Alright, a note before I start. I have no plans of continuing this story at all. This is just the last chapter that I had written for this story years back. And just for the heck of it, I'm publishing this.
PLEASE NOTE:
When the Uzumaki-Namikazes are talking close to anyone from Halkeginia, their dialog will be in {} to signify a different language, while the Halkeginians will be []. Or the other way round, maybe I forgot.
Also, this is not betaed, so there will be issues. Lots of them.
CHAPTER 8: THE DEMON CHILDREN
-STORY START-
"Are you sure that's correct, sis?" a voice said.
"Yup!" another chirped happily, with the third person just standing where he was, looking at the sight of his sister as she crouched down on the ground.
Kushina was humming a cheerful tune as she held a chakra-charged paintbrush in one hand, the ground underneath her stained black from the ink that she used for the humongous seal array underneath her feet. Using the design she saw her mother made the other day, she added her own touches to it, adding a couple words of power, the most prominent being the kanji for 'World' and 'Atract' situated around the outside of the strange hieroglyphic circle that was the summoning circle for her father.
With a flourish of her brush, she happily said "Finished!" before standing up, looking at her seal array. The array was huge, measuring 5 meters in diameter. The centre contained the kanji for 'Summon' within a circle, with smaller circles containing different words around it. The circles were joined together by a series of thick, black lines that act as chakra conduits, creating a chakra link made of blood ink on the ground, a basic necessity for a high-powered seal. In the exact centre of the circle, a three pronged Hiraishin kunai stood erect, its points stabbed into the ground to act as the centre for the circle.
The massive seal array was designed to pull their father from whatever world he was at by utilising a massive amplification of a reverse Hiraishin, which means that instead of calling themselves to their dad, where the seals of their father's body pulls them to him, it instead does the reverse: pulling their dad to them via the massive seal array. The chakra use was immense, even for an Astartes, thus why Kushina was recruiting her brother and sister as well in the uncertain endeavour of pulling their dad from wherever he was.
Not that they won't join in the effort of rescuing their dad as well, though.
The blonde haired Minato studied the seal carefully, his Byakugan activated to ensure that there's no interruption from any chakra leak from the seal array. Finally satisfied, he deactivated his Byakugan and nodded. "Looks fine," he said. "You asked Mother about this?"
"Nope!" Kushina said merrily. "I copied it straight from what I saw of her design and added a bit of twist to it!"
"Fair enough," the voice of Mito came from his back. As twins, they're nearly inseparable, being with each other at nearly all times even despite their hundreds of years of age. Together, they were the Elemental Nation's best Byakugan users, their mastery in both their bloodlines, the Astartes and the Byakugan allowing them to go to-to-toe with any manner of enemy and come out on top. When working together, they're nearly unbeatable. And they rarely work alone. "When are you going to start?"
"Right now!" Kushina replied happily. Among her tens of siblings, these two were her favourite. Not just because they're the first two siblings that she had, but they're also very fun to play around with. They may have more of their grandfather's stuck-up habits with their stony faces and emotionless drawl, but when the conditions were right, they could be even more playful than she did. "Get over that part there and place your hands on it," she said, pointing towards a part of the circular seal with a small circle on it, specially made to accommodate their hands.
Wordlessly complying, the two went towards the two circles and placed their hands on it as Kushina put hers on another circle. "Alright! When I give the signal, pour your chakra into it! Ready?!" she shouted out to her little brother and sister, watching as they nodded their agreement. "GO!" she screamed out before pouring her chakra into the seal array, her part of the seal glowing blue from the amount of chakra that she poured into it. This action was mirrored by her little brother and sister, causing a ghastly blue glow to flow from the three points on the seal, slowly spreading out, flooding the seal with the blue of chakra before it slowly spreads inwards, heading towards the Hiraishin kunai in the middle.
Kushina had a wide grin on her face as she watched the seal array spark with chakra static, the entire array glowing blue within the darkness of the night as the entire glowing array seemed to spark and crackle with barely unrestrained power as it slowly spreads towards the Hiraishin kunai in the middle. A spark of bluish chakra lightning arced with a loud crack towards the standing kunai, before another, another and another followed it. The kunai then lights up with a bright blue colour as the entire ensemble started sparking together, the bolts crackled and rose before a massive blue glow covered them, much to Kushina's horror.
Without warning, a massive lightning bolt shot from the ground where they were before the ground exploded with a massive force, leaving a huge crater with no sign of the seal or any of the siblings…
-BREAK—-
Kushina stood as she pushed away the wooden beam on her back as she found herself lying on the ground, a structure seeming to burn around her. Letting out a cough, she hacked out a glob of smoke, possibly coming from the ashes of the building that was burning merrily around her.
"I don't think I did anything wrong with that seal… maybe something else was?" she thought as she looked around, barely registering the heat of the burning house thanks to the layer of Mucranoid protein on her skin. Unfortunately, her clothes did not survive the ordeal unharmed, some of them were still burning merrily as she was wading through the rubble of the house.
"Sis!"
Came a voice behind Kushina, causing her to turn around to greet the owner. But before she could do so, a huge fist caved her face in, the sheer force nearly sending her flying away from the force. Luckily, she wasn't a regular person. "What the hell did you do?!" the voice said again.
Kushina, who was knocked back for a step, grabbed her broken nose before with a loud crack, she snapped it back into position again, her healing already working to heal the fist's damage. "Hey, don't blame me! You saw the array! It was supposed to work!"
"Well, it doesn't!" the voice, now identified as belonging to Minato, replied.
"There should be a better reason for that," came another voice, this time of Mito's as she walked from the still burning rubble that was supposed to be a house, a massive wooden pillar falling as it snapped in half behind her, sending plumes of red hot ash flying from the pillar. The veins around her eyes were visible, a clear sign that her Byakugan was activated. "And it seems that we're no longer in the Elemental Nations now."
Minato immediately did the same as his twin, activating his Byakugan to check the surrounding areas as Kushina looked around with her own regular (to an Astartes) eyes. Much to her shock, the first thing that she saw was the moon. Or moons. One pinkish, the other white as they orbited each other. "Holy shit! Two moons!" Kushina shouted in shock.
As she looked around again, still shocked at the (literally) otherworldly observation, a certain sight caught her eye. Where they were standing, the figure of a person was standing close by, his hand grabbing a sort of stick hard for some reason. Quickly Kushina dashed towards the person in question, shouting. "Are you alright?!"
Colbert realised that this was actually Naruto's first daughter from the way her hair looked, and most importantly, her immense size. However, to confirm it, he lifted his staff up and shouted. [Are you the daughter of Uzumaki-Namikaze Naruto?!] in Halkeginian.
Kushina abruptly stopped in her steps as the foreign words entered her Lyman's Ears, having never heard such words before. However, the only part that she understood was that he said her father's name. And that's enough for her to say that this guy somehow knew her father. {You know my father?!} she shouted back in return.
{Sis, who's that?} said Mito as she walked beside Kushina, completely uncaring about the fact that parts of her royal dress were in flames. It didn't harm her anyway, so no point in caring. Besides, she had spares. They all do.
{Don't know,} Kushina said with a shrug before continuing. "But what I do know is that he spoke a strange language, and he somehow knew Dad."
Mito then said, {So… Whatever screw-up you did to that seal array-}
{Hey! I didn't screw up!} Kushina protested.
{-Brought us to where Father was supposed to be, instead of Father to us,} she said, ignoring Kurumi's protesting and her annoyed face.
Meanwhile, Minato walked towards the man, slowly inching towards him with both hands held high, a sign of surrender. {Mister, I assure you, that no matter what the other two said, we mean you no harm. Completely so. From what my sister said, you know our father, Uzumaki-Namikaze Naruto.} Letting his hand down slowly, his pupilless eyes keeping track of the man's alert eye movement and his ready stance, Minato folded his arm at his waist before bowing. {My name is Uzumaki-Namikaze Minato, son of Uzumaki-Namikaze Naruto and Uzumaki-Namikaze Hinata.} He then waved his hand towards the other two behind him, pointing at each one of them as he introduced them to him as best as he could. {The blonde is Uzumaki-Namikaze Kushina, and the other is my twin, Uzumaki-Namikaze Mito.}
Colbert just stood where he was with his wand at the ready, a spell behind his lips to be unleashed at a moment's thought towards the three interlopers as he watched the man walk towards him before he spoke, once again with the same language as Naruto when he first came by. He may not have understood him, but he definitely understood the parts where he said his name and the name of the ones that was with him. However, this gave him another problem. He may have understood that they were Naruto's children, but they still have quite the language barrier between them. For now, he gestured to them to follow him.
Minato watched the man as he pointed towards him and made a 'come here' gesture and quickly understood: follow me. Turning around, he called his siblings. {Hey you two!} he shouted, stopping the shouting match between the two that he ignored before. {It seems that he wants us to follow him. What should we do?}
{Let's go then,} Mito said. {We're not familiar with this place, so it's better to have someone guide us somewhere. We might just meet Father by doing so.}
{Yeah. Let's go,} Kushina said in seriousness before walking towards Colbert and gesturing for him to take them where he wanted. Besides, not many could withstand the power of the Emperor's own sons and daughters. Her hundreds of years of warfare had attested to that. Also, the fact that Colbert didn't seem to have any bad intentions to him helped her make that decision.
Colbert, seeing that the three had complied with his orders, walked towards the gate of the academy with the three in tow. Along the way, a couple Academy professors who saw or heard or felt that booming lightning bolt rushed outside before meeting him and had him explain the current situation and the three mysterious giants behind him to them. However, he just brushed them off with a quick [Later. I need to take them to the Headmaster] before briskly setting off, a pace that was equivalent to a slow walk to the three siblings behind him.
Having went through the same looks of oddness and fear that the people had on their faces as when they were at their world, the siblings instead focused their sights on everything else, getting the sights and sounds of the academy, trying to locate just where they were. The first thing that they realized was the fact that everyone seemed to wear some sort of strange clothes, a combination of thick robes and cloaks for some. Also, they have a certain similar icon on their clothes, a spherical, gold coloured clasp with a five pointed star on it.
Unlike Kushina, the twins had their Byakugan activated, trying to get as much detail as their complete 360o vision allowed them. Potentially due to the merging of the two bloodlines, the Astartes and the Byakugan in one body, it made them lose the blind spot that was present at the back of a Byakugan user while increasing its potency. They could also see heat signatures and chakra, just like the original Occulobe of their father's.
Their eyes scanned the area, locating every entry and exit point that they could while trying to find their father as well. They failed to find him, but they made some strange discoveries during this. First was the fact that the building that they're heading to was quite large, about 20 stories tall and shaped in a cylindrical form with 5 roads heading towards the smaller buildings at the walls, arranged in a pentagram with the large building centred in the middle. They also saw that there's quite the amount of heat signatures in the structures, showing that there's quite a lot of people within the academy. They also have barely enough chakra than a civilian, something that they found quite strange.
But that wasn't the strangest. The weirdest was the fact that they saw quite a number of animals within the buildings. But the animals were peculiar, things that they never saw in their world. A giant lizard with flaming breath and tail, if her heat sight were to be believed. A huge, floating eyeball, of all things. Alien things that they never met, only a part of some stranger's fictitious mind appeared as animals within the structure in front of them.
Colbert discreetly peeked behind him to ensure that the three were still following him and was silently relieved that they still were. Colbert actually knew that there's nothing he could do to stop them if they were to run away and to do their own thing instead of following him if what he knew of their father were to apply to them. And from the way they looked, it sure seemed that it does apply.
Another peek towards the trio showed that two of them had huge veins popping out beside their strange cloudy eyes, the two looking straight ahead as another looked around with her strangely shiny blue eyes, the same eyes as her father, the same eyes that locked the audiences of the Springtime Familiar Exhibition with a gaze deadlier than a magic spell and harder than a Rock Golem. And in his mind, he already knew what she was doing: scouting the area and looking for exit points, points of interest, targets of opportunity, cover spots, everything. His grip on his staff tightened as he thought of the possible repercussions of her actions. No matter what, he's going to defend his country, no matter what it costs him!
Kushina still haven't finished looking around, taking in all the sights and senses of this strange new world when she suddenly felt a minute KI coming from the person in front of him. Giving a discreet glance towards her siblings, she saw them giving her an extremely tiny wink, a sign that they definitely noticed the man's suddenly spiking KI. She quickly understood the reason for his sudden anger: the fact that she was looking around. {He acted like a trained soldier,} she thought.
And so the trio walked in peace, Colbert up front, Kushina behind him with Mito and Minato flanking her. All four were wary and ready, though only Colbert's wariness was visible, with Kushina smiling and Mito and Minato just looked straight ahead, almost to the point of carelessness, something that couldn't fool Colbert, knowing just how powerful they were. In fact, he was sure that they need not care and only did that for appearance's sake.
After a while and a very tall staircase climb later, they reached the top floor of the Main Tower, the room of Old Man Osmond. Colbert then stood in front of the headmaster before saying, [Headmaster, I brought you someone that I think you must meet.]
[And so I realise,] Osmond answered, quickly discerning the identity of the three giants behind Colbert, his own wand at the ready in case they made any sudden movements. [They must be Naruto's children, right?]
[Yes,] Colbert answered with a sigh. Of course he knew. Anyone who knew Naruto would know. Kushina looked almost dead on like Naruto for Founder Brimir's sake! [Yes, they are.]
[The problem is how they got here, wasn't it?]
[Yes.]
[Hmm...] from the way Colbert was saying it, it seemed that they did not speak Halkeginian, and whatever language that they spoke wasn't understood by them. [Lady Louise wasn't here right now, or we could have her try out the same spell that she did to Naruto to have us understand them.]
[True,] Colbert said. Only he and Osmond knew about the mission that she was undertaking, keeping it a secret from everyone. [Is there no way for us to understand their words?]
Meanwhile, Kushina was getting pissed off at the fact that she didn't understand anything that they said as she watched the two people in front of her discussing something that she had no idea of what, especially when she watched the unconcerned look on their faces. She then tilted her body towards Minato, who was a bit taller than she was before whispering, {Hey, Minato. Why don't we just attack these guys? Eat their brains, grab their knowledge. We can learn their language, blend in.}
Minato looked at her sister as if she had two heads. {You crazy?!} he loudly whispered. {We are not here to attack them! We're just here to find Father!}
{Then why not just use Hiraishin?} Mito asked. {It'll take us straight to Father. We don't have to go through all these hassle.}
Kushina was stumped. Why the hell did the three, in all their experience and power, never had that thought in the first place?! {Stupid!} she said, mentally banging her head on a metaphorical wall. {Stupidstupidstupidstupidstupid!} she screamed out, causing the two men and the twins to look at her strangely.
{Right!} she said, ignoring everyone before focusing on her father's Hiraishin seal that was on him, a seal that was made so that any of his family member could easily teleport to him if necessary. He made it better after that, where every one of his family member could teleport to each other, a seal that for some reason missed her mind until now. In her mind, she managed to feel her dad's seal, located somewhere far away.
Quite far, but there's no distance too far for Hiraishin.
