Forged by Steel: Soul's Affliction

The birds chirped rhythmically in perfect unison allowing their music to travel across Konohagakure and satisfy everyone whose ears were fortunate enough to receive these tunes. Many opened their windows to hear the birds, others walked outside, but one man slammed his windows closed. “Too much noise,” he muttered, closing the curtains, shutting off the rays of the sun and leaving the room enveloped in darkness. He approached the mirror unable to see his actual body due to the darkness, but could make out his own silhouette. Suddenly, the silhouette morphed into something new. It reached out from the mirror, clenching Sannoto by his throat radiating a killing intent so strong that the Senju literally began to shake in fear; his body began to mutate. He felt diseases invading his body, eating up his flesh from the inside, but regardless of how much they ate he just never seemed to die. The flesh just replaced itself with more flesh, but the pain never went away.

He screamed out in agony, only for his voice to be drowned out by the laughter of a demon. Sannoto glared into his eyes hatefully; images of people he had killed, Sannoto himself, simply reflected off of the demon’s eyes and took form. It was like he was almost there again, in the Third Shinobi World War: ripping out enemies organ’s, slitting their throats, and eating his comrades for food. “You never had a purpose for any of it….” The demon spoke, his voice overlapped with the hundreds of other shinobi Sannoto had killed during this war. “You wouldn’t have died. All you had to do was walk away, but you didn’t. We’re free, saved from the pains of reality. But you will forever live on, and not even death can help you save yourself from your sins. Rot forever in this hellish reality,”

“Sannoto!” a voice echoed, pulling the floor bound Senju from his hallucination. Sweat dripped from his forehead, his breathing was rapid, his hands trembled, and his eyes were filled with tears. “Honey,” his wife spoke from the doorway, “Are you-?”

“I-I’m F-F-Fine,” he stuttered. His tone lacked happiness and confidence and instead radiated fear. “Sannoto, hun,” his wife continued, “This is the fifth time this week. I really think,”

“I said I’m fine, Ayame” he interrupted, barely getting himself off of the floor without falling back down again. His body still trembled, though every other condition he had during his hallucination seemed to calm down. The sweat no longer dripped, his breathing was no longer rapid and his tears had been replaced with red smudges across his cheeks. “I need to take a walk,” Sannoto started, walking out of the door with such haste that Ayame didn’t have a chance to finish her statement, “Sannoto, hun, please let’s go see Sak-“ Twenty Minutes Later

“Sir, that’s your eighth one in ten minutes. Don’t you think that’s enough?”

“Nah, I need just a little more. It’s okay, I can’t get drunk,”

“Ummmm, Okay then. Just, take this then,” the bartender responded, sliding the bottle of liquor across the table.

“How much for the entire thing?”

“No need. It’s on the house”

He lifted the liquor bottle up to his mouth, gulped some of it down and put the rest back on the table. He had truly hit rock bottom.