The seal that Mito had used to first contain him was a rushed job, that was obvious even to him who had never had any particular interest in sealing. It was heavily tied to the woman's willpower on top of needing absurd chakra reserves -for a human- as a minimum in order for her to not simply melt from the inside out.

This was represented in how, instead of some grand cage he had instead been covered in taut, nailed down chains.

Mito had never been a particularly strong individual, the only reason that she had even managed to contain him from the beginning was a luck of the draw with how her particular strand of chakra chains were capable of suppressing him similarly to how her cursed husband's ability did.

This -on top of the seal not being tailored to a being such as him- led to the misguided belief that seals containing Bijuu weakened during childbirth.

He would have been free by now if the tree bastard had not been present during the birthing process, when Mito's strength had been at its weakest.

The first child did not survive.

The second child was an opportunity, after noticing the spawn starting to grow he had pulled back as much as he could at the time that Mito tried to restrain him further, he feigned sleep every time Mito came to check up on the seal.

He later raged and tore at the seal as much as he could to disrupt the birthing process in the hope of, if not killing his container then to cause great grief in lue of what she and her mate had done to him and his siblings.

This proved futile however as -once again- the tree bastard tamed his power before the last few chains could be broken. He had not even managed to kill the child, causing slight hormonal imbalances at most.

He gave up on the project after that and let the third and last child pass without interference, this led to the child growing while being surrounded and submerged in his calm chakra, leading to a very distinct mutation in the form of bright ruby-red eyes. He would have been in an uproar about something that -inadvertently or not- he helped create resembling Madara were it not for the strife and political fallout that the confusion caused his two jailers.

Not much happened after that, Mito had more and more small lapses of control the older she grew but it allowed no more than a flicker of malice to manifest with the exception of when news of her two only children's passing came.

Kurama loved that day -he was the slightest bit mad over his accidental creations death but not enough to ruin the moment- the only thing that soured his mood was that it gave the humans the idea to harness his power what with how it was far more potent in a smaller form… how did they figure that out you ask?

Mito killed Hashirama.

The seal was built upon Mito's reserves and her willpower, one was diminished with age and the other with grief.

His chakra bursted out of Mito in a colossal wave, the Anbu agent that had delivered the news had their flesh melted off their bones moments before the majority of the nearly uninhabited Senju compound was reduced to ash.

Mito had fallen to her knees as three tails manifested behind her, desperately trying to put a stop to the flow but he would not yield, now when a crack was formed it was a battle of wills.

Her damned chains would not be able to help her there.

Then he came.

Trees burst into life around the crater that the incident had formed, they stretched multiple meters into the air before the branches wowe together and the crowns moved to cover as much of the ground as possible.

Mito tried to scream for her husband to get away, to bury her where she sat so that he wouldn't get out but nothing but blood left her throat. She had always kept a tight lock on the seal, so tight so that her body had never been able to adapt to his chakra, adjust yes but not adapt .

Hashirama -the bleeding heart that he believed himself to be- had moved to embrace his wife as soon as it seemed that his chakra was receding. Kurama plowed over Mitos' will and tried to cram himself through the crack.

An explosion of red and black extended with Mito as the epicenter, Hashirama was thrown back into the tree-line head first as the skin on his arms and legs boiled.

He just managed to raise his arms and head before Mito in the seven-tailed form - Kurama in control - crashed into him and buried their claws into his chest and poured chakra into it.

Red spread through the man's system, light visibly spreading through his veins and blood leaking through pores.

Hashirama, despite the soul wrenching pain, managed to form the serpent hand seal behind their back. Roots bursted out of the ground and wrapped around every limp and tail multiple times over. They did not stop.

Kurama could sense Ninja approaching, surrounding, and a few looking into the dome despite the corrosive power that practically slapped them in the face for doing so.

He knew that they wouldn't be able to take on all of them, but he would hurt them all at the very least.

He pushed even more, so much so that he started to feel nauseous, a sensation that he had not felt since his sealing.

Hashirama screamed in pain as his skin started to disintegrate . It did not melt . It did not burn . No, it disintegrated, destroyed so thoroughly that it ceased to exist.

The roots grew, twisted and pulled with fury until they overwhelmed his hate and Mito managed to start pushing him back.

seven tails, six tails, five tails, fore. The threes around the clearing had all been twisted, their previously green leaves now shades of red, orange and yellow. The previously dark bark now a golden brown.

