Chapter 27

Kenshin and Ichiro instantly jumped up to Keiji, and fell to their knees in front of his body. Kenshin immediately checked his son's pulse, but felt nothing. Tears rolled into the grieving eyes of Kenshin and Ichiro, who could not realize that Keiji was dead.

After a few minutes of inconsolable grief, Kenshin's eyes were clouded with anger, and he resolutely stood up, then went to the defeated Genin. Unbuttoning his green vest, and ripping open his shirt, Kenshin grabbed kunai, and began to make deep incisions on his chest.

At the moment, Kenshin was furious, and decided to use one of the most terrifying formations – the "soul cell" formation.

The soul cell formation was one of the most evil and "forbidden" formations. Those who used it on defeated enemies were considered vile scoundrels, and all because this formation caused damage not to the body, but to the soul.

After the runes were applied to the victim's ribs, the soul that did not have time to leave its body was locked in a "cage", and was forced to languish in a rotting and decomposing body until the last bone decayed and turned into dust.

Souls locked in a cage were usually considered destroyed. For several years locked up in his decomposed body, the soul was saturated with a huge amount of evil energy, and even after entering the cycle of reincarnation, nothing good happened to such a soul in the future. At best, after rebirth, a person will be born mentally retarded, and misfortunes will haunt him all his life.

After finishing putting runes on genin's ribs, Kenshin checked his pockets and found 4000 re in them. After taking them, he turned around and went to the body of his deceased son, and resolutely pulled the kunai out of his heart.

"No, Father! What are you doing?! You can't pull the kunai out of the wound!"

Exclaimed Ichiro.

"Calm down! Keiji is no more. We need to get out of here as soon as possible before anyone notices us."

Kenshin said in a serious tone.

"N-but... Keiji..."

Ichiro muttered, and received a slap from his father.

"Come to your senses! Quickly pack our things and let's go."

Kenshin growled at him.

Ichiro reluctantly obeyed, and grabbed three shoulder bags, then approached his father.

"Help me put him on my back

," Kenshin said calmly.

Ichiro was taken aback, and muttered,

"W-what?"

"Help me pick him up."

he repeated.

"We need to bring him home.

Ichiro helped to put Keiji's body on his father's back, and said, "Father, maybe I should carry him? I'm stronger...

"No! I took him out of the house, I have to bring him back."

Kenshin replied decisively, and slowly walked forward, carrying the lifeless body of his second son on his back.

Kenshin and Ichiro walked in silence all the way. An hour later, Kenshin felt incredibly tired, his hands were stiff, unable to hold his heavy body, and his legs refused to walk, but Kenshin clenched his teeth and continued to walk. There was still an hour to go home, but Kenshin forced his wobbly legs to take another step.

The last few kilometers were especially difficult for him. The pace slowed down to a shallow shuffle, and what should have been an hour of travel stretched for two hours.

As soon as they reached the foot of their native mountain, Kenshin found the last of his strength and moved up. He seemed to be punishing himself for his carelessness, and for not saving his own son from death. His entire body was covered in blood pouring from the pierced heart, and even Kenshin's knee joints were covered with a thick crust of blood, refusing to bend and unbend.

By the time Kenshin and Ichiro got home, the sun had almost set, and Keiji's lifeless body began to be shackled by rigor mortis.

Kenshin took his son's body to one of the neighboring caves and laid it on the ground. He knelt down in front of him, and for several minutes silently looked at his peaceful face. Outwardly, it seemed that Keiji was just sleeping, but a huge blood stain on his entire chest spoiled the whole picture.

A few minutes later, Kenshin got to his feet and walked home.

As soon as the front door opened, an agitated Aya appeared on the threshold right there, and exclaimed:

"Thank God! I've already started to re.."

She interrupted her speech when she saw Kenshin completely covered in blood.

"Oh my God! Kenshin, what's wrong with you? Are you hurt?!"

She exclaimed, and immediately rushed to her husband.

Kenshin couldn't look her in the eye, and muttered,

"Follow me. You need to say goodbye to him."

And then turned around and moved to the exit.

Aya, taken aback, instantly felt fear, and jumped out after Kenshin.

Following Kenshin, Aya asked "what happened" several times, but he remained silent and continued to walk forward. A minute later they reached the right cave, and Aya, first seeing Ichiro, asked: - Ichiro, honey, what happened?

Ichiro looked away, and two trails of tears gushed out of his eyes. The next second, Aya saw a body lying on the side, and it was as if she was struck by lightning. My legs gave way, and a scream mixed with a howl escaped from my mouth:

"No... no... no!

she sobbed, and rushed to the body lying on the ground.

