Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Where We Come From

Belly of the Beast

Following the Nine-Tails into the deepest parts of its lair hidden deep below the mines was not as tough as it may have been considered for it to be. Tired and struggling with severe starvation and malnutrition the monstrous Tailed Beast ran slow, sometimes bumping into the rocks or tripping over. While the four genin could not confirm that fact, the vicious quakes and roars of the beast confirmed at least that much.

"Mana... Are you sure about this?" Shimo grunted finally gathering the courage needed to once again question the client's actions.

"I'm really not. None of this makes any sense and I cannot make a proper plan without understanding why everything is so convoluted..." Mana shook her head angrily. "That being said I feel that saving the Nine-Tails is the right thing to do, even if it is just a rampaging force of nature. Our predecessors tolerated its existence, the greatest of all ninja gave it life in the first place. It must exist and it must serve its role in this world whatever role it may be"

"What did you mean when you said that none of this makes sense?" Kouta curiously inquired once the beast shook the ground below them keeping them rooted firmly onto the rocky floor while the tremors ceased.

"The Nine-Tails appeared to eat people. The thing is that Tailed Beasts shouldn't feed at all, it's unnatural. It was never recorded in known history to feed on anything. They are living constructs of pure chakra given conscience and life, they are destructive in nature and malevolent because they are beings nor of Earth nor of Moon that feel out of place everywhere. They were the bridge connecting Moon and Earth as the Ten-Tails so now they feel a huge gap and desire to fulfill some sort of purpose yet they're unable to do so which is why they're so angry, at least that's the theory most commonly discussed in ancient scrolls..."

"Well, it looked pretty darned hungry to me back when we tangoed with it the first time..." Meiko nodded to herself looking on forward trying to see the end to the spiral rising tunnels they were roaming looking for both the Nine-Tails and an exit. At their current location, the ground appeared to have already been stable and nothing was falling from the ceiling aiming to crush them so that was already an improvement.

"Also, since they do not feed, their chakra should automatically rejuvenate every couple of days, just like it does for ninja under normal resting conditions. Their levels of chakra are nearly infinite, they can rampage around the world for weeks or months firing beams of concentrated chakra and never tire... The fact that it is so severely exhausted is just so odd, truth be told such degree of exhaustion should be completely impossible to someone with such vast supply of chakra..." the magician ground it out through her teeth again. She didn't like to be completely unable to understand just what was going on there.

"Well, let's just ask it when we see it, maybe if you tell it that it doesn't have to eat – it won't munch us like all those remains of all the mobsters on the floor back there..." the Yuki swordsman snapped back at Mana with a certain shade of sarcasm and irritation in his voice. He clearly didn't fancy the idea of confronting the Tailed Beast, he may have fancied it more if sneaking past it was their idea and not clearly confronting it.

Finally, the four left the endless halls and tunnels only to enter into what appeared to be an improvised temple, some sort of man-made lair with four tunnels leading up to a large platform in the center, strangely enough it also had the same belts of carts and steel beams viciously torn up and tossed all over the place.

"I think it was tied down by those things, why else would they be torn apart..." Mana noticed and directed her gaze at the ruined track system.

"Yeah, makes sense. That's why they didn't normally use the belt system and carried the ore out by hand, it must've been used to detain the Tailed Beast in here and when Kouta's father activated them they must've tensed up and forced the Tailed Beast to break free. Whether he knew it or not the man caused a lot of trouble..." Shimo nodded looking at the ruined cart system from afar.