Unaimaru spat me out into the water. I quickly righted myself, finding up and down before the water could disorient me further and kicked my way to the top where I climbed out and stood atop the surface sending a glare at the giant unagi that was my courier. His barbels simply raised and pointed behind me. A door, the same one I'd been brought before during my last visit to Kaizoku's summon realm.
The bold, red spiral of the Uzumaki held greater importance after the brief conversation Unaimaru had amused Uncle with— speaking of which, "Don't you ever touch my Uncle like that, Unaimaru, do you understand me?"
Unaimaru cackled, his head bobbing underneath his relaxed body, "You give too many orders for a summoner that might never see tomorrow."
His words I knew were truthful or at least he believed them to be. Unaimaru, giant unagi capable of drowning entire navies or not, was getting on my last nerve, "And you are too disobedient for a fish that feeds off his fathers leftovers."
The giant unagi lost his relaxed gaze and inched towards me, his head becoming more pronounced, glaring eyes fixated on my unyielding form. I doubted he could still see me by the time he stopped and said, "Never again call me a fish."
"Don't ever handle my Uncle without my permission."
We remained at an impasse and I would have loved to ensure his fragile will buckled against the waves of killing intent radiating off of me but I literally had bigger fish to attend to.
I showed him my back and approached the large Uzumaki labelled door that led to Kaizoku, the unagi guards barely recognized my presence beyond pulling the door open. This time I braced myself, expecting to be overtaken by a tidal wave but none came. The water level between the rooms was flat with little more than a ripple passing through as the doors swung open.
But I felt his presence, a greater pressure than Unaimaru could hope to achieve, bathed me, rattled my teeth and bones for a fleeting moment before it meant nothing. Isobu's chakra, I felt my friend bolster my chakra network with a small infusion that instantly toughened my mind and will.
Thank you, Isobu. He didn't offer a response, content to watch and pay attention as I ventured into Kaizoku's lair. The large door began to shut the moment I walked through, until the only light source was the ominous pair of slit eyes leering up at me from the water's depths.
"Kaizoku, I have paid your gruesome price and I have come to reap its worth." Truly, what was the worth of five hundred drowned souls?
Whether he heard my call or just got tired of staring, Kaizoku began to rise, slithering up the impossible distance in a few seconds. His head breaking the water tension was like a mountain being born, he continued to rise even after exiting the water, extending to heights only his tower could afford.
"The little turtle has returned and with his task complete. This is the first time a human has fulfilled that task of mine this quickly, you must really be the Mizukage." Unlike his progeny, Unaimaru, Kaizoku spoke without a hint of derision.
"That I am, great Sea Serpent Sage."
Kaizoku chuckled, his merry breath shook the tower more than his spoken voice, "I see. You, turtle, have ambition, a finish line you are desperate to cross."
I narrowed my eyes up at the colossal creature, not liking the way he threaded his sentence, "Do not attempt to extort me, Kaizoku. I have done as you asked, delivered five score lungs drowned in your waters, drowned in the Kaizoku sea. It is time you reveal your secrets."
"I need no reminders of my obligation, turtle. I will do as I have promised, now come closer."
I sensed Isobu stirring within me, my friend's concern growing without a verbal thought. Still, I walked further into Kaizoku's overshadowing form until he spoke again, this time in a hush that didn't rattle walls, "The path of the Sage is one of nature and nature is wild, an untameable being that cannot be bargained with as you bargain with me." He continued, "There is no in betweens in such a path, you either become a Sage or you become one with nature, one with my realm."
I'd thought as much. Jason's memories did not include Kaizoku or anything related to his summon path, but the little I recalled of Senjutsu informed me of the toad Sage Arts and the penalties for failing its transformation. Kaizoku's mermen and other strange human-aquatic hybrids fit the bill well enough.
"I understand." I said, resolute.
"Do you? You must undergo a trial of nature itself, accepting its power, the chakra of the entire world into your frail, small body. Do you not have a village to protect, Mizukage?"
"I do. This is how I will protect them."
Kaizoku's gaze held mine for a moment before he slowly blinked, "Shinobi…I will only warn you once more then. Once we begin you will have to balance the nature chakra entering your chakra pathways with your own chakra, you will have to contain the power of all the worlds with your own. If you are not capable enough then you will become kin and never leave. Do you accept this?"
"I have been waiting for this."
Kaizoku inhaled and after witnessing Unaimaru do the same before demolishing a boat, I tensed and awaited the devastating blow of water to strike me. Instead, the spout of water Kaizoku expelled cradled me, even as I sunk into the veritable ocean from its impact.
