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

Hostile Tourism

Mana and Kouta, who was still carrying Usuzoku around on his back, followed Mongohi to the room where, apparently, the rabbit could have gotten some help. The four kept descending lower and lower to the center of the Ziggurat, the deeper down they tread, the less they had to walk to complete circling the floor.

"How are you feeling?" Mana looked at Kouta with worried eyes. The young man had been treating Usuzoku this whole time from the site of their fight with Vasuki and the other snakes to the Ziggurat. Every thirty minutes to an hour, the rabbit required a small check and, even while this luxury was offered, he was still getting worse.

"I think I'm approaching the wall. I have some chakra reserved for emergencies but I'd rather it recovered unimpeded now." The young man admitted. Kouta was not the macho type to brag about having an infinite supply of stamina or strength. Mana liked that about him even though she had to admit the bragging, which Usuzoku very much tended to do, was beginning to seem sort of cute to her.

"It is a good thing then that you did not get to fight." The magician sighed easier.

"How is that?"

"I seem to recall that natural chakra requires replacing a certain percentage of your own chakra for a Jugo to transform into their Curse Seal." Mana brought up.

"True." Kouta nodded.

"That means that, if you even began taking in natural chakra, you'd have gone over the edge and lost control immediately."

"I don't think I follow..." Kouta scratched his head through a whole handful of messy hair.

"Think about it, if a Jugo requires a value of 200% to transform, it is much easier to cross that value when your own chakra is low. While it is much easier to tap into that power when worn out, it is also much easier to lose control without needing or wanting to." Mana expressed her worries.

"Huh... I guess that's why they call it a "Curse Seal"." Kouta smiled with some cheer in his tired face.

"Say, Mongo-whatevertwas," Usuzoku grumbled from the position of Kouta's piggyback. "Ye don' talk like dose other mongooses. What with dat whole "then" thing an' all..."

"I have spent so much time outside of the Ziggurat, fighting and interacting with other species and humans that I have come to abandon the speech quirks of my species. Some of you rabbits could also use that, I see..." Mongohi closed his eyes with a cocky smirk. While he felt glad to have found an opportunity to sting to a rabbit whom his kind has had a murky past with, he clearly did find some sense of enjoyment from just talking to one as well.

"I dunno what yer talkin' about..." Usuzoku grumbled. It was tough to say if his slurry speech and strangely blown cheeks were from embarrassment or if it was a symptom of the poisoning he was suffering from.

"Here. I'll help you get things done right, else you'll get nowhere..." Mongohi led Mana and Kouta into a much smaller room before leading them further to a small counter where a brown-furred mongoose with black stripes was located and doing her quite well maintained and blade-sharp claws.

"How then can I help ya?" the mongoose asked, her eyes did note the oddity of two humans and a rabbit being present in the room but she was not surprised enough to break the everyday monotony of her job.

"These humans need anti-venom. I think they've encountered Vasuki." Mongohi sighed. He clearly viewed interacting with this specimen of his own species as being more troublesome than talking to humans or barely conscious rabbits.

"You'll need to fill out this form then." The female mongoose gently showed a piece of paper to Mongohi who just cleared his throat in frustration.