Naruto: Azure Awakening Ch 150 - Birdie and the Beast

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“What? Drop you here?” Maru turned his head, glancing back at Kaoru as he began slowing down their flight. “Actually... that’s not a bad idea. Might teach you not to annoy so much.”

Kaoru knew he was joking, but the way Maru said it made sothing uneasy crawl down his spine. Before he could think more about it, the joke started turning real. Maru began descending.

“Wait… this is the place? Seriously?” Kaoru asked, voice rising with disbelief. The air around them, even at such height, was still wild with screaming winds, spinning waves, and a storm made of water and madness.

“Maru, I don’t think even I can survive that current,” he muttered, eyes narrowing as he tried to process what he was seeing.

“We’re not going into the water, kid. The whole maelstrom, this chaos, that’s him. The second we get close, it’ll stop,” Maru said in a calm but mischievous voice as he dropped lower. “Activate your eyes. You’ll like the view.”

Kaoru didn’t answer. He simply did as told.

The mont his Suijingan lit up, his breath caught in his throat.

Beneath the swirling waters was sothing. Sothing massive. The maelstrom, for all its size, was just a ripple compared to what lay underneath. He couldn’t see its full form, only the vague figure made distinct thanks to the water particles Suijingan picked up. But Kaoru could tell that it was easily twice the width of the storm. Ten tis bigger than Maru. Maybe more.

“What... what is this?” Kaoru whispered, fingers tightening around Maru’s feathers without realizing it.

But the eagle said nothing.

They kept gliding forward, toward the center. And just like Maru said, the mont they drew close enough, the chaos began to settle. The swirling water slowed. The screaming winds softened. In under a minute, the sea was calm, as if nothing had ever happened.

But Kaoru knew better. He could see it coming.

The ripples ford, getting stronger with each second, and finally, the surface broke open as a massive head rose from the depths.

It was smooth, slick, and dark blue, nearly the sa color as Kaoru’s own hair. Horns like jagged coral stuck out from the back of its skull, a dozen of them at least. Its cyan eyes with traces of yellow, scanning everything.

Kaoru stared, unable to look away.

‘This isn’t what I imagined…’ he thought, chest tightening. ‘He doesn’t look friendly at all.’

No matter how much he tried to rationalize it, he couldn’t shake the feeling. This wasn’t just so legendary beast or ancient summon. This creature was a predator. Its shape, its size, those jagged, saw-like teeth – it all scread danger.

Kaoru could tell that this creature was born to kill. For a mont, he genuinely hesitated.

‘Maybe I shouldn’t have co.’ The impression this sea creature made was so intense that Kaoru actually considered going back.

‘This is not like ,’ he snapped, furrowing his brows as he tried to shake off the unease.

Kaoru’s eyes sharpened, locked onto the massive form rising from the sea. Maru was flying low now, almost skimming the waves, and Kaoru found himself wondering where they were supposed to land. But that question didn’t take long to answer.

A thick, slick tentacle, or rather the limb, rose from the water, curling just enough to offer a flat surface.

“Kid, get down,” Maru called, noticing Kaoru was still on his back even after landing.

Kaoru hesitated. He wanted to ask if it was safe, but before he could, sothing cold and wet brushed his waist. He looked down and saw a smaller tendril coiling gently around him. It didn’t squeeze. It didn’t pull. It just lifted him carefully, like holding sothing fragile, and brought him closer to the massive eye staring at him.

“Hey, you’ll scare the kid,” Maru protested. But it was too late.

Kaoru was already face to face with an eye larger than his entire body.

“Activate your eyes, please,” ca a voice. Soft. Low and calm. Nothing like the monster Kaoru had imagined, nothing like what he was seeing.

Kaoru had deactivated his Suijingan. He was worried it might co off as rude and provoke the creature whose eye was larger than his entire body. But now, he did as asked.

The mont the Suijingan activated, he felt a strange pull - a new connection. Kaoru didn’t know what to call it. But he did not have ti, or rather the desire to focus on the feeling and try to understand it, because there was sothing else that made the hair on his neck stand up.

‘I can’t see inside him…’

Only one other living being had ever blocked his sight before, and that was himself.

“It’s Kaoru, right?” the creature asked, but didn’t wait for an answer. “Call Elder Ogashi. I’m glad the bird was correct… your eye… it really is awakened.”

His voice was still deep and low, to the point that Kaoru felt intimidated, but he caught sothing hidden beneath it. Excitent. Joy, maybe. It didn’t match the creature’s appearance.

‘Maybe he just looks scary…’

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Now that the tendril had returned him to Maru’s side, Kaoru took a proper look.

Ogashi’s body was long, yes, but not like a snake. Tentacle-like limbs sprouted and moved around him in the water, slow but graceful. And his head… that was sothing else entirely.

It was sharp and jagged, covered in layered, fin-like plates that shimred dark blue under the light. His mouth stretched wide, rows of sawlike teeth visible even when he wasn’t trying to show them. Thick ridges swept back from his forehead, splitting into several horn-like extensions that curved and pointed in different directions. The back of his head was layered with more of those horns, looking almost like a crown made from bone and sea.

Kaoru was still staring when Maru suddenly squawked in excitent.

“What…?” Kaoru asked, blinking.

Ogashi had plunged one of his limbs back into the water, and when he rose it again, he was holding so kind of sea creature.

Kaoru had no idea what kind of creature Ogashi had dragged out of the sea, but he rembered what Maru had told him, that beasts like them grew stronger by consuming others. So it didn’t take him long to realize this was either paynt… or a thank-you gift.

“It’s yours, birdie,” Ogashi said, dropping the giant fish right in front of Maru like it weighed nothing. The thing was easily twice Kaoru’s size.

