The jungle air had turned still—almost reverent.
Not a single leaf rustled. No branch swayed. The world itself seemed to pause… waiting.
Radahn remained silent, a monolith of gold and steel, watching the two shinobi children as they sat on the grassy patch. The only sounds were their exhausted breaths and the distant chirps of insects returning cautiously to the night.
Then—
Without warning, Radahn moved.
The ground quaked softly as his massive frame bent at the knees. With a grace unnatural for someone of his immense size, he crouched down before them, his brilliant eyes now at their level. The soft clang of his armor echoed slightly in the clearing, metal groaning under his shift.
Rin tensed, unsure.
Kakashi's eye narrowed. His hand hovered near a kunai.
But Radahn only raised his colossal hand, palm out.
From the center of it—a soft, low hum.
A ripple of gold light began to form, delicate and slow, spiralling out like a sun being born. Circles within circles—arcane, divine—etched themselves into the air with a brilliance that defied understanding.
"What is he doing…?" Kakashi muttered under his breath.
Rin's eyes widened. "So pretty…"
The glowing circle grew brighter, burning gently like dawn breaking through midnight. Then—
FWOOOM!
With a resonating pulse, the golden sigils burst open, expanding into a massive ring of radiant energy that enveloped the entire clearing. The trees around them groaned as if touched by something divine. Shadows were driven back. The darkness peeled away.
The ground beneath them turned into soft glowing golden earth, stretching out in a perfect circle—nearly forty meters wide. Grass shimmered like it was kissed by stardust.
And then—like stars rising from the soil—glimmering fireflies began to emerge, weightless and slow, floating into the air in a gentle dance. Each one shimmered with hues of warm white and pale gold, illuminating the clearing with a dreamlike glow.
Rin gasped. Her tired eyes sparkled, reflecting the light.
"It's… beautiful-" she whispered, her voice soft with awe.
Even Kakashi—battle-hardened and ever-wary—couldn't help but feel the weight of something otherworldly.
'What… is this power?'
'This isn't ninjutsu… not chakra… '
He turned his gaze up to Radahn, voice low and cautious.
"What's going on? What are you doing…?"
But Radahn didn't answer.
He remained crouched—still and silent. A sentinel. A god cloaked in steel and stars.
The fireflies continued to rise, circling gently around them like small spirits, casting golden rays over Rin's pale skin and Kakashi's blood-streaked flak jacket.
In that moment, the jungle didn't feel like a battlefield.
It felt like a dream.
Like they had stepped into a place untouched by war.
The golden ring pulsed once more and rose to sky-
Then, as the light fully enveloped them, a sudden shockwave of pure vitality surged through their bodies—sharp, instant, impossible.
Rin gasped.
Kakashi's body jolted as if struck by lightning. His eyes widened—every inch of his being ablaze with a strange warmth. The air around them shimmered as golden motes sank into their skin like sunlight sinking into soil.
The effect was instantaneous.
Wounds—gone.Bruises—erased.Fatigue—obliterated.
Kakashi's slashed and blood-stained body began to mend itself at an unnatural pace. The large gash on his ribs vanished without a trace. Internal bleeding ceased. Muscles that had been pushed past their limit no longer screamed in agony.
Even the scarred tissue crisscrossing his chest and forearms—gifts from countless battles—began to fade, absorbed by the light until not even a shadow of them remained.
And then… his eye.
Obito's Sharingan.
The eye that had always burned with chakra strain, the one he had to keep covered to prevent it from draining him dry—it settled.
For the first time in years, Kakashi felt it.
Balanced. Controlled. His.
He raised a trembling hand to his face, lowering his forehead protector slightly. The Sharingan opened without effort. No burning sensation. No chakra drain. Just… clarity.
"W-what…?!" he muttered, voice shaky.
"What's going on…?"
He stared at his hand, then at Rin.
"My body—it feels… anew. My chakra… it's like… five times what it was before. That's impossible. Even my eye—it feels like a part of me now. I can open and close it at will…"
He clenched his fist experimentally. It was as though his body had been remade—perfected.
"How did he…?"
Beside him, Rin let out a soft sound of relief, almost like a happy sigh. "Ah…!"
Her expression brightened like the very light around them. The bruises on her arms were gone. The fatigue that had dulled her eyes was replaced with a sparkling shine. She looked down at her hands, her fingers moving freely again.
And then she turned to the golden giant beside them, eyes wide and glowing like starlight.
"Thank you, Mister Radahn!" she beamed, joy coating every word.
She jumped slightly to her feet, twirling around in the shimmering field like a child under snowfall. "How did you do that?! That was amazing! Can you teach me that?! Pretty please?"
Kakashi's jaw dropped. His brows twitched.
'Is she serious?!'
He turned his gaze to her in disbelief.
'This… this technique—whatever it is—it's not some C-rank healing jutsu. This is something else entirely. An S-Rank? No… even that feels like an understatement.'
'The potency… the scale… even Lady Tsunade's healing wouldn't compare. It was like… divinity touched us.'
