The Four-Tails tried expelling emerald flames from its mouth again, but its mobility appeared to have been crippled to merely flexing and twitching. Ethereal tendrils of golden energy extended from the peaks of each pillar while Mana clapped her hands together "Om Mani Padme Hum" she chanted out as the ethereal tendrils surrounded and sealed the prison around the Five-Tails. The Five Pillars peaks began raking the ground they stood from, carving the ground as they moved in closer.
Once the Five Pillars finally surrounded the Five-Tails, their upper halves bent up, creating an appearance of a hand that had captured the Five-Tails within its grasp while the pulses of golden energy still burst in all directions. Power of a technique so ancient and so powerful that not even a Tailed-Beast could defy it. With the seal locked in place, the Five-Tails could once again thrash about, but there wasn't much use to it as nothing it could have tried doing would have left the containment field around the Five Pillars Seal.
"Now you're free from Rakugi's control over you. You don't have an excuse to hide behind anymore but we both know you'd have done every single thing you did, isn't that right?" Mana looked down at the Tailed-Beast, still hovering in the air where the pillar she stood on once was. The magician swooped down, feeling a heat wave pass her when the raging Five-Tails shot out a tongue of emerald flames her way, flames that hit an invisible energy barrier and dissipated, washing all over itself as punishment instead and calming the beast down.
"That's right, I've read about you. You see, I've met one of you before. The Nine-Tails…" Mana mentioned as she approached the hand-like cage that the Five-Tails ended up in.
An ear-splitting roar echoed for kilometers on end, spreading far and wide through the empty Lightning Country wasteland in all directions until the bustling mountain ranges of Kumogakure stopped it in the north or the snowy mounds of the Snow Country in the south did. While the beast knew full-well, it wasn't able to hurt Mana from within the cage, it still had boundless fury to express toward the ninja magician, and releasing these vociferous growls and yells was the only way it knew how to do that.
"Not a fan of Nine-Tails, are you?" Mana closed her eyes and nodded a few times before turning her attention back up at the beast that begged the universe for a chance to slip its hand out of the jade cage and crush this annoying brat standing right in front of it with its bare hands. "When I was younger and less experienced, I ended up releasing it from its imprisonment. It was at a tough spot, being endlessly drained and tortured, abused for nefarious goals by greedy people. When you look at it from that perspective, I can see why the Tailed Beasts aren't so fond of us."
The colossal monkey grabbed the jade fingers and released a maddened howl as it tried splitting them apart with its bare hands. Everything about this situation tipped it off: the fact that the seal it feared the most of all things once again came into play, obstructing its freedom and will, that it was snared and at the mercy of a mere human it hated so much and the fact that this human was just posturing and lecturing him despite being younger than some parasites making the Five-Tails' back itch this very moment were.
"I ended up releasing it. Everyone kept telling me what a massive mistake I did and how I would regret it. The Nine-Tails is by far the strongest and the most fearsome of you, isn't it? Even with that in mind, for the longest time, I was perfectly fine with my decision. Maybe I was even feeling cocky about it. The more days passed with no news of a settlement or a village leveled to the ground by that beast. But… The more experienced I've grown, the more I started second-guessing that call. I kept reading up more and more and more about you, finding out as much about each one of you as humanity knew. I guess it's because I just really, really wanted to be sure I did the right thing there." Mana scratched the back of her head, rustling her sticky with blood dark hair.
Another pair of sandals touched down. Mana could sense that familiar chakra signature incoming for a little while now, which was why she didn't hurry to decide over what to do with the Four-Tails. She turned to Skaven's direction and caught a whizzing head decoration. It was her hat. It had taken more than a few painful licks from the flames, the black cloth wrapping around it had torn off in a few places, and the whole cylinder looked more miserable than it was classy as the accessory looked when Mana wore it.
"Sorry, most of your stuff's scattered all over the place or burnt up. I guess you're not going anywhere for a little while, huh?" Skaven dragged his hand over his hanging on one side, greasy hair as he looked up to Mana with a dull pair of eyes.
Mana turned back to the Four-Tails without answering Skaven. If he found more than just her hat amongst the stuff she had packed that had been lost and scattered during the initial blast, why would he specifically look for her hat, almost as if he knew this hat held specific significance to Mana? The young woman shook her head lightly and turned back to the snarling chakra titan before her. She could wonder about Skaven's secrets when she didn't have a Tailed Beast waiting to be judged for all its transgressions.
"That kid, the part of which I still hold inside of me, would say that I should just open up the seal and let you go. That you're not to blame for what you did while under Rakugi's orders," Mana returned to talking to the Five-Tails who became suspiciously quiet once the magician brought up this possibility. "I say, I know what sort of Tailed Beast you are. Even amongst the Tailed Beasts, you are renowned for your dislike for humans. The few Jinchuuriki throughout history you've had have recorded that you believe yourself to be superior, stronger, and more intelligent than us. Even if it is because of this injustice that creatures weaker whom you also consider less intelligent than you are bossing you around and not giving you your peace of mind, I cannot in my clear consciousness allow such a human-hating monster to roam free."
