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The Blessed Realm	By : susanna Category: Naruto > Yaoi - Male/Male > Naruto/Sasuke Views: 1746 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: Disclaimer: Naruto, his friends and the world he lives in don't belong to me but to Masashi Kishimoto. I write this story only for my pleasure and I don't make any money with it.

Chapter List
- 22
- 23
- 24
A/N:
My friend and beta eowyn
unquendor noticed that the previous chapter was not complete, so I
corrected it two days ago. It meant of course that I pushed my story
back to the top of the list of recently updated stories, without
adding a new chapter. I have a bit of a bad conscience because of it,
but I did not want to leave the chapter as it was.

For
those who have not read the complete chapter: The correct version
ends with Sasuke and Suigetsu going home.

It
won't happen again.

Kinai26:
Many thanks again for your review! Yes, the story is gaining some
speed now.

Chapter
Twenty: In Denial

Sasuke
was away for just one evening, and his Katana on Naruto's wardrobe
and his backpack next to Naruto's bed, containing the photo of his
family, bore proof that he would return soon, and still Naruto missed
him and was short of panicking. Not seeing him in a quiet corner of
the restaurant, scanning the newspapers for articles on Konoha, nor
helping Naruto, as he had done the day before – coming to think
of it, it had been fun to watch him use his Sharingan for learning
how to wash glasses most efficiently, and then use his high speed
jutsu for actually doing it. It had never occured to Naruto to use
his ninja skills for such a mundane purpose. It had also been fun to
see him answer to the regulars' attempts at making conversation with
him, and being all embarrassed about it.

He
missed him, even though they had not talked much during the evenings,
as Naruto had to concentrate on his work – but even focussing
on his work had been easier when he had just to turn his head to see
that Sasuke still was with him, instead of worrying all the time
whether Sasuke would return.

It
was a weekday, with few guests, and the patron's daughter told him to
leave early, as she could see that it was not his best day, and so it
happened that Naruto returned to his apartment before Sasuke and
Suigetsu arrived. He found Karin lying on his bed, reading the Gutsy
Ninja. She must have noticed that he was a bit displeased with
her taking the bed, as she apologized immediately: “It's only a
few more pages.”

“Take
your time”, he answered, taking the chair instead of the bed.
He watched her reading the last pages.

“How
did you like it?” He asked her as soon as she had put down the
book.

“It's
quite okay”, she answered. “I mean, one does notice that
it's his first book. He is still a bit clumsy with mixing the
different plotlines, and there are several problems in his buildup of
suspense. Also it is clear that he still lacks some routine with the
pacing: With his later books he knew exactly when to increase the
speed and when to give his readers a break from the action and let
them enjoy a love scene.”

“The
love scenes are boring”, Naruto interrupted her. “I
always skipped them, unless I had to proofread the manuscript.”

“You
proofread them? But you must have been only a child then.”

“Thirteen
or fourteen.”

“But
how could you judge them, without any experience of your own?”

“I
was able to find the typos. And I could judge them: I found them
boring. I still find them boring. Twenty pages just for the wedding
night.”

Karin's
eyes turned to the ceiling and she assumed a dreamy expression. “I
know, it was in Icha-Icha Violence. It's one of his best. But
you need some experience to enjoy it; if you are still a virgin you
simply cannot imagine what he is describing.”

Naruto
was annoyed, being treated as a little boy by Karin, who was probably
only one or two years his senior. It irked him that she was correct:
He still was a virgin, and also he did not care much about sex: Since
his return to Konoha, there had always been more important matters on
his mind, and if there had been some time to relax, he had mostly
spent it thinking about Sasuke and how he might retrieve him. And
since he had arrived in Music Town, where sex was considered a
subject that might be discussed in public (if not performed in
public) he tried to avoid the thought of it altogether. It hurt too
much to remember that he was alone.

“Do
you have any experience?” he asked Karin.

“Certainly”,
she answered. “We were often bored at Orochimaru's place, and
then we had sex.”

“Just
as a passtime? Not with your boyfriend?”

“Certainly
not! Who would I have chosen as a boyfriend? The available men were
all subordinates or prisoners of Orochimaru, all ugly and disfigured
and shabby, and also, they were my rivals in rising in Orochimaru's
favor and making some career instead of ending up as his next test
subjects. How could I have loved any of them? They would have
betrayed me without a second thought if the choice had been between
them or me becoming Orochimaru's next guinea pig.” She paused
for some seconds, then she continued: “Well, I would have
betrayed them if I had been in the same situation. I did not love
them. We just had sex with each other, as a passtime. It was fun all
the same. - Don't look at me as if you were shocked. For Jiraiya, sex
was a passtime too, wasn't it?”

Naruto
silently admitted that this was true.

“What
about Sasuke? Did he participate in your passtime too?”

“Not
that I know of. He was part of Orochimaru's entourage, and I only saw
him when they came to visit the base I was in charge of. You'll have
to ask him yourself.”

Naruto
thought that he'd rather not do this.

