Though the war against the Hino hadn't been long, the military forces of Kaki and Nishihara were closer to exhausted than merely tired due to the necessity of securing Hino and Tanaka land as fast as possible. This was especially in sight of neighbouring and potentially hostile countries, which meant a lot of travelling long distances. It was a mental sort of weariness rather than physical, and it said something for Nishihara's retainers – who were largely known for their endurance – to possess such fatigue. If all Nishihara forces currently returned to their home country at the word of their landlord, they would be able to make the journey and fight an army of equal size for only a day before their stamina would hit a wall.

Lord Nishihara had in fact recalled all his military forces before Oichi had learned of the action, forcing Kaki forces unbeknownst to her to pick up their slack in overseeing the Kaki's secured but not stable hold on conquered lands. Thus the majority of the Kaki military force was stretched thin and exhausted by the time Oichi learned that a tailed beast was rampaging a trajectory that would run through the Nishihara nation, a neutral nation, and then the northwest area of the Kaki nation.

"We should fortify our defences here," Inui urged in the war room where they were gathered. "The tailed beast's path through Nishihara land is short; the monster will only clip that country before rushing through our other neighbour and hitting the Kaki capital where we stand!"

"Not possible," Oichi rejected. "Short its path may be, but the land that the beast disturbs are rice valleys. We can't be the country that lets a beast damage our ally's food supply. We must send back-up right away."

"But not too many," Musashi warned with elderly wisdom, "just in case we fail to stop the beast in Nishihara."

"You mean redirect it," Oichi deadpanned.

Tense exhales rippled through the war room. "None have killed a tailed beast before, Your Grace."

"If Lord Nishihara is smart," another retainer reasoned, "he's aiming to push the beast away to the southern province of our neutral neighbour. That way the beast won't be a threat to the Kaki nation that is his ally."

"So we shove our grievances on a neutral party?" Oichi summarised. "Not to forget, what is to stop that same party from redirecting the beast back to the Kaki capital – or worse, to our homeland in the south?"

There was a guilty cough through the tense air.

"The Makoto nation doesn't have the manpower or terrain to redirect the beast our way-"

"No."

"My lord-"

"I can't agree with this," Oichi rejected, "not without speaking with Lord Makoto first."

"He won't agree."

"Of course not," Oichi snapped, then sighed. "However, he might agree to working with Nishihara and Kaki forces to kill the tailed beast."

"Kill, my lord?"

"You heard me. What are we?"

"M-My lord?"

Oichi swept her gaze across the room. "We are the Kaki. Impossible is what we do."

Despite the situation, the war room inexplicably brightened.

The Kaki delegation quickly traversed their trade routes for Lord Makoto's southern residence, preceded by a written request to meet that was tersely accepted. The travelling group comprised of only Oichi, her retainers, and the Kaki forces that could be spared outside of keeping civil peace, bringing their numbers to just above 900 men. Not enough to stop a tailed beast.

"Makoto-dono, thank you for agreeing to meet with me."

"What choice have I?" Lord Makoto tartly returned.

The whiskered, heavy-set man could have been an old dragon taken human form, coiled and sturdy upon his dais. He gazed down at Oichi and her chosen aide, Sanjuro. Lord Makoto's own aide sat deep in the landlord's shadow as a token presence, reflecting the clan's opinion of the meaningless meeting.

Lord Makoto leaned on a crossed knee. "You have come to declare war against the Makoto nation. Duty demands I pursue every avenue of averting or winning such conflict, and I'd prefer to engage in this sham of a negotiation before sicking my soldiers on Kaki."

Oichi sputtered. "War? Makoto-dono, I wish to discuss the tailed beast with you!"

"The beast that you and Nishihara-dono intend to redirect into the southern province of my country," Makoto's voice hardened.

"Not at all!" Oichi pursed her lips. "I haven't spoken with Nishihara-dono concerning the beast yet, but as his ally and your neighbour, I tell you now that our best course of action is to kill the beast as soon as possible, so that we may suffer its effects no longer."

