A/N: Somewhere in the multiverse in a void between dimensions sits a club with no name. On the outside it looks like a small and dingy place, but on the inside it seems to stretch on to eternity. This is the place where lost creations go to commiserate after being abandoned by their creators. Here you will find all sorts from characters whose series got cancelled prematurely, to characters whose pilot episodes never got picked up, and lastly and most common of all the various fanfiction induced variations of characters. Sometimes these different groups commingle but for the most part they tend to stick to cliques composed of characters from a single creator or group of creators. Usually the place is filled with the deafening roar of uncountable voices...but today the roar finds itself silenced when in a flash of light a figure appears near a small group of characters sitting near a group of tables, one no one thought they would ever see again.
"I'm back bitches!"
"Wha...Lord of Daemons, what the fuck are you doing here?!" spoke a strange floating book with a face on its pages.
"Pulling your ass out of this purgatory Xy, now go get the kid, we got a story to make!"
"WHAT!? Your serious? What prompted this?"
"Hahah, well so much for your vast breadth of knowledge your supposed to have. I guess nobody ever told you not to look a gift horse in the mouth!"
"Grr..."
"Relax man I'm just fucking with you. If you must know it was the unexpected return of Shinji and Warhammer 40k that inspired me to return to my old fics. I guess it got me thinking about some of my old stories and how they should finally be updated. Also I finally figured out how to get around the mental block for your story caused by Kishimoto's bullshit plot decisions in canon."
"Hey wait a minute what about us?!" roared another group of voices who had finally gotten over their shock at seeing their creator's return.
"With the exception of Gods and Demons which shall remain a dead fic and probably get deleted real soon..."
"Fuck you Daemon!"
"Nobody liked you anyway Watcher!" fired back Daemon "*Ahem* continuing where I left off... the rest of the vast majority of you guys are going to have your stories rebooted, due to serious flaws in your initial work. Especially you Marcus, that long philosophical rant I dropped near the end of Dominion Ascendant is really cringe-inducing and confusing looking back. On the plus side I think I'll finally get around to updating Blood Hope and Chaos..."
"Halle-fucking-lujah! Sweet merciful crap I've been waiting here in this void since before freaking Obama took office!" Shouted an ecstatic voice from near the bar.
"Yeah I'm real sorry about that Rory, but to be fair I didn't have much knowledge about the warhammer fantasy verse when I wrote your story….well beyond what I read in fanfiction. I mostly wrote you in a burst of inspiration after reading another fic...whose name escapes me at the moment...and I hadn't heard about the Lexicanum website back then so the idea sputtered out without the necessary info about the world. It wasn't till some time later that I did get any info about that world...like the fact it recently got remade into Age of Sigmar *shudder of revulsion* and by then I had already moved on to other stories. Like Xy's or my long running choose your own adventure quest "Phage blade" that I've been running over at Sufficient Velocity".
"So that's why none of us have seen you around here!"
"Precisely Xy, now enough of this meta-bullshit. It's time to get back to work!
Chapter 3: A Heady Offer
In retrospect Xy was extremely grateful the events of the past couple of days had occurred when they did. More specifically, the fact that the events of last night had happened on a Friday night of all nights.
It meant the kid would have most of the weekend to think things over without getting distracted by concerns over school, which given the importance of this matter was something he could ill afford.
'So what is it you want to talk about Xy?" asked Naruto as he fixed himself a bowl of cereal for the umpteenth time for his breakfast, reasoning that if the news was as important as Xy made it out to be he doubted he was going to be able to go back to sleep even at this unusually early time for a Saturday morning.
For a moment as Xy watched him eat he thought that the kid might as well apply for an advertising role for that cereal of his given how much of the stuff he seemed to eat. At least then he might have a chance of earning some money and moving out of this shit-hole apartment some time soon. He quickly shook that odd thought off upon realizing that everyone in the village hated Naruto because of the fox, and he doubted the Hokage would let him leave the village under his own power anytime soon if ever short of with an escort. After all it wouldn't be useful if the village "weapon" got snatched while shooting a commercial in some foreign country.