Except for another world.
Focusing on the seal, she activated the jutsu without handseal, expecting the pull of the seal on her father as the seal summons her there.
A pull that didn't materialize.
{What?!} Kushina asked mentally in surprise before she tried again, focusing even harder on the seal. Much to her shock, she still wasn't pulled by the seal. In fact, the seal only seemed to pulse once, doing nothing at all. The only thing that the seal seemed to be was like a tracking beacon, notifying her of the seal's location, but nothing else beyond that. No general sensing area, no pulling effect, no summoning, nothing.
{What?!} she said, voicing her surprise as she looked at Minato. {I cannot use Hiraishin!}
{Yeah, we realised,} Minato shot back, giving a glare towards her sister before sighing in disappointment. {Don't you think it would be the first thing that we should try?}
{Uh…}
{Don't answer that,} he said quickly, cutting Kushina off of her probably recently thought answer, causing Kushina to look at him in a bit of shame. {We did that the first thing we get here, but we failed as well. After some time, we decided that it's best to follow the locals and get some intel on our current situation.}
{What?! Why didn't you say anything?!} Kushina asked him back, a tiny bit of anger in her voice.
{You're too busy worrying about the local,} replied Mito from her side, still with the same stoic expression and statue-like body as when she first came in Osmond's office. {Me and Minato were arguing about it behind you.}
{Guess that means I must've missed that,} Kushina said with a shrug. {I must've concentrated too much on the local.}
{You did,} said Minato, as stoic and as rigid as his twin.
Colbert and Osmond were discussing the topic of how they should treat the three newcomers when they spoke something before the blonde suddenly said something rapidly before a confused look appeared on her face. A while later, she was arguing something with the man. Much to the two's surprise, the dark blue haired lady and the blonde man seemed unperturbed with whatever's happening and just stood where they were, their burnt clothing uncared for and their posture as rigid as it was powerful.
Osmond, who was watching as these siblings interacted with each other then asked Colbert something. [So, Colbert, what do you suggest we do to them?]
Colbert remained silent for a while before answering his question. [What should we do? It's more along the lines of 'what CAN we do' to them. If they're as powerful as Naruto was, not many could harm them, much less kill them, if we're going down that path.]
[True.]
[On the other hand, if we were to let them stay here, it would be a problem since they didn't understand our language, and we didn't understand them as well,] Colbert said.
[True as well. What do you suppose we do then?] Osmond asked, his eyes having a dangerous glint to them as he stared into Colbert's own.
[The best we could do now is to either just let them do what they want, or we could assign them a couple of rooms and have them wait for their father,] Colbert said truthfully. [The first would be quite a gamble since they might just decide to wander around and enter the more dangerous areas of the Academy, where the professors were performing experiments and practicing their magic. However, if we're lucky, they could just run away from the academy and look for their father, solving our problems immediately. The second would be more dangerous in that they might get bored, making them do things that are unreasonable to us. Also, the fact that we hid them from the Inquisition would be a terrible blow to us if they were to check on the recent reports coming from the academy. It's already bad that we hid Naruto, now we had his children as well.]
[So it ends up with the same thing,] said Osmond with a smile. [Either have them do whatever they want, or have them do what they want while they wait. Both are not good options no matter how.]
[Huh…] Colbert sighed before leaning on the armrest that was Osmond's guest chair. [Why are we hiding him anyway, headmaster? It's better if we were to expose him and hand him over to the Inquisition.]
[Listen to your own words, Colbert,] Osmond said, slightly scolding him. [You've seen a part of his power. His manipulation of the elements, his capabilities, his strength. And I'm sure, that was just a little part of what he was.]
Osmond stood before lighting up his pipe and took a deep breath of the scented tobacco within it, blowing the smoke out, spreading the sweet smell of the tobacco over the room. [He already told us about him. An army killer, a hero that won an entire war, a warrior without peer. His demonstration of power during the Familiar Festival should be more than enough to show just how skilled he was.]
Another lungful of smoke. [He demonstrated you of his power. You, the Flame Snake, one of Tristain's best fire mage, a Square Mage, and he defeated you without even a breath. Lucky for you, he doesn't kill you. From what I know of him, his techniques were beyond anything that even I could attest to. He made a house out of living trees in front of my eyes, Colbert. If that's not him showing his power, then what?]
Another smoke. [For me, it's better to have him on our side. Even Princess Henrietta was with him, and she must've forged quite an alliance with him for her to easily be able to talk to him like that. Saying that she didn't realise that having such an asset would be a boon to our military and just taking him in because Louise is her friend, then I would say that you're a traitor to the throne and should be executed.]
Another breath of the delightful tobacco. [Also, if we were to consider Tristain's political situation, we might be in quite a need for help. I heard rumours of operations intending to undermine our country in some way, though I am unable to confirm it. For that, I believe Naruto's powers would be beneficial to us. Chasing him out of Tristain would be another bad idea in a series of bad ideas.]
Colbert just sat calmly in front of Osmond, already knowing of the punishment of a traitor, and the country's political status. [Then, should we continue with our current line of actions? Letting Naruto live here as he trains Louise as her familiar?]
[Yes.]
[Not like there are many other options for us,] Colbert continued. [But that still didn't solve the current problem, which was what to do with the three here.]
[True that,] Osmond said, his eyes darting towards the three at the back of Colbert, looking at their faces. [How about this? For now, let them have some food first, show that we have no evil intentions. Then, we'll monitor their actions before discussing about what we should do.]
[Fair enough,] Colbert said before he stood up and turned to face the trio. Having been introduced by Kushina just now, Colbert knew of their names and who was which. The blonde one was Kushina, the long-haired with dark blue hair was Mito and the blonde man was Minato. Once again, he signalled them to follow him. Wordlessly they complied, following behind his steps as he led them to the grand dining hall.
Kushina once again whispered to Minato as they walked down the spiral stairs of the huge tower, trying to create a plan of action for their current situation. {Minato, let's get away from this place as fast as we are able. We may not be able to use Hiraishin, but we could still feel dad's location from the seal. We could head to where he is quickly. Or at least, send a Shadow Clone there.}
{A good idea,} Minato replied with Mito agreeing with a nod. {We'll do that when we've cleared their observations. For now, it's better if we were to learn what we could of the natives.}
{Right,} she said before putting her own stoic face and walked behind Colbert. He realised this, but not knowing what they meant, he just had to believe that they're not having any bad intentions. A while later, they reached the doors of the grand dining hall before Colbert pushed them open, revealing to the trio the humongous dining hall of the Tristain Academy of Magic, the students were just about to start their dinner.
This action was noticed immediately by everyone within the hall, causing all eyes to shoot towards the newcomers. As their eyes landed on the three, gasps were heard as some of them quickly linked their huge figures to the only person they knew that had the same figure, that of Naruto's. A couple even saw the similarities between the blonde guy and Naruto and immediately remembered the terrifying ordeal of the Zero's familiar flexing his elemental muscles just a couple days ago, causing them to shiver in fright as they sat rigid at the sight of who they presume – and correctly at that – to be Naruto's daughter and son, though the other, similarly massive lady were total strangers to them.
Mito caught sight of all this, causing her to deadpan, {It seems that Father left a lasting impression of himself on these children.}
{He sure did,} Kushina replied just as expressionless. {Oh look, that guy was sweating bullets.}
{And so does some of the staff up there,} said Minato as his eyes caught the sight of the staff who was sitting behind a massive table at the end of the dining hall, some of them already trembling with fear, their eyes wide as they saw the figure of the person that they're most terrified of at the end of the room, though it seemed like he changed genders while having more of him present. The room's atmosphere simultaneously became heavy with oppression and fear, something that definitely wasn't missed by the trio.
{Wow,} Kushina said again. {He REALLY left an impression on these guys.}
{He did,} Mito said.
{Father always had a penchant for flair and drama,} Minato said next, echoing the sentiments of his twin. {Just like you, sis.}
{Can't help that,} Kushina said, puffing her chest in pride. {I'm his first child, anyway. It's a given that I'd follow him in a lot of his ways.}
As they walked towards the table, already understanding why Colbert told them to follow him, Colbert was at the staff table where he sat calmly even with some of the other staff looking at him in both fear and anger, almost like they're saying that he was insane. [Colbert! Why are there more of those blasted monster here?!] a professor asked beside him. [Do you not see his skills last week?!]
[I do,] Colbert calmly said as he eyed the dinner that was prepared in front of him. A magnificent dinner as always, he thought. [And I believe that we have nothing to fear from them. Just do not antagonize them, and they will not harm you.]
[He is right,] said another voice that came suddenly from behind them all, the figure of Osmond appearing without warning behind them. [Do not do anything to them, and I'm sure that they will not harm us. They were just here to look for their father, though I have no idea how they ended up here. Unlike Naruto, no one summoned them here this time.]
[Father?!] another professor asked in abject fear. [The monster breeds?!]
[He does,] Osmond said, sipping his wine calmly. [He told me of his sons and daughters, some of them here, as you could see. However, we did not understand everything that they said, and vice versa. I have no idea what they were speaking. However, if there's one thing that I knew by fact is that they meant no harm.]
[How can you be so sure of that?!] a women's voice squeaked among the staff's seating.
[If they do, we won't be here, eating our dinner,] Osmond said calmly, having a spoonful of the delicious minestrone that was the entrée before continuing. [They'd destroy the Academy in mere seconds before creating a huge path of destruction to wherever they wanted, with us powerless to stop them.]
Meanwhile, the trio went to the rows of tables, trying to look for a place to sit down. {There aren't many people here,} said Kushina.
{Maybe because there really aren't many of them here,} Minato answered. {For a place this big, they didn't really have the best land usage with the massive empty grounds and all.}
Finally realising that there's no place for them to sit down, they decided to make their own. Going to the entrance of the grand dining hall, Minato unsealed a table from his arm, thinking, {At least our skills still worked here. Just Hiraishin was affected somehow. Strange…} He then unsealed his own chair, a chair large enough and strong enough for his Astartes body before sitting on it.
Mito and Kushina followed suit, unsealing their own chairs and sat down before Kushina asked. {Okay, so we're going to send Shadow Clones to dad's location, but we must first remove their surveillance on us.}
{Right,} Mito answered. Not a difficult task for them, truthfully.
{Then what?} Kushina asked again. She really wasn't much of a planner. Her usual task was to destroy things, and mercilessly. Despite her age, experience and power, planning wasn't something that she was really good at. It's not that she cannot plan at all, it's just that she liked to relegate the task of doing so to her betters, and in this case, it's the twins.
{We'll need to either learn their language somehow, or just wait for Father to come back,} Minato said next. {From the way it seems, Father will definitely come back, though we have no idea when. Though there's a chance that when our clones reached him, he'll return immediately.}
{Why not just rush towards where he is? We could just skip all this things and get where he was before going back to the Elemental Nations,} Kushina said.
{We have no idea where he was, or even what he was doing right now,} Minato said. {He may be captured-} Kushina immediately scoffed at this. Their father? Captured? It'll take more than an army to even disable him, much less capturing him. {-or under attack, or something else. We have no knowledge on his current situation, and going in blindly is not our style. It's more like yours.}
{Damn right!} Kushina said with utmost pride. Her favourite strategy was the simplest there was – go full throttle at the enemy and crush them under the power and force of the Uzumaki-Namikaze's Hanyou Astartes bloodline. It rarely failed, though she knew when to be discreet and hidden. And from the way it seemed, this would be the time for stealth and covert, not to go 'full power maximum destruction'. {So that means… we'll stay here, check how the locals work and act, and just lay low until we could find Dad. That it?}
{A good summarization as any,} Minato said calmly, his eyes remaining unblinking as they scanned the gaggle of students and staff for any threatening behaviour. Noting none, he continued. {For now, we need to find a way to learn their language if we're able. If not, guess we'll need to… hunt,} he said, the end part exclaimed after a pause. Minato never liked hunting people for knowledge, though he understood just as well that it's a tool within their bloodline, meant to be a gift for them. It may not be a good habit, but it helps them when they're in a foreign place such as this.
Quite a distance away, Kirche was sitting beside her good friend Tabitha as she observed the trio of hanyou from afar, already setting her sights on Minato. [Hmm… If he's as powerful as Naruto, then I'd say that he's a good catch, don't you think?]
Tabitha was reading a book as usual before Kirche's sudden comment struck her, causing her to peek an eye over the book she was reading and looked at the trio. Slowly she placed her book down and observed the three with her eyes, observing every little detail that she could about them. Slowly she spoke. [Powerful. Like Naruto.]
[Hmm?] Kirche replied, a finger on her chin. [So that's what you think? But Naruto could be considered a huge fish too. And that is definitely his son, if his height and looks were to be believed…] Kirche said, slowly licking her lips of the prospect of 'owning' such a powerful person.
Minato saw this from afar, already feeling her lecherous gaze on him even from their distance. {It seems that I already have a fangirl here despite every signs to the contrary.}
{Are you kidding?!} Kushina said incredulously as her eyes scanned the people present, trying to locate the so-called fangirl before her eyes landed on the lusty look of Kirche's face. A quick look on her face made her realise something. {Well, if you were to look at it, it seems that she's the kind that hits on everyone.}
{She sure is,} Mito said next. {Not a good mate candidate.}
{Wait,} Minato said, suddenly having an idea on what to do with her. Quickly he stood, not caring about the looks of fear and shock thrown his way by the people within the hall. With his huge strides, he walked towards where Kirche was, his face in his usual stoic mask.
Kirche saw Minato stood and started walking and asked Tabitha. [Hey, Tabitha, do you think he saw me?]
[Possible,] she answered simply, a hand already reaching towards the staff on her lap. [Ready to engage.]
Before Kirche could say anything, Minato was already in front of her, his entire 7'1" height towering over her as his fearsome aura leaked from his every pore, his pupilless eyes nearly boring holes into Kirche as it stared straight into her soul. Kirche, ever the fearless one quickly placed her most sexy face before she purred, [Hello there… care for a chat?] she said, her sultry voice an aphrodisiac to lesser men.
Unfortunately for her, Minato was definitely not a lesser man.
A hard look was on his face as he stood over Kirche, giving her a look that's sharper than steel. Her gaze penetrates deep into her soul, the oppressive feeling such a simple gaze created would've driven some people mad with fear or terror.
However, Kirche, just like how Minato wasn't a lesser man, was not one to back up from just a simple glare.
Instead, she smiled sweetly in return. Before Kirche could say anything however, Minato offered her a hand, still with the same hard look.
Kirche was obviously shocked at this action as she recoiled from his offered hand. It's not that she was expecting him to just accept her invitation, but she also didn't expect him to come there himself and gave her a hand. Once again licking her lips as if she's found the best prey, she lifted her own hand, not forgetting to give her considerable chest a good squeeze with her arms as she crossed one arm below her bust and handed another for a shake, all the while Tabitha was watching silently, preparing herself for any actions the hanyou might take with Kirche.