Down to three tails and then it was done, his aura receded completely and the seal slammed shut, Kurama fell into a deep, uncomfortable sleep.

The last thing he sensed was Mito bursting into tears anew as her husband slumped into her arms.

Things got better -if a bit boring- after that, for him at least. Roughly one hundred ninja had arrived on the scene and only a handful had seen what actually happened.

The Anbu captain, the head of the Nara clan, the two surviving Senju out of those that were in the compound and Tobirama.

Two days later Tobirama was sworn in as the second Hokage, Those fore others that were present ''testifying'' to how Hashirama, in his final moment, proclaimed his brother to be his successor.

Normally -since no child of Hashirama was alive- Senju clan law would have seen Tobirama as the head of what remained. However that can only be initiated after a five day mourning period and so Tobirama could revoke his claim to the title during his inauguration both to avoid it for personal reasons while avoiding negative light by proclaiming that it would instead go to Hashirama's grand-child, Tsunade.

Mito was isolated, a cottage inside a miniature forest grown by Hashirama located near the far right of the mountain range. Tobirama had explained that the fuck had intended for it to be a diplomatic quarter, distanced so that the visitors could relax but he evidently forgot that he could manipulate it to his will and that the trees reeked of his signature.

She closed herself of, the only interactions that she had were with Tobirama who visited when his schedule allows it, Tsunade who was busier and busier with conflicts piling up and the Anbu Commander who would escort her whenever her art was needed to reinforce the walls, repair the outer barriers or to protect the Hokage monument.

Then he saw her .

Kushina had been an enraging sight, here came a small innocent girl who had been ripped away from her home by the whims of Mito's village. Here came a girl whose life had been irreparably changed for the worse simply because people were desperate for power that was not theirs to use.

Kushina had obviously been frightened to be in Konoha, as she should, for as much as Konoha was known as the nice village they had an awfull tendency to consider anything not of them as less then the dirt under their feet.

It disgusted him how Mito had played the girl, portraying herself as the only true ear that would listen as well as playing up their shared ground as Uzumaki's even though Mito had not spoken to anyone not of Konoha since she was made a Senju.

She had immediately painted their original home as evil, scorning the leader of Uzushiogakure for selling Kushina of like cattle when it was Konoha that had demanded a suitable host to ''keep their bond strong''.

Then she moved onto the subject of him, or as she usually referred to him ''the Nine-tails',' for what was he but the amount of chakra that she could steal.

...Her seal may have been a patch job but even the weakest of dams could temporarily be made unbreakable with the right preparation.

She told the girl of how no matter the amount, no matter the situation and no matter the perceived sincerity she could never trust ''It'' too want anything but the destruction of all that she held near and dear.

Kurama had never actively disliked Kushina.

Oh don't get him wrong, he did not like Kushina but that was more because of his hate for all of human-kind rather than from anything substantial that the girl had done.

Had he been sealed into her older self with the fitting mannerisms then he would probably have dreamed of the day when he'd get to rip her to pieces. But it was not so as he had seen how the girl had been brainwashed by Mito and twisted against him, made to believe that any sign of compassion or cooperation on his behalf would be a deal with a devil that would burn the werry sky to ash.

He could not even blame her for how the seal kept him, for it was Mito who had designed it to be as rigid and air tight as possible, believing that he would take any opportunity to break out of the innocent girl like he had tried to do with her.

The only positive that he could draw from Kushina's fate was that he'd finally be rid of Mito.

He had almost felt... proud , watching her grow up. Had also found it hilarious how he could trick her into taking his advice by simply disguising it as snide remarks and digs at her competence.

He had also been quite...vocal in his dislike of the Namikaze brat. He would not claim to be an expert on human interaction but the almost obsessive desire that the boy had for her did not sit right with him, this only boiled over into shouting about the girls moronic behaviour of falling for the brat because he had happened to be the one to save her.

She could easily have handled the situation if only she had taken the chakra that he had offered to her but -like the child she was- she held tight to Mito's words of golden tongues and double crossing.

He was -for the first time in thousands of years- fond of a human, of her.

It's almost funny to him how it took death itself for her to actually accept his help.