#kureanko

Like, okay, Kurenai is already objectively terrifying.

"I'm going to psychically convince your brain that I was never real and lull you into a false sense of peace with the scent of pleasant flowering trees before I emerge like a nightmare from the branches to snap your neck. Then when your friend looks back they see you standing placidly in the street before wondering where that lovely scent is coming from?"

(Kurama being scared shitless of Kurenai is a fun mental image. Like he doesn't give a fuck about any other living or unliving creature, but this illusion master witch who can carve up someone's reality and murder them while they smile it all away? That's fucking scary no matter how big you are.)

BUT IT ALL JUST GETS SO MUCH WORSE WHEN SHE’S NO LONGER QUITE HUMAN

Kurenai is now upset because she keeps like... bleeding from the eyes? And is freaking out the Uchiha? And she can still eat dango and sushi and all that, but she's like really into raw steak and literal bloody Marys now? And she keeps seeing ghosts?

Kurenai, poking at her chest: My heart keeps stopping and I forget to restart it and then I get cold, help.

Kakashi: Hey Asuma, are you into fangs? Asuma: ...I'm straight and not into you so why does it matter? Kakashi: Not about me. Just answer. Asuma: Fine, uh... I guess it depends on the fangs? Extended eyeteeth, sure, deep sea creature needles, not so much. Kakashi: Great! So, your girlfriend got herself into a situation.

There are Offerings being left at her doorstep by minor demons from the forest. It’s fine.

Kurenai gets monsterized, a tad, and then just. Illusion makeup. For several weeks. Under the assumption/fervent hope that it'll get better on its own. 'It's not a cold Yuuhi, I expected better of you!' 'I panicked okay? And how was I supposed to know it wouldn't get better, I've never been possessed before!'

(Kurenai is a millennial and didn't want this going on her record and interfering with her chance of getting her promotion/a genin team.)

She's not even sure WHAT she is, just like. Probably semi-dead? And demonic? Just like. Kurenai gets into a Situation and it's not even a sentient entity, it's just like. A special kind of chakra... that acts like an infection... but isn't communicable. Or something.

And there's a second layer of chakra under her own, so it doesn't mess with her control of her normal techniques at all, but if she does reach for that second, creepy chakra, things start, like... dying.

Like she channels the chakra and all the grass or trees around her just turn grey. If she channels the creepy chakra, it works like magic instead of genjutsu, and she like... sings hypnosis and shit. Calls up the dead.

She has no idea what she's doing but ANBU is making grabby hands.

Konoha completely skips over everyone else when the Zombie Combo shows up because DUH we're gonna send Undead Kurenai out against immortal bullshit.

SHE HEALS LIKE THAT ONE NEBULA GIF BUT MORE ORGANIC AND LESS TECHNO

Also sometimes she’s just like “Why is my blood black?”

Mostly I'm just really enjoying the mental image of like Hidan: What the fuck are you?!?!?! Kurenai, mid-attack: GREAT QUESTION. I'll let you know when I figure it out!

It's been like ten years by that point and they still have no idea.

Honestly Ninjas are so used to weird bullshit by now that they'll just call it a "Technique" unless it turns out she can pass it on to kids in which case it'll be revised into a Bloodline. How does it work? 🤷. Why did it happen? 🤷. Can you use it to murder people effectively? Hell yes. Good enough!

Kurenai: Wait, what if I can't have kids anymore? [one pregnancy later] Mirai: [is born singing the wails of the damned]

Like one of those Evil Possessed Child horror movies except everyone has superpowers so the Ghost Murder Attempts are just Precocious Shenanigans and the kid eventually grows up to be a productive member of murder-society

"Mirai, honey, what do you want to eat?" "The souls of the innocent." "Uh-huh. We have miso soup." "That is acceptable."

Sometimes if she’s good, they give her a freshly dead pigeon. Asuma is not nearly as thrown by all of this as he could be.

Kiba is SO PUMPED to brag about how he has the scariest sensei in Konoha and people are just like "Yeah right" because they meet Kurenai and she is so??? Normal??? Compared to Gai and Kakashi and all them??? And she's polite and friendly and caring and gorgeous! How is she--OH MY GOD WHAT THE FUCK DID SHE JUST DO TO THAT GUY'S BRAIN

Kisame and Itachi's trip back to Konoha right after the Chuunin Exams and they get set to fight the Jounin team and Kurenai shows up and gets dismissed and then it takes a moment for everyone to be like "Oh my god, you weren't here when that happened, dude she's a literal creature from your nightmares now."