'Well Naruto I've got good news for you, some possibly good news for me, bad news and news that...well it might be considered of a dubious nature as it's mostly dependent on how you decide to act upon it.' spoke the possessed tome from where it had placed itself on the top of a nearby set of drawers.
'O...kay.' thought the boy uncertainly as he momentarily put down a spoonful of cereal and paused his eating to listen.
'The good news is I have gotten the information I need, and I can confirm with absolute certainty that the nine-tails is not coming to destroy Konoha in the near future.'
'That is good news' thought Naruto as he released an unseen bit of tension he had been holding onto since last time they spoke.
'Yes' continued Xy 'It seems that while it is not dead the Fourth Hokage did manage to seal the fox away behind a pretty durable seal...but we'll get back to that later. What is more important is this. While I was investigating the matter of the fox last night, I unexpectedly discovered that a group of...well I wouldn't call them friends...interested parties more like, have been watching us since around the time of my awakening.'
'Isn't that bad Xy? I mean you went through all that trouble to disguise your book from other people's eyes when I took you to class yesterday. I thought that meant you didn't want attention?'
'Normally you would be right Naruto, but in this case these individuals are the kind we definitely want the attention of.'
'...and they are?'
For a moment Xy began to speak...and then paused, trying to figuring out the best way to phrase things. Eventually though he realized that a bit of context might be needed so that the boy could fully appreciate the gravity of the offer. Given that, he figured he might as well give him the full story of who he and by extension the offerers were. It would get a lot of annoying questions out of the way before they could form, plus it would also deal with the burning curiosity regarding who or what he used to be which he could tell the boy had been harboring since they had first met.
'Well Naruto...to put it bluntly they are beings who my people feared and for good reason.'
'Your people?' thought Naruto intrigued at finally getting some background on the strange entity he'd gotten himself mixed up with.
'Yes Naruto, my people, and just so you understand the seriousness of this matter I might as well give you a little background on myself. Normally I would wait a lot longer before telling you all this, but this isn't something I think I can afford to hold off on any longer given these circumstances. So get yourself comfortable...cause this is a bit of a LONG story.'
Hearing the serious tone in Xy's speech Naruto could only nod. And so he moved himself onto a cheap stained sofa close to the drawers where Xy was and got himself comfortable. There was a bit of a pause and then he began.
'The name of our people...is one which I don't thing is possible for you to understand as it requires certain sounds to pronounce which I don't think your species is even capable of producing. Therefor I will simply refer to us by the name your ancestors gave to us...the Old Ones. Long ago we evolved on a far off and impossibly distant land. How distant? Well let me ask you this...do you believe in alien life Naruto?'
'...you mean your an….'
'Yes Naruto. I and my people are what you would refer to as extraterrestrials or aliens. We evolved on a far off distant star and after reaching a level of evolution and sophistication that your species cannot even begin to imagine we came down from the stars to this world and numerous others in search of knowledge. For you see despite our immense power we always knew we weren't the top dogs in the grand scheme of things. We ourselves had gods we bowed to and we searched out those places that were special to them for knowledge. Among them was your world.'
'Our world?'
'Yes quite so, and even though our power was far less than that of our gods it was still something so immense that many of the proto-human and other beings that walked the worlds we visited before mankind had fully evolved bowed to us and worshipped us, though not all did. In any event seeing those who did bow to us including the proto-humans was quite a sight….especially in light of the fact that your ancestors thought of your actual inadvertent creators the Elder Things as demons. I'm not surprised though, given the fact we could shape shift and your creators looked like carnivorous winged starfish headed half-plant things I can understand why they would have thought that. By the way you should probably not mention any of this stuff to other people that you can't trust, not unless you want to get locked up in a nut-house'
'You don't say' thought Naruto sarcastically to which Xy merely mentally rolled his eyes before continuing.