‘Birdie?’ Kaoru raised a brow, amused. But when he glanced at Maru and then back at Ogashi, he got it. From sothing this massive, Maru probably did look like a regular bird.

“Stop calling that, you bastard,” Maru snapped, imdiately clamping his claws down on the prize, like Ogashi might snatch it back if he took too long.

‘What do you an ‘bastard’?!’ Kaoru scread inside his head, suddenly nervous. ‘Don’t provoke him, are you crazy?!’

But then he rembered how casually Maru had always spoken about Ogashi. It made him realize that Ogashi’s temper probably didn’t match his terrifying appearance. In fact, his patience seed way higher than most people Kaoru knew.

“Your mouth is as filthy as ever, my feathered friend,” Ogashi muttered with a slow shake of his head. The movent made a strange sound, like tal scraping against tal, as the scales across his head shifted. “You’re a bird. I’m calling you a bird. Why be offended by the truth? Or are you ashad of where you co from?”

As he spoke, one of those long, rope-like tendrils lashed out and slapped Maru across the head. It wasn’t violent, but it did knock the eagle off balance for a second.

“You damn sea slug! Do that again and I’ll claw out your eye! And rember my na, we’ve been friends forever now!” Maru shouted, stumbling and trying to look dignified again. Kaoru didn’t understand half the insults he threw next, but they were… creative, to say the least.

“Kaoru, right?” Ogashi asked, his voice deep as ever, but weirdly full of pride, as he kept ignoring Maru.

Kaoru blinked, confused. He couldn’t figure out why Ogashi sounded so pleased with himself.

‘Did he enjoy slapping Maru that much?’ Kaoru narrowed his eyes, giving the sea beast a suspicious look.

But then he noticed it - a small symbol on one of Ogashi’s scales, just above the waterline. It was about to slip beneath the surface again, but Kaoru saw it clearly.

It said: Kaoru.

His na.

Ogashi, or soone else, had actually written it onto his body. Just so that this huge sea creature would not forget it.

At first, Kaoru didn’t know how to react to that. But sohow… it felt flattering. He wasn’t sure why, but he suddenly saw the creature in a very different light.

“Stop hiding your chakra,” Ogashi said suddenly, snapping Kaoru out of his thoughts. “I need to know if you’re strong enough to handle the journey.”

Kaoru didn’t argue. “I apologize, Elder Ogashi. It’s just a habit,” he replied quickly, letting his chakra flare out. No way was he risking getting hit by one of those tendrils.

“You don’t need to be cautious around ,” Ogashi said. His voice was still low, still deep, but this ti there was sothing different in it. A calm warmth, like a teacher reassuring a student. “You’ll co to understand… no Leviathan will ever harm the bearer of the Suijingan.”

‘Leviathan?’ Kaoru blinked. That na wasn’t familiar. He racked his brain, going through everything he’d read and everything he rembered from the ani, but nothing ca up. Not a single ntion.

‘I’ve never even heard of them.’

The existence of such a massive being going unnoticed carried several implications.

‘If soone like him is real… how many more creatures like this are out there?’

Ogashi was clearly reading Kaoru’s thoughts on his face, because the corner of Leviathan’s mouth curled as he spoke.

“Humans don’t know about us… because most don’t survive eting one of our kind.” He paused, realizing this probably wasn’t the ti for that conversation. “We’ll talk more about that later. Your chakra looks good enough. Less than I hoped, but we’ll work on that.”

Kaoru didn’t react right away. He couldn’t.

‘He plans to help grow my chakra reserves?’ He got so excited that for a mont he outshined the sun.

He would've brushed it off if anyone else had said it. But this wasn’t just anyone. This was a massive, unknown being strong enough to outclass every summon Kaoru had ever heard of. A walking mystery. And he had just casually offered to help him with one of his biggest weaknesses.

“Just one last thing,” Ogashi said. “Make a water bubble. It needs to withstand my pressure.”

He lifted one of his limbs, pointing to a spot just in front of it.

Kaoru nodded without a word, still riding the high of that offer.

The glow of his Sujingan intensified as the water around them began to swirl. A small sphere started forming in the air. Kaoru didn’t just form the bubble. He tweaked its density and reinforced the outer layer to show what he could do.

But Ogashi didn’t react at all, disappointing Kaoru.

“That’s enough,” Ogashi said at last. “If you strengthen it more, you won’t be able to hold it for long. And I can see you haven’t learned how to extract chakra yet.”

He didn’t even finish the sentence before one of his huge tendrils pressed down on the bubble.

Kaoru didn’t care. He was still stuck on that last part.

‘Extract chakra? Not YET?’ His mind was racing.

‘That ans I’ll be able to soday, right?’ He didn’t know about Suiren’s ability. Kaoru did not know the power Suiren demonstrated. Apart from Shin and Maki, no one had witnessed her ability to transform water into chakra, and they never revealed that to Kaoru. They kept that to themselves, afraid he’d try to mimic it and trigger whatever backlash killed her.

“This is good,” Ogashi said, still watching him. “You can only use one function of your eyes properly… but you’ve mastered it better than I expected.”

This was the first complint Kaoru had received from Ogashi, and it was weirdly pleasant. Like he had been waiting his entire life for this acknowledgnt.

“Birdie,” the Leviathan turned to Maru.

“It’s Maru. How many tis do I… ugh, never mind,” the eagle sighed, deciding it wasn’t worth it.

“I’ll be taking…” Ogashi paused, glancing to the side. “The Suijingan bearer… with .”

Kaoru blinked. ‘He forgot my na?’

“Return every month,” Ogashi added. Then his eyes turned back to Kaoru, not even waiting for Maru to answer.

“Are you ready… Suijingan bearer?”