Red Riot - Interlude - Violence is my love language

Himeko glared at her lesser cousins. 

They glared back like any true Kaguya clansman should, but they knew better than to get in her way. Instead, they continued about their jobs seeing to the Kaguya compound as was their place. These were the wretches that had been granted mercy during their trial. 

She, unlike them, had proven herself through trial of blood and bone. 

She had the kekkei genkai that only a few of the clan did. 

The ones that didn’t have the kekkei genkai had to make up for it with a ferocity to throw themselves into the fight. 

Himeko liked to think that where they only had the desire to fight she had the ability and the desire. 

Few knew that the Kaguya clan was in truth one of the larger clans within Kirigakure, but this was due to only those that proved themselves able being allowed to attend the Academy. 

The strong lived and the weak died.

It was the way of the world.

Except… Matsu hadn’t agreed. 

He hadn’t fit in with a lot of what the clan taught her. Not from the first day where he’d kicked her in the face. 

She still remembered it vividly. 

She’d entered the room, still sore from her fight to the death with her cousin, and there he’d been, lounging like a shark resting in the shallows. It should have been easy to establish the pecking order for her class. So she moved on to Matsu only to get a textbook kick to the face. 

She spent a lot of time thinking about that kick. 

It had set the tone for a lot of their encounters. 

 It seemed like Matsu always had ways to surprise her, and while not the straightforward lessons that she learned from fighting and losing against her cousins, she found she still enjoyed seeking out and fighting Matsu regularly.

Himeko hadn’t been surprised to learn about the Academy’s graduation requirement when the time had come. It made sense. 

It was how the world worked.

Not to Matsu though.

Matsu saw the writing on the wall before a lot of people and he rejected it. He worked to do that.

That was another thing that Himeko thought about a lot. What did it say that Matsu had to work so hard to reject the way things were? 

He hadn’t blooded himself as was expected of a shinobi but rejected how things were to demand… better? 

Was he wrong to do that? 

At first, Himeko derided his efforts. Matsu could have been stronger if he had just focused on himself instead of stopping to lift up the weaklings.

It was only recently that she started to notice that they weren’t so weak. 

Sharkbait had never tried to actually spar with her during the Academy. 

A lot of things had changed since the academy. 

Matsu had grown stronger at a speed that defied her expectations. He’d previously struggled to fight her, but Himeko seemingly woke up one day and found that he was no longer weaker than her. 

He was so much stronger than her that Himeko struggled to understand it.

He’d beaten her strongest cousin with jutsu she’d never seen him use against her. That had stung; she understood he’d saved that jutsu specifically for that situation, but still. He was supposed to come at her with his best.

Matsu had used that victory to advance his plan in the Academy, though, and it had been an incredible plan.

Beating the Instructors had proven to be a greater challenge than simply facing off against the rejects the Academy had wanted her to cull. 

The clan head, Kimikaku Kaguya, had laughed himself sick when he’d heard how the graduation had gone. She and all the other Kaguya children had been heaped with praise for taking on a harder fight than most at their age. 

Himeko and Kitoma were then brought before him to explain everything they knew about Matsu. Kimikaku listened with a huge grin on his face and sent them off with instructions to keep sparring with the boy. 

When Matsu returned and fought Gantu only to survive, Kimikaku announced that he had his approval to keep fighting with them. He wasn’t to be slain in their training field. 

Matsu didn’t know it, but he’d been stepping on a lot of clansmen’s pride, and they’d been planning to put him in his place. 

Only for him to dodge a kunai he hadn’t even known was coming his way as Kimikaku stepepd in and granted Matsu official Clan Head approval. 

The disgruntled clansmen’s resentment had vanished like mist outside Kiri in the face of that. 

With the Seal officially given, Matsu was to be treated like a fellow Kaguya. 

One of the proper ones that fought, not the shitty clansmen that stayed at home and cleaned, cooked, and made babies. Himeko shuddered, knowing that had almost been her fate. 

If he’s lost that fight against her cousin that day…

Himeko pushed it from her mind and stalked out of the clan compound before making her way to the Civy tower, which the various clan shinobi were calling it these days. She didn’t jump up the side but rather ran up the stairs, enjoying the burn of training her legs. 

When she reached the top, she grinned fiercely and kicked the door off its hinges. 

