Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Games of Body and Soul

The Fleshy Stakes-Raiser

Standing in front of the only spiraling orb of pure chakra, emanating the same dark shroud that covered the entire building, Mana recalled Musha's words when the team of jounin decided to take Mana with them.

If Kiyomi truly had some hand in causing this, Mana and her past relationship with the Yamanaka may have been crucial in ceasing this. Maybe Kiyomi was corrupted by whatever remnants of the darkness that caused these disappearances still lingered in Ikiro's mind, maybe Ikiro took over Kiyomi's mind after the Yamanaka opened a link between their minds or maybe it was some combination of the two.

Whether there was a hint of a malicious plot at hand, or if it was just a mournful calamity that befell the village upon the sections of a dark and tortured mind getting unlocked, Mana could have been the only way to stop this.

"Meiko..." Mana's lips whimpered. Sure, Kiyomi liked Meiko in a much different way than the friendship between the magician and the Yamanaka heiress worked but the blacksmith was far away and unavailable at the moment. It would have been selfish to try and shift the responsibility for stopping all of this on someone else's shoulders just because technically they would be better suited for the job, even though waiting for them would cause Kiyomi and Ikiro much more pain.

Yes, Kiyomi needs to know that this Mana reaching out to her. The magician pressed her hand against the barrier without any force or an attempt to break it and enter. She just concentrated the flow of chakra to her palm, like she would have if she tried to set off a seal she had placed. Sure, the magician had nothing to do with this barrier and only a little to do with this entire event but that was beside the point.

What was important was that if Kiyomi had any hints of control over this and her own mind, like a spider on an extensive web spreading out wide, she'd have felt the dragging on the strings somewhere and turned her attention. That was the theory, anyway...

Mana just stood by the barrier channeling chakra into it in small quantities for a short while to no end. The spiraling orb of malice did not become less dense, it did not just cease its destruction and the fleshy and nightmarish corruption covering the entire Academy building did not just magically go back to its source and free the sanctuary of education it had tainted.

Nobody answered.

"Let me in, Kiyomi!" Mana called out with a plead. "Just let me in and give me a sign if I can help. At least let me know if you can hear me. Just that... Just tell me I'm not standing here preaching to myself."

Nothing. For people that were exceedingly fast, those jounin took a frightening while to get their minds together. Then again, even if Dorimi did manage to subdue and calm his colleagues down, what possible success could they hail approaching even closer to the heart of their dread? With each step, with each point of space one's glare extended to the direction of the evil's heart, the abyss looked back with more petrifying nightmares to swing back with.

"Missy, why did you not save us?!" The melted abominations that resembled their innocent childish selves less and less with each passing moment began their relentless assault on Mana's psyche again.

Their hands reached out from the fleshy walls and their skeletal and sharp images began forming from the bony protrusions. The constructs, resembling the digestive tract or organs that pulsed with unknown liquid flowing inside them, full of unholy stenches, which luckily Mana could not pick up, burst. In that way revealing some more unfortunate bodies flowing outside them with the pus they were drowning in running down the floor.

Mana screamed out as the feelings boiling inside her combined with the hideous sights and sounds these images sent her way began slowly taking over her own mind. It was so easy to think that nobody could ever corrupt you. Be as naïve as those children sitting safely in their classrooms and thinking no scary sight ever could bring fear into one's heart.