With this Mana sparked the previous outrage from the Tailed Beast as it tried every possible option of breaking out and killing Mana while remaining within its cage imaginable: from pulling or splitting the five pillars obstructing it to breathing fire on, reaching or smashing the defiant ninja magician standing so miniscule before him and daring to talk down to it like that.
"I see, so you're sealing it inside of you, gonna become its Jinchuuriki and make sure that destructive power isn't wasted?" Endo approached Mana from behind, alongside Skaven, who stared at Endo with suspicion and followed his actions with wary.
"No." Mana shut that option down. "I'd rather die than host a human-hating beast like this inside me. I don't think I could stop anyone trying to cleave me into two when a part of me would belong to a monster who killed Tomi."
"So… Tomi's dead…" Skaven muttered to himself, pocketing his hands and looking at the sad and dusty windstorms picking up with hollow howls behind him.
"I believe that the right thing to do in this case would be to command you to jump as high up as you can, into the deepest corners of space and leave you there. Gasping for breaths, stuck in a perpetual cycle of dying and rebirth repeatedly. But… I just don't have that much hatred in me for you to do something like this. That's where we're different. Still, I'm not showing you mercy either…" Mana raised her hand, showing the Tailed Beast the depths inside of her hat.
"My punishment to you is to remain sealed inside of my hat. Stuck, waiting for the remaining four orders until all the remaining pillars are down and the seal frees you again. Once you have served humanity four remaining times, you'll have earned your freedom and you can have your way with me, the person who imprisoned you for however long this will take. That is my first order, Mitra Svaha." Mana completed the five-part mantra etched onto the Five Pillars of the seal, making the Five Pillars caging the Tailed Beast collapse with thunderous rumbling.
A paper tag held by a jade hand appeared on the center of the Four-Tails' forehead, one that replaced the previous decoration with far fewer available fingers and had all five fingers clutching the paper tag containing the mantra of "Om Mani Padme Hum". Almost immediately after the Five Pillars Seal finished forming over the Four-Tailed Beast, the thumb of the jade hand holding the paper tag opened up, engulfing the Tailed Beast in a golden, ethereal glow and washing toward Mana's hat. A wild whirlpool of energy began swirling around the head accessory as the hat appeared to struggle to contain the Tailed Beast initially but once the chakra titan converted fully into pure energy, soon the entire energy mass disappeared inside the hat and Mana rolled it up her hand, up her shoulder, and onto her head.
The Four-Tails had been sealed away and imprisoned inside of Mana's hat with four remaining orders to issue to it until the beast earned its freedom. Even if Mana didn't feel entirely contempt with the Four-Tails ever being allowed to walk free for what it did here, it wasn't like she'd allow the Tailed Beast to redeem itself with manual labor, anyway. Plus, maybe she'd feel more forgiving once the grief settles down somewhat and they pick up the pieces of what's left of the rest of their lives again.
"I've got to say, few people would have resisted taking the power of the Four-Tails to themselves. A fool would have used up those orders and bent back all five fingers eventually, a true warrior would have sealed the Four-Tails inside of themselves and become its Jinchuuriki," Endo looked to Mana from behind her while the magician stood still for a while, even after the affair had entirely resolved.
"Maybe I'm just done being a warrior," Mana muttered. "Too many people died today, and I just wanted it all to stop."
"Well, not being a true warrior is better than being a fool." Endo closed his eyes and sighed. "At least you're keeping the Four-Tails contained, even if this imprisonment is still susceptible to your questionable womanly judgment."
"Do you really want to be your lousy self around a woman that has a Tailed Beast sealed inside of her hat?" Skaven opened his right eye to scold Endo for giving Mana flack.
"I'm not just planning on using the Four-Tails for any excuse. If I can help it, I'll ask nothing of it once as long as I live," Mana turned around and wrapped her own hands around her arms, rubbing them to warm herself up as she looked around the grisly scene of total devastation around them. Finally, this nightmare was over, though, arguably, a far worse part of it remained–to pick up the pieces.
"I can't fucking believe it!" the Supreme Leader's jaw dropped when Mana, Skaven, and Endo appeared from the wall of dust and sand. Endo dragged Damisan's unconscious body with some rag wrapped over his face as a respect for the ninja's need to keep his face concealed at all times, Mana had Shige-H hanging over her back while she floated lightly above ground to make carrying the Stars leader a simpler task.
"Where is the Tailed Beast?"
"Did they stop it?"
"What on Earth happened out there?"
