Chapter 124 - Arc 8 - Forest of Quest: Crying Out In Pain With No One To Hear It

Didn't realize it was Friday. My meds have reached a stable point where it's obvious I'm still depressed. The bad times - currently in a bit of a fugue - are clearly so much better than even my best times off the meds though so like, whatever. I can't expect drugs to fix me, I need to do that. I'm just happy to have the help.
Chapter's fun, please enjoy.

-----------------------------------------------------

[Meditation ++
You may now enter a meditative state at will as long as you are not in active conflict.

Meditation greatly increases the strength of your senses, your ability to differentiate individual stimuli, and the range of your senses. You may mix spiritual and physical energies while in a meditative state to generate mana at a much faster rate than previous versions, though the ratio of spent energies to mana generated remains the same..

You no longer have a slowed reaction time upon exiting a trance, though being forced out of one can cause severe mental backlash.]

She spent the entire night training Meditation and she must say she’s pretty pleased with the results. She doesn’t get to sit down and grind something without any sort of break very often, so she can’t help but feel a little nostalgic. Memories of hundreds of hours grinding drops and skill levels in MMOs flood to her, as they have most of the night. Chunin Mental means she gains ten times the experience for any skill below Chunin, and at least in its current state, she’d say her meditation is probably nowhere near a B rank Jutsu. It was nice watching the exp percentage go up for hours on end while sitting here in a fugue state. There’s not a lot else she can do with her time, she can’t train anything that expends chakra or mana lest they get attacked and she finds herself dry, and she can only sleep five hours of the night. She converted a little bit of Chakra to mana to touch up the dog - the forest is no reason to go neglecting her pet - but mostly she just took in the world around her and tasted the air.

Sit here, grind, wait, and watch is really all she can. Sure she got to do like two weeks of grinding a skill in a few hours, but that’s really just a cool cherry on top to an otherwise boring night. Due to the wording of Chunin Mental, one would think ten times exp values would increase its grinding rate by a factor of ten, but the reality is that at different points in knowing something, it becomes easier to learn.

Learning how to fall into deeper meditative states without having to break is actually incredibly effective and cuts out a lot of the in-between moments of grinding that she would need without a single massive session. Now if only she had gotten meditation while in classes, she’d be a master by now, or at least whining about how slowly it goes up after it hits the Chunin skill level.

She’d like it if the backlash hadn’t gotten worse as the skill leveled up, but everything else is great, and the increase to her senses is no joke. She can feel worms digging around under the dirt - like normal worms, not sand worms, she’d be excited about that - and she even catches the exact moment Sasuke wakes up.

He lays there silently and deathly still for several minutes. His breaths are a little quicker, but they fade to his normal quickly. She’s never noticed that before. Does he do that every day? If so, why? She needs to learn more about her teammate soon.

Meanwhile, Naruto is up for his morning shouting jacks almost instantly after his eyes open. He scares away some of the local wildlife, but that’s fine, they should be scared. She has to get about forty summons today if she wants to be ready for Ino’s thing, and she definitely wants to be ready, so the wildlife should be absolutely terrified of the massacre she is about to inflict upon it. She hopes the ecosystem can handle this, she’s going to feel really bad if it turns out she’s drastically impacted the state of life here. Even massive monsters are still animals, she has no desire to cause any extinctions or ruin the balance of life.

She’s taken great care to be equal opportunity in what they hunt to avoid overgrinding any populations beyond what they should be able to handle, but when she’s likely not the only person butchering them, she has to hope elimination isn’t a serious risk. “Are you almost ready?” She asks Sasuke before he’s even up, and sees the slightest nod from him at an incredibly slow rate.

At Meditation+ she became able to fall into the state while her eyes are open, and now it seems like she can talk and move while in it too. Everything is slowed down, louder, brighter, she can feel a little dirt on her hands and the air entering her lungs has a taste to it she hadn’t noticed before. She can smell the forest, life intermingling in every direction and questioning why they’re here.

She can’t think of a lot of reasons why she wouldn’t want to be in this state during every moment of downtime, except for one simple problem; this is incredibly boring. Slowed time, enhanced senses, potent observation skills and an accelerated mental awareness mean that every second is a lot slower than it should be.

