Beauty is the Beast (Kakashi Love Story)

Chapter 31

The newly made silver cuff glimmered in the sunlight as Akio inspected it with a hard look of concentration before a satisfactory smile appeared.

“You’ve done a very wonderful job on it Yosuke. Well done.”

Yosuke gave a smile as well and chuckled in embarrassment. “Aw, it isn’t anything really worth praising about. It was an easy job really.”

“Give yourself more credit, Yosuke. Believe me, the work you have put into this is beyond most. I really appreciate it.” Akio was quick to assure the hardworking man of his endeavor.

“So,” Yosuke’s voice turned serious as he began in a low voice to keep unwanted ears from eavesdropping, “I don’t have many orders that come in for an item that has a seal worked in with it, much less a seal like this one. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a seal like that one before.” Yosuke said as his eyes trailed the seal on the underside of the cuff. The kanji characters for the seal had been ‘restrain’ and ‘blood’. 

Several detailed curves surrounded the kanji, framing it beautifully. Tick marks that were vertical to the kanji, lined all around the rest of the cuff before stopping just on the opposite side of the kanji. Where the tick marks ended, several small squiggling lines swirled around each other, stopping at just a few centimeters away from the cuff’s edge.

To those that didn‘t know—and Yosuke was one of them—it seemed as if the seal had been written on the wrong side of the cuff. Seals were usually and most always placed on the outside of an object so that it showed; not on the underside away from view.

Akio simply gave a small smile as he put the object away and turned to leave. “Trust me Yosuke,” he spoke over his shoulder, “it’s better you don’t know.

Yosuke scratched the back of his head with an understanding smile. “Right.”

Now that Akio had the cuff, it was time for him to go find Hisayo. She was more than likely with her Genin at this time of day, and decided that the training grounds were probably best to start at.

Now that they had been in Konoha for a good time, her scent was all over the place, making it difficult to pin point her by smell, so he was reduced to finding her the old fashioned way. He didn’t make it very far out of the market when a familiar face flashed passed his vision, locking eyes with his before making their way away from the crowds.

It all happened so fast, that he wasn’t sure of who he had seen, but it was enough to unnerve him. He tried smelling the air for a familiar scent in order to confirm, but the wind wasn’t in his favor—he was upwind of the person.

He gave a heavy sigh and swallow, before following in the direction of who he thought he had seen. He weaved quickly, yet calmly through the crowds of people, in an attempt not to lose the person. Turning the corner of the street, he stopped, finding the person of interest standing in the middle of the street, waiting for him. His brows rose and his eyes widened slightly in surprise as they locked with another set of eyes, equal in emerald color.

“It…it’s you.” He said in near disbelief

A smile upturned on the person’s face, “Hello, Akio.”

******

“Hey, Hisayo-sensei,” Akira spoke as he looked around the packed streets of Konoha’s market place; Suzume and Ken walked on either of his sides as they followed Hisayo, “it’s not that I’m not happy you decided we should have a day to relax, but why now? Shouldn’t we be getting ready for our exams?”

“Akira.” Suzume gave a small thrust of her elbow to Akira’s side.

She personally didn’t have a problem with the outing, and didn’t want Akira spoiling it for her. In fact, she was hoping that maybe Hisayo would want to take them to the hot springs to relax. They were heading in that direction, so she was crossing her fingers…well, her sore fingers. Hisayo had wanted her to get used to wielding the whip with both hands as a way to strengthen her less dominant hand. So now, the long training sessions with her whip were really starting to take its toll on them—her wrists as well.