Chapter 32 – Upheaval

As the atmosphere in the room was turning sweet, Sango and Kurenai were immersed in the moment. Nothing seemed to be able of disrupting them, until the sound of fast footsteps and shouts reached them, indicating something was clearly wrong outside.

*thud* The door to their room was abruptly opened as two Anbu entered while surveyed the room and their gazes focused on them, seeing Sango and Kurenai safe they relaxed and one of the Anbu left while the other one approached them.

“Something happened, please stay here for a bit longer.” Seeing the questioning gaze of Kurenai, the Anbu spoke.

“What happened?” Sango asked.

To Sango’s question, the Anbu didn’t reply immediately but pondered for a few seconds, “I can’t tell you at this time.” It seems whatever happened was pretty bad if they refused to say anything, Sango thought.

*pat* Sango felt a warm hand atop his head, turning his head he faced Kurenai whom was the owner of said hand. “Don’t worry, I’m sure it isn’t anything to worry about.” She said calmly.

Being treated as a child wasn’t something Sango liked, but he couldn’t do anything about it, not that the feeling of her hand displeased him.

“Haha, just a short time ago I was comforting you and now the tables have turned.” Sango laughed at the situation they were in.

Remembering how Sango kept her in a tight embrace, Kurenai’s face reddened and the hand atop his head tightened inciting a painful yelp from Sango.

“Ohoo? Are you teasing me?” She had a smile that didn’t reach her eyes, it would have been more believable if her ears weren’t still red.

The Anbu watching this scene had sweating cold at the scene, outside everyone was in turmoil but the duo in front of him were behaving as if they were on a date.

Yes, Sango was having fun together with Kurenai, but at the same time he was receiving information from many clones, a normal person wouldn’t have been able to resist the amount of information received as easily as Sango who wasn’t showing any change in expression. Most of the information was useless but it was still sent to him, unable to be filtered, he knew something had to be done about that for the sake of time, but he wasn’t so capable as of filtering memories yet, maybe in the future.

Despite sowing a smile to Kurenai, Sango’s mind was working faster than ever, trying to understand why something like that happened, there was no reason for that he could think of.

Asuma died, to be more precise, he was killed, his head separated from his body and missing. Such an event wasn’t a contingency he prepared for, not that it would bring him trouble in the immediate future, but it was still an event he didn’t expect.

Once in the past, something he didn’t expect happened, that time it was Orochimaru whom managed to take Sango by surprise.

Sango didn’t think Orochimaru would have any reason to kill Asuma, his aims were bigger than that, but that man wasn’t one to go along with someone else’s expectations.

Sango was forced to face the fact that he wasn’t as infallible as he thought, more than enough proof was the fact that someone else was also progressing with their own agenda from the shadows right under Sango’s nose, without him noticing it.

Feeling sorry about his mistakes wasn’t something Sango liked to do, after lowering his overconfidence to just confidence, Sango decided to take things more seriously. He understood that he shouldn’t underestimate the people of his new world anymore.

Still, Sango had to smile, Asuma was dead, and it wasn’t even Sango who did it. That was a good outcome, now he didn’t have to take care of Asuma himself and many troubles were avoided.

With this, everything changed, with Asuma’s death the butterfly effect would be like a tornado. Sango had already given up on guiding the world along with original path, so he didn’t care, but this was rather sudden nonetheless.

“Is something the matter?” Kurenai, who saw Sango becoming quiet and pensive, asked worriedly.

“It’s nothing, don’t worry.” He replied to her worried question, it wasn’t time to lose sight of his surroundings, so he decided to focus on the present.

“How much longer do we have to stay here?” Turning towards the Anbu, he asked.

The Anbu had no answer to that question, with everything that happened everyone was on edge. The duo in front of him were obviously not at fault since they were in that room the entire time and the guard outside did not see or hear anything strange. That said, it wasn’t his call to make that decision.

“Haa, at least leave us alone.” With a sigh, Sango told the Anbu.

The Anbu remembered that he was busy, so he was more than happy to comply, without a word he left the room and closed the door.

“I guess we have to wait.” Said Sango shrugging.

[Hokage’s POV]

In his long years of life, there weren’t many times he felt so much anger towards someone. The last time was when Orochimaru left the village. Now, his anger was all directed towards his stupid son. After he read the Anbu’s report he wanted to charge where Asuma was and beat his senses back into him.

He wasn’t stupid, the Hokage was aware of Asuma’s growing obsession with ‘something’ that allegedly ruined his relationship with Kurenai. Such claims were of course baseless, Asuma was the reason of his own failed relationship as the Hokage’s reports clearly stated. The Hokage may have used his authority to verify Asuma’s claims, as much as it embarrassed him to admit that. The reports he received from the investigating Anbu were without doubt accurate and they found Asuma at fault for ruining his own relationship, not anyone else.

This time although… Asuma assaulted two people with the intention to kill, the Anbu that investigated the scene confirmed that the traces on the site indicated Asuma didn’t hold back. Not to forget that the ones he attacked were shinobi who had contributed a lot to the village.

Even if he was his son, something like this couldn’t be shrugged off, he had a duty towards the whole village, favouritism, even towards his own son, wasn’t an option, not when it didn’t benefit the people.

“I wonder when…” The Hokage murmured, he wondered when Asuma strayed from the right path, and he wondered where he made a mistake with his upbringing.

Remembering that it wasn’t time for such thoughts, the Hokage became aware that he had to decide on a punishment for Asuma.

As he pondered such, a rapid and loud knocking came from the door to his office indicating the urgency of the matter that person was bringing him.

“Enter.” Resigning himself to more bad news, the Hokage invited the person in.

One of the high ranking Anbu entered the room.