She’s pretty sure meditation is supposed to be a way to pass time, so she has no idea why it has this side effect, but it sucks. A little slowed time isn’t going to stop her from grinding it, watching the exp bar go up makes the slow night so much easier to get through that she doesn’t care that the night is almost twice as long, and being able to generate mana changes everything. The wording implies she can eventually get a better ratio of chakra to mana, which she’s super excited about. But uh… she’s deactivating it for conversations and travel, screw that.

“Before you run off to anger every animal rights group to ever exist, can we approach Karin yet?” Naruto asks at her side, “she’s moved past panicking at every little thing and at this point she’s just sitting in a cave and crying.”

“Why is she crying? She has to get someone’s been taking care of her by now, I’ve had the summons bring her food.” Sakura wonders aloud.

---------------------------------------------------

The night before

The cave’s darkness has become familiar to Karin, it’s like a second home. Being trapped in a dark cave while monsters make scary noises outside shouldn’t feel like home at all, but it does. It puts into perspective just how much she hates her life.

It’s only been a little over a day but it’s felt like an eternity for her. She grasps she’s alone in here, and she even grasps that the monsters outside have no interest in coming in, which means the fear has rapidly drained away and become replaced by a feeling of prolonged helplessness and isolation.

The human brain doesn’t handle helplessness or isolation very well. Some civilians can be permanently traumatized by ten seconds of a horrific event, and while ninja are more resistant to trauma, Karin’s not really a ninja. To be stuck in this cave with monsters right outside for over a day, and feel good about it for some reason? She can’t help it, she cries. She cries a lot.

Her body doesn’t listen to her when she tells it to shut up, even when she reinforces her demand with the understanding that they might come to shut her up with force if she annoys them. Her body ignores her when she tries to block her eyes with her dirty hands to stop the flow.

It’s during one of her attempts to stop herself from pouring her dwindling water supply directly onto the stone ground, that she hears something skittering across the rocks in front of her. Her fingers form a hand seal to summon light, but she hesitates. It might not notice her, and she has very little chakra remaining at the moment. Instead, she quietly jumps up in the darkness and readies herself against the rock wall. For the first time in well over twenty four hours, she’s too scared to be sad, and she finds she prefers the fear. She’s going to die here, but at least she’ll die in control of herself.

The sounds get closer, large groupings of limbs pushing against the stones and creating a scraping noise that echoes around and quickly overwhelms her senses. Eight eyes glow like fire in the darkness, getting closer with every breath she takes. They flood the cave with an ethereal light that draws her attention. It’s the only thing she can see in the entire cave, and there is no looking away. For the first time since sunset she can see something, but that something is the hairy exterior of a colossal spider that’s crawling right towards her with intent. So much for it maybe not seeing her.

“Stay back!” She shouts with a warbly voice. She tries to walk backwards, only to be reminded by the harsh cave wall that she’s already the furthest back she can go. It looks directly at her as it glides across the ground, her stomach flops, she fights down the urge to vomit and waste what little resources she has inside her. The glow seemingly gets brighter as it moves in, its glare intensifying in tandem with her heart beat. She can’t hear anything anymore, the pounding inside her chest blocks out her senses.

It comes to a stop right in front of her, and begins to stand up on four legs as if trying to intimidate her with its massive size. Fear has a limit and if hers could be tracked, it’d quickly find that she can’t get anymore afraid so its attempts wash over her meaninglessly. If it had knives for hands she’d react exactly the same as she currently is, pressed against the wall with tears dripping down her face onto her already extremely drenched clothes. This is fitting because it’s a giant spider, it actually does have knives for hands and she can’t help but stare at them.

It has something in its mandibles, but she doesn’t give it any mind. Instead of caring about that, she kicks out at its midsection with all she has. She finds her legs hit what feels like a brick wall. She cries out in pain as the shock of kicking an immovable object with everything she has reverberates right back through her, but she finds her announcement to the world is drowned out by the sound of the spider quickly disappearing from her side. One would expect a bunch of thuds or maybe some blades clanging, but the discordant melody that fills the cave is that of stone being shredded and torn apart. It’s indescribably harsh and unlike anything she’s ever heard before. It would easily block out her screams if she deigned to make any.

She falls on her ass, panting harshly. She finds she’s out of breath despite almost no activity. She can’t help but wonder what just happened. Her brain rapidly works overtime trying to figure out why it would leave, and in that process she finds her foot smacks against something that makes a loud scraping noise.