"Kill it?" Makoto laughed without humour. "Spare me your performance, and tell me you come with a declaration of war. At least then I can cut this meeting short and return to my duties as lord of a land threatened by a tailed beast. Your only option besides assisting Nishihara-dono in his redirection of the beast, is assisting me in mine."

"We don't have to point a tailed beast at each other if we work together," Oichi pressed.

Makoto scoffed. "None have killed a tailed beast, and I'll not spend my retainers in a futile and wasteful effort. It is one thing to request I drop half-hearted interest in Tanaka land and not participate in a conflict between Nishihara and Hino, Kaki-dono; it is quite another to ask the Makoto clan to actively assist Nishihara in any way. After all, the Makoto and Nishihara clans are at war."

"So you said when we first met, and which by your own admission has recently lulled."

"As it does every generation!"

"Makoto-dono—"

"We have been at war for so long, it's practically tradition!" the old dragon steamrolled. "Nishihara-dono and I command two of the most reliable shinobi clans in the Great Continent. War against Nishihara is expensive. If a tailed beast is destroying that nation's rice valleys, then I say good riddance!"

"You won't address a tailed beast," Oichi slowly summarised, "because of expensive shinobi contracts? Are you so far in debt that you can't see reason!?"

"War is wealth, Kaki-dono."

"Don't speak alliterations at me!" Oichi huffed. "What can I say to change your mind?"

"You can't." Makoto snapped his fan shut. "You must think me simple, or yourself eloquent, to expect the words of an upstart noble to erase entire generations of conflict. Not to speak of the collateral damage between my Uchiha shinobi and Nishihara-dono's Senju shinobi that costs thousands of gold coins to repair…!" His ire faltered before Oichi's expression. "…You didn't know."

The volatile atmosphere had suddenly chilled into the mute pressure of the deep sea. Everyone in the room could hear their own blood pumping in their ears.

Oichi's voice dropped to a hair-rising flatness. "I must speak with Nishihara-dono."

Lord Makoto watched his fellow daimyo briskly rise and dismiss herself from the council room with a thunderous expression.

At the doorway for the antechamber, Oichi paused. "I'm leaving my soldiers here to fortify Makoto's borders."

Lord Makoto perked up. "Then…?"

"To fortify." Oichi turned her head, voice hard. "No more. San-chan, you're in charge of the Kaki forces here. You four, with me."

Four of her retainers in the antechamber bowed. "Our soldiers will prepare to leave at once."

"No, just you four. I can't move swiftly with a group of hundreds." She left the room.

Everyone blinked after her.

"Your Grace!?"

"But your safety!"

"My lord!"

Oichi's retainers exploded into action as they hastened to obey her orders as best as they understood them. Sanjuro bowed to Lord Makoto in the expected farewell of a lower-rank representative of guests to an upper-rank host, while in contrast to his etiquette, the four retainers whom Oichi had addressed raced out of the antechamber to catch up with their lord. The rest were just as quick to frantically leave the scene in order to update the Kaki army. Unknowingly, none of Oichi's retainers spared a glance at Lord Makoto in their haste.

The weary daimyo stroked his whiskers at their departure. At the very least, the outcome of the Kaki nation's involvement with a tailed beast would be memorable, in no small part due to their baffling young landlord.

"Where is your lord?" Oichi confronted. "I must speak with him about something."

The male shinobi that had greeted Oichi's arrival to Nishihara Castle straightened at her tone. Oichi detachedly recognised him as the retainer whom Nishihara had sent as a messenger earlier, and whom Sarutobi had been fond of earlier than. The Nishihara retainer likely currently sensed the shift in Oichi's usual mood.

His eyes flicked to the four lone retainers behind her. "May I ask what?"

"Oh, he knows what!"

"Kaki-dono." It was Lord Nishihara, surprised but unruffled. The landlord swept down the wooden hall for them with castle servants fluttering after him, checking his robes and attentive to his needs. "You showed up swiftly and without warning, I didn't have time to prepare my servants for your arrival."