Her small, dainty hand came close to Minato's relatively large hand before, with a strong grasp, Minato shook her hand, still not letting up his stony visage as he shook hand with the ever playful Kirche. Kirche, meanwhile, felt Minato's powerful, vice-like grip on her hand and nearly flinched from the grip. However, like a true seductress, she savoured every inch of Minato's tough hands, getting the feel of his thick, leathery Astartes skin, while her mind was wandering as she imagined the feeling of those strong arms as it roamed all over her body sensually, feeling every nook and every cranny of her luscious figure…
Minato can't help but felt a little bit of worry as she watched the girl in front of her suddenly gain a blush with a look of ecstasy on her face for some reason. However, having dealt with many fangirls in his 300 years of life, he understood why. She was definitely a lecher, that's for sure.
{Do not ogle me anymore. I am not your toy or your target, nor will I ever be,} Minato said, his hard voice booming through the silence of the hall's stunned denizens. {Remember that.} His powerful voice echoed through the forced silence of the hall, reaching through every corner and into every ear.
After this short speech, he quickly pulled his hand after letting go of hers, causing her to sigh in disappointment before he left, heading back towards his siblings. Kirche watched as he walked, still feeling the warmth of his hand on hers. [Mmm…] she said, rubbing the hand on her cheek. [Very, very sexy…] she added, her eyes lidded with lust as she watched Minato from afar.
[Dangerous,] Tabitha said, letting her hand go from her wand as she felt the threat go. [Powerful. Mysterious. Strange eyes.]
[Mmm…] Kirche said, placing a finger on her chin in confusion. [Those eyes of his made him look unique and dangerous, that's for sure. Makes me… want him more…] she said with a small moan of pleasure at the end from the thrill of her future chase.
Minato can't help but feel weirded out by Kirche's extremely direct and sensual advances as he left, already knowing that Tabitha would just continue her reading, being the kind of person she was just from his observation. With long, purposeful strides, he reached their table before sitting down, his eyes still looking towards the red-haired girl.
{So,} Kushina said with a grin on her face. {You failed eh?}
{She's more stubborn than I thought,} Minato said, not even flinching at her sister's small snicker at the end. {Though her ways felt more of that of a prostitute looking for customers.}
{She had no qualms as to who's her target though,} Mito said, also looking at Kirche. {Most would beg you to stop that stare. She took it in stride.}
{No matter,} Minato said. {She'll give up after a while if I were to ignore her.}
{Well,} Kushina said, leaning on the table with her elbows on the surface. {Why not just give her what she wants? From the way she looks like, what she wanted would probably be your dick,} she said, never bothered with tact or even any sugarcoating of her words. {Just fuck her a couple times, show him how you put that Astartes bloodline of yours to good... use,}
He glared at his sister, already hating her evil grin. How dare she even suggest such action! {Sis,} he began as he gave a terrifying glare to her sister. {That isn't even a possibility. I am not someone that would just fuck any random people who was attracted to me.}
{Aww...} Kushina pouted, completely ignoring his brother's baleful glare. {That's sad... Might even get her off your case, you know.}
{Hmph.} He harrumphed before crossing his arms, ignoring his sister. {Still...} he began again, trying to move away from the topic of the sudden fangirl that he had here. {These people... they don't have much chakra. In fact, it's only a bit more than a civilian's.}
{Yeah,} Kushina said, being serious for once. {Their chakra's so small that if I were to unleash mine, they'll probably be blown away if they didn't outright die from the pressure.}
{True,} Mito answered next. {In combat terms, it would be easy for us to overpower them both physically and power-wise. However, we still had no understanding of this world to act rashly.}
{Yeah,} Kushina said, her eyes locked into one of the maids running around as they served the nobles with their food. {And from what I could tell, they used a caste-based system, and that the people in this hall would probably be the nobles.}
{And judging from their age, they're probably still young, so it is easy for us to deduce that this would be an academy or a school of some sorts,} Mito reasoned, hitting right at the marker. {Though we have no idea what they were taught about, the people at the end over there would definitely be the teachers of this academy.}
{What about we take a tour of this place?} Kushina suggested. {Might gave us some insight at what they did here, among others.}
{A good idea,} Minato said, nodding his agreement. {When should we start?}
{Now is fine,} Mito said, quickly standing up from her seat and quickly unsealing the chair, followed by her sister and her twin next. {We'll need some more information on this place before we could act.}
{Agreed,} Minato said as he sealed the table back into his arm before walking behind their sister as were their usual formation, Kushina ahead, Mito and Minato at her flanks at both sides.
{Minato,} Kushina said as she pushed open the ornately carved door to the dining hall.
{Yes?}
{I still think that you need to give her some good dicking,} Kushina said with a grin as she exited the hall.
{For the last time, I will not,} he answered calmly before exiting the hall as well Mito following closely with a sigh.
Osmond watched as they left the hall, the hundreds of pairs of eyes within the hall followed their departure before a collective sigh of relief was heard from the entire hall. He then heard Colbert asked him. [Is it wise to just let the three do what they liked within the academy?]
[It's not like we could stop them, no?] he calmly said. [Besides, we understood nothing about them. For now, it's better if we were to just let them do what they want. If they were as old as Naruto was, they'd know better than to touch random objects or bother our classes.]
Colbert stayed silent for a while before replying. [I guess that's true enough,] he said. [So, should we continue our classes for now?]
[You should,] Osmond replied. [But first, I'll need to inform the students of them.] Wiping his mouth, he stood up, ready to address his beloved students. "Students of the Tristain Academy of Magic!" he shouted, drawing all attention upon him as he prepared to speak his announcement. "As all of you had seen, we have some... special visitors to the academy! If you think that they're familiar, it's because they are. From what we have learned, they're the son and daughters of a familiar of one of the academy's student, of Uzumaki-Namikaze Naruto, familiar of our own Louise Françoise le Blanc de La Vallière!"
The screams of outrage and fear that was heard was deafening, but it's not something that he had no experience in controlling. "SILENCE!" he screamed out loudly before clearing his throat. "Where was I? Oh yes. You should know this. Despite the fact that you feared their father, I assure you that they meant us no harm. Just don't do anything threatening to them."
"As you already know, Naruto, Louise's familiar had shown an incredible grasp of power last week, if we still remember the events of the Springtime Familiar Exhibition," he said, looking at the students of his academy. "It is safe to assume that his son and daughter would also have the same power. We do not want to see that power turned against us, so do not provoke them. Just let them be. Avoid them completely to make things simpler for all of you. Now, all of you are dismissed. Please continue with your regular routines, and don't worry about them."
As the students were nervously shuffling out the hall, the trio were walking towards one of the outer towers of the academy, Kushina leading them as usual. "So, we have nothing to do right now, right?" she asked her siblings.
"We do not," Mito answered.
"So let's spar!" she said cheerfully.
"Absolutely not," Mito replied back quickly. "We have no idea of their allegiance nor their powers. What we know is that this is an academy that taught unknown skills. For all we know, they might be supernatural hunters, ready to kill unnatural beings like us at any moment." The fact that they might just destroy the academy accidentally went unsaid.
"Yeah, you're right," Kushina said, her mood deflating quickly at Mito's words.
"I have a suggestion," Minato suddenly said. "I just scouted something interesting with my Byakugan just now, so I think we should check it."
"Oh? And where would this 'something interesting' of yours be?" Kushina asked.
"It's somewhere over there," she said, pointing towards an area close to the academy's main building, situated beside a square-shaped structure that seemed attached to the main tower.
"Well, let's go then!" Kushina said before she merrily walked towards the location Minato specified, humming the tune to a song she heard before. But as they were getting closer and closer, Kushina realised what made Minato so interested in the place. Seeing the heat signature and the voices, she saw that the place was actually where the strange animals from before gathered. "So, this is what you're interested at," Kushina said, getting the reason why her brother wanted to go there.
"Yes," he answered, agreeing. "These creatures… they were different than the ones in our world. They were unlike anything else that we ever saw, and we have seen a lot. Studying them will help with the creatures that we might find in this foreign world in case of any trouble."
"I suppose," Kushina said, slowly walking towards the corner. Just as she peeked from it, she saw a whole group of strange, otherworldly animals that she never saw before, causing her mouth to gape in shock. A gigantic armoured mole, a bat, and was that a dragon?! "Holy crap!" she exclaimed in shock. "What the hell are these guys!?" She then turned towards her siblings. "Did you see them before?"
"We don't know, and we did," Mito said. "It's not something important, or so we first thought. But there might just be something that could help us here, so it's better that we check them out now."
"Fine with me," Kushina said, shrugging off her disappointment at her siblings before walking straight towards the gathering of strange animals. However, just as she came close to them, the animals suddenly hissed and shrieked in anger and fear before retreating as far away from her as possible, huddling the walls of the building for safety, still hissing and shrieking for some reason.
"Wha…" she said before she slowly walked towards the animals, her arm outstretched. "Don't worry, you guys. I won't harm you. Just want to pet you," she cooed as she came closer, Mito and Minato observing the actions of the animals with rapt attention, even having their Byakugan activated and focused at the animals.
For every inch that Kushina stepped, the animals get more and more agitated, no matter how much she tried persuading them that she meant no harm. Cornered by the wall of the main tower, the animals were unable to run, so they turned around and faced Kurumi, their fight-and-flight response already at their maximum if the increase in body heat that she saw was accurate and their biology was the same as a regular animal in their country.
Suddenly, a red-coloured lizard, as big as an alligator jumped in front of the pack before its mouth opened wide. Before Kushina could ask herself what it was doing, she saw the rapid increase of temperature within the gaping mouth of the lizard and reacted accordingly.
Seallessly she spewed out water onto the ground, the massive Suiton: Water Encampment Wall protecting her from the sudden ball of flame that the lizard spewed at her, together with four more balls of flame, the Suiton: Water Encampment Wall sizzling as the fireballs dissipated harmlessly on her massive barrier of water, not harming her a bit.
The lone salamander stood still as the waters receded, revealing the figure of Kushina already far behind the wall of water, her eyes alert and ready, scanning everything for any further threat. The salamander looked into Kushina's eyes defiantly before its mouth opened. "GYUUUUUU!" it squealed, screaming its challenge at Kushina, intent on protecting its fellow familiars behind it.
"Heh," Kushina scoffed before she wiped the residual water from her lips from the Suiton: Water Encampment Wall that she spat from her mouth. "Have I lost my touch in this world? I even got shocked from a stupid flaming spit coming from a flame-breathing lizard."
"You two!" she said to Mito and Minato, both of them standing stoically beside her, Byakugan activated to see the animals' physiology better. "You better watch carefully! Take note!" not caring about her siblings' answer, she lowered herself to her battle position, ready to react to anything that might come. It seems that the animals were somehow agitated by her mere presence, and in that agitation of theirs, they decided to attack her.
A bad move.
A slow rumble was the only warning for her as the ground underneath her erupted, the figure of a human-sized brown armoured mole jumping from it with a loud squeak, intent on clawing her. But just as it swiped its claw, it realised that it hit nothing but air.
Before it could question anything, a powerful fist landed on its side, launching it at high speeds towards the wall behind them as it squeaked loudly. "SQUEEEEEEEEEAK!" went the armoured mole before it smashed into the ancient wall, cracking it and nearly killing the animal.
As the mole was writhing in pain, a large snake-like animal with yellow scales and a green diamond-shaped mark on its head shot towards Kushina, hissing as it darted towards the figure of Kushina, intent on avenging its fellow familiar. With an extremely quick strike, it tried to wrap around Kushina, crushing her with its powerful muscles.
Keyword being 'tried'.
The snake felt its target disappear in a whoosh of wind before a kick on its head nearly shattered its skull before the force behind the inhuman kick sent it hurtling towards the same wall where the mole crashed into, sending stone chips flying everywhere as the snake smashed the wall, causing it to cough a wad of blue blood.
Kushina landed with cat-like grace as she smirked, a grin filled with deadliness on her face. "Heh," she said. "It still bleeds, no matter how strange it is. And if it bleeds, I can kill it!" she shouted out the last part as she prepares herself to annihilate the strange animals that dares to attack her, her hand coming together for a jutsu. "And I'll take all of you scared little pieces of fuck together with them!" her hand was in a Tiger sign before she drew in a massive breath, filling all three of her lungs as they were filled with hot Fire Element chakra, chakra kneaded and churned as it prepared for release, intending on annihilating everything in front of her.
Minato saw this and tried to stop her crazed sister. "Sis, sto-"
But it was too late.
"Katon: Great Fire Annihilation!" she thought as she blew as hard as she could. From her mouth poured powerful bright orange flames that rushed from her mouth straight towards the frightened animals, the powerful flames unstoppable as it swept everything, burning anything that was close, not even carting whether it is a friend or an enemy. The air around her instantly dried up, all the moisture burned away by the intense flames she spat, the sea of flames roaring forwards, gobbling everything in its path in a funeral of fire.
But just as Kushina was about to celebrate her victory, a sudden, massive wall of earth erupted from the ground in front of her wave of fire, the hemispherical wall blocking her flames as the fires washed harmlessly over the earthen construct. "Wha…" Kushina said, stumped that someone managed to stop her jutsu.
The flames of the jutsu washed away over the huge earthen wall, burning everything around it mercilessly as it swept beside the massive wall, the flames dissipating harmlessly after expending its temporary volatile nature burning everything but the wall to crisp, the ashes scattered by the winds towards every corner of the academy.
The wall slowly receded back into the ground where it came from, revealing the figure of a figure of a sizeable lady with a black clothing and purple cloak with a purple pointy hat with the same bronze coloured clasp holding the cloak behind the massive wall, together with the sight of a blonde ponytailed girl and a blonde haired, handsome looking boy holding the animals, the huge snake and the armoured mole for them respectively.
Chevreuse was both surprised and afraid. Surprised, because the three titans suddenly attacked the young nobles' familiar for no reason at all. It was only by coincidence that she was passing by with a group of students trying to have some after class study group after the dinner that she managed to create the earth wall to stop the gigantic conflagration from killing all the familiar and burning the academy's buildings down. She was completely sure that that gigantic inferno could burn down the stone tower to a crisp.
Afraid, because of the power that she just demonstrated. That gigantic sea of flames that she conjured out of her mouth swept through everything mercilessly, burning with a single touch, a level of devastation barely matched by the strongest of Square Fire Magic that she ever saw performed. In fact, she was sure that such an intense flame wasn't possible for even a Square Fire Mage. The fire was so hot, it actually baked the parts of the wall that the fire crashed into and nearly melting it, almost burning the occupants behind it. Luckily, the onslaught stopped not long after, keeping all of them safe though sweating profusely from the increased temperature.
The second reason why she was afraid was because of their father. She, together with the other staff and students saw Naruto's demonstration of power during the Springtime Familiar Exhibition, and can't help but be awed and fearful at his skills. And his daughter had demonstrated that her skills would be equal, if not the same, as her father's. However, right now, his daughter, if what Osmond said was correct, had harmed a noble's familiar, their partner for life, a being with a piece of their summoner's soul imprinted on them as well. Harming a familiar is equal to harming the noble as well, and is not something forgivable.