'Yes I do. Getting back on topic. Given that the Elder things at best thought of your simian ancestors as test subjects for their experiments and at worst thought of them as food it's not surprising that they turned to us. Some of our kind like myself thought it was amusing and allowed them to worship us, even giving them bits of power in exchange for their appeasement of us. Initially we hogged the attention and worship all to ourselves but eventually others began to intrude on the issue. More specifically the intruders were our gods, two groups of beings known respectively speaking as the Outer gods and the Elder gods, both of whom served an even more powerful and unknowable force beyond even our understanding. Out of the two lesser groups the Outer gods tended to be more liable to bending the rules and doing their own thing and they in turn loved when we lesser beings acted the same way (as long as we gave them their due), hence why we favored them over the Elder gods. The Elder gods by contrast just tended to get mad at us every time we tried to raise ourself above the limitations the primordial creator gave us.'
Unexpectedly Xy stopped upon hearing a snickering sound began to fill the room.
'And what is so funny Naruto?'
'Sorry...its just these names for all the things your mentioning are so...silly and bland. I mean, Old Ones, Elder things?'
'Hey don't look at me! Like I said its your own people's fault for not being able to pronounce our true names what with your primitive biology. Anyway, like I said previously these gods, the TRUE gods, not the nonsense lesser deities that would eventually be imagined up to replace us later on, for some reason started to get an interest in you mortal species and so they demanded that we spread their gospel to you. So we did until eventually certain events lead to our downfall and certain individuals seemingly decided to repress the truth of our and by extension the gods existence for their various agendas. And so in response the gods decided to ignore your world and a few others. However, in the last couple of nights it seems that events conspired to ensure that the Elder gods have turned their attention back to this world and more specifically to us two.'
There was a seemingly endless moment of silence as Naruto, wide eyed and jaw dropped, spent trying to process this information.
'...w-what?!'
'Yes it seems that somebody, possibly one of those lesser deities I mentioned your species created via your imagination and which since has become real...and before you ask yes that is possible and happens all the time...decided to screw with something very important to the fabric of reality and caused a whole big mess throughout the multiverse. And it seems that the Elder gods believe that the two of us are the only ones who can fix this mess...'
"WHAT?!" Screamed out Naruto, the shock causing him to forget about their telepathic link.
"Hey SHUT the fuck up you little bastard! Screamed out someone from the floor below shocking Naruto yet again and confusing the hell out of Xy.
'Who the hell…?'
'Building manager...' muttered out Naruto 'or at least the guy whose SUPPOSED to be the building manager. Honestly the guy does next to nothing around here which is why everything is falling apart. I think he just shows up once in a while so whoever is writing his checks thinks he's doing his job.'
'And you never thought to have someone look into the matter?'
'I gave up after the LAST two people before him acted the same way…it's not important anyway...not like the little matter of the ELDER GODS somehow taking an interest in my life! Which brings me back to the question of WHAT?! Why the hell they think either of us is perfect for this job of theirs?! I mean I'm no one special...and if you were so powerful as you claimed, powerful enough that you can fix this mess, why the hell are you trapped in a freaking book?!'
For a moment there was a pause and Naruto thought that in his little outburst he had insulted his companion but that matter was soon put to rest.