“But
I don't think he has”, Karin continued, her eyes again getting
that dreamy expression. “He was different. He was pure. He was
Orochimaru's future vessel, and nobody dared to touch him, not even
Orochimaru himself, but when the time had come that Orochimaru would
seize his body, Sasuke would not acquiesce to it but strike against
him and defeat him, and then set us all free.”

Naruto
was bewildered by Karin's sudden display of admiration for Sasuke
that did not go together with her usual behaviour towards him. “I
would not have thought that you looked up to him like this”, he
said.

“Why?”
Karin asked back.

“You
don't seem to get along very well.”

“Oh,
that's only how it appears on the surface. He likes snapping at me
and being rude, but that's just because he doesn't want to admit that
he likes me.”

Well,
this did fit Naruto's image of Sasuke: Not being friendly to anyone,
not showing that he'd care for someone. But the way Karin had
pronounced the word “like” made him uncomfortable.

“He
won't even admit it to himself, just because I am ugly”, Karin
continued, taking off her glasses. She looked prettier without
glasses, and more seductive, but wizened with his experiences of
buying glasses for Sasuke, Naruto knew that this was mainly an effect
of her choice of glasses and of how she changed expression as soon as
she took them off. “He's beautiful, and so he doesn't want to
associate himself with a woman who's ugly. Only deep down in his
heart he knows that I'm only ugly on the surface, not inside, and
that he likes me all the same. But now I am going to be beautiful
again.”

Without
any warning she took off her jacket and her boots. Luckily she wore a
shirt under her jacket – Naruto had always assumed that she
didn't. Actually she looked more decent with just a shirt and her hot
pants, not much different from what any young girl in the town might
wear on a sunny day, while with boots and jacket she looked like a
prostitute drawing attention to her pants and to the patches of naked
skin above and below them. (He had not been aware of this fact until
now.)

But
he understood also why she took care to hide her arms and legs: They
were covered with weird round scars. There were also other, worse
wounds on her thighs, but these looked as if they were making
progress, at least those that were no longer bandaged. Those were
wounds from a fight as every shinobi might receive them occasionally,
and they would heal off with time. But the scars would remain, and
they were disgusting.

“Now
you're shocked”; she said as if in triumph. “That's my
gift, and my curse. People heal when they bite me, even if they are
almost dying. I transfer my chakra to them, and the chakra closes
their wounds. I did it twice for Sasuke, once before we left
Orochimaru, and once afterwards.”

Naruto
wondered where he had bitten her: There were also scars above the
neckline of her shirt.

“Now
he must love me”, she continued, “because I saved his
life. He just doesn't want to admit it, because it hurts his pride to
admit that anyone saved his life.”

Somehow,
her words made sense to Naruto. He too had hated Sasuke until he had
saved his life in their fight against Haku, sacrificing himself for
Naruto, and then Naruto had difficulties admitting that he had
changed his mind about his teammate. Still Karin had to be wrong.
Teammates saved each others' lives all the time, without necessarily
falling in love. Sasuke did not have to be in love with Karin.

“I
think you are deceiving yourself”, he said. “He's in love
with a girl back at home, in Konoha.”

Karin
paled and got serious. “A girl in Konoha?”

“Our
third teammate. She's desperately waiting for him to return. And I
will see that he returns to her. I promised, and I will keep my
promise.”

“You
think he's in love with her?”

“He
must be.” Naruto tried to think of any instance when Sakura had
saved Sasuke's life. “She has always cared for him when he was
wounded, and visited him in the hospital.”

“But
I care too”, Karin said, and then desperately: “Is she
pretty?”

“The
prettiest girl in Konoha, just as he is the most handsome guy. They
are bound to come together.”

He
fell silent, sad as he knew that this left him out of the picture.
But since he had promised to Sakura that he would bring back Sasuke,
he had dreamt of them coming together. The two people he loved best
being happy with each other.

He
had not noticed that Sasuke had entered, who had returned from his
visit to that musical event: Suigetsu was still downstairs, storing
away his musical equipment. Sasuke (who had heard Naruto's words
about him and Sakura and found them rather irritating) stared at
Karin, who was sitting almost naked on Naruto's bed.

“What
are you doing?” he asked her. “You're not trying to
seduce Naruto, are you?”

“No,
she's not”, Naruto came to her rescue, wondering whether Sasuke
might not indeed be interested in her if the idea was so annoying to
him. “She just wanted to show me her scars.”

“Ugly,
aren't they? That's what Orochimaru did to her. He offered her
training as a med nin, but in reality he just wanted her in order to
use her as a chakra reservoir to make his test subjects last longer,
abusing both the test subjects and her, and ruining her along with
his guinea pigs, only more slowly.”

Naruto
wondered about Sasuke's own attitude towards Karin.

“She
thinks they are keeping you from admitting that you're in love with
her, because they are ugly. I told her that it's got nothing to do
with these scars, as you are in love with Sakura and will return to
her to marry her. You are in love with Sakura, aren't you?”
Suddenly Naruto grew anxious. “You've always liked her, haven't
you, you just couldn't stand by your love because of your stupid
revenge. You will fall in love with her again when you see how pretty
she has become, and how much she cares for you.”

Sasuke
gasped. Naruto's words were absurd, weren't they, and hearing that
Naruto wanted him to come together with Sakura felt like a bucket of
ice water on his skin.