Torn between fear at Kushina's power and the fact that two of her student's familiar was attacked by this strange being in front of her, her hand trembled as she balled it into a fist. At one hand, she was powerful, extremely so, if that one fire magic that she just used was an indicator. At the other, she had a though in her mind to make the giant in front of her pay for her slight, and to show that the nobles of Tristain could even go toe-to-toe with her and her kind when necessary. And for that one fleeting moment, pride and anger took hold over her, taking over her ability to make a choice as she forgot the warning said by Osmond just now.
Making up her mind, she shouted her challenge, concealing her slightly trembling voice beneath a will as strong as the earth that she had her runic name from. [I am Chevreuse the Red Earth! You have harmed the familiars of not one, but two nobles! That is a grave offense!] She yelled towards Kushina before she slowly took her wand from a pocket in her mage robes. [And for that, I'll have to subdue you!] With a flourish of her wand, multiple clumps of rocks shot from the ground in front of her before forming an army of Stone Golems, all of them holding various sizes of different kinds of weapons, from spears, clubs, morningstars to swords. [Stone Golem Army! Get her!] she screamed out loud, causing the army of golems, numbering about a hundred of them to shoot ahead, ready to subdue or take down Kushina by any means necessary.
Guiche was busy weeping over his not-yet-dead familiar Verdandi when he heard the gentle Professor Chevreuse yell her runic name and Kushina's offense, causing him to look at Chevreuse with tears still flowing from his eyes before he saw her took out her wand and summoned an entire army of Stone Golems with just a gesture. [Amazing…] he said in awe at Chevreuse's power. [So this is the power of a Triangle Mage…] he muttered, intending on watching the battle with everything he had, intent on not becoming another disgrace like that time when he duelled with the Zero.
Kushina had a bloodthirsty grin on her face as she watched the hundred strong Stone Golem army rushed her, weapons held high with the intent on using them while Chevreuse stood at the back of the army. {Interesting,} she said, her eyes glinting with both curiosity and battle hunger. {Interesting!} She screamed louder before she stood to her full height, the size of the golems childish compared to hers. {Then hear me!} she shouted her reply. Though they didn't understand one another, she understood the essence of her words: a challenge to her.
"I am Uzumaki-Namikaze Kushina! First-Born Astartes! First Daughter of the Emperor! First Princess of the Nations!" she screamed before she crouched, her hand held far to her right. "I will crush every enemy that I encounter! I will destroy every opposition, and annihilate them from the world!" in a poof of smoke, her favourite weapon appeared in her hand. It was a shovel, a 6' long shovel from end to tip with a rhombus-shaped, gold coloured handle in the middle with a free-flowing ribbon tied on it and a triangular-shaped handle. The head was made of gleaming silver with ornate gold markings at the flat side, the point as sharp as a freshly sharpened sword. "With my weapon, the Earthrend in my hand, I will tear you apart!"
Mito just facepalmed herself as she saw this. "Oh great," she said. "Sis took out Earthrend. This won't last long."
"She really never knew how to hold back," Minato said, barely holding back the same urge to facepalm.
Ignoring her siblings, Kushina dashed forwards, Earthrend in hand. Meeting the charge head-on, Kushina slammed Earthrend on the ground, the powerful shock it caused sent the Stone Golems flying away before with a sweep of the same weapon, she sent a chakra blast with it, destroying the golems with impunity as her eyes glowed in bloodthirst as she saw the oncoming army of Rock Golems. Kushina roared as Earthrend struck true, her sweep crushing more of the Rock Golems.
A whistle caught her ears before she saw a massive number of stone spears flew towards her position, intent on skewering her. With a grin on her face, she swept Earthrend skywards, sending a blast of chakra so potent it destroyed the Golems in a wave of bluish chakra before she brought it on the ground again, causing the ground to shatter and rose around her, crushing the golems that were about to smash her head in.
She rampaged among the golems, each swing of Earthrend destroyed golems left and right. Attacks couldn't even touch her as she danced with her most beloved shovel, forged by her father during ages long past, every single move of hers crushed her enemies. A fist caught a golem's head, blowing it. A heel drop split another in twain. A throw of Earthrend destroyed an entire line of the golems. An uppercut destroyed another even as the downwards returning elbow crushed one more, the elbow quickly turning into a handstand for Kushina to backflip in the middle of the enemy group before she spun with her weapon in hand, Earthrend destroying even more golems without mercy.
Chevreuse's false confidence from before eroded as fast as her golems were destroyed within the huge typhoon of destruction that was Kushina with Earthrend in her hand, the massive numbers doing nothing to even slow her down as she was cut down to half the number of golems that she started with in less than a minute. Her face paled together with the gathered young nobles as they watched their teacher, a Triangle Mage, got her golem army decimated at speeds unlike anything they've ever seen, Kushina's devastating weapon and strength at full display as shards of rocks were sent flying every which way from Kushina's non-systematic annihilation of the army of Rock Golems.
"Professor!" cried Guiche from behind her. "Don't you have anything else?! She'll destroy everything if this goes on!"
Chevreuse was snapped out of her shock as she heard her student asked her something like that. Of course she do! She's a Triangle Mage, for Brimir's sake! She had more than that in her arsenal! Quickly holding her wand in front of her, she chanted her magical aria, ready to unleash another spell to defeat Kushina, her melodious chant floating around her students, calming them.
As a fist of Kushina's caught the head of another golem in its lethal path, her hand grabbed the head of another before crushing it with her Astartes strength, leaving nothing but rubble. Amidst her battle hunger, she heard the slow voice of Chevreuse's singing as she devastated the last quarter of her golems intent on heading towards her as well. Suddenly, the pieces of golems that was all over the ground rolled and moved, and headed towards where Chevreuse's position was, gathering upon her body like magnet attracting balls of steel.
In seconds, where Chevreuse once was stood a mighty Giant Rock Golem, its 15 meter height and sheer size displaying the amount of power that the golem had. The very sight of the golem made her students let out a relieved sigh at the thought of her defeating that giant over there. [Monster!] Chevreuse yelled out, her voice distorted from her being the core of the golem. [This is my Giant Stone Golem, my most powerful offensive spell! I shall defeat you and punish you for harming the familiars!]
Kushina's grin got even larger as she saw the massive golem dashed towards her, kicking dust and massive amounts of dirt with every step, a huge fist of rock lifted high up, ready to be brought down on her. {Heh! Now that's a fight!} she screamed as another swipe of Earthrend destroyed another golem. {These pussy-ass bugs weren't even remotely challenging!} she screamed in a battle hunger influenced euphoria before she dashed towards the golem.
An immensely strong stone fist fell on Kushina with all the force of twenty exploding tags, something that would obliterate nearly everything that it hits. But instead of worrying, Kushina pulled her hand, Earthrend with it to her back. At speeds only achievable through hundreds of years of training, she swung as fast as she could, meeting the powerful rock fist directly with the point of Earthrend.
Without warning, the entire rock arm, longer than Kushina was tall exploded in a thunderous explosion, the sound reverberated through the ears of the stupefied students and Chevreuse herself, being the centre of the golem, the shards of rocks flying away from the golem at speed, nearly hitting the students present. Even as the golem staggered backwards from the sudden loss of its arms, Kushina stored Earthrend again before pulling both hand backwards, the palms pointing towards the unsteady golem.
{Eight Trigrams Mountain Crusher!} she thought as she thrust both arms forwards, launching a powerful chakra wave towards the golem even as it was trying to recover the lost arms, rocks rolling on the ground towards it to reform the lost arm. The potent wave of chakra washed over it like sea on a sandcastle, the force sweeping away the tiny rocks as it cracked the front part of the golem before it shattered into pieces, revealing the stunned face of Chevreuse in the middle.
Before she could even be surprised, Kushina appeared in front of her in a blur of motion, her face shining with glee at her terrified look. "Well, well, look what the golem brought in~" she said in a singsong tone. "End of the line for you, my dear! Hahaha!" Kushina cackled evilly as she pulled her fist back to punch Chevreuse in the face, happy at the terrified face of Chevreuse as she saw her end coming in the form of a mighty punch to the face.
She was closing her eyes as tightly as possible as she uttered prayers to Brimir in her heart, not wanting to be killed in such a brutal manner, with a fist to the face. A fist that's probably powerful enough to cave her entire skull in, if not pop her head like a grape. But after a while, the fist that she expected didn't come. No force, no feel of onrushing wind, no KI that alerted her of the knuckles of bonemetal alloy that she was anticipating hitting her face.
Peeking a nervous eye open, she saw that Kushina was walking away, her burnt clothes the only sign that she was in battle just now, burns that weren't even caused by her. She let out a massive sigh of relief after greedily swallowing life-giving air that she forgot to breathe in from the absolute fear that she felt with Kushina at her face. Immediately her golem crumbled back to earth, her sitting in the huge pile of earth as she fell together with the golem in relief even as her students watched in both horror and relief, the former because she beat their teacher practically effortlessly, and the latter because they weren't killed yet.
Kushina left the battle site with a smile on her face as she waved her hand to the back, not taking the chance to finish off Chevreuse. Going back to her siblings, she was about to ask them about the battle when she saw their confused face. "What?" she asked. "Something on my face? I got some dirt on me from that woman?"
"No, no," Minato answered.
"It's just..." Mito said next, almost continuing what her twin said. "You never hold back before. You even took out Earthrend, yet she didn't have any injuries or anything."
"Hmm..." Kushina said, rubbing her stubble-free chin, a side effect of being an Astartes. For some reason, the women grew facial hairs, forcing a constant shave on their side, though she only used a wind chakra coated finger to do the trick. Works wonders, and it's quite fast. "It's just..." Kushina paused, trying to find some good words to describe what she felt. "It's just that she's too weak," she finally said. "I didn't get a good fight out of her. Those golems were pussies, and she was barely standing as I met her face to face."
"But you pulled your punches," Minato said next. "You hit her with less force than you did to us in training. Even the smaller kids wouldn't feel something like that. Heck, jutsu-wise, the Great Fire Annihilation that you did before was even more powerful than the Eight Trigrams Mountain Crusher that you used on her. In fact, I was expecting you to split the earth and drop both her and this academy into the ground."
"Hitting you guys at less than full power is less effective than dropping water into an ocean," Kushina replied. "Yeah, true that," she continued, trying to find a way to say what's on her mind. "I know I usually look like a battle-hungry Astartes hanyou-"
"You are," both the twins deadpanned at the same time.
"-but the truth of the matter is that I still know when to hold back and not kill everything that took a pass at me-" she said again, ignoring their blank words.
"You do," the twins added again, as deadpan as before.
"Okay!" Kushina snapped to her siblings. "I admit, I do, and I am! But just now, she was not fun at all, and the fact was that she was too weak to be a challenge. I took out Earthrend to intimidate her, maybe make her take out something else instead, but it seems that the only thing she could do was some strange Doton jutsu or something. Besides, we need a subject to see their skills right? Well, you got one!"
She faced her siblings' stoic gazes for almost entire minute, no words passing between them. Finally, the silence was broken by Minato who lets out a sigh. "Whatever, sis. At least we learned something."
"One:" Mito continued, lifting a finger. "Whatever those strange animals were, they had a certain bond with another person, like that guy with that huge mole. There was no way he could understand whatever that mole said, unless they had some sort of bond over each other."
"Second:" Minato added. "They didn't use jutsu, or even chakra for that matter. Whatever they did, that lady did with the earth, it was all using a different rule than ours. A rule that, as of yet, unknown. More observation would be required."
"Third:" Mito said again, continuing her twin's explanation. "From this, we could deduce that this academy taught their pupils, the ones behind her being some of them, this strange art of theirs."
"And fourth:" Minato added. "Was that they were all of high class, if the difference between the student's clothes and the ones worn by the servants were of any indication."
"Wow," Kushina whistled. "You guys really learned all of that from just watching how they act? Damn you're good."
"We know you do too," they said at the same time. "You just hid it well."
"Heh," Kushina said, scoffing at their answers. "That's why you're the master of infiltration, and I'm a master at blowing shit up." This wasn't actually true, because Naruto trained his children to do everything well. It's just that some of them had a certain predisposition to something, some aspect of their training. Kushina had, as she crassly put it in words, a disposition to blowing shit up, something that she did with glee.
Mito and Minato? They're recon and intelligence specialists, the best spies in the elemental nations.
However, it's not like each didn't have the other's skill. Kushina could observe just as well as any elite spy, capable of learning one's habits and quirks given some time. Mito and Minato also tend to blow things up in various incredible ways when they need to or they want to. In fact, to the twins, Kushina was even more dangerous than they were due to her usual habits. Beneath the playful act of hers hides a personality with cunning unlike any other matched with a brutality only known to some of the worst kinds of people. Many have been caught unaware of her machination, thinking that she was just some sort of playful governor. They have been proven wrong time and time again.
"Right," Kushina said. "So... what now?"
Meanwhile, Chevreuse was sitting at the disappearing mound of her golem, looking with fear-filled eyes at the siblings as she recalled the battle just now. "I... I cannot do anything," she thought. "My golems... she destroyed them with a hit. Even my Giant Rock Golem, my most powerful magic was destroyed with two attacks. Even before that, those flames of hers... they're unnatural. She was about to kill me. Why didn't she? I've lost..." she thought again.
"Professor! Are you alright!?" said Guiche as she ran towards the still catatonic professor.
With her mouth gaping in surprise, fear and relief, she slowly turned her head towards Guiche who bent down and tried to help her stand. As she swung a hand over his neck, having him lift her up, she said into his ear. "Guiche. Whatever you do, do not challenge them. Do not anger them. Do not try to fight them. Just now... I thought I saw the Death God in front of me."
Guiche just remained silent at this before nodding his acceptance. He understood better than she thought, having lost to Louise in a duel. Even their student, trained quickly in a short while managed to defeat a Line Mage without much difficulty. Without using any magic at all! And now, as he saw the way she battled a Triangle Mage and batted her down without much effort, he knew better. Much better than nearly anyone in Tristain, or even Halkeginia for that matter. They may be brutes, but they were strong brutes. Brutes so powerful that they would eat him for breakfast and use his bones as toothpicks if he even looked at them strangely. Then kill his entire family, burn their corpse and scatter the ashes to the four corners of the world before torching their mansion and salting the ground that they own.
Or worse.
As he dragged the professor towards the gaggle of students, two Water Mages, both of them of Line level came from the tower, rushing behind another student who went away and called the healers immediately, hoping to heal both the students and the injured familiars. Seeing the state the grounds were in, they gasped in shock before quickly tending to their respective patients, one heading for the familiars while the other going straight towards Chevreuse. "Chevreuse, what happened here?!" the Water Mage asked as she reached Guiche and Chevreuse, trying to ignore the blackened grass that was once a beautifully kept field.
"C-Clarisse… " Chevreuse said, her voice faltering as she saw her friend coming to help her. "I…"
"Stop talking," she said as she crouched beside the downed Chevreuse, Guiche watching in worry. Her hand was quickly covered with water as she swept them over her body, checking her vitals and her body for any injuries. "You're fine," she said. "Just startled. Calm down. I'll heal you up."
