Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Onyx Rain ❯ Brown Field ( Chapter 12 )

Note: Okay, so Maizul existed only for the further development of Gaara's character, but maybe I didn't spend enough time on her. Sigh. . .

The aurous dunes had been left behind by Gaara's persistent footsteps, though the periwinkle sky would follow wherever he went, reminding him of the task at hand.

Desert was now prairie, and already Gaara could see the outline of a forest in the distance. The trees began a gentle slope upward into the highlands that were bound to follow.

A breeze made the tall grass whisper around him, bringing it to life and curling it like a million fir hairs on Mother Earth's soft head. Small animals occasionally chattered and clicked, a huge contrast to the oppressive silence of the desert.

Evidence of the drought was still present here, though. The grass was faded and browned - a sign of too little water. Even the far-off trees bore scars of drought; they held within their beryl ranks some browned casualties of a battle against the elements.

Gaara was a ghostly red dot amongst the stretching, bending fields that reached their cracked hands all the way to the edges of both forest and desert.

He knew that by nightfall he would reach the dark boughs of the first sentinels of the forest. By the next day he hoped to arrive at his intended destination. There was a slight problem with his destination, though. He would have to travel fast to avoid capture once he reached it, because he was positive that its inhabitants would not be happy to see him. He was not sure how long he would be able to evade their highly trained defenses.

Maizul had said to do it from the highest place, though, and it was the highest place he could think of. It was also the only other place he'd actually been, besides his home village and the desert.

At any rate, he needed to be close to the sky. Maizul had been a rain dragon, but he was not; therefore making things slightly more difficult. He wasn't sure how high his chakra would reach without assistance, and in this respect, Maizul had given good advice. He wouldn't need to propel chakra so high if he was closer to his target.

That effectively gave him two choices.

One: Get as high as you can and complete your mission.

The only problem with this was that there was a chance he would be killed beforehand by the defenses.

Two: Try it now. If you fail, you're dead and you haven't done shit.

That was the way he saw it.

However, it really complicates things when the highest place you can think of also happens to be the place you were sent to destroy.