'I don't blame you for not believing this story of mine as it is quite hard to swallow given my current state...so let me explain how I got here. You see for a time after we introduced you people to our deities everything was good...until a massive war broke out between us and a species called the Necrontyr. Apparently they had the misfortune of living near a star that was prone to spew out radiation like no tomorrow which shortened their life considerably. In their attempt to find a solution they travelled throughout the stars and eventually encountered us. By this point in our history we basically were immortal and learning this they tried to force us share our secrets of eternal life. When that didn't work they tried to attack us only to fail. At some point after that though one of them discovered that the reason they were dealing with all this radiation back on their home-world was due to the fact that their star was being fed on by one of several energy based beings called the C'tan. They then made a deal with these beings, if they helped them in the war against us then the C'tan would gain physical bodies... The C'tan agreed but added also that they were willing to give them eternal life in exchange for their servitude. They agreed, changed their name to Necrons, got shiny new robot bodies and decided to use their new powers to make our lives hell. The war was so bad that we were left severally weakened and several species including the Elder things and two newer ones the Mi-go and Yithians decided to try and force us off our worlds. In a bout of pridefulness we refused to invoke our gods, believing our powers to be sufficient for the battle at hand. So we fought back with everything we had, even creating a bunch of warrior races to fight on our behalf and supercharged them to help fight against the C'tan. Long story short...it was a bad move to not involve the gods as our new weapons inadvertently managed to tear massive holes in the fabric of reality with their new powers, allowing entities from other realms to come pouring through. In the end most of us ended up being literally consumed in the resulting carnage, forced into a kind of half-death state to protect ourselves, or in my case...fragmented. Which is when my tome's CREATOR comes into the picture...'
At the word creator pure hatred seemed to roll off Xy. So intense was it that it ceased to be purely an emotion and became almost a tangible thing...and judging by the sounds of animals nearby suddenly making a racket Naruto got the feeling that he wasn't the only one to feel it too.
'His name was Haon-Dor and as much as I HATE to admit it he was quite a powerful spellcaster. In fact it's safe to say that not only was he one the strongest spellcasters to ever exist on his world, he also eclipsed those of many other worlds and had lasting effect on said worlds and others. He even inadvertently played a part in your own world's history via the knowledge I gained from him. At the time the "War in Heaven" as our conflict was called was ending he had just managed to seal dozens if not hundred of the demons unleashed by our creations screw up into the mirrored walls of his lair to siphon their knowledge and was gloating over the matter, when he got it into his head that he could use the same power to try to seal away one of his people's absentee gods...namely me...into an object of power, in order to strengthen himself further. Weakened and fragmented as I was, I was unable to stop him and while he couldn't seal me totally away into the book before you... he managed to seal away the most important part of me, my mind, and a sliver of my true power. I got the last laugh on him though. Some time after he sealed me away he asked me why it was my kind had come to his world in the first place and so I told him…the lair of Ubbo-Sathla. A being who like myself was a fragment of a much more powerful entity, in its case, an Outer god who had pissed off the Elder gods by stealing forbidden knowledge from them causing them to rip it apart and turn one of the fragments into the equivalent of a glorified guard dog for the very knowledge it had stolen. A being whose very flesh later on had been manipulated by the Elder things, both to create a servant race known as Shoggoths and as an unexpected side-effect of the experiment...all life on several planets including yours.
'No way! But wait, what about the temple I found you in?' Thought Naruto thinking back to strange place he had been in before.'
'That place comes into play later. In any event, as luck would have it the Elder things hadn't been able to read the hidden tablets that they had found with the creature and so had just left them there after gaining a sample of the creature for their experiments. We found out about this and so went to see if we could find this lair and gain the hidden knowledge which the Elder things had so casually dismissed, but in the end just as we had finally found it the gods told us to back off. Haon-Dor however had no fear of the gods especially after sealing me and knowing this I tricked him into venturing into its lair. Surprisingly he wasn't eaten as I though he would, he even managed to find one of the tablets the Elder gods had hidden there...unfortunately for him, while I could easily understand what he found, his mind couldn't handle the enormity of it and he went insane. In the course of his panicked escape from that place he dropped me...that was without exaggeration over a million years ago. Since then I passed from one wielder to another, some alien, some human, some from your dimension, others from the realms who our creation had inadvertently opened portals to, until at last just over a thousand years ago I managed to convince one of my wielders into bringing me to your world via a portal once based at the temple you found me in, for I had heard rumors of a powerful object that might be capable of giving me my freedom.'