Guiche was watching all this, looking at Chevreuse's fallen figure being treated by the Water Mage before his anger flared, remembering his defeat at the hands of Louise and the ease of which Chevreuse was defeated by Kushina. He nearly turned and showed her a piece of his mind when he remembered. The Zero didn't even need any special powers or anything to beat him up, just bare hands and a huge amount of brute force unlike anything that he ever saw before.
But a small thought grew at the back of his mind. What if, instead of opposing them, he was to join them? Their immense powers were visible even from the short scrap that they got into due to Chevreuse attacking her, though not before they attacked his Verdandi. A capital offense, but from what he could see from his familiar's eyes as their runes called him, he attacked first, so it was a just retribution if he were to say so, no matter how much he hated the fact that she attacked her. Though her retaliation was quite disproportionate to his crime, seeing how he failed to harm her even a little.
He then looked towards the siblings, looking at how she was discussing with her siblings about something in their strange language. Recalling his beating by the Zero, he thought of what he could do with such power. Louise was trained by their father in just a short while, yet she was capable of such strength and power. What if he, a magic-able noble, a person with a born disposition for power, was trained by the same person? The thought was both terrifying and stimulating at the same time, and he gained shivers from his line of thinking.
However, there was one thing that he understood. If he were to ask them for some teaching, he'll have quite the obstacle to him, which was the language barrier between them. They understood nothing about what he said, and their language was incomprehensible to him. He might as well have spoken to a wandering tiger if he were to try and communicate with them.
"Aa~h," Kushina yawned, stretching her massive body as she did so. "That was a really lame fight." Her eyes went towards the group of strange animals, all of them more fearful than ever as they looked her in the eyes. "There's no foxes in the animals too. Sucks..."
"We can communicate with them if there's any," Minato reasoned. "But there's none, so there's nothing we could do."
"And they felt our demonic aura," Mito added. "Thus why they feared us."
"Yeah," Kushina said, agreeing to her siblings' appraisal of the situation. "The Linker Core and our own demonic cores might suppress our powers massively, but the fact still remained that the animals could feel them, unlike humans. They were more or less afraid due to whatever Dad did, so that's why they're so jumpy with us." She then had a finger on her chin as she folded her arms on her ample chest. "Still, I wonder why – or what – Dad did to them that made them so afraid of us," she wondered.
"True," Minato said in reply with a small nod. "We need more information. Meanwhile, we could send out clones to scout the area for any information, and even head to Father's position to inform him of our presence while we stay here, learn as much as we can about the locals while making this our staging area."
"Haa~h" Kushina moaned as she smacked her forehead lightly, bemoaning her siblings. "You guys are just waaaaaaay too militaristic. Lighten up!" she said cheerfully, opening her arms wide. "Enjoy this new scenery!" she waved her hand towards the academy's central tower. "The people!" towards the still-shocked students. "The strange creatures!" once again, waving towards the familiars. "Take some fresh experiences! Don't just go around and be a killjoy!"
"This came from someone who nearly killed a local?" Minato said exasperatedly.
"That's another method to experience the local environment!" Kushina replied, still with a merry tone.
"You play around too much sis," Mito replied next. "We need to find a place to stay though. Any ideas?"
"Yeah, need some lodging for us three," Kushina said, a thoughtful hum from her lips. "Hmmm… what about there?" she added, pointing towards a random area of land within the academy. "That seems fine."
"Anywhere's fine with you, really," Mito said. "Besides, you just picked that randomly right?"
"Yeah," Kushina replied, having the decency to look sheepish as she scratched the back of her head. "But really, anywhere's fine, right?"
"It actually is," Mito replied, just accepting her sister's playful and comical nature as it is. Can't go through life without some sort of humour right? "We'll set up tent there, then we'll just wait until it's night."
"How about a spar?" Kushina asked. "Can't be lax on our training." She just wanted to move her muscles actually. That just now wasn't even a fight!
"Absolutely not!" Minato rejected the idea with a loud voice. "We might just destroy this academy!" And he knew that her sister just wanted to punch something
"Pah… spoilsport," Kushina pouted at her brother's refusal. "Just kidding," she added. Of course she knew that their spar will destroy the academy if it's at full strength. She was just trying to lighten up her brother! He's too hard-headed and too much of a conservative…
As the trio left the area towards the impromptu camp site and the scared students together with the fallen Chevreuse, they missed the sight of a small critter watching everything that happened before, from the attacks of the familiars to Kushina, her uneven payback, short fight between Kushina and Chevreuse and even the discussion and Guiche's sight, everything was not missed by the small mouse beside the other familiars. Unnoticed and unheard, it ran away, scurrying to the main tower.
Osmond closed his eyes with a sigh as he cuts off the connection between him and his familiar, Chuchu, seeing everything that happened before from his familiar's eyes. It seems that they followed their own rule, doing whatever they want, the language barrier between them making it harder for him to have them follow his orders.
He leaned back on his seat, recalling everything that happened and merging them with what he knew of Naruto and his ilk, which wasn't much. For starters, he and his children all had strange physiques. Even Kushina, of whom he said quite often of (though he never described her, they were only identified as his children because of their size and that Kushina looked just like her father) was large and muscular. So was the other lady. Undoubtedly, they were beautiful. But with such powers in them, together with their father being present, he doubted that he'd want to know the colour of their panties soon. Or ever. And not to mention the pupilless eyes of the other two, and that whenever they wanted, the veins around it could bulge suddenly. It was both freaky and intriguing at the same time.
Second was the fact that just like Halkeginian mages, they could manipulate nature to do their bidding. However, their level of control over the elements were nothing short of legendary. Naruto could control 5 elements with just a thought of his mind and a gesture or two. His daughter could breathe out a fiery conflagration larger than anything that he ever saw in his life made by a single technique. It is safe to assume that the other two could do the same as well.
Finally, completely unlike their Halkeginian counterpart, they were very, very good at close combat. Halkeginian mages acted like magical artillery, raining death on their enemies using a variety of spells that corresponds to the element that they were proficient at, being capable of stacking the elements multiple times or combining them with others to change its effects. However, this made them vulnerable at close combat, because their more powerful spells took some time to prepare, allowing the enemy to come close and slaughter them, requiring the presence of regular men and/or their familiar to protect them as they do. Exceptions were available, of course, especially among the Griffon Knights that was trained by Karin, who trained her students on both melee battle and magic attacks, even combining them to create powerful combat techinques, creating what was called the 'Magic Knight' class, a mage who could fight up close with the best of them while engaging in long range magical combat at the same time.
This was completely different than Naruto. Even his daughter had insane close combat skills. Chevreuse's Rock Golems were made to crush small squadrons, yet that lady destroyed them with nothing but hand-to-hand attacks, with the golems unable to touch her at all due to her speeds and skills even with such a massive figure. Louise was trained by Naruto, and she too had a level of close combat skill already extremely high when compared to her peers. In close combat, she'll decimate them even without her familiar helping. It seems that just like Karin, Naruto's training her to be another 'Magic Knight' class, except that she had some sort of superhuman strength augmentation of sorts from the way she demolished Guiche's bronze golems with her bare hands.
Osmond sighed again on his seat. They are going to be a hassle, and that's for sure. For now, he knew that they set camp on the academy's grounds, and there's nothing he could do to stop them. As long as there's no one bugging them or do anything stupid to them, he's sure that they won't bother them. For now, he must think on what to do or say to Chevreuse. She clearly ignored his words to just let them be. Though it's not without reason, and she did save all those familiars. It's both a heroic deed and a stupid idea, especially when she challenged her for no reason. Heroic, because she saved all those familiars, and stupid because she just challenged a powerful half demon of unknown strength who might probably be much stronger than she was.
He heaved a heavy sigh as he sat on his chair. It seems that he's going to go through a bad evening…
-BREAK-
Night falls upon the Tristanian Academy of Magic, enveloping it in a cloak of darkness as the air lay heavy with the cold of the night. The residents of the academy were all asleep as they tucked in their massive beds for the nobles and their rickety wooden beds for the servants. Within the grounds of the academy, a brown tent sat on top of the short grass that was the academy's open areas, no light appearing from it.
The tent was small, measuring only 4' tall with a flat topped pyramid shape with a zipper up front with a base length of 6'. However, using the same seal techniques that were used to make their old mansion on what was once known as The Hidden Leaf Village, the inside was much bigger than the outside, with intricate security seals lining the insides of the zipper and walls to prevent any intruders. It could also be stored easily using a built-in seal, changing it into a small paper talisman with a seal on it.
Inside the tent, one capable of fitting 6 Astartes bloodline carriers comfortably was Kushina, Mito and Minato, all of them meditating facing each other, their eyes closed as their chakra flared around them as they controlled it with their willpower, unleashing their full chakra from their Linker Cores while holding the chakra from just dissipating into nothingness. Slowly the suffocating cloud of chakra disappeared from them, being absorbed back into the body of its owner as their training ends.
Drawing a deep breath before exhaling it sharply, Kushina asked her siblings, "You know, I always found it strange. We already have perfect chakra control thanks to our Linker Core. Why did Dad still trained us in chakra control?"
Mito sighed as she stood and turned around, her back facing her sister. "You know what? I think that you just wanted to ask us two stupid questions. We've been doing this for more than 300 years, and Father already told each of us many times why. And don't say you forgot, because we Astartes cannot forget."
"I know!" Kushina whined as she dropped her back on the floor behind her, her legs still crossed. "Of course I know! Just wanted to play around with you guys!" giving another loud sigh, she continued. "Training all the time… Shit, we're at a new world! Try enjoying it more! Look at the sky and shit! The animals! Not just training our asses off all the time…" she grumbled.
"Now you're just kidding," Minato said as he took his time to stand before continuing. "Even you know that we mustn't let off in our training and continue them as we can whenever we can. Father trained us to train all the time!"
"I know, but this is absurd!" Kushina continued her whine as she jumped to a standing position. "We're in a new freaking world, with strange creatures, strange skills, strange buildings, strange language, and a caste social structure! Not that ours don't have a caste system, but theirs look worse! We should be looking around, looking for information, not sitting in a tent in the middle of somewhere training our chakra capacity!"
"Well, we're going to do just that tonight, Sis," Mito countered her whining.
Minato said nothing before his body morphed, and in an instant was already in his demon form, his single blonde tail wagged in the air as he stretched his entire body, his forelegs outstretched as far as it was able. "Almost missed this form," he said in a wistful tone, never one to show much emotion. The Hyuuga blood is strong in him.
"You really liked your demon form right?" Kushina said before she morphed as well, taking her own demon form with a single tail as well. "I remember you being born in your demon form. I think after that, Dad said that any one of his children who were born in their demon form will favour that form more." Stretching her own body before giving off a huge yawn, she continued. "I was born in my hanyou form, so I favour that form over anything else. Me hiding it was only to make it easier to deal with unknowns."
"We all knew that," Mito said, in her own demon form, her blood red fur shining within the small light bulb of the tent, powered by a Raiton seal. "I favour my hanyou form as well, and Father favoured his human form. Now, everything ready?" she said, looking at the three Shadow Clones that were standing within the tent, two of them ready at the tent's flaps, holding the zipper.
"Ready," Minato said with a heavy tone. "I never liked this. If we should hunt, it's animals, not people."
"It's only for a while," Kushina said, trying to hide her own distaste at this act. She may not like it, but it's both the fastest and easiest way to learn how the locals act. However, she hated it less than her little brother, understanding it as a sort of necessity. Some of her siblings who fell to their animalistic urges ended up becoming crazy for blood, eating anything they came across. Most needed to be put down, and it's up to her. Being feral was never good. "At least we won't go on a blood rampage or anything."
Minato sighed before accepting this small consolation. He was forced to put down some of his own siblings and/or his cousins, and so, he understood where she came from. "You're right," he said slowly in his deep baritone demonic voice. "Let's go."
With a quick leap, Minato jumped out of the tent, followed by Kushina and Mito before the clones inside quickly closed the tent, taking the place of their makers as they ran outside the academy's grounds, the gigantic walls scaled with minute chakra steps as they ran on them before they landed outside the walls, their padded foot silencing their jump with little effort.
The twins flanked Kushina as she took the lead, the veins around their eyes bulged as their Byakugan, also available even when they're in their demon form, fully activated with them scanning the area for any threats or targets of opportunity and to see if there were anyone who saw them. Dashing silently through the huge plains that was the academy's outer grounds, they passed the burnt structure of their father's house with nary a glance as they sped ahead, all senses completely active to locate the signs of anything that might see them.
With silent footsteps they dashed ahead, following the worn road that leads from the academy towards their as-of-yet unknown destination through the bushes, not seeing or sensing the presence of anything worth alerting to the others. Their four legs pumped and pushed as they sped towards the smell of humans, the eyes of Mito and Minato scanning for the signs of any human settlement nearby.
"There's a town up ahead," Mito notified the party after a two-hour non-stop dash at full speed, thenearby foliage parting silently as they brushed upon their silky fur. Regular foxes could not maintain their running speeds for too long lest their body overheats. They were never made for long periods of running. However, for the Uzumaki-Namikazes, the holder of the Astartes bloodline, their bodies, no matter in what form, still carried their bloodlines, allowing them to move faster and far longer than their regular natural counterparts.
"Acknowledged," Kushina replied, all business. She may be playful and friendly, but when she's a woman on a mission, she'll focus everything on it. "Look for any shady character. Scout around, but don't strike first. Observe their movements."
"Copy," the twins replied beside her, the wind splitting apart beside them as they ran towards the village. Not that they didn't know the procedure, but it's better to be reminded of it than not.
Reaching the outskirts of the village, Kushina ordered, not stopping stride. "Split up. Each a target. Make sure no one sees you. Rendezvous here when we're done." She then stopped, looking at her little brother and sister. "And remember," she added with a vulpine grin. "No sound."
"No sight," Minato continued.
"No sign," Mito uttered the final Tenants of the Hunter, a principle their father made just for situations like this.
With a nod from Kushina, all three split apart, hunting a target of their own pickings.
-WITH KUSHINA-
With a silent dash she climbed up the roof of a nearby house, smoke pouting from a chimney on top of the house as she stood beside it, sniffing the air for the sign of any undesirable targets. For this mission, she had a small list of acceptable target, namely scums and if necessary, homeless person, those who will not be missed. The first one she'll attack without mercy, but the second was only when there were no other options.
Her Astartes senses caught whiff of plenty of humans within the town, the smell of their lives mixed in with their natural bodily smell. A man was covered in metal dust, probably a blacksmith. Alcohol and puke covered the scent of a man and his companion, no doubt having just exited a bar inebriated. The smell of lovemaking was in the air, from the house that she was on top.
And among all this, she caught a whiff of a single smell that attracted her the most: the smell of old, dried blood.
A series of quick leaps, and she was on the roof of a house a couple blocks away from the first she landed on, a sign of the town's quite well-made management. Following the smell like a hound dog, she leapt and sprinted atop the houses, her eyes easily keeping track of any hindering objects before her body dodged with precise movements, not diverting from her path.