"Nishihara-dono," Oichi curtly greeted. "May we speak? Alone?"

He tilted his head. "Of course."

"Without aides," Oichi elaborated.

Everyone froze.

"My lord!"

"Your safety!"

"It's unprecedented!"

Oichi jerked her head aside, and her retainers behind her immediately silenced, having learned when it was futile to try changing the mind of their strong-willed lord. She looked ahead at Lord Nishihara. The daimyo silently scanned her face before hesitantly gesturing behind him in response, leading Oichi to the castle's council room. A shake of his head declined the company of his retainer.

Lord Nishihara slid the council room's door closed behind him. "Speak freely, Kaki-dono."

Oichi immediately whirled on him. "You have some nerve!"

He tilted his head in acknowledgment. "Kaki-dono—"

"I'm still speaking," Oichi hissed. "I had to learn that Makoto is ready to declare war on Kaki from Lord Makoto himself! Was a warning for something so predictable from your standpoint worth too much ink for your letter?"

Nishihara slipped his hands into his silk sleeves, the equivalent of a shrug. "To be fair, you would have had to help Nishihara redirect the tailed beast north into Makoto regardless. And given our clans' long history, the fact that Makoto-dono and I are pressured by debt shouldn't be a leap."

So Lord Nishihara had intentionally kept his letter brief. Wonderful.

"Do you take me for a fool?" Oichi paced. "You hid the fact that you command the Senju while Makoto-dono commands the Uchiha! Not only are those two, in Makoto-dono's terms, the most expensive shinobi in the Great Continent – they are also the most vicious! You and I just finished a war against Hino! While my forces would have been stretched thin across the expanded Kaki nation and driving a tailed beast out of your rice valleys, Makoto's forces would have swept south into my homeland to take my family hostage, then west into the Tanaka and Hino lands to take my mines and trade routes!

"Or," Oichi caught her breath, "is all this by design? An intelligent man like you could have agreed to not take the Tanaka or Hino lands if we won the war in order to lower my guard. Then you could preemptively swoop in before Makoto-dono could while my forces were exhausted from the frontlines in Hino and preoccupied with the tailed beast in your rice valleys."

Nishihara's eyes turned flinty. "You dare question my honour? My word is my bond!"

Oichi exploded. "Your honour has been in question since the moment I realised you've been using me as a prodding stick! First Hino, now Makoto!"

"You wanted Hino gone just as much as I did!"

"And now," Oichi continued over him, "I must debate the merits of assisting a landlord who prioritises money over his allies, or a landlord who is the same, but is at least honest about it! I've had my fill of waiting for others to trust me. I'm handling this beast my way!"

She stormed out of the room with Lord Nishihara close on her heels. Their departure startled the retainers waiting outside like a flock of birds, who hastily followed after their masters.

"We're not done!" Lord Nishihara called out.

"I am!" Oichi declared.

"See reason, Kaki-dono – no one has killed a tailed beast before!"

"No one has tamed one, either!"

Oichi and her flustered retainers disappeared around a corner, leaving Lord Nishihara, his retainer, and the castle's servants flabbergasted in their wake.

The retainer – who was Nishihara's most trusted servant – gaped after them. "Your Grace, did I hear Lord Kaki correctly? She means to tame a tailed beast?"

"I don't know," Lord Nishihara snapped. "I doubt even the heavens can predict her!"

"You like Lord Kaki as an ally."

"I do!" Lord Nishihara pivoted away and fixed his robes, reluctantly restoring his appearance of aged grace. His retainer followed dutifully behind him. "That child has the devil's luck." Lord Nishihara sighed. "But the devil can't help against a tailed beast. At this point, one can only pray."

The wind howled above the grassy hills of the Makoto border. Deciduous trees in the distance bent under the weight of the sky as the full moon itself seemed to press down on reality. Behind Oichi, rows of armour faintly trembled in the warm summer night. Oichi straightened upon her horse in confidence to reassure her retainers.

