Enchantress
Chapter 12 – The Third Soul
Disclaimer: Naruto is the property of mangaka (comic artist) Masashi Kishimoto. This story implies nothing about the characters nor does the plot of the story have any effect on the manga volumes (or the anime) themselves. This story is pure fiction.
——†——
It wasn't long before Minako, Koki and the two unconscious forms of Sakura and Ino (the latter two of which were being gently carried by Minako) arrived at near the front entrance of the Red Sand Inn. The blonde was just about to take another step towards the establishment's main doors until the sound of Koki's voice halted her in her place.
"Hold on a minute Mina."
As she listened to the fox pup's order, Minako raised an eyebrow at him. "Mina?"
Koki looked back up at her. "Hope you don't mind the nickname."
Minako made a small smile back. "Strangely enough, no I don't."
Koki nodded in gratitude. "Now before we go in, I must do something first."
"Um…alright." Minako gently lay Sakura and Ino down in a sitting position up against the nearby wall of the Inn. "If you don't mind me asking Koki, um…what exactly are you planning to do?"
Koki braced himself and lowered his upper body down a notch, almost appearing as though he were about to pounce on something. "A diversion. This will only take a few seconds."
The snow-white fox pup closed his eyes in concentration. Shortly afterwards, Koki's mysterious "third eye" reappeared on his forehead. The jewel located in between the small diamond-shaped patch of black fur began to glow with a soft yet slightly wispy blue light. After a few moments had passed between Koki's short-lived enchantment, the light on his forehead vanished along with the jewel, completely reverting back to his natural looking self.
"There…that should do it."
Minako looked down at her companion in confusion. "W-what should do it?"
Koki lightly nudged his snout towards the direction of the doors. "Take a look inside and see for yourself."
Minako did as she was instructed and observed the fruits of Koki's labor: the few front lobby employees were all on the floor, knocked unconscious.
"Out cold…"
"I've clouded everyone's minds within a 2 meter radius from us in a mild sleeping illusion."
Minako looked back at Koki in understanding. "So I see…"
"It won't last for very long, but it should give us enough time for the two of us to make it to your room with your friends without arousing suspicion. Bringing in two unconscious girls into a local inn instead of the hospital would only be grounds for an inquiry."
Strangely enough, Minako understood Koki's logic. "Fair enough."
"And of course, we couldn't exactly wake them up from their original positions outside the shop without the having them question you with regards to your whereabouts at such a time of night.
For now, the best we can do would be to simply play it out as if it were all a dream to the both of them. Should they both wake up the following morning with similar thoughts, neither of them would be able to come up with a reasonable explanation as to how they ended up back in their temporary place of residence if their late-night venture occurred outside."
Everything the pup had said made perfect sense.
"Let's go Mina. The illusion will be wearing off shortly."
"Right."
——†——
After bringing Sakura and Ino's unconscious forms into the girls' room, Minako gently laid the two of them down into their respective futons and tucked them in warmly. She spent the next few moments looking back and forth between the two sleeping girls with Koki patiently seated by her feet.
"They usually sleep in their pyjamas. Wouldn't they find it suspicious if they woke up tomorrow morning in their day clothes?"
"Not a problem. You leave that to me."
The jewel on Koki's forehead reappeared for the second time tonight and shone in its usual splendour. This time however, the pup took a little bit longer to utilize his powers, in contrast with the mere seconds that it took to dowse the hotel lobby employees into temporary sleep only minutes ago. The pup made a light sigh.
"That should do it. Physically, they will continue to remain in their current attire, but mentally, they will appear to be clothed in their respective sleeping wear, even to each other. Unlike before, this illusion should last until the hypnotized have gazed upon their reflections."
Minako glanced down at the seated white fox.
"Koki…" The pup simply continued to stare straight ahead, almost blankly, not even acknowledging the fact that his master had just whispered his name.
"Dawn should not be too far off now."
Without even so much as a warning, Koki made his way over to a nearby window and gently pushed it open with one of his paws.
"W-wait you're leaving? But there's so much I want to ask you! I fact, I haven't even started do that yet. Furthermore, where do you even plan on staying at this time of night?"
