𝕸𝖎𝖘𝖋𝖎𝖙𝖘

Act I - Beyond The Horizon

Chapter 10 - The beginning of an End, Part 1

As someone who climbed his way from a civilian household to the peak of the shinobi world, Minato was well-versed in knowledge regarding shinobi clans— their history, lore and practices were all necessities for a budding Hokage. Not only did it give him a clearer picture of those under his administration, but it also let him better estimate their abilities, potential development, and use on the battlefield. If he were honest with himself, there was one clan that stood head and shoulders above the rest, and contrary to what Danzo Shimura may have thought, it was not the Uchiha or Senju.

It was the infamous Uzumaki Clan.

Disciples of shinobi history knew of two ways to identify an Uzumaki. The first, and easier, was their red hair. Much like the Yamanaka clan's natural-born high yin chakra reserves, the Uzumaki phenotypically stuck to crimson locks, enough that it was proof of at least distant Uzumaki lineage in one's ancestry.

The second, and scarier, factor was the ability to manifest Adamantine Chains.

To this date, Minato distinctly remembered the very first moment Kushina Uzumaki, his girlfriend of five months, materialized hers for the first time. They were chains that had a unique chakra combination, she had later explained, the likes of which he had never seen before. A curious combination of yin, the metaphysical element responsible for its myriad properties, and yang, the physical element allowing it to materialize as the strongest substance known to the world. It was an utter juxtaposition of the real and unreal that helped maintain the Uzumaki Clan's stronghold over the rest of the world until its sudden and unexpected annihilation during the Second Shinobi War.

And now Minato faced those very same Adamantine chains, flaring out at him like spirals of a maelstrom, the very phenomenon the Uzumaki took their name from. They stared him down like fanged serpents, with fuinjutsu matrices glowing ominously. And above all, they rose from the one woman he had never expected to face in battle.

At least, not like this.

"Kushina, we don't have to do this." He raised both hands in surrender, a rather useless gesture all things considered seeing as how he could teleport himself to any of his hiraishin seals. One did not try to corner the master of terrain manipulation in his own terrain, after all.

Unless it was Kushina Uzumaki doing the cornering. The rules just never seemed to apply to her.

"Then release the seal, Minato. I will help you with the Ryujin."

Minato's thoughts, much like Kushina's, were interrupted by Orochimaru's signal brief chuckle of amusement.

The redhead turned around and glared at him. "Are you entertained by this, Orochimaru?"

The Sannin shrugged. "Somewhat, I suppose. I find it ironic that you are lambasting your husband over his inaction when you're the one desperately trying to sell him this subpar deal of yours. Minato may be the most sanctimonious fool I have ever met, comparable to Danzo perhaps—" Minato glared at him, "—but even he isn't pretending to lord over you while clearly being a beggar."

The Fourth Hokage winced at that. "A little tact would be nice."

"Tact is for civilians—"

The air became palpable with ominous killing intent. "A beggar?"

"But of course," Orochimaru continued, pretending not to notice. "You want him to undo the Seal and release yourself from your pathetic existence. And so you're trying to guilt him into doing that, going so far as to use his woman's face to do it."

That did it.

"His… woman?"

Minato opened his mouth, speaking in the voice of someone who knew with absolutely certainty that what they were about to say was the indisputable truth.

"We're going to die."

"His woman?" Kushina hissed, shooting eight— no, ten, twenty— fifty Adamantine Sealing Chains straight towards Orochimaru's vital parts. They pierced through the Sannin's body with no remorse, revealing—

Empty air.

"Disappointing," the snake-like man drawled, standing nearly thirty feet away from the point of impact, as if he were discussing the weather. "Though, admittedly you do raise some interesting points."

That stopped her in her tracks.

"Orochimaru," Minato warned, "as funny as you may think it is taunting her, I should inform you that she is the representative of the Eight-Trigrams Seal. The very Seal inside which we stand and, presumably, are locked until the end of time."