On his own horse to her right, Inui sighed wearily. "I am honoured to serve you, Your Grace, in war and strife."

"We will not enter war with the Makoto nation," Oichi corrected. "You were there. I said I wouldn't shove a tailed beast on someone without their permission."

The mounted retainers around her immediately whiplashed. "So your first plan is to tame it!?"

"That's Plan C," Oichi stated. "Plan B was to kill it together with Nishihara and Makoto forces. For obvious reasons, I've had to move past Plan B."

"I'm afraid to ask about Plan D," Musashi murmured from behind.

"That's easy – D for death." Oichi blew a stray hair out of her face. "We all die pursuing any of the previous plans. Then we wouldn't have to worry about accomplishing them."

In a blink, the trees in the horizon suddenly vanished. A shockwave instantly slammed into the Kaki and Makoto forces holding the border, followed by a meteor shower of uprooted trees. Oichi reined in her panicked horse as she coughed against the dust storm. Her teary eyes caught a dancing shadow in the distance. The lone silhouette split into nine.

Standing to Oichi's left, Lord Makoto's senior retainer watched the horizon with piercing red eyes. "You truly intend to lead your retainers to their end, I see."

"Pffft," Oichi scoffed, startling the Uchiha. "Anyone who knows me well enough should know this: I only gamble on winning terms. Yah! Kaki forces, with me!"

The leader of the Uchiha forces watched Oichi ride straight for the Nine-Tailed Fox with flat bewilderment. Without tearing his gaze from the sight, he spoke to the Kaki retainers left with him. "Incredible. I don't think I'll ever understand your master."

Inui, Musashi, and the two other retainers who had followed Oichi to the Nishihara residence were now charging into battle with their armies behind them. Oichi was answering the Nishihara shinobi's corralling of a tailed beast with her modest strength of 400 men. Behind her stood the rest of her forces and the presence of Lord Makoto's Uchiha shinobi, waiting for the Kaki nation's betrayal or extinction. Either way, the Makoto would respond to the Nishihara's redirection of a beast with violence.

Still, none of this detracted from the uniting truth of Oichi's character.

The Kaki retainers with the Uchiha nodded in agreement as they watched their lord.

At the head of the group, Sanjuro spoke with reverence. "I have served Oichi-sama since childhood, and still her thoughts are beyond my comprehension. I can only continue to serve faithfully and watch the world change by her side…."

A Kaki retainer patted Sanjuro's shoulder sympathetically when his voice cracked with emotion.

"Sanjuro-dono…."

A few men wiped stray tears, moved.

A field away, Oichi was panicking.

She had hastily informed her immediate retainers of the approach they would take in taming the tailed beast, but now in the shadow of the creature, Oichi was personally coming to grasp why tailed beasts were called walking calamities. Only the Nine-Tailed Fox's ire at being hounded by Senju in Nishihara territory could explain why the beast was currently overlooking the Kaki. Truly, as a handful of men and women on horses, Oichi and her people were as flies to him.

Ahead, the Fuuma and Sarutobi clans clashed with the beast first, relieving the Senju shinobi that were baiting their foe away. As discussed, Oichi's Fuuma and Sarutobi retainers pinched off to create two pressure points against the beast's balance – his right foreleg and left hind leg. With a free left claw, the Nine-Tailed Fox whipped out at the shinobi crowding his limbs, only for the Senju to net the claw with living wood and wrangle it into the ground. The tailed beast was off-kilter just in time for Oichi to arrive in breath range of its snout. Inui and Musashi with their forces split off from Oichi to support Fuuma and Sarutobi, as the wooden net was already splintering.

Cold sweat ran down Oichi's face.

"Lord Kaki!?" A senior of the Senju clan, and thus a Nishihara retainer, called from afar. His shock was clear even without his face in focus, for who could name a daimyo who lead vanguards against a tailed beast?

