Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of What Defines Us

Wild Dances

 „You damn, dirty snake, I'ma make your slimy fangs ache!" Inaba angrily grunted holding his fist up and tensing himself up. The only reason why he didn't lash out and strike at Mana was because her teammates were close enough and Meiko has proven herself to be fast enough to intercept him midway.

"So that's your plan..." Kiyomi thought out loud before shrugging her shoulders lazily and looking around at the wildly unstable Kumogakure shortie and his darker tanned teammate who just calmly observed Mana's further actions.

"If you want me, you should've let them beat us up. Just watch us lose to them. What gives?" Junipu-R squinted angrily at Mana, stabbing with her eyes like they possessed the ability to poison somebody.

"It's pretty simple, really. I want to change the world, make it value life as something magical, just like I do. I hate causing people pain, I hate fighting meaningless battles..." Mana began explaining.

"So you're guilt tripping Junipu-R into fighting you alone. Just because you helped her and because accepting this deal can spare our participation in the exams further..." Quill-B grinded through his teeth. It was clear as day that his opinion of Mana changed from when he first saw her.

"I'm not manipulating anything. I just wanted to give Junipu-R an option to settle this by ourselves and spare our teammates the trouble. The participation of the Iwagakure alliance would've ruined that idea. By now you guys must know that three on three battles are terribly wasteful." Mana shook her head beginning to plead Junipu, her tone softened to match her lowered position somewhat.

"I don't think you know how this ninja thing works, you need to take your X out, no fireworks!" Inaba grinded his teeth again, like a dog ready to pounce but still restrained by the leader of his pack. Judging from the eyes of Team Cirrus, as Mana observed them, that was Quill-B.

"Jeez... She once stole a bag of food pills and she still won't let that go, if she stabbed someone in the back while they're peeing, or something, we'd never hear the end of it!" Kiyomi groaned.

Both Inaba and Junipu were switching their sights from Mana to Quill-B, watching both. One deserved a portion of their attention just to have her actions surveyed, the other, meanwhile, called most of the shots in Team Cirrus. Quill instead chose to look calmly at Junipu-R and ask a simple question.

"Do you think you can do it?"

Junipu lowered her head submissively before her eyes wandered off aside. She was clearly unsure, Mana didn't show her abilities off too much so it was tough for a non-sensor kunoichi to just go on a hunch. Mana, on the other hand, saw a general skeleton of R's abilities. She could begin formulating a plan, figuring out ways of how to overcome the Kumogakure kunoichi.

"It doesn't matter if I can or cannot do it. I need to." Junipu-R firmly declared by nodding her head.

"But you provide our team support, fighting head-on isn't your forte!" Inaba looked hopelessly at his teammate.

Just looking at all the emotions in the eyes of the Kumogakure ninja made Mana feel like scum. And yet it couldn't have been helped – she needed to fight, she needed to win. It wasn't a fight she was used to, not like the others. Mana wasn't fighting for someone's life or a chance to save it, she was protecting absolutely no one. This fight was bloody and dirty and completely selfish – just a primitive need to further herself in the competition and advance to a higher rank. It made the magician feel dirty and made her want to clean herself for hours after this, not even for the reasons of personal hygiene after being stuck in the Forest of Death for so long.

Honestly, it shouldn't have felt this bad. Mana didn't like that feeling of guilt crawling up from inside her lungs and all the way up to her throat before locking it with a cold and strangling grip. She went out of her way to give R an option to leave her teammates out of this, to have her team still survive in the exams even she lost, have them remain completely unharmed in this battle.