"Enough with that utter tripe, Namikaze," Orochimaru snapped. "This place is an illusion. A world where everything is true yet nothing is real. Only you have the power to tether everything in here back to reality by undoing that Seal."

"And where do you stand?" he retorted, tired of silly word-play and prose. If both Kushina and Orochimaru wanted to bluntly cut to the point, then he could too.

"Whatever do you mean?"

"You know perfectly well that unlocking the Seal is the trick to getting back to the real world."

"You're referring to the same real world where my body has probably been destroyed by the explosion of energy," the Sannin dryly pointed out. "Believe me, I have no intention of trying my luck as a wraith and becoming food for some demon, thank you very much. But she, on the other hand," he thumbed at Kushina, "does not share our agenda."

"I don't wish to unleash the Nine-Tailed Fox. All I desire is the removal of the Shiki Fujin. Between Minato standing vigil and my chakra, the Kyuubi can be restrained—"

"Please tell me you don't actually expect us to believe that."

"…"

Sighing, Orochimaru turned towards Minato. "I ran the tests. Without the Shiki Fujin, the Eight-Trigrams seal will crumble. The Kyuubi is far too powerful for it to restrain on its own."

"It worked for the previous two jinchuuriki," he countered.

"The boy has yellow hair."

"…Alright, I see your point."

Kushina growled, her eyes burning like red hot coals. "You're going to side with the one who betrayed our village and kidnapped our child?"

Orochimaru rolled his eyes. "Between the two of us, I'd say I am the kinder one."

"Not helping," Minato hissed, before turning to Kushina, his expression guarded. "My decision does not change. Unless there's a way to keep Naruto alive, I have to keep things as they are. I—"

"Oh how plebeian!" The Sannin levied him with a look of utter disappointment.

"Do you have a better idea?"

"As a matter of fact, I do," he replied, a shark-like grin spreading across his pale visage. "The Seal, your seal, fears the continued existence of the Shiki Fujin will be detrimental to the world. Good intentions, I will give it that, but the execution leaves a lot to be desired. Unlocking the Seal would unleash a bijuu onto my castle and destroy my life's work. Oh, and incinerate the boy until he's nothing more than a dark spot on the floor."

Minato sighed. Trust Orochimaru to keep his twisted priorities straight.

"Even if holding hands and praying does somehow save young Naruto from being turned to ash, it leaves your child utterly alone, with the Kyuubi now free to mold him into whatever twisted monster it desires. Don't take my word for it, but the fox does seem to have a fetish for children."

Minato gagged at the very thought.

Eccentricities aside, the snake summoner raised some good points. Then again, this was Orochimaru he was dealing with. There was always a caveat. There had to be.

"So what do you propose we do instead?" he challenged.

Orochimaru smiled, his bright fangs glinting in satisfaction. "We allow my Ryujin to run its course. The seal was made by me, for me. It represents the best and worst of me, as I am sure you have already worked out."

Minato didn't bother to confirm or deny it. He knew it, and he knew Orochimaru knew he knew it.

"Should you allow the Ryujin to integrate with the Eight-Trigrams, something well within your authority, my seal can use the Kyuubi's unfathomable power to forge Naruto into the next Madara Uchiha or Hashirama Senju. And that's just the beginning."

"And you're just so giddy about selflessly giving your life's work to my son, aren't you?" he snarked.

"Hardly," Orochimaru snorted. "But it's only a matter of time before another 'Me' springs out from one of my Cursed Seals. The new 'Me' will come for Naruto and capture him, and I'm betting I won't make any of the mistakes I previously did. I'm smart like that."

It boggled Minato's mind to think that Orochimaru was the most narcissistic one on his team. One that included his sensei Jiraiya.