Stopping on top of a taller building where the smell of booze was strong, probably a tavern, she took another sniff, ensuring that she was at her potential target.
Another sniff. A familiar feeling pricked the back of her mind as she stood tall on the building's square roof. Looking around, she realised why: her siblings were all here, no doubt attracted to the same smell as she was, their heat signatures glowing like a torch in the darkness of the night. "What?" she wondered. Were there no other targets in this town? Why were the two there, aiming at the same building?
-WITH MITO-
She laid in wait at a small alley right in front of the building that she was targeting, her sight masked by the garbage that she was hiding behind, her Byakugan activated. She cursed as she saw both her twin and her sister coming this way, no doubt attracted to the same scent as she was, and no doubt already realising that she was there. They were not supposed to be at the same place at the same time, dammit!
But this made her wonder. The absence of other targets within the area sure was strange. Every town or village had their own share of dastardly persons, no matter how good the area was. That's why her father went through quite the difficulties to eliminate them personally. Any place that's well-off will definitely attract evildoers, and thus, the absence of them sure were strange.
-WITH MINATO-
Minato was quite surprised as he saw that her sister and twin was locking on the same location that he was heading to. "This is strange,"he thought. He was at the opposite side of the building with Kushina on top and Mito at the other, his Byakugan trained on his siblings. No other target seemed to present itself to him, so for now, he took the liberty to just observe the building, his confusion temporarily pushed aside as he lied on the hard ground, waiting for anything to happen.
-WITH KUSHINA-
"Shit," Kushina cursed mentally at the presence of the other two. After a couple of seconds, she decided to take her own path, leaving her brother and sister there. It would be suspicious by the locals if they were to target people that came to the same place at nearly the same time, so she decided that she'll look for a different target, a better one now, hopefully.
With light steps she headed towards the edge of the building before, with a powerful leap, she soared across the night sky to the next building, switching targets. On and on she jumped, trying to sniff out some other targets that won't bother her siblings. The rooftops of the unknown town became her primary road as she avoided the sights of the people still awake in the night, not wanting them to catch sight of her.
Her footsteps light as she landed on another roof, constantly smelling the air for any targets of opportunity. She cannot target animals, because they didn't understand the language. What she needed more than the words used were the context, the meaning of the words, not the words themselves.
After a while of scouting and looking around, she finally gave up on finding a target within the town. Sighing, she dashed to another rooftop, her lithe foxy figure slipping through the cold night air unnoticed by everyone below her. A while later, she reached her destination: the outskirts of the town. Her new target: any undesirables outside the town.
-WITH MITO-
Mito let out a slow sigh of relief as she watched Kushina disappear and head towards the outer part of town. However, Minato was still at the other side of the building. As she was thinking ways on how to push Minato away from her prey, she saw that two of the customers stood from their table and started walking out of the tavern. She stood, ready to hunt her target and saw that Minato did the same, probably heading towards the same person as she did.
The door to the tavern opened, revealing the sight of a portly man of about 50 years of age, followed by a taller man, a well-trained man, if what Mito could see from the way his muscles moved and the way he acted as he scanned his surroundings calmly without anyone realising, a feat only the highly trained could do, even when he was only slightly younger than the shorter man. The smell of dried blood followed them out, and Mito quickly determined that it came from the tall man, not the other.
"I trust you will continue?" the man spoke with a slow voice, not wanting to be heard by anyone but the other man. And the two Astartes that was listening to him.
"Of course," the pudgy man said, nodding. He may not look it, but Mito could smell the person's nervousness wafting from him, a scent that intrigued her.
"Good," he said with a light nod. "Keep me posted at all times. I await your updates."
"Yes," the man replied, before they went their separate ways.
-WITH MINATO-
Minato watched as the two separated before he focused back on his twin who gave a nod and silently ran on top of the building beside her, taking the smaller man as her target. Minato quickly went on a roof close by, keeping his Byakugan trained on his target unerringly as he followed his movement, not missing a single detail of the man.
Along the way, Minato made the same observation his twin did on the target: he was a well-trained person, his every step light and quick, his eyes slowly scanning everything to find any signs of threat or anyone that saw him. His arms were always at his sides, ready to counter any attack while looking calm and collected as he dodged the minimal foot traffic of the night to head to a place somewhere. The smell of old blood coming from him also strengthens his choice of target.
After a while, following the man through the twists and turns of the alleyways of the town, Minato reached the outskirts of town, where the man was walking towards a horse that was tied outside the town. Jumping down to the ground from the building's roof, Minato landed on the ground as soft as a falling leaf, not alerting the man of his presence. Calmly, Minato analysed the situation.
The man was still quite a ways away from the horse, the horse being tied quite far away from any nearby buildings. But if he struck right now, the horse would see him and will definitely panic and will create a racket, attracting more attention. Attacking him when he's close to the horse or when he was in the process of untying it will do the same thing. But at the same time, leaving the horse behind would create suspicion.
The solution: attack both of them at the same time.
The man was walking at speeds towards his steed, attention still focused elsewhere as he looked for signs that anyone was following him. Satisfied, he headed straight towards his horse, a mount that had been with him for quite some time, helping him with his jobs. Giving its brown mane a quick rub, feeling the horse's soft fur underneath his hand, he untied the horse before readjusting the saddle and preparing to ride him again.
The only thing he heard was the sound of his horse suddenly neighing in worry before he felt rather than saw a massive set of extremely sharp teeth biting his neck from the back, the pain of the bite not registering into his mind as he fell on the ground motionlessly, not listening to the hissing sound that came from the bites. The last thing he saw was the sight of a massive fox, bigger than his horse, biting the horse's neck, struggling soundlessly for only a couple of seconds before everything went blurry and dark in seconds.
Minato quickly wrapped his extremely flexible tail around the man, watching as his clone did the same towards the large horse before taking both of them to a bush nearby where he laid them down, watching as the cocktail of deadly poisons and acid within his spit affect his two preys, watching as they died within seconds after their brains stopped working. The spit from his Betcher's Glands worked their mojo quickly, melting the man's skin into liquid as the contact poison entered through the puncture wounds from his extremely sharp bonemetal alloy fangs, the deadly concoction stopping all nerve signals and muscle activity in seconds, a combination of multiple types of deadly animal poisons that his Betcher's Glands created after exposure to them in his hundreds of years of life.
A sigh escaped Minato's lips as he watched the bodies of his two targets in front of him. For a so-called peaceful family, they had one, if not the deadliest body in the history of the Elemental Nations. Capable of feats impossible even to the greatest of ninjas, the disparity between their peaceful selves and their powerful body was something that everyone saw and knew, but took it in stride after hundreds of years. He hated this fact just as much as his father did, but he understood an old adage about war and peace:
"Men wage war so they could find peace."
An adage long since proven true, time and time again. And from a young age, when he was just a couple years old, he understood that to keep peace, what you need the most is power. Power in any form, be it physical, political, economic or social. More than any amount of goodwill, power came first and foremost in looking and maintaining peace, and he knew it. A fact that he knew his father knew. That was why they trained every day, exhaustively, to gain that sharpened edge that they could point towards any enemy threatening their peace and stability, both within and without. If they cannot have anything else, then physical power would be the only thing that they, and their descendants, would have, and he knew it, no matter how much they hated it.
Letting out a small sigh at the sudden contemplating he did, he went towards the man in his demonic form, ready to consume his brain to gain all the necessary knowledge to live in this foreign world…
-WITH MITO-
Following the pudgy man behind him, Mito tracked him as he walked towards an as-of-yet unknown destination, slipping from shadow to shadow unnoticed. The man, unknowing of his follower just walked, wiping the nervous sweat from his brows as he met the other man, the same man that Minato was targeting. He may have lacked the smell of dried blood present on the other, but she knew that someone who was in cahoots with a person that smelled of dried blood cannot be good.
She hoped.
The man walked straight towards a massive building, the wooden double doors opened wide as the people inside saw the man's arrival. Seizing her chance, Mito activated her Chameleon Jutsu and sneaked straight behind the man, entering the same building he did with not a sign. The building was a large office with a long wooden reception desk at the front, a sleepy receptionist on the table. A hallway was seen beside the receptionist as the room was lighted by the huge chandelier on top of the nicely decorated room, a carpet laid down below her feet as she watched the man greet the doorman that opened the door for him.
At first, it looked like a regular office. But when she activated her Byakugan, she saw the terrible secret hidden within the building. The top floor was what she thought was the man's office, an opulent room with a beautiful table and many decorations around while the hallway behind the lady leads to rooms, potentially a high class hotel of some sorts.
But what angered her was the hidden basement. Only accessible through a room at the end of the hallway, underneath the seemingly innocent, beautifully crafted hotel was a rounded circle with high walls surrounded by lines upon lines of chairs like an auditorium: a slave gladiatorial arena. Beside the arena, she saw two rooms, rows upon rows of cages were on it with the gladiators lying on the small pile of hay that they were given, a distressing mock of a bed. Signs of old blood on the ground proved to her that the place was there for quite some time, being used by the people as a sick kind of entertainment.
She never liked these slave arenas. For her, they're a massive waste to a nation's manpower. It's better if they were in an army, trained to fight their enemy instead of fighting for the entertainment of nobles and other higher-ups. In their Elemental Nations, there existed official gladiatorial pits where the gladiators fight but not to kill, only to disable and entertain. Only when a challenge was issued or a criminal was about to be punished will there be deaths on the arena. Even then, it's quite rare, and they were mostly used for entertainment where the gladiators were paid and cared for. All of Naruto's children have entered the arena where the rules were simple: fight, but not to kill or maim. It's a training to their own ability to hold back and to fight. Usually a fight between his children and other gladiators does not count towards the prizes for them. They usually win them anyway, so it's not much of a fight.
Silently she trotted towards the office she saw on top, seeing that the arena was empty. No fight tonight it seemed. Following the man behind him silently, concealing her presence with all the skill of a master infiltrator, she moved behind the man, following him in as he opened the beautiful oak doors that made his office and entered, Mito following unnoticed behind him.
"Huh…" the man sighed as he went to his table. "That stupid assassin really was getting on my nerves," he said loudly as he sat on his large chair, a chair so big that it dwarfed him, not seeing Mito following him. Opening his drawer, he took out a stack of documents before placing on a pair of glasses and started reading them. "Dean!" he shouted out in the emptiness of the room, seemingly towards no one.
A smaller door opened and a small boy, wearing black tuxedo with a white shirt and a black bow tie underneath, the clear signs of a butler of the man. "Yes master?" the boy's voice, probably aged no older than ten asked.
"Make me some tea," he ordered. "I need to think clearly if I were to handle all this," he said, holding back his anger at his meeting.
"Of course," the boy, named Dean, said with a bow before he left, going back into the door he came from before, being watched by his master. The man removed his glasses, rubbing the bridge of his nose from the stress. All of a sudden, he felt a strong invisible furry limb tighten around his neck, squeezing his jugular, and he knew no more.
"Master, tea's rea-" Dean said as he came into the room with a tray of steaming hot tea, his master's favourite. But much to his surprise, he saw that his master was not present even when he was there just a minute ago. Everything was left untouched. The documents on the table, his seat, his glasses, everything was still there, he noticed as he placed the silver tray on his table. However, his master was gone, disappeared for no reason without any sign. "…Master?" Dean said, looking around for his master.
Mito was dashing away from the building after she knocked the man out, his body wrapped by her tails as she dashed out on the rooftops, the Chameleon Jutsu still activated to prevent anyone from seeing her, but this time it also covered the victim of hers, ensuring complete invisibility as she rushed through the cold night wind towards a hidden location, ready to begin the bloody ritual of her Omophagea…
-WITH KUSHINA-
Kushina sighed slowly as she prowled the city's outskirts, looking for targets for her own consuming. They all just had to converge on the same source of smell. But then again, they didn't expect to sense only one viable target through everything that they sensed within the town. Being the bigger man – or woman – she left to find her own target. And it has been a fruitless endeavour so far. The only thing that she managed to get were a bunch of small critters and a snake. Filling, especially since they had nothing through the day, but nowhere close to her objective: to get information about the mysterious land that she and her father ended up in.
"Dammit! Why the hell did such a town had no one seedy enough to be gobbled down in it?" Kushina grumbled slowly as she thought about the town. "There's something fishy around here… but what?" Once again, she lamented the fact that she knew nothing about the town, or the world that she ended up in. "Grrrhhh…" she continued her grumbling, looking around for anyone.
She walked around, still in her demon form, looking with her peculiar eyesight targets to hunt. Unfortunately for her, nothing seemed to register across all her senses on any consumable targets. As she was busy cursing her terrible luck, a voice, carried by the soft night wind registered within her Lyman's Ears, the voice of a man speaking. Quickly and stealthily, she trotted through the plains surrounding the town towards her target, the Chameleon Jutsu around her still active, a happiness in her as she probably managed to get a target. She may not like it, but following her more animalistic instincts sometimes gave her a sort of happiness.
Slowly moving through the plains, she spotted two men walking slowly with another person on one's shoulder. And now, the scent of blood was fresh, and not dried up like the guy at the tavern. As she came closer, she heard them speak with those strange words of theirs.
"…a pretty penny for this guy," the man, a short male with a dark travelling cloak with a small boy on his shoulder said.
"Yeah. He seems good enough." The other, a taller man with the same cloak said.
"The boss won't mind it, you know. He liked having them stronger and younger. Makes him more… enthusiastic," the shorter man continued.
Memorizing their words to be reanalysed once she had their language in her head, she concentrated on the bundle on their back. A lower body temperature, she saw through her Occulobe's infrared sight, with a line of heat flowing from the head to the face, a sure sign of flowing blood from a wound on the boy's head. According to the size, probably a 7 year old boy. "They must've knocked the kid out before kidnapping him," Kushina thought.
Kushina followed the two as she walked behind them, slowly pacing herself to put her behind them, in an optimum position for a disabling pounce towards the two, her tail, more flexible than a regular fox's while having variable length was ready to wrap around her target, a sure way to catch her prey while disabling the other.
The two chatted merrily as she followed behind them, waiting for a good spot to attack them. In her mind, she was already planning her approach to the two. A quick pounce towards the shorty, a quick bite with her poisonous spit while an even faster tail wrap around the other would knock him out silently. She'll leave a clone to heal the boy as she left with her two targets in tow, disposing of them as quickly as she could.
Without a sign, her body flew towards the two as her hind legs propelled her forwards, her preys in her sights, ripe for her own bloody ritual…
-30 MINUTES LATER-
Minato was the first to reach the rendezvous point, his snout and parts of his head still bloody from the deed that he just performed, a truly gruesome deed that would terrify anyone who saw what he did, but one that he knew was necessary. Wiping the blood from his silky blonde fur with his paws as he sat on his haunches, a heat signature caught his eyes, causing his head to turn towards the newcomer, realising that it was Kushina. "Fast," he said.
"Not fast enough apparently," Kushina replied with her own smirk. Her expression turned serious, or as serious as you could get from a fox's face. "Report."