'And now she's asking him to teach her like he's a kindly old sensei handing out scrolls?! Has she lost her mind?!'
He glanced at Radahn.
The golden warrior hadn't said a word—he didn't need to.
Still crouched beside them, his burning eyes watched Rin's joy with quiet serenity. The light around them began to fade slowly, the glowing field dimming until only moonlight remained.
But even with the sun gone, the feeling remained—like a lingering blessing in the air.
Kakashi breathed in slowly, deeply.
'Who… no—what is this man?'
'And this stupid girl is going to get us killed-'
But to Kakashi's surprise he smiled-
Radahn looked at the girl—this small, spirited soul who had clung to hope in the jaws of despair. For the first time since his arrival, his stern visage softened. A gentle smile crept across his chiselled, battle-worn face, a rare expression from the war god.
"I can teach you-" he said.
His voice rumbled like a landslide in the distance—deep, mighty, but kind.
Rin's eyes sparkled. For a heartbeat, she stood in stunned silence, then she gasped and jumped in joy, her arms waving as she spun around on the grass like a little whirlwind of sunshine.
"Yaaay!! Did you hear that, Kakashi?! He said yes!!"
Kakashi sat frozen, half-healed bandages fluttering from his side.
'He said yes?! He's actually going to teach her?!'
'That jutsu—no, that sorcery—healing that restructured our chakra network and rewrote our injuries as if they never happened… and he's offering to teach it?!'
He stared at the beaming Rin.
She had her fists clenched to her chest, her eyes shimmering with more emotion than he had ever seen. "It's my dream…" she said.
"To become the greatest healing ninja in the world! So I can save everyone! I want to be able to protect the people I love!"
Radahn looked at her in silence for a long moment, as though reading her very soul.
But then—something shifted.
Rin gasped. Her joy paused abruptly. Her bright expression dimmed as a strange aura suddenly spiked around her—a pulse of sinister chakra rippling through the ground.
Her eyes lost focus for a moment. She stumbled forward, clutching her chest as if it burned from the inside.
"H-hngh…!"
"Rin?" Kakashi bolted to his feet, concern flashing through his now-stable Sharingan.
"What's wrong?!"
The air grew heavier.
Radahn's smile faded. His instincts roared.
He stepped forward and gently placed a massive, gauntleted hand upon the girl's small shoulder. The sheer size of it nearly enveloped her entire petite frame. His fingers, heavy and plated in shining gold, were surprisingly still and calm.
The moment he touched her, the area around them began to glow faintly again—but this time, not from warmth.
From warning.
Radahn's eyes narrowed.
'Something lives inside this child…Not a parasite of the body… but a sealed fury of chakra. Wild. Untamed.'
The air had stilled.
That suffocating pressure—the cold malice of something far too vast for one body to contain—had vanished in a breath.
It was as if a dam had cracked… and then, just as quickly, had been sealed by a divine hand.
Radahn's golden gauntlet still rested gently on Rin's back. Faint trails of light shimmered from his fingers—so subtle it was hard to tell if it was real, or just the reflection of the waning sun's final rays.
Rin's breaths came shallow. Her small hands trembled in her lap as her body sat hunched over. A few tears welled up in her eyes, and she gritted her teeth—trying not to break down again.
Then, barely above a whisper, she spoke:
"...It's the Three-Tails…"
Kakashi looked up sharply, stunned.
She clutched her chest again, the place where the chakra had flared from.
"I-I felt it. It was angry… l-like it was waking up. Like it wanted to... lash out."
She turned her head toward Kakashi, eyes wide with fear. Her voice cracked.
"K-Kakashi… I… I'm scared."
The words hit the young shinobi like a blade through the ribs.
She was always the healer. The optimist. The soft light in their trio.
To see her like this—eyes swimming with dread, her voice trembling, not from exhaustion but from fear of herself—it shattered something in him.
Kakashi swallowed hard and moved closer, placing a hand on her shoulder.
"I'm here-" he said quietly, his tone uncharacteristically gentle.
"You'll be okay-"
Rin shook her head slowly. "No… I don't think I am. It knows I'm scared. It feeds on it."
Radahn remained crouched beside them, silent. The light around his hand slowly faded, and the earth dimmed once again to its natural dusk, the golden radiance gone.
But Rin could still feel a heat—not from the sun, but from the man.
From the power that had calmed the beast inside her with a mere touch.
She turned her teary eyes to him.
"Mister Radahn… w-what… what is that thing inside me? Is it… really a monster?"
Radahn's eyes slowly drifted to meet hers. Burning, ancient, steady.
"No-" he said, voice like a calm thunder.
"It is not a monster. It is a force. A beast… trapped inside a cage."
His gaze softened slightly.
"And you… are the one holding the key."
Rin blinked, silent, her thoughts a swirl of hope and dread.
Kakashi watched them both, jaw clenched. He could sense it too now—how close she'd been to breaking. How dangerous this could have become if Radahn hadn't intervened.
"I'll help you tame it-"