"Look, let's just say this is me thinking long-term, Namikaze. Time favors me, and I will not allow this tiny obstruction to stand in my way." Orochimaru's eyes were filled with an insane brightness. "No, I will use it to my advantage, even at the cost of myself. Sooner or later, the new 'Me' will find your boy and extract the Ryujin from him. But until then, Naruto may hold onto it. For safekeeping."

So there's the caveat.

Minato felt an overwhelming urge to strangle the man with his bare hands. But seeing as how that would accomplish nothing, he simply stood there, exhausted by it all. He felt a sinking sensation in the pit of his stomach that the future had suddenly become a thousand times more complicated.

"Naruto will stop you," he muttered at last. "He is my son. Mine and Kushina's. The Fourth Hokage of Konoha and the princess of the famed Uzumaki Clan. Something tells me he won't make it easy for you, Orochimaru."

The other man licked his lips in a predatory fashion. "The struggle to outwit one's prey always makes the hunt more satisfying."

Staring at one another, Minato and Orochimaru finally nodded. Yes, they understood one another perfectly. Had things been different, he'd have spent an eternity killing the man, constantly stabbing him with his kunai. But now…

"Activating the Ryujin will mean a temporary unlocking of the Seal. Just enough time to allow your creation to integrate properly—"

"Without the Kyuubi escaping," Orochimaru finished, rolling his eyes. "You're not the only one well-versed in the intricacy of seals, Namikaze. Buy me some time to work on it, and keep her from impaling me with those chains."

Snorting, Minato turned towards Kushina, who stared at him with a hate-filled expression he never could have imagined he'd one day be the target of.

"This… this is not the end," she replied, her chains gathering around her like missiles.

"No," he sighed, "barely the beginning."

"Of a new end," Orochimaru crowed.

And with that, they went to war.

Black and white.

The space around him was like an empty void. Initially, he'd believed he was staring into a starless sky, before realizing he was standing in it. All around him was an ever-growing, ever-consuming blackness. Yet despite the utter absence of light, he could see everything. A stark bleakness impossibly contrasting with reality. Merely standing there felt wrong, and yet, so, so right.

But Naruto was not afraid. He had just embraced the power of a maddeningly monstrous creature and fought and exalted shinobi, his Master, to a standstill. In comparison, standing in this freakish place was hardly a challenge.

Besides, this place felt… comforting. Like he belonged. Like it was—

"Mine," he whispered, inwardly wondering why he said that. The description was apt, but he didn't know where it came from. The unending void, somehow, was his. His to claim. His to stay in. Even when nothing would be left in the world, the void would still be there, patiently waiting for his return. For he was—

"Odd, isn't it?"

Naruto spun around to face the—

He stared.

And stared.

And kept on staring.

His mind drew a blank. What was it? He was looking at something, certainly, but he couldn't comprehend what it was. He could see, but he couldn't observe. Nothing about it made a lick of sense.

What the hell was going on?

His brain felt like bars of solid ice were shoved into each individual lobe. It was as if this… this thing in front of him had all the colors of the world sucked out of it.

No, that wasn't it. It was likely colorless to begin with.

Or perhaps transparent.

Naruto genuinely couldn't tell.

He could still somehow make out a vague structure of what he was gazing at. The base was humanoid, with spindly legs and a spherical, bulb-like thing climbing out of it, contorting in on itself in ways that defied basic geometry. It was twisted into some kind of loop and coiled back unto itself, almost as if nothing was there, like it cancelled itself out. Yet there was something, something he couldn't truly comprehend despite all his best efforts otherwise.

It was hot, it was cold. It was up, it was down. It was still, it was moving. Sideways went upwards and inwards, vanishing into nowhere. It was biological, mechanical, alive, ethereal.

It was utterly wrong, yet he'd never seen anything that looked more right.

But what was it?

What was it?

WHAT WAS—

"Any more and you will damage your mind, child."

"Who–who are you?" he blurted out, unable to help himself.