It took all of three seconds to recognize the next change. The water cradling me was also invading my body and chakra network. Water has a weight, it always has but this felt nothing like the weight of water. Every sliver that slipped through my pores was like a kunai to the knee.
The water brought along with it a concentrated amount of Nature Chakra that quickly began to sicken me as I continued to fall, though my descent didn't last as the cradle of the Nature Chakra infused waters created a sphere around me that Kaizoku dragged out.
He placed me in a folding of his tail and inspected my acute experience of agony. His words were muffled by the dense water in my ears, but I heard his words and they weren't helpful. "You must absorb or expel this sphere of Nature Chakra, accomplish one and you may have some potential to become a Sage after all."
He said some more things but I'd quickly stopped listening the moment I felt a new nostril or gill growing out of me. I've definitely had enough Nature Chakra come in. I grabbed a hold of my chakra, seizing the bounty becoming a Jinchuriki left me with and fought against the Nature Chakra.
I flooded my pathways with chakra spun at my core. But flushing out the excess Nature Chakra was no easy task. It weighed at least twenty times as much as my normal chakra did, quickly demanding more chakra continue my efforts.
My eyes were squeezed shut in concentration, I didn't even concern myself with the agony of the water still seeping into my pores, introducing more dense granules of Nature Chakra in spite of my attempts to be free of it.
"Remember balance, Yagura-kun. Balance between us, between your two selves, between Nature and Man. Acceptance alone will bring balance."
Isobu's voice was like a distant scream, easily lost in a whirling wind but his words reached me. His trust reached me. He didn't intervene, didn't infuse my pathways with his chakra to help. He was trusting me to find the balance as I had over and over again since waking up in this world, since becoming two people, since becoming Mizukage.
I let go. Of all of it. The tension, fear, worry, guilt, indecision, mistrust, paranoia, schemes and doubts of futures yet to come to pass. I let go of it all in one exhale and allowed the Nature Chakra to be free.
It cycled through my pathways like an IV drip and with my focus recentred on maintaining balance, the water seeping through my pores stopped hurting. The weight of Nature Chakra became a force I merely guided down existing paths rather than challenge.
A cold breath blew over me and I fell, knocked out from the sphere. Kaizoku was there to catch me, he raised me up to his face and for the first time since I entered the room his eyes weren't the only thing I could see.
"Well done, turtle, you truly are worth the title Mizukage."
Kaizoku had blown away the sphere of Nature Energy, leaving me to sit and recoil as the world with [Sage Mode], however fleeting, was brighter than I imagined. It was the most startling change to my perception, more so than the rippling strength I felt pulse within my hands.
Kaizoku's personal sea chamber was full of Nature Energy, the water glowed a bright blue-green to my eyes, fine particles of debris, carcasses and scum floated around in it making me cringe at the thought I'd swam in it. But at the same time, the colour appealed to my senses as a natural born Water Nature user, I could sense a stronger attunement with the element, stronger than I did with my Wind Nature even though both had increased.
The air was heavy with the same otherworldly glow. There were clumps of gas or perhaps just Nature Chakra that lit up the room in a manner that made everything I'd seen feel like the descriptions of life from a blind man.
Kaizoku had his secrets too but perhaps a summon animal like him didn't have enough enemies powerful enough to make him bother hiding them better than under his bed. Both the clumps of Chakra in the air and the luminosity of the water were significantly increased in certain spots. I counted two before I sensed the residual Nature Chakra still in my body begin to waste out of my pores, leaking out uselessly even as I quickly shut my eyes and breathed in a vain attempt to claw the power of the Sage back.
But it was gone and all I had left was Kaizoku's hot breath against my neck. He snorted down at me, thoroughly amused, "I have had few students but all made that sour face once they were plunged back into darkness." He held me up above the water on the feathered part of his tail and let out a low rumble of a laugh.
I merely smiled, "So I'm a student now, that's good. We can move on to the next lesson."
His barbels reached over, longer and thicker than any actual human arm, it poked my neck and I felt more of the Nature Chakra fall out of my body, "You must be prepared to become kin with all this haste. The power I have given you a taste to meddle with is not one that should be taken lightly or for granted."
"I know that." I said.
"No. You know only the augmented strength, speed, stamina, perception. The enhanced justu and all the destruction you may wrought upon your enemies with it." Kaizoku shook his head at me, "I will give you these things and I will show you the path to more if you do not die first."
"I have the Three Tailed Beast within me, the one you so call turtle as if you hold more strength than it. I will not die from what you have to impart on me."
Kaizoku reared his head away and looked upon me with an intensity, "Arrogance…as always. Very well, I will gift you more to balance, more to learn and master."
Pleased, I fell to a crouch on his tail and waited, "That's great. When you're ready."
