Her Mask (Shikamaru x Oc)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The wind blew through her hair as she stood on the tallest branch of the tallest tree in her radius.

The sun illuminated her bone-white mask as she looked for any inconsistencies in the area around her.

Kakashi’s information had been rather helpful. But she only had a month before the final part of the chunin exams.

And somehow, it went by too fast. The final exam was today, she could prove that Orochimaru was, in fact, in the village. But no matter how much digging she did she just couldn’t find where he was hiding out.

He or one of his lackeys had murdered Hayate, Shingami believed that Hayate had seen Orochimaru or someone conspiring with him and they killed him because he was a witness of some sort.

Hayate was a good friend of Genma’s and it made Shingami sad to see her partner in crime so upset over his death.

Genma had volunteered to take over as the proctor, as a way to honor his friend and so Shingami could find the bastards that killed him and make them suffer, all without needing to worry about the exams at the same time.

She jumped branch to branch, she needed to find something. All her investigating had led her to this area, she had to find something or else the trail would go cold and she’d likely never find the slippery bastard in time.

Her eyes scanned the area once more before running to the right, the first thing she noticed was the blood-splattered against the trees, then the smell hit her like a ton of bricks.

The horrid smell of rotting decomposing flesh left out in the scorching sun.

This wasn’t the first time she’d smelt such a putrid scent, and it wasn’t likely to be the last.

She got closer to see what or who was causing the stench. A meter in front of her were three corpses.

“Shit.”

The second she laid eyes on the one in the middle she turned heel and sprinted as fast as she could in the direction of the village.

She knew whose corpse that was.

The blood-red hair had given it away.

It was Rasa’s body.

It was the goddamn Kazekage who had already arrived in the village earlier this morning.

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Genma proceeded to watch Shikamaru fall as Naruto pushed him over the railing into the arena where he would be fighting the Kazekage’s oldest, his daughter Temari. She was a very straightforward person and didn’t really seem to care about anything in particular except for winning.

Genma was also on edge, Shingami hadn’t really been coming back to the village this whole month. He doubted that she was sleeping at night, but if anyone could find the snake sannin it was her.

He never doubted her abilities or her judgment. But she didn’t know when to stop. The wounds added up and sometimes they wouldn’t heal until she went to sleep at night. 

But it was like the girl never slept at times. She could lay still for hours not moving but her eyes would still be open with a million thoughts going through her head. And yet she never wanted to talk about it.

Genma allowed the pair to begin their fight then backed up to watch them. He frowned when he remembered how excited Shingami was about being able to see her team during the exams, but nothing ever went the way it should’ve. 

While the girl didn’t show it, she was probably disappointed that she couldn’t watch the fights.

The man exhaled through his noses and smirked as he watched Shikamaru put his hands up forfeiting the match.