Knitting Fate (Canon Patchworking with Uchiha Ren Part II)

Forty-Fifth Thread

This chapter has been beta'd for you by hestia8693, who, just like me, is currently braving university exams, therefore if there are still mistakes present - blame the education.

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I'd say sorry for the delay, but frankly, I'm so spent after chasing index signs, ironing out the kinks and waiting for 4h in line to take 10min oral exam. University is not fun. Who would've thought?

There's more blood and graphic descriptions of violence and gore than usual. You should probably get used to that, Ren is a quite gory person.

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"Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough."
― Og Mandino

0

Fighting an ice user in the middle of a winter wasteland, Ren realizes, is not such a great idea after all – formal shinobi training or not. The woman might not be particularly well-trained in other shinobi fields, especially mental fortitude, but she has great reflexes – as evidenced by her avoiding the projectiles from before – and damn good control of her bloodline limit. Frankly, it doesn't surprise Ren – whether she needs it or not, she still fiddles with her Sharingan nearly constantly, and while the things she does with it are mostly inconsequential – like remembering recipes or walking around in the wee hours of the morning without having to turn on the lights – it still makes her grip on the bloodline limit better, more secure, and lessens its strain.

Ren curses and blocks a spear of ice with Ryuuzakura's bloodstained blade, nearly staggering when she shifts most of her body weight onto her wounded leg. She can feel the rapidly cooling blood still oozing from the wound, half-cauterized by the raw fire chakra thrumming underneath her skin, and the bite of cold seeping into her flesh. It impairs her movements greatly, as she can't lean on that leg too much, and definitely cannot support herself on it. It hurts, and since the kunai tore some muscle, it doesn't even work properly, no matter how much Ren clenches her teeth and wills it to.

A few small explosions shake the air around Ren and her opponent, and she can hear more cackling above the sound of the explosions. Well, at least Deidara is having fun.

Ren jumps over the icicle charging at her and shatters the next with the blunt of her blade. Wrapping explosive tags around a few kunai, she sends them with a zap of chakra after the Yuki woman, who shields herself from the explosion and sends more ice spikes after Ren. She moves to evade and-

She's too slow. A minute ago she definitely wasn't, what-

Ren gasps in pain when the ice slams into her side, though thankfully the armor-mesh shirt she wears underneath kept it from piercing skin, and falls to the ground, only able to propel herself up and away from the ground at the very last moment. Adrenaline is pulsing through her veins like crazy, but she somehow feels weaker now than she felt a minute ago. In fact, she can feel herself rapidly weakening. This- this isn't good.

"Fuck," she says, stealing a glance at her leg, only one answer floating in her head – the kunai she had gotten stabbed with must've been dipped in a slow-acting poison. And it was acting now.

The Yuki woman, apparently sensing her growing weakness, sends a barrage of ice spears her way, much more numerous than any before. There's no way for Ren to evade them all, so she clenches her teeth and wills herself to move, past the cold and the poison, bending her fingers together as fast as she could go and sending a massive fireball with a rush of chakra straight at the missiles. They all evaporate under the heat, and the Yuki woman manages to shield herself with a wall of ice. It half-evaporates from the onslaught of flames, but Ren pays it no mind, moving forward through the unpleasantly hot steam and right into the cold air behind it, slashing at the woman with Ryuuzakura. It's clumsy, Ren knows, and her opponent is able to evade as Ren forces herself to move past the kaleidoscope of specks dancing before her eyes. She spins and swings again and again, not nearly on par with what she is normally capable of but still somehow enough to keep the Yuki woman busy enough-