"Something beyond your comprehension. However, events shaped by entities both mortal and divine have allowed me a small window of opportunity to express myself. I am of the ethereal, and you, who I find myself tethered to, are real. Our bond is a true anathema, yet going against what created me is a hypocrisy I do not share."

"I understand, I think," Naruto replied.

"You think?" the entity repeated.

"Well… it's natural, isn't it? You rush into something you don't understand, and it's scary as hell. But once you learn more about it, it isn't— at least, it gets easier to handle. Knowledge counters fear."

Whatever this entity was, it was huge, powerful, and different from anything else he'd encountered before. This thing wasn't bigger than the Nine-Tailed Demon Fox, but it was horribly, unbearably deeper than her. It was like comparing a photograph of the sculpture to the wear and tear of the real deal. The power at its command was beyond anything he'd ever seen or felt. Beyond measure, beyond comprehension, just— just plain beyond.

It was Power, stemming from █████████ and he was a grain of sand to its oncoming tide.

The entity felt somewhat pleased by his thoughts. How he knew, Naruto had no idea. He simply did.

"Then allow me to bestow knowledge upon you, child. This world… has gone astray. We have failed it. The bijuu and other divinities have thought it wise to live quietly, to embrace civility," It spoke the word aloud like the vilest curse that could be uttered, "with mortals that once knew to tremble at our very feet."

How apt, considering he himself was trembling at that very moment.

"We have watched the powers of the World fall to mortals. Forest after forest, sea after sea. They dare to walk where they were never meant to walk. And every moment they do, the divine retreats, withers, and dies."

The entity fixed him with a hard gaze. "This will end. And you will be its herald."

Its voice was rumbling now, a loud, deep, powerful tone. "The scales are shifting, and you are the linchpin at the center of it all. You must do everything within your power to ensure things go as they are meant to."

"And, uh, how do I do that?"

He heard a rumbling thundercloud. Or perhaps it was merely the entity chuckling in amusement.

"Survive."

Minato leapt backwards, hastily somersaulting as innumerable golden chains constantly tried to stab him and pin him to the ground. He was currently running on nothing more than adrenaline, doing the best he could to keep the woman distracted and far away from Orochimaru.

As it turned out, it wasn't very hard to make Kushina desert that line of thought and bay for his blood. Normally, such a scenario wouldn't have surprised him, as he was intimately familiar with his wife's righteous anger. But the current Kushina was unhinged, as if this fight was her last stand. Understandable, seeing as how she was a representative of the Seal. Meanwhile, Orochimaru…

"Get started with it already!"

"Hush!" the Sannin retorted, his arms crossed as he observed the Seal with deep attention. "If you rush a miracle worker, your miracle will never see the light."

Cursing under his breath, Minato dug his knee into the ground and pushed himself into the air, just in time to avoid being mutilated to bits as two dozen chains slammed into the ground where he was.

"Yeah," he panted, landing in a comparably safer location, glancing towards Kushina. "You're every bit as lethal as I remember."

The woman was fast, impossibly so, and darted across the terrain like a streaking red shooting star— so quickly that it was difficult to keep track of her while also eyeing any golden chain that erupted from underneath the ground. She would attack, retreat, and attack again from a different angle all in the space of a heartbeat. To make matters worse, her main weapon was truly insane. Countless chains shot out of the ground like earthen serpents, whirling around madly with only the slightest motion of her arm to attack from all sorts of unpredictable angles, and then be drawn almost instantly back into her hands and reshot.

Minato spun around, quickly glancing at the dozens of kunai he'd thrown around, and drew another pair into his hands. Lighting and fire and golden chains rained down upon him as Kushina's power seared the landscape around him.

He smiled fiercely. "If this works without me being killed, I'm going to look really awesome doing it."

Spinning the kunai end-over-end like a buzzsaw, he hurled it forward at Kushina. But as it ripped through the air between them, she sent him back an almost pitying look, before sending a chain to intercept it.