Minako never really knew why she harboured such an overwhelming sense of concern for Koki considering the fact that she had just met the enigmatic creature less than an hour ago. But for some reason, Minako had a strong feeling that their encounter was not by mere coincidence. She was under the belief that both her and the fox pup's meeting was somehow meant to happen. The sheer probability of something like this happening to an ordinary human would be next to nothing and Minako was determined to see how the rest of her life would unfold because of Koki. This now lay far beyond the depths of simple human logic.
From his position on the windowsill, Koki glanced over his shoulder and looked back at his concerned blonde master with his gentle eyes. The light of the moon and the stars reflecting off of both his brilliant blue eyes and his snow white fur, basked the animal in an ethereal glow.
"We shall meet again tomorrow Mina. I promise."
And just like that, Koki leaped out into the night air. Minako made her way over to the window and looked outside in the hopes of catching Koki's retreating form, only to be greeting by the stillness of Sunagakure's eve.
——†——
After a fairly exhausting morning of administering chakra-based healing to a few more patients and assisting in some minor physiotherapy, Minako found herself sitting outside on a bench located at the rooftop of the General Clinic. While she had her bentou box gently nestled on top of her lap, Minako had yet to open it up to indulge in its home-made contents. Instead of enjoying her lunch break which was also usually spent in the company of Sakura, Ino, and a few other local Sunagakure hospital employees, Minako decided to take sometime to herself to merely reflect on everything that had been occurring in her life thus far – particularly concentrating on her chance encounters with both Masato and Koki during her present mission in the Sand Village.
With the old shopkeeper's sudden disappearance combined with the even equally sudden emergence of the talking fox pup, Minako couldn't but wonder why such a thing would occur. In addition, the whole experience of somehow being displaced in that strange vision involving the three clans of the Kusanagi, Yasakani and the Yata – and while in her original body nonetheless – had left her confused even further, consequently resulting in multiple bouts of broken concentration during her working hours this morning. Luckily for her, by some stroke of luck, Minako somehow managed to get by her morning shift with relative ease and without any complications. Things would have become unfortunate if Minako didn't fully comprehend that she was dealing with human lives – as opposed to chemical compounds – throughout the majority of her daily duties.
As the gentle summer breeze blew through her golden hair, Minako felt emotionally heavy and lost regardless of the physically relaxing state of her body. Ever since she had met Masato during her first evening in Sunagakure, she had hoped that her extended stay would answer some of the burning questions that lingered on her mind with regards to her complete rollercoaster of a month as a spontaneously transformed female. But as the days went by and even at this very moment, all she was left with was even more questions and hardly any answers. Minako missed being her old self. Even though her overall personality and anchored beliefs remained relatively constant, deep down inside, she felt herself becoming more and more like this fabricated alias of hers. Bits and pieces of the real Naruto were beginning to chip off and fade away, only to be slowly replaced by this act and costume known as "Honda Minako," to which many have warmly accepted into their lives without a second thought. And the idea was eating her up inside.
"When will all of this end…?"
While intended as a rhetorical question that she meant to ask to herself, the sudden appearance of a new voice completely snapped Minako out of her focus.
"In due time Naruto…just have faith."
The blonde jerked her body around towards the direction of the voice, almost dropping her bentou box in the process, only breathe a subtle sigh of relief as she watched the calmly approaching figure of Koki's small frame.
"Koki!"
"Good Afternoon Naruto. I hope you are doing well."
Minako found herself both surprised slightly stunned at just how polite and gentleman-like the fox pup's form of speech really was. If she hadn't known any better, Minako could have sworn that Koki was simply a nobleman in the guise of the animal that he is.
"Y-yes," Minako cleared her throat, "I mean, yes I am thank you."
The snow white pup made his way over to the bench where Minako was seated and quickly hopped up on to it, comfortably taking his place right next to her patiently waiting form. The two spent a few comfortable moments in silence together until Minako looked back down at Koki who was lazily wagging his tail back and forth.
"You came back…"
Koki looked back at up at Minako with that same gentleness that she had seen in him the previous night. "I made a promise did I not?"
Minako smiled and gently ruffled Koki's head in affection, to which the pup happily nuzzled back in approval. Short following, Koki looked back up into Minako's eyes with a partially serious look.