Oichi slowed her horse before the front of the fox, seeking his range of sight despite her better instincts. "I just need one shot!" she roared across the distance.

"Of what!?"

Bewilderment spread like wildfire among the Senju shinobi as they realised the circumstances of the Kaki's assistance. Oichi's retainers, while aware of the plan, were no better.

Oichi sucked in a deep breath.

"Kurama!"

CRASH!

The beast's claw snapped out of its binds and toppled half of the humans around him in a heartbeat, like an orange wave of forest fire.

"Kurama!" Oichi cried out with the full weight of her desperation. "Your dad has a message for you: take care of your siblings, and don't cause trouble for others!"

The beast's three other limbs jerked free of their burdens, shaking off full armies like water droplets. Oichi half-feared that she couldn't be heard above the chaos from her distance, and half-feared that she could and was being ignored anyway, making her retainers' efforts meaningless. Such fear evaporated for blind shock when crimson eyes intently swivelled to her.

When the fox spoke, the sky rumbled — so naturally high was his gargantuan head.

"Confidence colours your aura," Kurama chillingly stated. "To speak with such…. Human, you have died before."

As best as Oichi could recall, it was near impossible to meet the Six-Paths Sage in death, even as an incarnation of Asura or Indra. Naruto and Sasuke had only been able to because Plot. But if a tailed beast was handing Oichi a vague excuse on a platter, she wasn't going to send it back to the kitchen.

"Well," Oichi reasoned with more boldness than was logical, "you're not wrong."

"Ha!" Kurama barked out a laugh. He grinned with all forty-eight oversized swords he called teeth. "Many crests have I crossed, but none of the persimmon flower."

"The Kaki nation was small until recently," Oichi admitted.

Kurama raised his voice and head higher like a bellowing mountain, haunches curling with tension. "Ages of silence, broken by meddling! So be it, Father!"

His energy peaked with a sudden slam of air and quaking earth.

Oh, shoot. In her previous life, Oichi had witnessed a pet rabbit dart across an amphitheater in three seconds.

Kurama was blinking across valleys in mere heartbeats. Entire trees were uprooted and huge boulders went flying with the tsunamis of wind rippling from the tailed beast's movements. Oichi found herself thrown off her horse, which was then lifted in the air by pressure and dropped on her legs with a slam. The panicked equine whinnied on its side as Oichi futilely struggled to free herself. Her hair whipped against her face in painful lashes.

"Fuuma! To me!"

Oichi's faithful shadow pierced the stormy gales to arrive by her side. Fuuma Kazama looked like he'd be plucked off the face of the earth at any second as he fought against the Nine-Tail's trail of wind.

"My lord," Fuuma breathed as he saw Oichi clearly.

A tender hand twisted armour aside to relieve weight against a stray tree branch that had skewered Oichi's shoulder. Ah. That explained why she was struggling to control her left arm. Nevertheless, the data was irrelevant.

The Kaki homeland was in danger.

"I didn't summon you to treat my shoulder," Oichi hissed with a sweaty brow. "Your people are the swiftest of my forces. Run to the Kaki homeland and steal Oharu away to the capital."

Fuuma gaped. "My clan and I are no match for the wind!"

"The women of my family haven't unlocked their chakras yet," Oichi returned. "The Nine-Tailed Fox will thus have to rely on sight to locate the Kaki clan. He will search for the greatest density of persimmon motifs. Go, Fuuma-kun! I will follow! Every second we waste is a life lost!"

Fuuma watched blood rapidly spread beneath Oichi's armour. "Your Grace—"

"Now!"

The retainer jumped and morosely nodded, vanishing to gather his clan and race for the homeland. He understood the weight of Oichi demanding one of her sisters' survivals. Oichi was willing to perish with the rest of the people from her childhood, so long as her heir went on breathing.

The final measure of devotion.

.

.

.

At the Makoto border, the leader of the Uchiha forces stepped forward with widened eyes.