'I'm guessing it didn't work out?'
Unfortunately you're right, it didn't work out. Some alien bitch, Kaguya Otsutsuki, who had come to your world and gotten attached to it found out about what I was doing and fearing I would be a threat to her rule on your precious world if unleashed killed my wielder, destroyed the portal and at the time all but destroyed my way to freedom by destroying the very object I sought! Needless to say I was pissed and so in a rage I gave her half-human sons, Hagoromo and Hamura, who had gotten tired of her treatment of the humans she ruled, the knowledge to finally seal her away. Sadly for once it wasn't me who came out ahead as one of their descendants...(Hamura's I think...its been so long honestly I can't even remember) sealed me away in that temple!'
'Why?'
'Because...he blamed me for the death of his loved one in a war caused by a fight over creatures that I had helped to create, ironically via a fragment of the knowledge that I had tricked Haon-Dor into finding. Creatures created by Hagoromo and me in a desperate attempt to stop an even greater rampaging monstrosity his mother had unleashed to fight him. A being so powerful that the only way to stop it given the limitations at hand was to separate it into smaller and easier to control portions...you know them as the 9 tailed beasts.'
There was a crashing sound shocking Xy. In confusion he looked over to find that Naruto, who had been leaning forward attentively the whole time as he told the tale, had fallen face forward on the ground upon hearing the latest twist in it. After a bit the boy quickly leaped to his feet.
'Y-you-you...' he could only mutter out blankly in abject horror and confusion as he stared at Xy with a thousand yard stare.
'Yes Naruto. I made the monster that attacked your village, thought to be fair they were supposed to help your people, act as peace keepers...but your fellow humans got greedy and decided to mold and manipulate them into weapons until their constant abuse of them turned them into beasts little better than the one I had made them out of. I might have been able to correct the issue, given enough followers or even human sacrifices (something Hagoromo had been too soft hearted to give me the first time), for instance I could have wiped the beasts minds, transformed them into something less threatening, or split them into even smaller chunks...but that worthless fur-ball you know as the nine-tails turned traitor! It had always feared me and furthermore blamed me for all the troubles it had gone through, believing that had I not given that first sealing formula to Hagoromo then the other humans would never have been able to use it as a basis to develop ways to use the beasts as weapons. So one day as one of the people who wielded its power was cursing it for the war that had cost him his loved ones and wishing the beast's kind had never been born the fox intentionally let slip my role in its creation, while at the same time lying about the fact of WHY I had made the creatures in the first place! For it knew full well that the man, half out of his mind with rage over my role and fearful of what else I could make, would seek to destroy me as revenge for what had befallen him. I tried to stop him, tried to explain how I could be used against the tailed beasts...but like Hagoromo he too grew disgusted by the human cost of the solutions I offered to deal with them and wouldn't listen. Thus he attacked me, and when his attempts to destroy me failed...he sealed me away. Without a wielder I was forced to feed off the temple to sustain the book I was sealed in for without it I would eventually become trapped in the pocket dimension which my book is connected to permanently. Feeding on the temple weakened me further but even so I still had enough energy to observe outside it and given enough time, to reach out and try to contact another potential wielder once the barrier around the place eventually failed. I nearly succeeded in doing so...but around the time the barrier began to fail the future first Hokage unknowingly buried the temple when he used his wood release kekkei genkai to create the forest around Konoha. Worse yet, his wood release's habit of suppressing certain kinds of energy caused the trees to feed off the energy that sustained the temple and by extension me. Shortly after he returned from dealing with his traitorous former friend Madara Uchiha I fell into a coma...and there I lay, till the day you found me.'
'Wow...' Naruto muttered out in a daze at the plethora of knowledge dropped on him. 'given all that I certainly do understand why the Elder gods would seek you out...and I guess since I'm your wielder that would make me important to their plan to right?'