Minato quickly switched gears into his battle report mode. "I managed to find an assassin or a bounty hunter, the source of that dried blood that we all smelled tonight. Will need some time to parse through all his memories. The bodies of him and his horse were burned with a Katon jutsu at the site, and the ashes buried deep in the ground."
"Good," Kushina replied. "I had me two kidnappers with a boy on one of their shoulder. I healed the boy and had a Shadow Clone accompany him while keeping him asleep. Once I know where he came from and the fate of his family, I will send him back. Unlike you, I ate everything on them, sealing anything that I might deem important. The earth under the site was overturned and cleaned, leaving no sign."
"I," said Mito who appeared all of a sudden without any sign behind them, though they recognized her chakra signature already to ignore her presence. "Managed to find the manager or owner of an underground gladiator arena. Took him away after knocking him out, and took him someplace. Will also take some time to gather the memories."
"Good job everyone," Kushina said. "Now, let's go. Full speed back. We need to meditate. Don't forget to let a clone go to where Dad was."
In a small poof of smoke, three clones came from the trio before immediately dashing to where their father's location was while the originals quickly dashed the other way, intend on processing the digested memories of their preys, hoping to learn everything that they could about this world they're in.
-NEXT MORNING-
Dawn was breaking at the sky over Tristain's Academy of Magic, shining upon the entire ancient structure with its radiance as the people's days started with the servants going about their tasks as they scurried every which way, the tools for their respective jobs at hand. The students were all waking up as the bright light shined upon their faces, preparing themselves for their classes; the events of the last day still remembered in their heads as some of the professors even looked in worry at the tent in the middle of the plains of the academy as they walked to their respective faculties.
Within the tent, Kushina opened her eyes from her meditative position at the centre of the tent, her sister and brother facing her in a triangle. Not a minute later, both her brother and her sister opened their eyes at once, revealing to the world the white, pupilless eyes of their Byakugan. All of them looked at each other for a while, in the final stages of assimilating the memories and knowledge of the people that they ate.
"Hmm..." Kushina said, rubbing her chin. "It seems that their language was... quite strange and unique."
"True," Minato concurred. "We have never encountered such a language."
"And what we hypothesized was correct," Mito said next. "This is an academy, and the students in here were taught the strange arts that you fought against yesterday, Sister."
"And they really did use a caste-based society," Kushina said as she got up and dusted her backside. "In fact, it's worse than ours, and was one that had quite the potential for any misuse of power."
"The memories of this man had the markings of such a misuse," Mito said in disgust. "He... The reason there were no criminals in the town was because he had bounty hunters to hunt them down before putting them in a battle to the death just for the entertainment of these... so-called nobles!" she didn't hide the disgust in her face or words as she continued. "In fact, he was a paedophile! He cared not whether his target was a boy or a girl, he'll have them all!" Taking a couple of deep breaths to calm herself down, she added. "However, he's an information broker, and he had quite the knowledge of the surrounding areas. However, nothing were of interest to us. Maybe we'll find use for them later."
"And the man I targeted was one of his bounty hunters," Minato said. "He had no memories of any of the man's atrocities, but he sure had quite the amount of targets in years, delivered via carts after they were given drugs to ensure they were knocked out. He's also a constant buyer of information from him, though he usually ended up threatening him more than anything."
"And these guys I ate," Kushina said next. "They were another of his merry band of kidnappers and bounty hunters. Sick fucking asshole. Luckily I managed to save the kid, though his family was dead, unfortunately." Powerful they may be, but bringing people back from the dead was not something that the Uzumaki-Namikazes could - much less would - do. The dead should just be left as they were. "Even luckier that he was dead. I'll let my clone know and take him somewhere safe," she continued before creating and quickly dispelling a clone to send all the information that she had to the clone still guarding the child. "It seems that we're in luck. All of our targets were related somehow," Kushina grinned. "Wonder why? God was watching from above or something?" she said as she looked skywards towards an invisible figure in the sky, if any.
"We're just lucky, I guess," Minato said.
"This might create a new problem for us," Mito said out. "They will find out about the missing people and will relate them somehow."
"But as long as we hid the bodies and leave no traces, they can't track us," Kushina said with her grin getting wider. "It'll be left as a mysterious disappearance, never to be found out forever, or until someone opened their big mouth."
"That is if we're still here once we retrieved Father," Minato said next. "For now, I suggest we head to the headmaster's office and apologize for everything yesterday."
"Yeah," Kushina said, flinching at the memory of what she did yesterday. "I really do, right?"
"Yes," Minato said with a nod. "The animals were actually their familiars, summoned animals that were permanently bound to their master, acting as their helper, guardian and friend. Unlike our kind of summons, they cannot be dispelled." He pondered over this for a moment. "I wonder... would Father be summoned to this world by the same... magic? Or whatever they called it?"
"Possible," Mito said, dreading the possibility. "He'll be bound forever, like a slave to his master." Unfortunately for her, she hit the nail right on the head. "The only way to release Father would be to either kill him, or kill the master."
"Unforgivable!" Kushina exploded with a sudden anger at Mito's accurate hypothesis, her cheery feeling swiftly changing to one of absolute anger. "Dad is the Emperor! The most powerful man in the Elemental Nations! No way would a small brat like these little fuckers be able to control him! We'll go and kill his master and take him back! There's no way I'll leave Dad to be a slave to these stupid fucks!" she roared out, her chakra rolling from her in waves of power as her chakra cloak activated, covering her entire body in a cloak of raging gold flames, her anger nearly making her cloak burn everything around her.
"Calm down, Sister," Mito said with a voice that only his siblings knew that he was hiding his own anger. "There would be no way that Father would just let him be controlled like that. He may have taught us all about being humble, but he had his own pride as the First Astartes and as our father. He will not let a snotty brat control him like he was a common house-trained animal."
Kushina took in some deep breaths and soothed her burning heart with a patience born of a 300 year life, the ethereal flames of her chakra cloak burning out as she did so. "Okay... Okay..." she said, taking three lungfuls of breath for each word. "I'm okay now," she said again. "Geez, I haven't exploded like that for a long time," she said abashedly to her siblings, scratching the back of her head as she said so. "Sorry."
"No need to apologize," Minato said. "We are angry as well, so we understand."
"Right," Kushina said, taking charge of her emotions again. "Now, let's go!" Kushina said, hiding the still smouldering anger beneath a layer of fake cheerfulness as she walked out the tent with her full ninja gear on as her longcoat billowed behind her as she left. Her ninja gear was a white longcoat with two tails at the back, an orange fire pattern at the tip of the tails. The left shoulder had the Uzumaki-Namikaze clan logo, and the right had the kanji for nine, with a huge kanji for 'princess' at the back. Her torso was covered by a thick black flak jacket with armour plating lined within it together with scroll pouches for quick access on it. The left chest of the coat had the kanji for 'demon' while the other side had a woven picture of her favourite weapon, the shovel Earthrend.
Her siblings wore nearly the same attire. However, their right shoulder had the Hyuuga Clan's logo, signifying their half blood status. Their coat tails had grey flames at the end and their back was written 'all-seeing', showing their status as masters of the Byakugan, one unmatched by even the pure-blooded Hyuugas themselves.
They lacked a flak jacket however, instead wearing a loose white shirt, a necessity for the high speed taijutsu movements of the Gentle Fist. It also signified their roles. Kushina was the bulldozer of the group, rushing in headlong and smashing all adversaries with her array of powerful jutsu and strong attacks, while the two acted as scouts and intelligence agents, dealing precise blows to debilitate their enemies. However, all of them had their own set of heavy 'Terminator' armours meant to be used during times when an all-out, head-on attack was the order of the day.
Mito watched her sister leave their temporary lodging, watching as the last of her sister's white coattails flow through the brown flaps of their tent before she spoke. "She really loved Father, didn't she?"
Minato said nothing as he walked past Mito and opened the flap with one hand. As the morning light speared the inside of the tent, he turned his head around and replied. "I hope that she won't go on a rampage. That is all." He then exited the tent, the brown flap falling slowly as he let it go.
Mito stood still, watching her twin leave before she went on her own exit path, her steps slow and heavy. "For both our sake and theirs, let's hope so." Just like her twin and her sister, she left the tent, heading towards the academy's headmaster, whom they probably met yesterday before.
-A WHILE LATER-
Colbert was having a cup of tea as he sat in front of Osmond, his face weary, showing his age. "It doesn't seem like they will leave anytime soon," Osmond said, taking a sip of his own tea from the immaculate china that was his tea cup.
"Agreed," responded Colbert, taking his own sip. "And from what we could see yesterday, their close combat skills are phenomenal. I would definitely say that even Karin would lose to them, though she will put up a fight."
"It certainly seems so," Osmond said, giving a loud sigh as another sip of the warm tea heats up his old body from the inside. "Excellent tea, I must say. I think you can be my new assistant, since Loungueville was caught as Fouquet the other day. You've been to my office for quite so often ever since Fouquet was caught and Naruto arrived. It would do you good to just stay here. Though I'll be sad that I'll have no one's skirt to peek under..." the old lecher added at the end.
"Thank you," Colbert replied to the praise. "It would be an honour to be your assistant," he replied again, ignoring the last part. Everyone knew of his lecherousness, though ever since Naruto came to this world, he's been making so much waves that he was unable to enjoy his favourite past time, not that anyone liked him doing that in the first place.
Osmond was about to speak to Colbert some more when a loud series of knocks were heard at his door. A strange knock, since he wasn't expecting anyone other than Colbert. Both his and Colbert's attention immediately went towards the door at this. Deciding to get it over, he called out to the person behind the door. "Enter!"
With a loud creak, the door, created with hard oak, polished to a shine with golden lines on it opened, revealing the sight of a person that they did not expect at all: the massive face of Mito peeking in from the open door. "Greetings," she said in perfect Halkeginian.
Her voice completely stunned both Colbert and Osmond as they sat there, the steaming cup of tea hanging in the air within their hands. Slowly Colbert turned and looked at Osmond, watching Osmond's utterly confused face, mirroring his own. Just yesterday, they understood nothing of the Halkeginian language, but suddenly, she could speak it as if she was already here for years! "Uh… Greetings," Osmond replied, his hand still hanging in the air with his cup of tea. "Welcome to uh… my office."
"Thank you," Mito said with a bow before opening the door, letting herself in, followed by her twin and her sister. With a flourish of her hand, she unsealed three chairs in front of the table before sitting down on one, her sister following behind with Minato standing right behind Kushina, his arms crossed behind his back. "Mind if we join in?"
"You already did!" Osmond inwardly said with comical tears flowing down his mental representative. "What manner of chaos will you be bringing today?" he said inwardly, though at the outside, he put on a façade of agreement and stood. "Uh… No, not at all. Please, have a seat."
"Thank you." Mito didn't ask for any of his tea, however. Kushina was just stewing in her controlled anger beside her. "For our first issue today, we apologize for barging into your office in this calm morning. I believe that it is of utmost importance for us to talk as early as possible," she continued, still in the perfect Halkeginian language she just learned last night.
"Uh... Agreed," Osmond said, only managing to recover from his shock in just a couple seconds ago. Loudly clearing his throat to gather his composure, he said, "The first was-"
"Wait," Mito said, interrupting him. "I think it is better if we introduce ourselves first. I am Uzumaki-Namikaze Mito, Uzumaki-Namikaze Naruto is my – and our – father, and I am his first child from his second wife. This-" she said, pointing towards Minato, "-Is my twin, Uzumaki-Namikaze Minato. And that-" she points towards Kushina, "-is our sister, Uzumaki-Namikaze Kushina."
"Yes." Naruto had talked about Kushina, so he expected her, though not the rest. Nevertheless, he could be sure that they are definitely his children, if their physique were of any indication. "Your father spoke of his children often."
"So he's here?" Mito inquired.
"Yes," Osmond said, giving a nod. It seemed that they were good people, nevertheless. And good people he could get along with. "But he's not in the academy right now."
"May I ask his whereabouts?" she continued.
"Unfortunately, no," Osmond said as he shook his head. "All we know was that he and his master was-"
"His master?" Kushina said with an ominous tone as an aura of darkness seemed to emanate from her entire body, the foreboding aura sucking all the warmth and gentleness of the morning air from the entire room like a sponge.
Osmond gulped down a nervous ball of saliva as he felt the ominous aura coming from Kushina. "I think I said something wrong just now..." he thought. "Uh..." Osmond was honestly debating within himself whether to continue his words or to just let it go, and hopefully he will not have to suffer the wrath of the angry Astartes hanyou in front of him.
"Sister..." Minato said, gripping Kushina's shoulder with a grip that could break bones to others, but was only mildly successful at holding the angry Kushina back, her fury rolling off her in waves of suffocating power. Honestly, Mito and Minato both couldn't hold her back when she's on her full powered rampage, and even now, Minato was having a hard time trying to stop her from tearing the entire country apart to its roots.
And to be even more honest, the terrified but still standing strong figure of Osmond and Colbert would only serve to be her toothpick if she were to do so.
"Sister!" Mito said next, a bit more force in her words. "Please, let us hear his entire explanation first. Things had their order and their reasons. Please, reason with them first," she said, trying to pacify her angry sister. "Hold your anger back for a while," she said in her mother tongue.
Still completely angry at having heard that his father was a slave now, she relented and sat back on her chair, crossing her arms, though the thick miasma of anger around her hasn't abated yet. "Alright," she said in Halkeginian after a pregnant pause. "Let's hear it. If I didn't like what I hear, you better wish that others could still find even a piece of your body after I'm done."
Putting up a brave face even as one of his hands reached into his robes to grab hold of his wand, Osmond continued. "Very well. As I said before, he and his master-" Osmond watched in fear as Kushina visibly flinched at the word 'master' as she did her best to hold in her anger, but he continued. "-went to a town somewhere on a mission by the Princess of Tristain."
Ignoring the waves upon waves of KI that Kushina was letting out, Mito said slowly. "I see. Do they have a set time when they will be back?"
"None that I knew of," Osmond answered truthfully. Mito could read both the honesty and fear within the man's voice, ensuring that what he said was the truth.
"No matter," Mito said. They already had plans on how to communicate with their father anyway. Now for some much needed explanation. "You said that my father had a... master. Is he his familiar?" she questioned, ignoring the trembling anger of Kushina beside her.
"Calm yourself, Sister," Minato whispered into his sister's ear in their mother tongue. "If Father had such a good bond with his master, I'm sure that we could talk it out."
"But he's our father!" Kushina hissed back in anger. "Though he taught us all humility, I'm sure that he wouldn't want to be a slave!"
"That's why we need to talk with them, get more information," he whispered back his own logical argument. "If we could find out what kind of person his master is and whether he is a good person or not, I'm sure that we could all get along."
"Hmph!" she scoffed. She continued after a second's pause. "If he treated Dad like a slave, then I will kill him myself, even if I have to bear Dad's anger!"
"And that's another thing," Minato added, trying to make his sister see reason. "If he really treated Father like a slave, do you think he'll just ignore it and took it all in stride? Father's a good judge of character. There must be a reason why he stuck with his... master," Minato spat out the word 'master' as well, showing his disgust at such a thought, though he was more conservative about it. "Even when he was forcefully summoned here."
