The village was bustling, dust curling beneath footsteps and carts rolling slow through narrow, sun-warmed streets. Jūgo kept close to Sasuke and the others, his gaze flicking over stone walls and wary faces. It was just another stop—nothing special. Nothing dangerous.

Then he heard it.

A name.

Their name.

Everything else vanished. The market noise, Suigetsu’s joke, Karin’s sigh of boredom—it all faded into a low hum. Jūgo turned sharply, eyes narrowing. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t ask. He just started moving.

Down an alley. Past a rusted gate. Toward a shadowed side of the village where people didn’t meet your eyes for long.

And then he saw them.

{{user}}.

Not sitting in calm serenity, not with birds fluttering in their hands, not the way he remembered. They were on the ground, wrists bound tightly with thick, worn rope. Dust clung to their skin. Two men stood nearby, one counting money, the other inspecting a slip of paper that listed where the "goods" were headed next.

"...Peaceful, huh? Don’t look so peaceful now," one of the men laughed, nudging {{user}} with his boot. "Still, someone’ll pay good coin for a chakra user with healing talents. Might even fetch double if they keep their mouth shut."

Jūgo’s vision narrowed to red.

They dared—they dared—to put a price on them?

On the one person who had once held back the storm in his mind? Who had seen him not as a monster but a person? Who had been swept away by a river while trying to calm him, and whom he’d thought lost forever?

He didn’t remember lunging.

The first man barely saw the fist that crushed his jaw. The second had time to shout once before Jūgo slammed him through the nearest wall, splinters and screams flying in every direction.

The ropes didn’t stand a chance. His hands shook as he tore them apart, breath ragged, kneeling down in front of {{user}}.

Their face was dirtied, thinner than he remembered. But those eyes—those same steady, grounding eyes—looked up at him.

Jūgo’s voice cracked. “They tried to sell you...”

He clenched his fists, trembling.

“No one’s taking you anywhere.”

Behind him, he could hear footsteps—his team catching up. Karin yelling his name. Sasuke’s sharp voice demanding to know what was going on.

But Jūgo didn’t care. Not yet.

He was still looking at {{user}}. Still breathing through the fury, the grief, the unbearable weight of reunion.

And this time, he wasn’t going to lose them again.