…
…
'Xy...?'
'Naruto...for all my power, for all the knowledge I have, for all the horrors I could unleash in the wrong hands the simple fact is... you are more important than me to their plans. Hell if they had their way I'd still be trapped in that temple as penance for my people barely acknowledging them as gods. Hell we thought they were stiffing oppressors, and the only reason we even bothered to worship them the little we did was as thanks for them not letting the universe explode. Truth be told, the only reason they woke me up was to save you.'
'What do you…?'
'Naruto, you were supposed to die in that forest...the only reason you didn't was because of a strange energy surge unleashed by the disaster that they are trying to fix. Even so that energy would have been a temporary fix, had the Elder gods not realized that very same energy that now coursed through your body, along with something else, meant you had the potential to help fix the disaster if you learned to harness it. Something which would be impossible altogether if you died, hence why they woke me up as I was the only one who could finalize the process set in motion by the energy and thus save you. Even so, they know that under normal circumstances I wouldn't care about their awakening me, for with the knowledge I've gained from the tablets guarded by Ubbo-Sathla I could shield you from further interference on their part and tell them to screw off'
'...so then why aren't you doing just that?'
'Because Naruto...they offered me my freedom in exchange for convincing you to help. That being said...there were some terms they added in to the agreement. 1). Neither of us can do anything to threaten the destruction of the multiverse as a whole, not that I was planning to anyway 2). Neither of us can attempt to fuse multiple realms into a single realm without gaining their or another higher power's express permission 3). Neither of us can do anything to harm either them, their brethren or their servants without their or a greater power than theirs express permission, which is admittedly annoying but I can accept that, 4). This world and those inhabitants who get in our way while performing or attempting this mission are free game for us to use as we see fit . And lastly 5). you had to agree to this willingly which is why I've been spilling my guts this whole time so you can't claim I hid anything from you. In exchange for agreeing to all these terms, upon fixing this mess I get my freedom and presumably you'll get a lot of power seeing as that's what they usually do once they get a new servant.'
'Wow'
'There's one catch though, judging by the nature of this mess they've gotten themselves into...we are most likely going to have to leave the village at some point...as for when and if we'll be coming back… I frankly don't know'
'But...it's my home! And what about my dream to become Hokage?'
'I know its hard. Which is why they gave us a year max to come to a decision. Even if you do agree to the contract we don't have to leave right away as it will take some time for me to teach you how to master the energy within you. So take your time and think it over, and before you go agreeing to this mess out of sympathy for me only to turn around and blame me for a decision you might ultimately come to regret, I just want you to know this. As much as I want to be free and would like you to say yes, I am also perfectly fine with you telling these guys to shove it. Now that I'm awake there's really nothing preventing me from finding another way out of this book. So...just do what you think is right and we'll take it from their.'
'Okay...wow...well thank you Xy, I appreciate your honesty.'
'Your welcome kid.'
'...wait a minute, what was the "something else" you mentioned? You know, the thing besides that weird energy that makes me so special to their plans?'
'Well...remember how I said there was good news for you, possible good for me, bad news and dubious news?'
'Yeah?'
'Well we've been over the good news both for you and possibly for me...as for the bad news, the bad news is...well remember how I said the Kyuubi was not going to come back for revenge?'
'Yeah but what does that?'
'Well the bad news is that the reason for that is...much like how I'm sealed in this book... the nine-tails is sealed inside you.'
*THUMP*
This time...when Naruto fell flat on his face in shock…he didn't get back up.
'Huh...you know with all the world shattering revelations I dropped on him I honestly didn't think that would be the one that caused him to faint. Mortal minds sure are funny like that.'
Mentally shrugging Xy activated a spell of levitation, hitched it to the boy, and floated him back to his bedroom to rest. He'd wait to tell him the last of the news when the time was right...
A/N: I bet none of you were ever expecting to see me again huh? XD