"Now…I trust that you have questions for me correct?"
Minako's smiling face dampened to an equally serious expression as the pup.
"I do…"
Koki nodded. "Then you may ask."
Minako knew that as she had to address the pup in such a way so that she wouldn't appear too desperate. Even though the pair had known each other for less than a day, Koki's seemingly wise and patient demeanour – in spite of his appearance – was all that it took for Minako to somehow retain a certain level of respectfulness within his eyes; an idea that was both simple to understand yet incredibly confusing all together. Why she was so determined to act so professionally around the mysterious creature in such a short amount of time was still beyond her. On the other hand (and in a slightly less than respectable hand at that), surface-wise she found that Koki was just too adorable to say no to. She wasn't really quite sure if this was she actually felt or if it was just a side effect of being "Minako" for an extended period of time – as Naruto had rarely caved in at the sight of cute things – but either way, Koki's physical charm as a juvenile fox was something that just couldn't be fought.
Minako let out a sigh to relieve herself of the built up tension and anxiety that had been stirring within her over the last little while. Minako glanced down into Koki's icy blue eyes which were looking back at her with both sincerity and an almost haunting intensity. After a few moments of constructive thinking, the blonde chose her words carefully…sort of.
"Now I don't mean for this to be offensive, and if it seems that way apologize in advance, but to put it bluntly…um, what are you?"
Koki made a small smile in response. "A wise choice…"
Minako sort of hated herself for asking it but it was the most basic, and frankly the most prominent question above others that was on her mind ever since their encounter the previous night. She laid down the facts prior to her inquiry: Koki is a talking white fox with a weird jewel located in the centre of his forehead which can be hidden to disguise his otherwise 'otherworldly' appearance into a more natural looking fox. His abilities seem to include, but are assumed to be not limited to, the alteration of his physical appearance (presumably at will) as well as the ability to conjure sleep-inducing illusions. It wasn't much of a lead and she needed to know more. The blonde was aware that she could have asked her question with bit more eloquence but she figured that as long as the message got out, there was no point in worrying about it any further.
"Well, to put it in simple terms," Koki looked at Minako with warm eyes, "I'm your Guardian." (1)
While Minako didn't expect anything revolutionary to come from the pup, Koki's answer was definitely something that she just wasn't prepared for.
"My what?"
Koki adjusted himself so that he was now directly facing Minako while still seated on the bench. "Your protector and guide for the journey that awaits you."
Minako continued to look back in both disbelief and scepticism.
"Um…okay. So…w-what do you mean exactly?"
"Minako," Koki's voice was stern, "your life is in danger. And it's not just your life that hangs in the balance but the lives of everyone you love." (2) Minako felt a slight chill run down her spine.
"W-what…?"
"Come with me and I shall explain everything."
"C-come…where?"
"Into the depths of your soul."
The mystical blue jewel reappeared on Koki's forehead and shone with sudden intensity. Before Minako even had a chance to respond, everything became blanketed in white.
——†——
Minako let down her arms, which were crossed protectively in front of her face, and opened up her eyes. The sight that greeted her shortly afterwards involved nothing more than black space. Despite the emptiness that surrounded her, she felt neither intimidated nor afraid. Interestingly enough, in sharp contrast with her surroundings, she was able to see every little detail of her person with great clarity. No ounce of visible light was present and yet she could see the color of her skin and clothing as if she were standing outside in broad daylight. (3)
"Where am I?" The sound of a familiar voice answered her plea.
"Welcome to the realm psionic of space where knowledge, thoughts, consciousness, emotions, and dreams come together to form the wondrous labyrinth that is the human mind."
The faint clunking sound of geta sandals made Minako face the direction that it was coming from. The sound became louder and louder until the silhouette of a man appeared before her. The familiar smiling face made Minako smile back in both delight and surprise.
"Or to be more specific…your mind."
"Masato!"
The old man nodded. "It's nice to see you again Minako."
It was then, Minako had a thought. "Hey wait a minute where have you been all this time?" Minako was about to cite a second follow up question but Masato interrupted her before she could.
"Patience Minako. It shall make sense to you soon enough."