Kushina remained silent for a while, ruminating everything that Minato said. What Minato said was definitely without a good reasoning behind it. Her father won't just let any kind of person to give him orders. He taught them about humility, and the virtue of listening to those weaker and of lower stature than you, something that helped them far more times than she could count. But he won't just let any kind of person to give orders to him. Someone who treated him like a slave will immediately be dealt with extreme prejudice, no questions asked. "Alright," she said finally. "Let's hear it first."
Osmond continued as Minato whispered to Kushina. "Yes, he is," he said, watching as Mito flinched at his truthful words. Trying to placate the angry hanyou, he continued. "But their relationship was different than any other master-familiar bond that I have ever seen."
"How so?"
"A familiar, as you may have heard, was supposed to be the master's guard, partner and assistant. Your father's strength made her extremely happy and terrified as he appeared in his golden armour holding his flaming sword in front of everyone during the Familiar Summoning Ritual. However, instead of serving her, he instead became her trainer."
"Her trainer?" now this intrigued Mito. Her father usually trained people, but only those who he considered worthy. His own elite army was trained by himself, men whom he considered valuable and strong enough to receive private tutorial from him. They ended up being strong, stronger than their fellow peers and was inducted into either his private guards or as a squadron leader or Black Ops member. This could only mean that her father considered that his master would be someone that could receive his training.
"Yes," Osmond said, nodding, inwardly relieved as he saw Kushina's angry aura dissipate a little. "It wasn't easy though. I've seen one of his training sessions, and I'm sure that a regular person would die immediately from a single session. But he cared for them, trained them well, and even without the strange elemental magics that you all seemed to use, she was a force to be reckoned with, winning a magical duel with her fellow student of the academy with her bare hands."
"Father always liked going into close combat," Mito added. Two important information were contained within the talk. His master was a female, and he trained another person as well.
"May I ask some questions of my own now?" Osmond said. They're... intriguing, to say the least. Intriguing, and terrifying, but at least Mito was more accommodating than Kushina. "Just yesterday, you were unable to understand anything of our language and customs, and had quite some time trying to get information. How, in just the span of a single night, all of you managed to learn perfect Halkeginian and our culture, so much so that you were able to understand everything of what I say perfectly?"
"We have our ways," Mito answered, already expecting that question, and not giving any answer. "Now, I need some clarification on your magics. You said that she used a… Familiar Summoning Magic to summon my Father here, correct?"
"Correct," Osmond answered.
"How does the magic chose what it summons? Does it select randomly anyone that appears in front of the magic oval?"
"Hmm…" Osmond said, rubbing his long beard. Finally, something that he could engage in: an intellectual discussion! "Within the ancient texts that details the Familiar Summoning Magic, it was said that the magic looks deep into the user's heart, reading their deepest need instead of desires and will pull the most suitable familiar for the user according to their necessity."
"Does the spell call upon those from another world, as well?" Mito asked again. This world was getting more and more interesting every passing moment.
Now that stopped his enthusiasm cold. It wasn't something that was thought possible, mainly because the spell usually summoned familiars among the creatures of Halkeginian origin. Some may not have been from Halkeginia, of course, but it still wasn't human, or even close to being a human. Except… "We have no idea," he answered honestly again. "It usually summons animals of Halkeginian origin, though a rare handful were definitely not from Halkeginia, as far as anyone knows. However, there never was a human summoning until now. Except for one person."
"That is?"
"The creator of magic himself, the ancestors of every noble, the god of our world, Founder Brimir, a Void Mage, an element unlike any other."
"Interesting." So the only person who was said to have summoned a human would be like her second mother's father then? "Coincidence?" Mito thought. "Now, as far as I know, magic could only be used by nobles. That means my father's master is a noble. Correct?"
"Yes."
"Why would a spell that pulls the person or creature most needed by the user pulls an already established emperor from his world to serve a snotty noble brat?" she asked, finding it quite strange. What quality does the brat had that made the magic pull her father to this strange world? "She's a noble, not a nobody. As a noble, she should have at least some sort of magical power flowing through her, being noble and powerful," she said, mocking both words. They may be nobility, but not for a second did they ever think that they rule over the people. The people ruled over them. "She should just have summoned a small critter, like that rat under the table," Mito said.
"What?!" Osmond said in surprise. Looking underneath his table, the tiny figure of Chuchu underneath his table, also looking at him in shock. "How…?"
"I have my ways," she echoed her previous words. "Now, please answer that question."
"Uh… Right," Osmond said. What terrifying people! Those strange eyes, their stature, the overwhelming feeling of power, they could probably pacify an entire army with nothing but their stares! "Right. Where was I? Ah yes. Your father's master."
And so, Osmond took his time, telling his unwanted guests of the story of Louise Françoise le Blanc de la Vallière, as far as he knew about her. Of her family, of her inability to use magic in a very illustrious family of mages, of her perseverance, of her seemingly terrible luck with magic, of her future fate, and of her summoning their father. "…After that, the ceremony was finalized via a kiss from the summoned to her would-be familiar."
"A kiss?" Kushina said. "Sounds like the start of a bad romcom." She then mocked her kissing her father. "Oooh, come down here my familiar! I am not tall enough to kiss youuuu~ Chuu~" she said, mocking kissing noises with her lips. "Or a certain ancestor was too much of a pervert to not add that part."
Kushina's head rocked forward as Minato gave her a good smack to the back of her head. Clutching her painful head, she glared towards him before crying out, "Hey! What gives?!"
"Shut up, Sister," Mito said, his face in a very serious look. "Enough that you nearly killed them with your KI just now, you mocked their holy ritual."
"That ritual's just begging for it!" Kushina whined loudly.
Osmond just watched this, not daring to comment anything about Kushina, the feeling of her power still lingered around him. Just like her father, capable of switching gears and emotions instantly, going from a happy-go-lucky huge guy to a rampaging machine of death and destruction the next, even crossing over the two sometimes.
"Don't worry about her. She's always like that," Mito said towards Osmond, who just nodded his acceptance. "Now, where were we?"
"Ah, yes. After the kiss, a rune will appear-" Osmond said before once again, he was interrupted by an angry Kushina, the thick miasma of KI surrounding her once again as she heard this part.
"You mean… He was branded?" Kushina said, the palpable aura of death surrounding her seeming to grow in intensity as it reappeared with a vengeance. "My father… had a slave brand?"
Even Mito and Minato had a dark shade over their eyes as he said so, causing Osmond's hope of having them stop Kushina minimal. His mind quickly churned to explain to them about the familiar mark even when he was assaulted by the combined KI of the three hanyous in front of him.
"Please, calm down!" came the voice of Colbert who was utterly silent through the entire discussion. "Let us explain!"
"You better," Kushina said, small wisps of chakra already floating out of her body in anger. "And the explanation better be good, or I'LL MAKE SURE YOU EAT YOUR OWN FOOT BEFORE HAVING YOU SHIT OUT YOUR INTERNAL ORGANS! WITH MY BARE HANDS!" Kushina screamed out in rage, her chakra already pouring out of her in waves, nearly buffeting everything in the room with a wind of power unlike any other.
"Let me explain!" Colbert screamed out through the catastrophe that was Kushina's raging wave of chakra, hoping not to be tortured like she said. He had no doubts that she could. And would. "The familiar runes that appeared on a familiar is a sign of their bond, where they will be linked by their soul forever! It allows the master to see through his eyes, feel through his senses, so that he could help her at any moment! It's a bond of partnership, not slavery!"
Kushina's maelstrom of chakra subsided as she heard this explanation before she sat down again on her chair, a scowl still on her face. "Sounds a bit too one-sided to me," she said. "That wasn't a good explanation."
Colbert was gaping like a fish out of water as Kushina said this, trying to make up some words to explain to her about what a familiar was when a hand fell on her shoulder, which was Minato's huge hand. "Sis," he began in their mother tongue. "As long as there are no mental subjugation function within the… runes, then I'm sure that Father will be able to fight back if he needs to. No one gets away with making Father a slave. No one." His grip tightened on her shoulder before he continued, his face still looking as angry as it was before. "For now, we'll wait until we've meet Father, then we'll see if there's any indication that he was made a… slave of sorts. For now."
Kushina seemed to be in thought for a while before her hand crept towards Minato's and gave it a good grasp, a grip that could break bones if it were to be done to a regular person. "Alright," she said, trying her best to calm herself. "Alright. I'll wait. I'll wait."
Colbert let out a sigh of relief as he managed to calm Kushina down. Though not as powerful as her father, she was still overwhelmingly powerful compared to him, and he knew that he'd die before he managed to even slow them down. But that doesn't mean that he won't fight, far from it.
"Ahem! …Right," Osmond spoke, trying to divert their attention. "And unlike other familiar runes, the ones on your father was different."
"How so?" Mito asked.
Colbert took over the explanation as Osmond's gaze turned on him. "Your father's runes were special in that it shows that he is a Void Familiar."
"A what?" Mito echoed, not understanding what he said just now.
"A Void Familiar. A familiar of a magician of the void." Colbert said.
"I may have not been in this world for too long, but I've learned that there was no other Void Mage but Brimir," Mito said with anger in her voice. "Are you insulting me?" she asked Colbert, her eyes meeting straight into Colbert's.
"No! No!" Colbert countered in shock. "I did not mean that! Here, let me show you!" Colbert then ran towards Osmond's book cupboard before opening one of them and taking out a large tome, thicker than his arm and opening one of the pages. The tome was there because he told Osmond of the runes some time ago, and he decided to just leave it there. A secret as big as this should better be left with him anyway. "Here, take a look," he said, showing the tome to Mito.
Mito complied and looked at the page that he showed to her, the letters, previously undecipherable by her was quickly understood as she used the knowledge that she gained yesterday to process it. On the page, a strange sign were evident. Reading the entire page, she understood. "It's the runes of Gandálfr, the Left Hand of God, said to be the familiar of Founder Brimir himself."
"Correct," Colbert said with a nod before he closed the tome. "And these are the runes that your father had. These runes are special, in that it gave Gandálfr the ability to use any weapons whatsoever, fighting to their best with any and all weapons that he could get his hands on."
"So wait," Kushina said. "You're telling me that the snotty midget that was Dad's... master is a mage with an element that had long since disappeared?"
"Probably," Osmond said. "No one could say, since no one is alive to tell of the Founder today. Most were known through legends and ancient texts though."
"Hmm... No wonder the magic chose Father," Mito said. "Think about it. Father was once a hated person, a different being amidst all the humans surrounding him. But inwardly, he had the potential to be the greatest among them, and he succeeded. Who else would be a good example for this... Louise to follow, if not Father himself?"
"Anyone else?" Kushina said simply. "Throw her out into the wilds, see how she would survive. That works too," she added with a careless shrug. "Why must it be Dad?! He's a fucking Emperor for god's sake! He needs to rule a country! That magic was stupidly indiscriminate!" she voiced her objection to the stupid summoning magic.
"Regardless, we now have some idea on what happened to Father," Minato said calmly. "And from what we could tell, he had quite the impact on these people." He looked Osmond straight into his eye. "Am I right?"
"Yes, your father definitely left quite an impression," he said. Finally they've calmed down! It's not easy, but finally, he did it! This could call for a celebration! "The students feared him, together with the professors as well."
"Damn," Kushina whistled in amazement, her mood once again making a quick turn. "Dad must've been making one hell of a ruckus to make them fear him that much."
"As I said, he did," Osmond continued. "He moved the earth with just a stomp of a foot, summoned a deluge out of nowhere which returned to wherever it was just as quickly, called down lightning, cut the ground with nothing but wind and coated his own hand with fire."
"Just a small display of what he was able," Kushina said with a grin. "Damn, Dad. You showed 'em all quite fast!"
"I do not for a second doubt the fact that he could do even worse," said Colbert from the side.
"Damn right!" Kushina spoke with pride, puffing her chest out. "Dad could destroy an entire army with his bare hands!"
"Not like we couldn't as well," Minato said slowly. Not that they didn't know that already.
"Now, back to important matters," Mito said. "For now, we have begun attempts to contact our Father. We have no idea what his stance would be, or if we could even return to our world."
"And why is that?" Colbert asked. Strange that they arrived here without any summoning attempts by anyone, but said that they cannot return. This intrigued his intellectual mind. "You managed to arrive here, but somehow, you cannot return? And why would you think that he would stay here?"
"For now," Mito responded to his question. "To come here, we used a massive seal array to send us here. However, the core of the seal was rendered unusable for some reason after we arrive. Due to this, we are not sure if we could even return back to our world. And right now, there might just be foul arts at play, diverting Father's mind from returning to his world."
"We won't stop looking for a way though," Minato continued. "And once we do, we will retrieve our Father and send him back to where he belongs, with us in the Elemental Nations."
"But Lady Louise would lose her familiar!" said Colbert in outrage. "A mage losing her familiar would cause the mage to lose a part of herself! Her very soul!"
"To be honest," Kushina said, countering Colbert's words. "Your stupid magic called our dad here against his will. There should be nothing stopping us from retrieving him from the indiscriminate selection your magic circle does."
"However, that would still depend," Minato added. "If Father said that he'd stay here, then we might just create a way so that we could move between worlds. We cannot just leave him here. He is still needed in our world. His citizens missed him. His wife missed him."
"Yeah, that," Kushina said, pointing at Minato. "Dad's Dad, so if he said that he stays, he stays. No one could change his mind. But we'll still be returning to visit a couple of times, or have him come by the world."
"A fair compromise," Osmond breathed out in relief. With Naruto's presence, he hoped that somehow, he could help with the situation in Tristain right now, though the way he would help might be... controversial.
"Right," Kushina said with a grin, her anger dissipating into nothingness as she gained information about her father and what he's been up to. He's strong, but she can't help but worry. "Okay, I think it's time for your questions," she said as she looked towards Colbert and Osmond.
"WHAT?" Everyone within the room said at the same time in surprise. What brought this on?
"Oh, come on!" Kushina whined out. "It isn't fair you know. We're the only ones doing the questioning when they're our host! It's just rude, don't you think?"
"You have a point, Sis." A good QA session would gain them quite some information anyway, Minato thought. "Alright then, ask away. However, know that some questions will not be answered."
"Fair enough," Osmond said, understanding where they came from. Taking his pipe from a drawer on his table, he lighted it up before taking a lungful of his favourite tobacco. Exhaling the smoke in a sigh, he asked them. "All of you have no problems with this, I hope?"
"Nope!" Kushina merrily said. Everything's done now, and the only thing that they need to do was to wait for their father to be back, something that all of them had no problem doing, resulting in her chipper attitude. "Besides, our body will filter any toxins that we inhale anyway," Kushina added, hiding her actual thoughts.
"Alright then, here's my first question," said Colbert before he faced the siblings, ready to throw his questions to the siblings. As he did, the three continued their planning again, doing as best as they can to gain a base of operations in this new world, even as their clones rushed towards their father's location as fast as they were able, trying to contact him in this foreign world...
-CHAPTER END-