It takes her another minute to calm down enough to focus on it, but she keeps it in her mind’s eye the entire time. When she finally can think for more than three seconds without almost sobbing from terror, she does a few hand signs, and her world ignites into a bright light that forces her to close her eyes. A simple light jutsu is academy level at best, it’s one of the few things she was taught. She was happy to learn it as it was a sign they were respecting her, but she quickly found out it was only taught to her so she could waste her chakra leading them through any dark area on the trek here. Better to use her chakra on something easy instead of forcing someone more valuable to use it.

She wishes it was cheap enough to have on all the time, but it’s not and that’s fine. A minute is all she needs. It takes a few dozen blinks of her eyes to get her gaze into focus, and for her to take in the wooden object at her feet. “Is that a bowl?” She reaches out with trepidation and lifts the half circle up high in her hands. It’s beautifully carved for something so clearly made yesterday, someone’s put a lot of effort into understanding and working with wood even in harrowing conditions like this. It’s smooth, sanded down well, and she’s not sure how these grooves were made but they make it feel like it’d be right at home on a dining room table.

“Are those, rice balls?” Her brow quirks, but her temporarily lit up vision doesn’t lie to her.
There are six well made rice balls in front of her. Well, they were well made, they’re half smashed into the floor but they’re distinctive enough it’s pretty easy to figure out what they’re supposed to be. The seaweed wrapping is carefully done and still holds parts of them together well enough she can pick them up.

There’s also a single fish in the mix, cut up into chunks that litter the now mushy destruction of someone’s careful effort.

“Did a spider seriously just bring me rice balls and fish in a bowl? What the fuck!?” It’s the only conclusion she can make. It had something, and now this is here right in front of her.

---------------------------------------------------

“She should know someone’s caring for her by now, that’s all I’m saying.” Sakura continues, wondering if Karin somehow missed the obvious message being sent. She’s an Uzumaki so it wouldn’t surprise Sakura if she’s missing common sense, assuming Naruto’s own issues are genetic and not just a result of his poor upbringing. He was an orphan until recently, not a soul was there to pressure him into learning basic things except maybe Iruka on a good day.

“I just feel like it would be pretty easy to send in a clone without making her die of fright, and I would like to meet her.” Naruto scratching the back of his head while sheepishly avoiding looking at her is cute, but he has a point and she gives it careful consideration.

“I would still suggest waiting until tomorrow.” Sakura gives him a mild shrug, “she’s still freaking out on the summons. Maybe sneak in while she sleeps and leave her a note, an explanation of some sort will probably calm her down some. Then it’s just waiting for her nerves to catch up with her mind. You should also bring her some water if she’s crying that much, and maybe some salt from my pack, let me get that for you.” She’s already pulling out her supplies as she finishes talking.

“What do you think I should write?” Naruto asks, making his way over to her and plopping down beside her.

“Mnn, keep it simple, something like ‘you’re safe, please stop attacking your protectors.’” She suggests idly. That’s the pepper, she needs the salt. One more try.

“Has she seriously managed to hurt one of your summons?” Sasuke asks with a bit of clear doubt to his tone.

“No, but protecting themselves is instinctive, I’m worried she might attack one while I’m in a fight or something and my control will waver. It doesn’t help that I can’t see what they’re seeing or anything so like, how do I know if it’s another examinee that just kicked one of them in the face, or just Karin? I’m worried my efforts to keep her alive are undermining their power in the forest. I have to repeatedly tell them not to maul any attackers that aren’t a big threat.”

She puts the salt to her side, and takes a bite of some of her prepared supplies. She’s quick to throw Sasuke his portion and gently hand Naruto his while taking great effort to savor the taste. She has another day of good food before they have to start hunting for every meal, she’s not wasting it. “She’s cute though, I’m looking forward to Haku taking care of her like a mother hen.”

The other small issue is that Karin might want to leave the cave if they go talk to her now. She’s rapidly worrying more and more about whatever Ino’s quest was talking about, too many things feel like they’re coming to a head all at once and it’s causing her heart to race a little faster than she’d like. What if Karin gets caught up in that because they were too early? She’ll hold Naruto off until at least that’s dealt with, then they’ll go get the Uzumaki together. “Maybe a little later tomorrow, after the Quest thing.” She decides to actually say what she’s thinking.

“That makes sense, get her after the danger has passed.” Naruto actually agrees with her, much to her relief. That’s one issue dealt with, communication!