Minato held back his smile. The kunai met blade-first with the chain, activating the large explosive tag in the process and engulfing her in smoke. Before she knew it, eight kunai came flying towards her from different directions. Without care, she launched chains towards each one with pinpoint precision.

It would be her undoing.

Minato— or rather, eight clones of him —appeared over the chains and ran on them, approaching Kushina from all eight directions with a glowing Rasengan in hand. The Uzumaki returned fire by channeling the seals on her chains, activating a powerful barrier of flames that caused seven clones to combust spontaneously.

The eight cursed and twisted his body midway, throwing a kunai upwards. Just as Kushina pushed another torrent of flames at the clone through an opening in her barrier, the real Minato appeared above her and opened a fuinjutsu spatial portal below.

His fingers moved to perform the necessary hand seals.

Wind-Style, Great Breakthrough!

A spiralling harpoon of angry wind came down like a vengeful god upon Kushina's barrier, flinging her into the fuinjutsu matrix below. The spatial tear literally sucked Kushina into it, sending her…

Somewhere.

"And that's that," Minato sighed, dropping to one knee. His spatial matrix could have thrown his wife's doppelganger anywhere inside the vast, endless labyrinth. But seeing as how she wasn't here, he didn't need to worry about it too much.

"Hurry up!"

Tayuya bit back the first hundred curses at the tip of her tongue.

"I'm right behind you."

As much as Tayuya wished otherwise, it wasn't the bimbo's fault she was struggling to keep up. If anything, this new redhead— Karin was her name —had somehow healed her back to functional capacity. Tayuya knew shinobi healers could do some amazing things, but Karin's blood was a cut— no, a dimension above any other healing jutsu.

That in itself was reason enough to put up with the girl's antics. Even if her obsession with Naruto— who she kept calling Blue for whatever fucking reason —was getting on her nerves. Naruto was hers, damn it! Just because some half-naked bitch healed her by making her suck blood like a freaking bat, didn't mean she was willing to share her Naruto with this airhead.

"I think we found it."

"That's the tenth time you've said that so far," Tayuya sighed, rolling her eyes. With the explosion that shook this place, every lab and room looked exactly the same— a smoking pile of rubble. And with the number of passageways and cave-ins, it was hard to tell where they even were anymore.

"Yeah, but this one has enough explosive seals lined around it to destroy a small village."

Tayuya paused at that. Why Orochimaru would put that many explosive seals inside his own building was beyond her. Then again, she doubted anybody could understand what that pedophilic snake was thinking. The guy was deranged.

"Alright," she breathed, wincing as she pulled out her flute. With how she was already running on fumes, this was going to suck. Big time. "Let me handle the—"

BOOOOOOOMMMM!

"…"

Tayuya stared at the chains whipping around Karin like fearsome snakes, half of them destroying everything around her while the other half cocooned her from all damage. Once the passageway was reduced to rubble, the girl peeked out from behind, nodded to herself, and shot her a thumbs up.

She really did not like this girl.

"You know what? Whatever," Tayuya sighed. "Let's just get this over with and find Naruto."

She stepped forward, into the room where Naruto was taken. The entire place was subsumed in an inferno. Nothing— not even the stone walls remained unscathed, if the intense dark marks and slashes were of any indication. Several places had literally melted, with anything and everything at the center of the room now completely incinerated to dust. There was a badly scorched body— a tall form with long, thin hands and dry, parched, pale skin and—

Tayuya halted.

No. That— that can't— it's not possible—

Orochimaru's scorched, melted, dead body— or whatever remained of it —was on the ground like burnt, discarded meat.

And there, next to him, on top of a raised table was—

"Naruto!" she heard Karin squeak. And for the second time, Tayuya had no words to say.

It was Naruto, her Naruto, encased within a dome of pure energy.

Another barrage of chains flew towards the barrier. Tayuya opened her mouth to chastise Karin for being reckless, but the words died in her mouth as they were instantly incinerated.