"Supreme Leader…" Mana muttered after landing before the woman and placing her comrade down on the ground. Endo just rudely let go of Damisan's lower body, sticking out his tongue and wiping his hands at his chest as if it disgusted him to touch the impaired ninja's limbless body. Skaven kept it behind Mana, having avoided any manual labor, and just wandered the battlefield with his hands inside his pockets.
"Well, I'll be fucking damned, I guess you found your stupid hat, you mean-ass bitch!" Supreme Leader still looked absolutely baffled because not only did the Stars survive but they also seemed to have dealt with the Tailed Beast menace.
"We've been wondering if you would find us having withdrawn so far away into the Land of Lightning wastelands, then we remembered that you're a chakra sensor, Mana," regimental commander Harcel chuckled to himself, looking mighty proud of something, most likely of the fact that he was the one to remember that fact and bring it up.
"I've sealed the Four-Tails away. It won't be troubling you any longer." Mana pointed at her hat before bowing and turning to walk away.
"Wait… Where the fuck do you think you're going?" Supreme Leader scratched her messy eggplant-colored hair.
"As I recall, I failed the prep course. I'm not an Allied Ninja even if there still were Allied Ninja. Thanks for the illusion of belonging that I had when I was here and the chance to do something bigger with my life but the graduation exam proved I don't actually belong with the Allied Ninja and I am not about to spend six more months of my life for another shot. I gave this Allied Ninja thing a fair shot, and it just didn't work out. I was planning to walk away from it all during the graduation ceremony, in fact, before this whole incident happened…" Mana looked around the site, seeing bright flames and smoke in the horizon illuminating the night's sky and making it look bright as early evening even this far away.
"You backstabbing cock-guzzler!" Supreme Leader growled, turning her head down and letting her spiky hair cover her seething face. "After all you've done for us, for the Allied Ninja, you think we're just gonna let you walk the fuck away from all this? From all the people you've helped save?"
Mana raised the front of her eyebrows, having heard something she didn't expect to hear.
"Mana, I've always known you to be incredibly strong. I never truly approved of you even going through this hassle of the prep courses. It's an awful waste of wonderful power. Strong ninja need to be on the field, moving mountains and defying impossible odds, and impressing mere mortals around them. You're one of the strong, Mana, therefore I never really cared about that chaff about grades and exams. Strength is the only truth, the absolute truth, and no amount of points or written tests can seal true strength in stone. Strength simply is, or it is not," regimental commander Harcel shrugged. "Quite frankly, most of the teachers who might have objected to this executive decision are dead right now, anyway."
"You're important to the Allied Ninja, Mana. Pass or fail, your name means something around the world. It attracts people whether or not you like it. Even if most of the people attracted by your name hate you, even if your name is polarizing, it still means a great deal. Now you've gone on and done something balls-licking crazy and sealed yourself a Tailed Beast. As if we can allow to let you walk away now, bitch!" Supreme Leader pumped her fist with a smirk on her face, encouraging Mana to turn around and stay.
"So deliciously strong. She could still unleash that monster upon us and break free if she wanted to. That's just the type of ninja we need around the Allied Ninja." Harcel licked his lips.
"Need…?" Mana muttered to herself. She couldn't sense so many familiar chakra signatures anymore. Most of the Allied Ninja that have been present for the graduation ceremony had been gone. She couldn't locate most of the familiar chakra signatures, no matter how hard she tried to.
"That's right, cunt, we fucking need your whiny ass!" the Supreme Leader took a step forward, extending her hand. "Look the fuck around you. We're the slimmest we've ever been and we've got more work on our hands and more enemies than ever. You're strong and your head's in the right fucking place. More fucking importantly–you've got a mother-fucking Tailed Beast in that ridiculous fucking hat of yours. That's a cock-sucking deterrent if I've ever seen one. Just you being around us and helping us out from time to time will save cum-squirts that're left of the Allied Ninja."
"Understood." Mana turned around and nodded, extending her hand and shaking it with the Supreme Leader. "I'll help you get the Allied Ninja back on their feet, Supreme Leader. Though I have little time to waste. I've got a World Magic Tour planned so you better give us a schedule that no other ninja team has worked before."
"Oh, you better fucking believe it, sister, it ain't happening any other way!" the Supreme Leader winked to the ninja magician while Mana sighed and returned to the Stars.
"What the hell just happened?" Skaven rubbed the back of his head.
"The Stars just became one of the top Allied Ninja units in the organization. We'll have to work our butts off because we're never going to see the end of assignments coming our way," Mana replied.
"What a hassle…" Skaven groaned.
"Well, we can kick back for today, at least until our leader wakes up," Mana sighed and turned to the still unconscious members of their cell. Slowly the selected location became an encampment for the Allied Ninja as surviving medical ninja raced all over the place for the roughest night they've had in a while. Something told Mana that Shige-H should have been thankful to have gotten knocked out…