Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Where We Come From

No Way Out

The three teens continued to stare at the mobster leader with completely out of this world expressions. Having just been revealed so much within the last couple of hours of their lives, something like that would cause such reactions in a person so they were completely justified in their utter confusion. It was safe to say that their entire worlds had flipped over, the entire way in which they conceived this weird world changed to the point where the world where children could breathe fire and lift giant boulders looked incomparably weirder than it initially was.

After several seconds of confusion Mana's body just leaned forward as if it was falling to the front, then it tensed up, her muscles just shot into action and fired her body off to run towards the giant hole where her friend was tossed into, where, apparently, the Nine-Tails resided below. She ran towards it with all of her speed, which while unimpressive to a ninja was quite something compared to her normal standards. The leader of the Syndicate even stepped aside to let the girl through, he had no intention to stop her in her quest to have her innards be feasted on by a colossal Tailed Beast.

Shimo's head leaned forward slightly, he closed his eyes and then looked at Meiko. "Stop her" he commanded her with a voice full of disgust and desperation.

To the blacksmith redhead, it was apparent that the stunt that Mana pulled on the top floor of the mines greatly rotted the relationship between the two friends. Shimo now looked at the magician as if she was a burden, an annoyance and whereas previously he looked at the girl with some admiration, nostalgia, and eyes overflowing with friendship, now he looked at her like a cow looks at a horsefly.

"What do you mean, what's this Nine Tails? Why is it such a big deal?" Meiko shook her head before Shimo broke into a fit of rage.

"Just shut up and stop her, damn it! I'll explain later. This is above not only our paygrade but also that of a Kage level ninja. This is a monster that needs to be left there, don't listen to any of Mana's bullshit, just grab hold of her and don't let go. Knock her out if you need to. The Nine-Tails and she must not cross paths, it's not a brawl that'll end favorably. I'll take care of this joker here..." he explained. Meiko nodded, her body blurred and disappeared leaving a ghostly afterimage.

Mana kept on rushing towards the hole when Meiko's image appeared right in front of her. These ninja moved at such speeds that it was tough for Mana to even keep up with it. She may have had peak human ability to perceive speed but even a genin managed to move so fast that to her it appeared like Meiko was teleporting around the place. It was like she was everywhere, or rather, anyplace she wanted to be in.

"Mana, stop..." she uttered pushing away Mana's hand which tried to push Meiko out of her way. The blacksmith gently let Mana's hand flow forward and then directed it to move behind the magician before she locked it behind the magician's own head placing her in a painful lock where any effort to break free would've caused Mana some additional pain.

"No! Let go! Kouta is down there with the Nine-Tails! We must get down there and save everyone who can still be saved..." Mana shouted out through pain, even when dislocation of her arm was the danger it didn't scare the girl. She was ready to struggle until her shoulder popped out of its socket and then face the Nine-Tails with a dislocated arm if she had to.

"Look... Just... Wait, can you please explain to me what this Nine-Tails thing is first. I know that Shimo doesn't want us to even face it, he's threatened by it to the extent where it actually sounds pretty scary even without knowing what it actually is..." Meiko mumbled out trying to buy some time, she knew that once Mana would get into explaining just what this Nine-Tails was she'd get into detail, that'd buy Shimo some time to finish fighting that mobster and get there to help her convince Mana of... Whatever their next plan was.