“I
am certainly not returning to Konoha to fall in love with Sakura”,
he said.

He'd
return to Konoha to burn it down with his Amaterasu, including Sakura
and including Naruto. He had not indulged in this fantasy for several
days now, he had rather dreamt of Naruto becoming Hokage after he
himself had died completing his revenge. Now however he imagined
Sakura burn with the black flames of Amaterasu, and then crumbling to
ashes, and then Naruto – no, definitely not Naruto. He'd once
tried to kill him, he wouldn't do it again. He would die and Naruto
would live and become Hokage and marry Sakura. He shook off the
fantasy.

“You'll
change your mind”, Naruto said. “Just see how much she
has cared for you and longed for you to return, just as much as I
have.”

Sasuke
felt a bit softer when he heard these last words.

“I
doubt it”, he said, leaving it to Naruto to figure out the
meaning of his words. “What about your burns?” he asked
Karin. “I see that they're getting better.”

She
had just begun to put on her boots.

“Is
this not an opportunity to change the bandages?”

“I
have already changed them this morning.”

“Then
it's time to change them again, isn't it?”

“If
you will leave me alone then. I don't want you to see them. They're
ugly.”

It
was getting ridiculous. For so long he had refrained from asking her
to letting him have a look at her legs in order not to awaken her any
hope that he might fall in love with her, a hope that he would
inevitably have to disappoint, and now she did not want him to look.

“I
need to know how you're doing. I am still responsible for this team.”

Without
him being aware of it, his Sharingan had activated because of his
annoyance. He'd place her under a genjutsu, he thought, but luckily
this was not necessary; Karin obeyed, sulkingly, and began to remove
her bandages. He saw that her wounds were healing well, and with his
Sharingan he saw that the chakra flow was still disturbed, forming
puddles and eddies where it shouldn't, but there were no blockades,
and all parts of her body were reached by it. So much for her needing
to find some legendary Blessed Realm: Her wounds would heal by
themselves with time.

Suigetsu
appeared (he had not only stored away his drums but also taken some
time to chat with the patron's daughter and check the notice-board
for more musical events.) Now he looked at Karin's bare legs, showing
much more interest than Sasuke, as Naruto noticed.

“So
finally we are allowed to see them. But you were not very generous to
us; you made us miss them when they were most colourful.”

Karin
began to put on her boots.

“Oh,
don't! You look much better like this!”

Karin
hesitated.

“You
do”, Naruto confirmed him, being rewarded with some angry looks
from Sasuke's side. But she did look better now, he thought, like a
normal young woman.

Juugo's
arrival ended their discussion. He was beaming with the happiness of
this afternoon and evening, spent again with his little friends.

Sasuke
looked at every of his team's members, making clear to them that he
had something to say. In the end, his eyes came to rest on Naruto,
but soon he lowered them: His intention was to invite Naruto to join
his team, but he felt embarrassed about it, and he still needed some
seconds to think about the exact wording of his invitation.

Karin
made use of these seconds to speak up herself: “I have
something to tell too.”

All
eyes turned to her.

“I
have received a job offer. They've asked me to teach medical ninjutsu
at the hospital, both to doctors and patients. They are fascinated by
it.”

“Can
they learn it?” Sasuke asked. “They are civilians, not
ninja, after all.”

“Everybody
can learn it to a certain degree. I'll show them some exercises that
are good for your health in general, and some that are good against
specific illnesses, then I will teach them some easy meditation
techniques, so that the most gifted among them will be able to feel
the energy of body and mind and perhaps even forge some chakra,
without being able to use it. And I have to teach theory. They insist
on it. I mean, who needs theory if they can feel their chakra? But
they have heard all kinds of weird stuff and keep asking me about it,
and I have to think of answers. I guess I'll just make it up.”

It
seemed quite a lot, Sasuke thought. “How long is it going to
last? Did you tell them that it takes years to learn to forge chakra?
Did you remember that we want to leave next week, as soon as I get
these contacts?”

“Yeah,
I remembered. I agreed with the people in the hospital on a seminar
that would last four weeks. It's – they have offered to remove
my bitemarks, and this will take four weeks too until they have
healed off. I won't be ugly any more. I won't any longer carry the
traces of my abuse by Orochimaru.”

Curse
her vanity. Curse his own vanity. If he hadn't insisted on contacts,
they'd already have left and Karin would not have got this job offer.

“You
should keep the marks”, Suigetsu said. “They make you
look interesting. A little extra that distinguishes you from other
girls.”

Still
sitting on Naruto's bed, she threw the pillow at her teammate.

“It's
no problem for me”, Naruto said, catching the pillow before it
hit Suigetsu. “I like having you as my guests.”

“Oh,
don't bother with this. I have been offered an apartment too. With
furniture and everything.”

Sasule
could see the disappointment on Naruto's face. “But the rest of
you will stay, won't you?”

He
looked at Juugo and Suigetsu, but turned his head immediately after
his eyes met Sasuke's.

“We'll
decide this tomorrow”, Sasuke said. “Tell the people at
the hospital that you accept their offer!”
- 22
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The Blessed Realm