The door skidded across the training area and came to a stop on the far wall. Himeko gave it small glare. Once, she’d kicked the door so hard it had flown off the hinges and over the rooftop. 

She gave the door a cursory inspection. 

The fuckers had been making it stronger!

“Can you please stop doing that?” sighed the blonde bitch in charge when Matsu wasn’t around from behind her desk. 

“Nah,” Himeko replied without a care.  Her gaze swept around only for the various people ‘training’ to lower their eyes like minnows. 

The only ones worth a damn met her gaze. 

Sharkbait all but vibrated where he was sitting, but Himeko didn’t want to kick his shit in right now.

Shoto wasn’t around, but that wasn’t unusual for him. She had a few bony spikes ready to burst out of her back if she felt anything brush across her skin. That’d teach the fucker for trying to get clever with her.

The girl who ran things when Matsu was out on missions was sitting behind her little desk pretending to be some shitty Daimyo. 

“Is he back yet?” Himeko growled. 

Sayuki grabbed some paperwork and set it off to the side before replying, “By him, I assume you mean Matsu? He isn’t expected back for at least a month or two. Rumour has it that he took a stack of missions for a trip west.”

Himeko grunted and was about to stalk out, not wanting to waste her time today only for Sayuki to stand up. “I’d like a spar with you.”

Himeko half considered beating her down for even suggesting they fight. “Get lost; you’re not worth my time,” snapped Himeko. 

Sayuki’s eye twitched. “Perhaps, but would you consider it if you were against… three shinobi simultaneously?”

That got Himeko to stop and think. That would be a more challenging fight if only for the fact it should take at least twice as long. That was assuming her opponents didn’t trip over themselves. 

Matsu was known to fight multiple members of her clan all the time. Why couldn’t she do the same?

“You’ll have to blunt your bone spikes, though. Without Matsu here, we don’t have anyone who can heal us up if we get skewered or stabbed.”

“Lame,” replied Himeko. 

Other people were always such wimps about their blood staying inside them. Or if their bones poked out of their skin. 

So what? They’d get better. 

Eventually. 

Then again, they were pretty slow at healing up from such things, at least according to Matsu, but he always seemed ready to fight after a few minutes rest, so the others must just have been weak. 

Matsu would make a good Kaguya clansman. Kimikaku always asked her about him when he was back and got this funny look on his face, right up until she described the fights she got into. Then he got this pleased look on his face.

It was good to have the clan head’s attention without it being because you fucked up. It meant less beat downs by older Kaguya clansmen, and more actual training sessions. 

Sharkbait hurried up to join Sayuki, having overheard the conversation only for Sayuki to shake her head. “No Sharkbait, I was thinking of two others joining me actually.”

Himeko frowned. Were any of these punks worth a damn?

“Sanae! Junta! You’re up! Bring your training blades!” Sayuki ordered, only to get two groans from a blocky-looking boy and a brown-haired girl.

Himeko gave both a look up and down. “What’s fatso and bowl cut gonna add?” Both of the kids bristled at her words and Himeko held back a smirk. Good, they’d fight properly now.

Sayuki smiled. “You might be interested to know that these two have been accepted into the intake for the apprentices of the Seven Swordsmen.

That got Himeko’s attention, and she watched as both of them drew large blades that were sadly blunted. 

Laaaaame. 

They took up positions around her and Himeko felt a thrill run down her spine. Huh, that was always a good sign. She threw herself headfirst at Sayuki, knowing that she was the weakest link, only for Sayuki to skate back and slide to the side, flicking kunai as she went before shifting to run through handseals. 

Tch! She’d seen Matsu do that before. Something to do with chakra control over a surface allowing you to move about easier.

Himeko got a chance to fire off a bone bullet at her to disrupt her before she was in turn interrupted by the fat boy swiping at her. 

Himeko’s retaliatory swipe had him backing off, and she committed to a slight spin that saw her disarm the bowl-haired girl. The blade went skittering, and Himeko readjusted, knowing that this ‘Sanae’ was, in fact, the weakest of the lot. 

Once again she couldn’t finish her opponent off, though, as Sayuki returned, advancing with a pair of watery whips lashing at Himeko’s ankle.

Damn, that was annoying!

She continued to fight against the two back and forth until it finally returned to a three-on-one where she had to work even harder. More bones started to be launched out and Himeko began to litter the roof, securing herself small traps that she forced Junta into. He tripped over a bone she’d thrown and when he fell, she chopped at his throat and her arm.