"No. When you are ready. You have not brought me another five score drowned lungs, until you do."
My eyes flew open at that but rather than yell at the great summon whose eyes were hastily becoming the only things I could see, I nodded and asked, "What do five hundred drowned souls do for you, what do you benefit from the dead, Kaizoku?"
Though I'd already glimpsed carcasses drifting near the bottom of the reserved sea Kaizoku had for himself, I doubted he was going through all the trouble of bargaining with a greedy summoner just to break a meal.
Where I had doubts I also had theories. There were at least four of the floating corpses in the Nature Chakra rich sea and all of them, as I saw, had features of aquatic life. Gills, fins, webbed hands and feet. They could be his past…failed students or they could be life itself.
Something that has intrigued me about Kaizoku's realm was the variety of the creatures within it. I understood from my memories that the Toad and Snake summon realms did have differently built creatures that still fell under the animal path in question but Kaizoku was different.
He himself seemed like an amalgamation of a Sea Serpent, Unagi and perhaps even a slice of dragon by the way his head was shaped and decorated with stalactites of ice. I wondered if the corpses bloated from drowning had any path to becoming one of the denizens that lived within his colossal, underwater tower.
"Do not extend your newfound arrogance unto me, Mizukage. I do not question what you wish to do with the power I bestow nor do I care for your curiosity. Answer my bargain or be gone."
I bit my cheek in annoyance. The great serpent was short and to with everything it seemed. But I'd already anticipated that beyond all its wisdom as a Sage or what not, the serpent would lust for death continuously as long as it got a taste. This was no honourable test of worth and truth of inner strength, Kaizoku didn't care about his summoners as long as they fed him what he wanted.
It might be more likely those corpses are past students then. I blinked away from his gaze as I thought this. In that case, what choice do I have?
Isobu spoke within me, "None. The perception Senjutsu will allow you is essential to anticipating the enemy within your walls, isn't it?"
I sighed, ignoring how Kaizoku growled, "So…I guess another five hundred."
"Criminals, scum of your human world, unwanted as much as I am feared. You will not be judged."
"Comparing yourself to criminals isn't making it any easier to sacrifice them to Kaizoku's mysterious whims."
For a moment Isobu was silent, I thought he'd said all he'd had to say when he spoke again, "Don't you feel any closer to chakra now that you have bathed in its most natural form?"
I quickly picked up on what he was implying without him needing to go further. I shut my eyes and searched myself for a change, if there was one. "Yes, I think…I think I can tell the difference now. There's a light inside like Nature Chakra but…not."
"That is Yin and Yang, Yagura, you have finally found them but it is not enough and neither is Kaizoku's bargain if it means you are buried under guilt."
"I have no guilt for criminals due their death and justice. But this, if I can't know what he does with them I can't be sure there is justice in any of it, it just feels like another horrid crime and with me as its perpetrator."
"How long will you take to decide, Mizukage? Or perhaps you did not feel the strength you could have in the palm of your hands long enough?" Kaizoku spoke as a devil on my shoulder and I gritted my teeth in anger for I had no else to turn to.
"You try to extort me and won't even let me think about whether or not I want to be scammed?" I sneered up at the yellow eyed predator.
"Yagura, what I mean is, now that you can perceive Yin and Yang, you only need to continue with Kaizoku's demands until you can gather and contain Nature Chakra. If you focus on learning how to contain it, I will help you to gather it."
"You can do that? Oh, I remember." Indeed, Tailed-Beasts in harmony with their Jinchuriki were capable of bolstering their chakra reserves so absorbing Nature Chakra came quick, easy and free as the cost of the balancing act was hoisted on the Tailed-Beast. But…. "But I would need to remove the Three Pillar seal, wouldn't I?"
"Only if we are friends."
I inhaled deeply and met Kaizoku's eyes, they widened and I allowed myself a smile knowing my dilly-dallying had made him anxious enough to be expectant, "Very well, Kaizoku. You will have another five score and the next time we train, don't cleanse me before I'm satisfied."
The great serpent let an evil rumble of a laugh, "I do not wish to see you die so soon."
I rolled my eyes, suddenly far less impressed with the character of the great serpent of the realm. He looked at humans as food and at best, interesting fodder and for the moment I was no different, "No, I'm sure you don't."
^_^ bYE
Das könnte Ihnen auch gefallen
Kommentar absatzweise anzeigen
Die Absatzkommentarfunktion ist jetzt im Web! Bewegen Sie den Mauszeiger über einen beliebigen Absatz und klicken Sie auf das Symbol, um Ihren Kommentar hinzuzufügen.
Außerdem können Sie es jederzeit in den Einstellungen aus- und einschalten.
ICH HAB ES