Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Journeys We Make

Unforeseen Interruptions

"Mana? Aren't you forgetting something?" Shige-H approached the magician from behind. "We've already got other engagements in Konoha. Something that sort of requires your presence when we look into it."

The leader of Stars was vague on purpose, trying to keep Hanshin in the dark about the fact that the Allied Ninja still had ulterior motives to merely Mana's magic show in being in Konoha. One had to hand it to the woman that she had a unique ability to point out the exact problems with the issue at hand without going into details, provided both parties knew what she spoke of.

Since the Allied Ninja would travel to the Naruto universe and seek answers about how to get to the moon, knowing that universe had contacted the moon before, and since Mana was the one to make the initial contact between the two universes, Mana's presence when discussing the matter with the Seventh Hokage of that universe would have inflated their chances of cooperation many times over.

"That's okay. Things won't quite work out how we intended them to work out, anyway." Mana glanced back to soothe her superior's worries.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Skaven stabbed his glare at Mana.

"You've intended to travel to Naruto's universe, travel to the moon, and then return to our universe while on the moon, effectively transporting you to the moon on our universe as well, right?" Mana turned around while taking a few steps back to stand by Hanshin's side.

"That was one option we would have discussed, yes." Shige-H crossed her arms.

"That won't have worked–the moon was destroyed in Naruto's universe. An omniversal bunch of wanna-be gods smashed it to pieces before invading the Earth." Mana pointed out. "It is possible that someone had rebuilt the moon or made an artificial one but, in that case, the trajectory of the moon would be way off and we'd end up transporting to a lifeless void of open space in the end when crossing from one universe to the other while on the other universe's moon."

"That's a bit of a reach. We can find another Naruto universe where the moon wasn't smashed to pieces then." Shige insisted. "We don't have time for you to learn Armor Ninjutsu right now."

"We don't have the resources or the strength to oppose a Konoha Sannin either," Mana said. "Plus, if you're counting on that advantage of my acquaintance with Lord Seventh of that universe, if we seek out another universe, I'll not have met that version of Naruto so he won't know me. The only Naruto I've met is the one whose moon was destroyed."

"Ugh... This is making my head hurt..." Damisan whined out, rubbing his wrapped-up head.

"Tell Hanshin about it..." Hanshin closed his eyes. "It would be much easier if I just crushed these Allied Ninja, and we started your training."

"Why is it so important to you that Mana trains with you, anyway? You sound so high, mighty, and proud of your Armor Ninjutsu, what's the point of pissing an infamous kunoichi off like this and teaching her your core skill? Are you looking to have your ass handed to you?" Endo addressed the Konoha Sannin with crude disrespect that could have earned him his death. This time, however, Hanshin just laughed out with a deep and low-pitched bawl.

Endo let out an audible grunt as his body stretched out, each of his limbs extending to a different side as invisible, ethereal hands comprising the scales of Black Vicious grabbed hold of Endo from behind and subdued the young man to a crucifix-like position. The apprentice swordsman shouted out in pain as his stare turned dull and a large indentation around his gut suggested that Hanshin had used his armor to deliver a blow to the exposed core of the Allied Ninja. Once Black Vicious became undone, Endo collapsed on his knees, wheezing, coughing, and panting from the pain of the free hit he took.