"Keiji, my God, Keiji! Wake up! Kenshin, tell me you were just kidding me! Tell me!"

she shouted, and tears poured out of her eyes, flowing down her cheeks, chin, and falling on the lifeless body.

She sobbed for several minutes, begged Keiji to wake up, but his eyes never opened.

"Why… Why?! You promised that our children would become great Shinobi!"

shouted Aya, and stared into Kenshin's eyes. He barely found the strength to meet her gaze, but did not answer.

Aya turned away, and again began to sob over the body of her deceased son, sobbing non-stop, and begging him to "wake up." A few minutes later, Kenshin came up to his wife and whispered, "That's enough. Come home.

Aya did not react in any way, and continued to sob, bending over Keiji's body.

"Aya, come back to the house!"

He shouted at her in a commanding tone, and she struggled to her feet and shuffled towards the house, not ceasing to sob, leaving behind a small scattering of tears.

All this time, Ichiro's eyes were streaming with tears. He couldn't believe his brother was dead. Just a few hours ago, they were happily wandering around the city, and now his younger brother was lying like a cold corpse in the corner of the cave.

"Go say goodbye to your brother."

Kenshin's voice suddenly rang out, knocking Ichiro out of painful thoughts.

Ichiro, wiping his tears with the back of his hand, silently approached his brother and knelt down. He looked at his brother's face for a few minutes, whispered words he knew only, and then got up and silently left the cave.

Kenshin took a deep breath and walked over to Keiji's body. Sitting down next to him, he began to draw a formation. After a few minutes, he got to his feet, carefully dragged Keiji's body inside the formation, and sat down next to him.

He looked at his son's peaceful face for a long time, then taking a deep breath, whispered:

"Goodbye, son..."

Kenshin activated the formation, and Keiji's body was enveloped in a burning flame in an instant. A few minutes later, Kenshin collected the dust hanging in the air in a bag, and without turning around, he moved home.

Approaching the front door, Kenshin took off all his clothes and put them on the cold floor of the cave, not wanting to bring her into the house. As soon as he stepped on the threshold of the house, he heard Aya's sobs coming from the bedroom. His heart twitched painfully again, but he found the strength to ignore his crying wife and moved to the bathroom.

The next ten minutes were harder for Kenshin than the entire previous hour. It was the first time he was alone with his thoughts, and they gnawed at him from the inside. He didn't know how he would be able to look into Aya's eyes now, or what would happen to their family in general.

After drying himself, he put on a bathrobe, and left the bathroom, heading for the bedroom. As soon as he opened the door, he immediately saw Aya lying on the bed. She was sobbing and crying bitterly, buried in the pillow. Noticing Kenshin, she was silent for a second, and looked in his direction, and then began to cry even harder.

Kenshin went to the bed and sat on its edge, stroking Aya on the back, but she instantly bucked and pulled away. Kenshin climbed onto the bed and lay down next to her, and the girl made an attempt to get out of bed and leave, but was grabbed by Kenshin's strong hands.

"Let go!"

she shouted, but he pulled her to him and wrapped her in a tight embrace.

Once in Kenshin's arms, Aya buried her face in his chest and cried harder than ever. Kenshin didn't say anything, but only stroked her head and kissed the top of her head.

After a few minutes, Aya stopped crying, and looking up, asked:

"How did this happen?"

Kenshin began to tell her in detail everything that had happened, and when he mentioned Genin from Konoha, Aya shouted out in anger: - Konoha Shinobi? But why would he attack you?

"Apparently he found out that we have a large sum of money with us,"

Kenshin replied with a sigh.

He continued his story, and when he reached the moment of Keiji's death, Aya could not restrain herself, and began to sob again.

Kenshin kissed her on the top of her head, and stroked her back again, soothing her crying wife.

After a minute, she finally calmed down a little, and asked,

"What happened next? How did you escape?"

Kenshin told her the last part, about the awakening of Ichiro's sharingan, and his crushing victory.

"What? Sharingan?!"

Aya exclaimed in shock.

"But... but...

"It turns out your great-grandfather was telling the truth...

Sighed Kenshin.

Under other circumstances, Aya and Kenshin would have been jumping to the ceiling with joy for a long time, but now, they only casually discussed Ichiro's sharingan, and continued to lie in each other's arms.

A few hours later, Aya finally fell asleep, and even in her sleep she involuntarily sobbed and moaned, but calmed down when Kenshin pressed her to him and stroked her head.

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