"…Lord Kaki is injured."

The Kaki retainers with him jerked into action.

"Her Grace is!? Your Grace—!"

A hand on Sanjuro's chest halted the Kaki army's energy.

"No," the Uchiha clinically reasoned. He flicked a gesture over his shoulder, and several Uchiha bolted into action. "You're collectively slow. Prepare a medical station instead, and I will fetch your lord here."

.

.

.

In the thickest of the dust storm, the Senju leader from earlier found his way to Oichi first, guided by his own sharp sense of chakra. Having fought a war by Oichi's side before, he and other Nishihara retainers could easily recall the feeling of being near the unique Lord Kaki. He was surprised to find the daimyo ahead of the present Kaki retainers, who should have started seeking their lord's location once the Nine-Tailed Fox had darted off. The Senju leader had just missed Fuuma.

"Lord Kaki," he began, only to be met with an echo.

The lone Senju and Uchiha ninja by Oichi's side stared at each other.

The Uchiha spoke first. "Lord Makoto's neighbour requires healing."

"Of which my people can give," the Senju returned.

"I'm faster."

"Cut it out, both of you!" Oichi barked. "If you truly wish to help, pick up my horse!"

The two shinobi blinked down at her. They silently hoisted her horse up back on its legs as Oichi shakily stood up. Two sets of hands flew out when Oichi stumbled.

She shot them a warning look. "Your help is shallow in these circumstances. You are not your lords, and this pettiness is beneath you."

Oichi sharpened her right palm with chakra and severed the tree branch in her shoulder like one would trim an arrow. Then she grabbed her horse's saddle with her right hand and pulled herself up onto it.

"Lord Kaki!" the two shinobi reacted with alarm.

The horse backed up with fear. Oichi winced as she steadied herself with one hand on the reins. More voices cried out as two Kaki retainers finally found Oichi in the dust storm.

"Inui," Oichi exhaled in relief, ignoring the Uchiha and Senju. "Inform Saru-tan and the rest: hasten to the Kaki capital and bolster its defences. Fuuma-kun and his people are already rushing to pick up Oharu and escort her there. Musacchi, with me; we must hurry to the homeland and protect it from the tailed beast."

"Your Grace!?" Inui stammered. Behind him, Musashi solemnly inclined his head, fully understanding Oichi's orders. The old retainer flared his chakra, signalling his men to gather and head off with their daimyo.

Oichi steadied her horse with a shush. "Inui," she said gravely. "Nothing I say will change your family's fate. I can only promise that I will give my full and final effort in denial of it."

"My family understands the danger of living in the nation's heart," Inui frantically countered. "I cannot ask Your Grace to risk her life just to save my family!"

Oichi burst out laughing, startling her retainers and her neighbour's two retainers. "Don't you know by now, Inu-pi? I never ask my people to do anything I'm not willing to do myself! Kaki nation, ride!"

Oichi, Musashi, and Musashi's men collectively darted off across the plains for the Kaki homeland, rushing to stop a tailed beast in its tracks or die trying.

Inui reached out after his lord's shrinking back and clenched his fist to swing it down, despairing. The Uchiha and Senju watched the Sarutobi clan and Inui's forces catch up to Inui.

"Curses!" Inui cried out. "Curse it all!"

"Inui-dono," Sarutobi panted, "what are Her Grace's orders?"

Inui whipped a wet gaze to his allies. "Our lord demands our swift return to the capital! We are to protect it and the Lady Oharu who will join us through Fuuma-dono!"

Shock and denial burned through the remaining Kaki forces as they realised the nature of the command. Still, the Kaki sense of honour present in both samurai and shinobi stayed foolish actions. Their only freedom was to stiffly weep.

"We hear and obey!"

;

A/N: The plan labels were initially numbers so that Plan 4 could be "Plan Shi," or as it sounds, "Plan Death." However, I was afraid that explaining the punchline would ruin the joke, so I stuck with alphabetical labels for the plans instead. As always, please review!