Itachi: Look, even if she's super dangerous, I'll just trap her in my unbreakable genjutsu it'll be fine. [uses unbreakable genjutsu that psychically links him to her] [several seconds pass] Itachi: [gets a nosebleed] Itachi: Hey Kisame quick question can you carry me and how fast can you run while carrying me because we need to leave right the fuck now.

Not a ‘ooh sexy’ nosebleed, a ‘my brain just completely misfired from horror’ nosebleed.

On at least one occasion, Kurenai does the Creepy Horror Movie Crawling after someone thinks they've snapped her neck.

She's functionally immortal but like. In the most unnerving way possible. She's “allowed” to return to life but the prerequisite to doing so is "freak everyone in the vicinity out as you do so." You're allowed to heal but only if you're a creepy, dramatic ho about it.

Some people have no idea that she's a Monster Person because they knew her in school when she was still mortal and then she learned all this psychology and illusion magic bullshit so when she does things like that they always assume that she's using said illusion magic to fake her injury and unnerve the enemy.

Poor, oblivious fool: Kurenai, good work back there. You can drop the genjutsu now though. Kurenai: Oh right, yeah. Kurenai: [snaps her head back into place with a sickening crunch]

"Haha god you're a freaky bitch sometimes" -Anko probably

Anko is the first person to just completely ignore the Creepy.

Orochimaru did weirder shit, the important thing is that they can still get drunk and bitch about how dumb boys are.

(As far as KureAnko goes, I like "roommates who have definitely done the young-and-experimenting sex thing a few times, and maybe some of the drunk-and-grieving sex thing a few other times, but are nowadays just non-sex buddies who like to wingwoman.")

So you know how I earlier mentioned something about Kurenai possibly being able to see the dead?

She. Figures out Obito's alive. Just. The weirdest fucking wrench in those plans. (Sorry, Obito, except not really.) It’s either because she sees all the other ghosts around periodically but never him, or she just... sees Rin. And Rin tells her.

Anyway

Orochimaru and Kurenai fight. It’s. Not a comfortable time for literally anyone in the area.

Orochimaru: STOP THAT. STOP... NOT DYING. Kurenai: Shan’t.

Just an endless background chorus of "necks don't BEND that way!" and "he just vomited up his own body is that normal" and "WHY THE FUCK DOES HER JAW UNHINGE AS FAR AS HIS DOES"

Honestly though I think Orochimaru is charmed. And wants her body for himself, because Orochimaru. Possibly like. Congratulates Anko on her good taste.

Orochimaru: I want to put my soul in that body. Inoichi: No, no you really do not, I can tell you.

Orochimaru: Can I have a blood sample? Anko, completely rabid: FUCK NO GET AWAY FROM HER Kurenai: [eyes rolled back to reveal black sclera, chanting an undead language that summons demons] Orochimaru: Delightful.

Inoichi definitely tried to mind walk her at some point to like, help her figure out what was going on? And came out of it shaking and speaking in tongues and to this day refuses to talk about it other than to say, "She's in control, don't worry about that part. Never ask anyone to mind walk her again."

He wanted to help and that's the only reason he got out relatively sane.

(Me, at any given point: But how can I turn this genre into a really dumb comedy.)

Kurenai: [on her knees in a random field, head tilted back to stare at the stars, mouth agape, black necro-chakra rolling off her her in waves] Kakashi: Does anyone know what the hell she's doing? [five minutes later] Kakashi: Aaaaaaaaaand that's an entire ROOT base. What the fuck, Kurenai.

Kurenai runs into an Edo Tensei and they burst into flames and nobody knows what's going on, least of all her.

"I'm here to ruin all the bad guys' plans but I honestly don't have any fucking idea what I'm doing" is just. A treat.

(This is such a niche AU.)

(I just point at the most random characters and give them a plot you'd normally only see in one of like... four characters.)

Asuma: [comes across Kurenai eating a dead crow, hasn't even been plucked, let alone cooked, mouth covered in blood and feathers, crouched over the kill like some terrifying, shapeless mass] Kurenai: ... Asuma: ... Kurenai: [swallows] Asuma: ...so, you good? Or... Kurenai: I... I think I need a minute. Asuma: Cool, cool, I'll be in the living room.

Demon Kurenai maybe? But with her actual red eyes, and black sclera. Though "grey skin and black veins" might be more on-brand for the Vibe

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