"Ack!" the other redhead screeched, jumping back.

"What, finally found something your kinky little chains can't penetrate?"

"Shut up!" Karin yelled, cheeks inflamed as she paced back and forth. "I'm trying to think of what else we can do, but my chains are the only offensive thing I have." She glared at the energy barrier. "Why is this stupid thing here anyway? We found Bl— Naruto, so we should be out of here already, but nooooo—"

Tayuya zoned her out. If her chains were useless here, then there was no point listening to her whining like a pussy. Clammy hands tightly clenching her flute, she wondered if her summons would be enough to break past Orochimaru's trap.

"—At least it isn't hurting him," Karin sighed.

Tayuya turned towards her with a glare. "And how the fuck do you know that?"

"Because it isn't corrosive, dimwit!"

Ah, that's right. The airhead loved calling people dimwits like a fucking toddler. And for some reason, even though it wasn't as satisfying as faggot or motherfucker or cunt-munching boogerfart, it still made her feel strangely affronted.

"Listen you cheeseflange," she angrily spat, "either you fucking explain what the fuck's going on, or I'll stick you with that land mammal Guren and make you play with a cup till you fucking squirt." Seeing Karin look nauseated by the mental image brought a self-satisfied smirk to her face.

Victory was hers.

"There's an energy coming from inside Naruto." Karin hesitated for a moment, before pressing on. "A special power within him—"

"The Nine-Tails, yeah I know."

"Yeah, that." The bimbo narrowed her eyes, but they quickly softened with concern. "It's corrosive. And reactive. The bijuu's energy has been stuck inside for… I guess a long time now, and it's slowly oozing out."

"Is it dangerous?"

"To everyone? Yes. To Naruto?" Karin peered at the glowing dome. "Probably not. At least, physically. Mentally is a whole different animal. But this does feel a lot like the Kyuubi chakra, which neither of us can overpower. Until it fades or Naruto wakes up, there's not much we can do about it. So I guess we'll just…" she shrugged, "watch?"

Tayuya blinked a few times, before snorting. "Yeah, well fuck that!"

Karin stared at her.

"Listen," she grabbed the other redhead's arm. "I'm gonna get Naruto the hell out of here. Are you in or not?"

Karin mutely nodded.

"Good. Then stop acting like a fucking tree and do something about it. We can't wait for Naruto to wake up from his beauty sleep to get basic shit done. If we're getting out, we need clothes, money, weapons. I'll go downstairs and see what I can dig up. You look through the other rooms and use your airhead brain to gather something. Maybe there's scrolls and shit that survived. Use those," she gestured towards her chains, "to carry them around. Guess it's finally handy to be a walking talking shibari set, am I right?"

Karin looked like she wanted to say something, but just couldn't. She seemed to try again, but it ended the same way.

And wasn't that just beautiful?

"Well?" Tayuya arched her brow, tapping her foot impatiently. "What the fuck are you waiting for? An invitation? Let's get to it!"

Editor: Solo Starfish, the best goddamn starfish the world has ever seen.

If you enjoyed the chapter and our stories, you can support us by giving us feedback in the form of reviews, favorites, and follows. You can also support us on 𝒫𝒶𝓉𝓇𝑒𝑜𝓃 where you can read ahead and view our original works. If you want to talk to us directly, share feedback, or ask us questions you may have you can join us on our Discord Server.

You can find links to all of our stories, our 𝒫𝒶𝓉𝓇𝑒𝑜𝓃, and our Discord at:

𝓁𝒾𝓃𝓀𝓉𝓇.𝑒𝑒/theblackstaffandnightmare

𝒫𝒶𝓉𝓇𝑒𝑜𝓃𝓈 can read up to 2 chapters ahead of the current release.

Thanks once again, and we hope you continue to enjoy our stories.

~The BlackStaff and NightMarE~