreheads, revealing their whereabouts.

As soon as that spot appeared, one the Alloy Race leader started communicating to the other ones:

"Noticing high intensity chakra attaches to all low level automatons. Starting removal process...Estimated time, 31 minutes, 13 seconds...Taking simultaneous course of action...Eliminate all members of the Parasitic Race known as Otsutsuki."

Then, all the automatons started their attacks.

As for Akimitsu, he had already predicted this outcome, so he said to his men: "The chakra spots will not last long, so destroy as many rob...I mean automatons as possible."

Then, his soldiers followed his order. All of them raised their hands and mobilized their chakra. Following which, all kinds of Five Elements Attack were released: there was Wind Style, Fire Style, Earth Style, etc.

However, none of these soldiers actually used any hand sign. As branch members of the Otsutsuki Clan, all of them are born with a vast amount of chakra and the ability to wield it like it was another part of their bodies.

Unfortunately for these soldiers, without any hand sign, they could only use only one of the Five Elements, while a few talented ones could use two.

With this barrage of attacks, a lot of the automatons were destroyed. Oddly though, none of these automatons used any weapons, but just rushed to get close to their enemies. Unfortunately, despite killing so many of them, the number of automatons was simply too large.

Knowing that the situation was not favorable to his team--especially in terms of consumption of chakra, Akimitsu ordered: "All of you prepared to evacuate, I will stay to hold them back."

Although the soldiers were a little surprised by the sudden order of retreat, they did not question their squad leader, nor were they worried; this was not the first time that the squad leader had bought time for them to escape.

Immediately afterwards, they all looked at how a green aura and massive chaotic chakra enveloped Akimitsu, and they knew that their squad leader had used his secret technique.

Meanwhile, Akio looked at the transformation of his big brother while thinking to himself: 'Nii-san can already open the Third Gate, while I'm still training to open the First One. Maybe it is because he is willing to sacrifice himself for everyone that makes him so special, so strong. No, I need to be just like him.'

So, Akio approached his brother and whispered something to him.

"Absolutely not," replied Akimitsu. "You have to evacuate with all the other people."

"Nii-san, you cannot always protect me. We were both lucky to be sent to the same planet, but what if that changes someday? What can you do then? You have spent so many times in childhood to train me so that I can protect myself."

Akimitsu looked at the firm determination in his brother's eyes, sighed before nodding. "Fine, but stay close to me."

After that, Akio spent a few seconds opening the Gate of Opening while Akimitsu protected him. Knowing that his brother's transformation could not last long, Akimitsu went into action.

He rushed with amazing speed in one direction, then a giant rotating blue ball appeared in his hand.

"Rasengan!" he yelled as he forcefully opened a path in the Alloy Race encirclement. Meanwhile, Akio also followed with a smaller rasengan of his own.

Meanwhile, all the soldiers of the squad took this opportunity to retreat, and Akimitsu and Akio stayed behind. After a few minutes, Akio was forced to close his First Gate. Logically speaking, he should be very weak and feeble now, but his Otsutsuki bloodline gave him a powerful life force beyond any ordinary human beings. So, he was back to normal after only a few minutes of painting.

"Nii-san, since there is nobody around, can I use the hand sign that you taught me?"

"No problem," replied Akimitsu. Then, he also followed as he started using all kinds of different Ninjutsu of different Releases.

Fire Release, Earth Release, Lightning Release.

With these two brothers working together, they easily destroyed this army of the Alloy Race. As such, both of them were excited at the prospect of returning alive after dealing such a massive damage to their enemies.

Unfortunately, fate had different plans for these brothers.

While they were fighting side by side, a weird automatons suddenly levitated from the ground and appeared out of nowhere. Then, its hand turned into a spear and stabbed Akimitsu.

As death approached him, Akimitsu could see the spear slowly traveling towards his heart, but he could not react in time. Knowing that his death was imminent, he hoped that his little brother would survive this encounter and return alive.

Unfortunately for him, to his horror, a strong hand pushed him to the side, and the spear went through Akio instead. Immediately standing up from the ground, Akimitsu watched the bloodied body of his younger brother, then he screamed: "No!"

His eyes suddenly turned into a weird shape, following which a blood red giant appeared around him to incase his body: it was a Susanoo.

With endless grievance and despair, Akimitsu decimated the entire Alloy Race Army, and he spent more than 1 minute smashing the body of the one that killed his brother.

After that, he rushed to his dying brother with a tremendous amount of pain in his eyes. Meanwhile, Akio raised his hand to touch his big brother's face, smiled with a bloodied mouth before muttering: "Nii-san, it's finally my turn to protect you." Then, he closed his eyes.

Meanwhile, Akimitsu looked at his little brother with tears coming out of his eyes.

Suddenly, an expected change took place from Akimitsu; his eyes became cold and indifferent. His previous cheerful and sunshine temperament became completely calm and rational.

He looked at Akio's body with indifference as he muttered: "My plan finally succeeded. With his death, I can finally awaken the Mangekyou Sharingan. It was really hard to hypnotize myself since young to deeply love my brother, and play the role of the ideal big brother. Now, all of my years of planning are worth it."

After that, Akimitsu closed his eyes to feel his newfound power. "It seems that I was right. As an Otsutsuki, even a branch member, my DNA is much more stable than the Uchiha's. Hence, I do not need to worry about losing my sight."

After that, he looked at Akio's body again: "This also means that your value has ended. Well, maybe not totally. As my relative, you are the closest person to me in terms of DNA. Maybe, you might still be useful."

After that, Akimitsu used a bunk of hand sign as he said: "Ice Style: Ice Coffin!" He encased Akio's body in ice, then sealed it in a scroll.