Part One: A Boy Meets A Fox
Chapter One: A Fox Saves A Boy
On a particularly quiet and seemingly uneventful night within the land of the Elemental Countries, a strange shadow moved at inhuman speed through a dark forest. With the skill only possessed in this realm by the shinobi, it traversed the land by jumping from branch to branch of the forest over-hang. The figure could not say how long it had fled for, only the sound of its own breathing and the soft sounds of the night-time forest were audible.
Suddenly, the figure stopped its flight and landed on the soft forest floor just before collapsing. Minato Namikaze was cursing himself and his own carelessness as he felt the blood from his wound pool around him. His hand, he knew, was soaked in blood from having held against the injury for so long with only a foot or so of dressing to stem the flow.
It had been a routine mission, one that a shinobi of his caliber should have had no trouble completing were it not for his own over-confidence. The sixteen year old, newly minted Jounin had been sent on a simple mission to check out the southern border of the Land of Earth and check for presence of Iwa-nin.
Instead, he had managed to get himself caught by a squad of Iwagakure ANBU deep within the Land of Earth's borders. Minato had thought himself taking a necessary risk when he decided to check out what seemed to be heightened military activity around the borders.
"If I had any sense I would have taken what information that I could have managed and high-tailed my blond ass back home." He lamented to himself, "And now I'm likely going to die here without being able to report anything back to Konoha."
Minato found himself scoffing at the idea that he was hailed as a "prodigy" in his village, some genius he was!
These were the last bitter thoughts which swam in the blond shinobi's conscious mind before his world went black.
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In the land of the Elemental Nations and the Demon Realm beyond, there were many beings of such potency and raw power that all who knew of them feared their power. Amongst these creatures, there were few creatures as feared and respected as the ancient Fox clan. Those beings were renowned for their potent magical power and vast knowledge of the arcane, feared for their fierce competency in battle, and avoided for their mischievous natures.
Of those in the Fox clan, none were feared or respected so much as Kushina the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox, matriarch of the Demon Fox clan.
On this night, said demon of world renown and nigh-limitless power was spending her time bathing in her favorite hot-spring within the mortal realm. There were few things that the ancient creature had not seen or experienced but that had never stopped her from enjoying the simple pleasure of a steaming hot-spring.
It came to pass that the Queen of the demon Foxes found herself craving a bit of sulfur-free air and gingerly lifted herself out of the spring to take a walk through the forest. Had any young human male been lucky enough to have been present to spy on the creature, he would have seen a woman of inhumanly rapturous beauty, with long, pointed ears, brilliant green eyes which slit horizontally like those of a cat, and most surprisingly, nine fiery red tails sprouting from the woman's lower back.
Kushina gave a luxurious moan as she stretched out like a cat before beginning her stroll. She enjoyed all the small sounds and smells of the midnight forest, the smells of wood, water, dirt, and blood were always comforting to her.
" …Blood?"
With a curious wrinkle of her nose, the demon fox walked toward the coppery smell, which after a moment of contemplation she concluded was the blood of a human. Strange, she was sure that this area was not occupied by humans and she would surely have noticed if any sort of battle between noisy humans had taken place so close to her. Finally she came upon the source of the smell, a strange human male lay on his stomach in a small pool of his own blood.
The man were loose fitting black pants and a dark green vest which she recognized as marking the man a shinobi. The feature which stood out the most about him however, was his spiked mess of bright golden hair. Even a demon such as she knew that attribute was rare amongst humans in that part of the world.
Carefully, she rolled the man over to inspect him in more detail. The young Ninja looked to be in his mid teens, he was still breathing, if only just and he bled from a knife-sized stab wound on his left side. She figured the wound must have just missed the man's lung and was steadily causing him to bleed out. The man held some kind of dressing in his right hand which was entirely soaked in his blood. It did not take centuries of wisdom and experience to figure out what must have happened.
Having lived for more years and eras then Kushina liked to give much thought had taught the Demon Queen that it was generally worth the effort to indulge her simple impulses. With little ceremony, she stripped the man of his shirt and recited a quick spell to seal the man's wound, preventing further blood flow. She did not even sigh with effort as she lifted the solidly built youth over her shoulder and headed back towards her favorite hot spring.
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Minato woke with a start and immediately collapsed back onto the bed he was laying on when his chest twanged its painful protest at the sudden movement. The blond shinobi looked around in confusion to survey his surroundings.
The young man was lying in a fairly large and comfortable four-poster bed inside an equally luxurious looking room. A large fireplace crackled with life to his right and the walls were constructed of a dark, reddish-brown wood, possibly mahogany. The room itself was fairly sparse aside from a large wardrobe in the far left-corner of the room and a small nightstand to his immediate right.
He was painfully aware that he was naked besides the bandages that wrapped around his torso and a couple thin sheets. Wherever he was, Minato figured it was unlikely his hosts meant him any harm. They had clearly saved his life and the room spoke of affluence beyond any need for thievery or an attempt to hold him ransom.
Slowly, he raised himself into a sitting position and reached for the silver pitcher he had noticed sitting beside a glass on the nightstand. Being as careful as possible not to irritate his chest he poured himself a glass of water and drank from it just as carefully.
Minato found after his first sip that he was actually quite thirsty and drained two more glasses before he felt satisfied. Suddenly he heard the door to his right click as the knob turned, despite himself he instinctively readied for a fight. Instead he was greeted by the face of an attractive, if rather strange looking young girl.
She had light brown skin and brilliant blue hair which bobbed at just above her shoulders; more strangely were here ridiculously long ears which nearly stuck over her head in sharp points.
Dumbly, he thought himself thinking "…An elf saved my life?"
"Oh! You're wake!" The girl squealed cheerily with a wide smile as she entered the room, closing the door behind her. She wore a knee-length blue dress made of a disturbingly sheer fabric with a flowers patterned on the cloth.
Suddenly the girl gave him a displeased pout before speaking with an evil grin "I was hoping you'd be out long enough for me to have my way with you whilst you slept." Minato became unpleasantly aware of another strange feature this mysterious girl possessed, she had fangs.
"Umm," he began awkwardly, he figured the girl was probably joking but the strangeness of the situation had him off kilter. "What is your name?"
This questioned cause the girl to giggle deviously before fixing him with an admonishing glare. "You know, it's rather rude to ask someone's name without first giving your own." She waggled her finger as she said this before winking and giggling again.
"My name is Melone, pleased to meet you." She said with a slightly ironic curtsy.
"Namikaze Minato." He responded, figuring he had little choice.
"Hello, Minato-kun." The girl purred with a wicked twinkle in her eye. "Welcome to the castle of the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox."
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Yatah! First Chapter is finished! For those of you subscribed to my other story, "Pride of a Prince, Resolve of a King", I regret to inform you that that story is discontinued. I just don't have the patience or time to rewrite the thing and my pride as a writer won't allow me to continue such an abysmally written fic. Anywhoozle, if you did like that story I feel confident you will enjoy this one more and I am determined to write this one to completion!
I intend to update this fic once a week if the gods favor me so let us hope that sacrificial lamb I smoked the other day pleased whoever is up there. *Laughs nervously*
Well that's it for today! Reviews make me happy and excited to write. Just sayin'