It was a gradual process, but eventually the pitch blackness that surrounded the conversing pair underwent a drastic change. Shapes began to form and physical surfaces began to solidify until the dark void had completely transformed into a strange circular room with nothing more than walls and a marble floor colored a stormy grey. Majestically situated in front of Masato and Minako were a single almost dinner-plate sized circular mirror, surrounded on both sides by two rectangular full-body mirrors; nothing else seemed to decorate the rest of the room in any way. Each mirror appeared to be completed with its own elegantly designed frame, all three of which seemed to be composed up of a different type of material.
The left full-body mirror appeared to be framed in gold where as the right full-body mirror seemed to be framed in some sort of steel colored an almost violent dark red. In contrast with the gold-framed mirror, the red-framed mirror had a sleek black curtain covering up the entire expanse of the reflective glass captured within the frame. The final central circular mirror was the one that stood out the most apart from the other two. In addition to being notably smaller in size and circular in shape, the central mirror was observed to have no actual mirror at all for Minako to look at. Apart from a single shard of what Minako assumed was the actual mirror just barely hanging on to the brilliant platinum frame, the rest of the reflective glass was found to be completely absent.
"What is this?"
"This Minako is the apex to which all of your memories are contained within the depths of your sub-consciousness, physically manifested – if you will – in the guise of the very room that we are currently occupying."
Minako had a strange sensation engulf her entire being. "Hmm…"
"The objects that you see before you, while they may resemble mirrors, they are actually metaphoric windows which archive the entire duration of your memories from past to present. Technically speaking, only one of these mirrors should exist within the mind of any normal human, but as you can see…"
Masato shifted his gaze over to Minako. The blonde slowly scanned the forms of the three mirrors from left to right in one fluid motion slowly taking in the concept as well as the realization that even from within, she was still far from "normal" than anyone she had ever known; a thought that had endlessly haunted her since the time of her birth. After finding the young girl unwilling to respond anytime soon, Masato simply continued on after a few moments of silence.
"As you probably may have guessed Minako, the presence of two extra windows within this room should theoretically indicate the presence of two additional inhabitants occupying your very mind. Or in other words: three souls sharing one body. A truly remarkable phenomenon that has always been theorized by mystics spanning across the history of mankind, and yet has never been truly witnessed or even accounted for until now."
Minako still found it hard to form words.
"While the true technicalities surrounding both the short and long term physical effects of a host possessing any other spiritual entity apart from their own – let alone three – in a single body have never been reported or even studied for that matter, there is still one common fact that continues to remain constant among all cases such as this: the human host inadvertently inherits a small fraction of the natural skillsets and/or abilities that the other soul or entity has retained prior to their transmigration. This phenomenon as you may know is already supported as given by the existence of those humans chosen to serve as the living host for one of the fabled nine bijus of the world.
Minako's thoughts immediately went to her ever present accelerated healing factor that was bestowed to her by the Nine-Tailed Fox demon. But in addition to that, the blonde had never really experienced or even noticed any newer enhancements in her overall skillset with regards to her recent gender change – at least, apart from the physical transformation of her original masculine body into this newer and slender feminine body. While the way she thought and contemplated things was a little bit more enhanced, in comparison to her usually one-track mindset when she was still Naruto, nothing really revolutionary had ever come out of this "spontaneous" transformation as of yet. All it really brought to her thus far was aggravation, irritation and confusion.
"The window on your left is the one that corresponds to your true self: the memories that have been rightfully yours upon the moment of your birth."
Minako glanced over at the gold-framed mirror and without even realizing it; walked up to it until she was standing directly in front of the glass. Small flickers of her past memories replayed within its confinements, some of unprecedented battle between Sasuke and himself and his very first encounter with the old bat (4).
"My true self…" Minako mainly whispered this to herself rather than to Masato.
"The rightmost window corresponds to the memories of the demon that inhabits 1/3 of your spiritual dominion: the infamous Kyuubi no Yoko."
Much like first mirror, Minako made her way over to the red-framed mirror until she was standing directly in front of it. She tenderly brushed her fingers along the dark black curtain that completely covered the glass, noticing that the texture of the fabric was highly similar to that of velvet. Before she could ask as to why this mirror was covered, Masato's continued speech made her hold that question to herself.
"I assume that you are curious of this particular window's attempt at concealment am I correct?"