“Dead!” she roared gleefully before swinging around on Sanae and once again disarming her before slashing twin bone blades across. She laid them lightly on the girl’s neck and grinned ferociously.

“Dead!” she growled, barely able to hold back on the urge to sharpen her bones and carry through with the strike. 

Sayuki continued to try to trip her up, but with no one else to save her, Himeko gave chase and quickly had the other girl worn down and cornered. Himeko snapped a kick through her paltry defences and knocked the girl off her feet, where she lay. 

Himeko flicked her wrist, and the watching kids gasped only to relax as the bone embedded next to Sayuki’s head. 

“Dead!” she declared proudly. 

Sayuki lay there, sweat matting her hair and her chest heaving. “G-good fight!”

The other two agreed, and Himeko snorted. “It was alright,” she said, rolling her shoulders and ignoring the ache of muscles and bones that had been battered and bruised from that little scuffle. 

It wasn’t a fight. No true Kaguya would ever call it that. 

A growl caused her to stop and hold a hand to her stomach. Ah, had she forgotten to have breakfast before coming?

Sayuki sat up. “Want to grab something to eat? My treat?” 

Himeko considered the girl for a moment before nodding. The other two joined them as they wandered down to a stall where a jolly man happily served them up some pork buns. 

They had just received their order, and Himeko did not care for the warning that ‘it’s hot’ before chowing down. The burn was good, and the heat in her stomach helped keep away the everpresent chill.

She was just finishing up her second bun, with eyes on her third, along with that of Junta’s second bun off to the side, when a nasally voice spoke up. “Urgh, it figures I’d run into you here.”

She looked up to find that smug asshole that used to be friends with Matsu and the others standing over Sayuki. 

“You still following Matsu along loyally, little dog?” smirked Kito… Or was it Kiza? She’d never really bothered with the asshole. 

He wasn’t that good a fighter, even with his sword that he’d gotten so she hadn’t bothered to really remember his name. He liked to think he was hotshit back then, but he wasn’t anything impressive. She fought stronger in her clan easily. 

She’d beaten him up a ton in the academy but never really bothered outside of it. 

“Fuck off Kizan!” snapped Sayuki. 

Himeko ignored them instead choosing to devour her third bun. Now she just needed to bully Junta off his second. Big lad didn’t need a third bun for himself did he?

Kizan and Sayuki growled at each other and the argument started to get on her nerves after she ran out of food to steal off the others with how distracted they were with the little spat. 

“Oh look you’re also here Himeko. Guess that—” Himeko swung herself up over the table and snapped her foot out, kicking Kizan right in the face and sending him flying. She was done listening to his voice.

He flew back a few metres and landed in a sprawl. “Fugging biddtch!” he howled. Huh, she’d broken his nose with that kick, that was kind of awesome.

Only it wasn’t a nice clean break like what Matsu had, it was instead more lisk she’d squashed it, like it was a bug. 

Matsu’s nose had a good angle to it. She liked the way it angled just enough to show that he wasn’t a useless pretty boy with nice eyes. He got down and dirty when it mattered. 

“You’re annoying, get before I actually bother beating your ass in,” Himeko growled at Kizan. 

Kizan scurried off and Himeko sat back down, a thought occurred to her and she sniffed pointedly. “So are we eating or what?” she demanded. She was still a bit peckish after all.

The trio with her all blinked in surprise at finding their meals missing. 

Sanae shot a look at Himeko’s mouth but Himeko shamelessly jutted her chin in challenge as she slowly wiped off the crumbs as she dared Sanae to challenge her. The girl merely narrowed her eyes. Hmph so there was some fire at least. 

This one might be worth sparing with more, once she’d fixed her shitty haircut.

“Heh, for beating Kizan up I think I can afford another round,” Sayuki said.

Himeko snorted. “Please, I barely touched him.” 

That got a round of laughter from the group and Himeko found herself smirking for some reason. These punks weren’t so bad afterall. 

They still weren’t as good at fighting as Matsu, but for now they’d do.

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A.N. Thanks go to my patreons for your continued support! 

I was not expecting to get this chapter done so quickly but I have to admit that it flowed together quite easily. 

I also wasn’t expecting Himeko Kaguya to be the winner of the poll.