Chapter 54: Desire Lines

Reading the report his spies brought him, Hiruzen was of a split mind. On one hand, he was elated to see his three-front war reduced back to two, as Rasa offered a hasty armistice after their embarrassment. On the other hand, he was worried to hear such a powerful and vicious missing-nin was out there, wandering in and out of the nations.

Sighing, he authorized the rerouting of the Suna Division to the other fronts. He decided that a general shift in mid-level command would be best. Minato needed to refresh his mind, and all these months fighting Kumo seemed to had dulled him. He ordered Team 4 to the Kumo front and Minato and Kirai's Team 30 to the Iwa front--plus, reuniting Minato and Jiraiya would likely increase both of their fighting proficiency--or lower it, now that he thought about it.

-

When Kannin heard the news, he was irritated. He hoped that he would be given a small respite from the war after the Suna incursion, but it seems their relatively short skirmish convinced the Hokage otherwise. He would be rerouted to Kumo, and Minato to Iwa. He hoped his speed would be good enough to keep up with A, and his strength with B. But only time would tell.

Kannin was again rerouted through Konoha itself, where he only got a day to rest before moving back out, so he spent most of his time at home. He also got another cloak, since his old one kept getting tattered and torn by kunai and the dozens of jutsus he fought against. He also made sure to get some food for Kiyo, since military rations weren't her favorite. He ended up deciding to get sandwiches again, though not from Kushina this time, since he didn't want to bother her while she's worrying about Minato.

The morning after he arrived back in Konoha, he was called to organize his little brigade for moving out. Counting his hatchlings, Kannin realized that he hadn't lost more than 20 soldiers fighting Suna. He had known their victory was quick and rather one-sided, at least that's how it looked on paper. The reports didn't exactly do what happened in the Land of Rivers justice.

While the general outline was correct, he accidentally sprung a trap Suna meant for a larger force, and drew them back to Konoha's forces, making Rasa engage his troops early, it wasn't like there weren't any casualties.

Rasa was leading half of Suna forces, while Chiyo led the other half, and thankfully, Kannin fought Rasa, whose gold sand wasn't very effective outside of the desert, so he was left with his less potent jutsus. Maneshi's brigade took the brunt of Chiyo's assault, which was brutal beyond measure. Her mastery of puppets was something to behold--dozens of wooden shinobi were dancing across the battlefield, lopping off limbs and spraying blood across the grass. Even without outright killing Konoha-nin with her puppets, her poisons were also terrifying; anyone who all but touched her puppets was at best paralyzed and at worst, well you can guess what the worst looked like.

The carnage on the right didn't stop until both Tetsu and Hotoke's brigades were committed to the fight there, at which point Rasa ordered a retreat, as his losses were too great to bear by then. Kannin lost 17 good shinobi in that battle, and those losses were weighing on him in a way he hadn't ever experienced before. Before, he would only lose his comrades, brothers and sisters-in-arms, but now he was above them, in a sense. Before he lost friends, now he lost something more than that--something like losing children, if he knew what having kids was like. Their deaths carved marks on his soul he bet he wouldn't lose until a long time ahead.

-

While on the path to the Kumo front, Kannin noticed a distinct change in scenery. He was used to the dense forests of the Land of Fire, and to a lesser extent the flowing marshes of the Land of Rivers, but the Kumo front was different.

Kannin could tell that it used to be a forest, at least at one point, but he saw the trees slowly losing their leaves as he went. First the leaves began to fade away, then the tips of the trees themselves, then the branches, then the bark, and, eventually, as he got to the front itself, the trees were little more than worn down stumps.

Smoke was rising from a number of points beyond his view, and everything that wasn't destroyed tended to be covered in scorch marks. From what he could tell, this place used to be quite serene: hazy blue skies, tall green pine trees, the occasional babbling brook, and verdant brush and hedges crawling across the forest floor.

'What the hell has Orochimaru been doing?' Kannin asked himself, when he heard from a distance a number of loud booms, one after another, 4 in a row, before ceasing, letting their echoes dissipate over the land. 'It seems one or both sides is trying to level the playing field, literally.'

When Kannin did eventually get to the Konoha HQ, he finally got to see the damage. He peered into one of the medical tents, and saw hundreds of Konoha-nin lying on the beds, many with bandaged or amputated limbs. Sullen faces looked through the tent flaps back at him, faces deep with pain and numbness, faces who had gotten more than they bargained for. It was when Kannin noticed 5 more medical tents, each like the first, that he realized that he was in hell--at least for the time being.

He took a moment to organize his men, and told them to make camp and await for further orders. After that, Shin and Kirai gathered their teams, and brought them to Orochimaru's war room, where Kannin saw the Sannin himself, and another familiar face.