"Y-yes…"
Masato nodded. "To make it brief, the Kyuubi no Yoko is a completely separate entity from yourself. While she may still be a part of you from within, ultimately, the two of you are nonetheless, separate entities. This is the reason as to why jinchuurikis are still able to live apart from their biju should the demon be successfully extracted from their soul. Neither one of you are supposed to have access to the other's memories, however this is only limited to the ones that that the both of you have shared from the time of the Kyuubi's sealing: the very moment that the two of you became one."
Minako removed her hand from the curtain and let her arm fall down to her side.
"Any memories that either you or the Kyuubi have prior to your union are to remain strictly between yourselves."
Finally, Minako made her way over to the mirror that had sparked her curiosity the most: the central, platinum-made, circle-shaped frame comprising up of only a single shard of what used to be a complete mirror. The single shard seemed to glow in a strange and eerie light.
"I hesitate to ask…" Minako gulped down the nervousness that was caught in her throat before looking back over her shoulder towards Masato. "Who or what does this third mirror belong to…?"
Minako waiting in heavy anticipation as Masato calmly walked his way over to the blonde until they were standing side-by-side.
"This mirror…belongs to the woman who has been reborn to finally put an end to foretold ruin."
Minako's heart rate began to speed up.
"The ancient priestess whose very efforts marked the dawn of a new era yet conversely evoked much future destruction because of it."
Minako's eyes began to widen. No…it couldn't be.
"The one who has dominated your body over the last month…"
Minako held a hand up to her chest as her breathing became rushed. IT CAN'T BE!
"The long forgotten heroine who had succeeded terrifying evil, the 'Mother of the Demons,' the Enchantress: Yata Michiko."
And then, Minako's world came to a grinding halt.
TBC
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A/N: Didn't expect another chapter up within the span of a week did ya? Well it's simply my way of apologizing for the in fact, year plus long wait that I made all of my readers go through. A little bit shorter than the last few chapters but I think it got my intended literary purposes out just fine.
I'm actually on a little bit of a role with this story now that all of these ideas finally coming into place. Please notify me if you feel like I'm rushing my story. Since "The Enchantress" has now approached a pivotal point in the main story line, I would like to smoothly transition my story so that other mini-storylines (current and future) are addressed and completed without tapering off too far from the main plot. Your feedback means everything to me. It lets me know that I'm doing something right.
As for this chapter in particular, I'm pretty sure that a lot of you predicted these turn of events in previous chapters but lo-and-behold, the real deal is here. I originally intended this chapter to be a little bit longer but I felt that the cliffhanger moment at the end of this chapter was the appropriate moment to cut it off. Any additional story line would just seem anti-climactic…at least in my eyes. Stay Tuned for Chapter 13!
(1) Kind of gives you a Sailor Venus/Artemis feel doesn't it? Well, that's what it is! Koki has is now Naruto's "Artemis" in my story. Lots of good reading material ahead with this pairing (non-romantic of course).
(2) This dialogue was actually derived from the TV show Wolverine and the X-Men. The character Emma Frost (voiced by the brilliant Kari Wahlgren) quoted a similar line in Episode 24 – "Foresight Part 1."
(3) The wording of this particular passage may be difficult for some of you readers out there to properly visualize and I apologize for that. To make it easier on you, I got this particular story element from a scene in the CardCaptor Sakura anime. Episode 42 – "Sakura and the Blacked Out School Arts Festival" – when Sakura captured the final two remaining Clow Cards of Light and Dark.
(4) Just for future reference, the "Old Bat" will always refer to Tsunade in my story. This term was used a bunch of times in previous chapters so many of you probably already knew what it meant already without me bringing it up. I'm not gonna lie, I really hate the use of "-baachan" in stories whenever I read Naruto fanfiction. In my story, will only ever use romanized Japanese phrases or words whenever I am referring to an actual Japanese objects, places, or honorifics, using terms specific to the Naruto manga, and whenever my characters use any ninja techniques.
Just seeing such phrases as "Daijoubu desu ka?" or "Hontou ni" in an all English story just kill me SO MUCH on the inside. In fact, I'm going to edit a few of my previous chapters to remove my story of such instances as I vaguely remember using them a few times.