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

Who Will Save the Saviors?

Mana slowly followed the procession of the Congregation, stumbling and turning back to admire the magician's presence as if they saw her for the first time every time did not do the pace of the process any favors. Axolkin, one of the Spliced that followed the magician not, staying not too far behind and looking back to confirm that none of the Allied Ninja succeeded in giving the other Spliced the slip and rushed in to take them out.

Looking at the intense, dark and endlessly deep glare of the Spliced ninja Mana was sure – this man was willing to sacrifice his life for the magician. There could not have been any mistake about it, Mana herself has had that very same look in her eyes. Every time the Congregation stopped, the back of the flock bumped into the front while the front turned back and the back thought to mumble and shake their fists at the front before deciding that looking back at the magician was not such a bad idea, Axolkin looked a bit irritated but his eyes turned softer when the movement continued.

All of a sudden, the procession bumped into a closed steel door with the Spliced ninja slowly demanding to be given way through the crowd. He pressed his hand to a panel, a screen similar to those most villagers mindlessly stared at during free time, after emitting a pleasant beep the steel rumbled open. Slowly, picking up the pace like an old train brought back into action for one last ride but with a degree of certainty and inevitability to it.

"Only I can operate this door. Had one of the others decided on following you, I'd have had to hand them out a piece of my own body to open it." Axolkin spoke up. It was just a mean to strike up a conversation but, given the peculiar topic, it was certainly a poor one.

"How so?" Mana did her best to smile, just like she used to smile onstage. At this point in time, she was an entertainer. Better than that, she was an actor. A lone star who will never be acknowledged for any accolades, a girl stricken with disgust and drowning in the bitterness of betrayal but one so determined that she moved past it and turned that scorn into strength required to move on.

"My cells are unlike those of the others. My regeneration works a little differently." Axolkin explained while the two made their way through the most sophisticated looking of all labs present in the underground facility. This one still had flora being cultivated in tubes, strange and misshapen organisms, some more humanoid than others, being produced in tubes. Mana could only imagine what the smell of this place would have been like...

Axolkin quickly pulled out a kunai blade and spun it about in his hand, somehow Mana managed to resist the better judgment to jump up and react in self-defensive instinct. That would have seemed odd to the Spliced ninja, it'd have tipped him off, which was the last thing that the magician wanted. The ninja pressed his hand against the wall before slashing at his pinky, removing it with a less than gracious swipe. A kunai lacked some of the grace of the finer blades...

The severed finger began growing back almost instantaneously. Let alone that, the severed finger began rumbling and writhing on the ground before beginning to elongate itself. Axolkin just looked at the elongated and inflating mass of flesh while he had the free time to admire his creation after glaring at his newly regenerated finger.

"My severed cells actually carry the potential to give birth to a new organism." Axolkin grinned with pride while the pinky turned to a sleeker copy of the original, laying on the floor with its eyes and mouth shut by a wet membrane of skin. "That's because my cells can become whatever kind of cells they want to be. Blood cells, skin cells, stem cells... It was my rebirth that brought Ayushi-sama the most use."

"It's true, your abilities seem to be on the whole different level compared to your counterparts and the reappeared ninja. Now that I mention it, are they our agents as well? Infiltrators of some sort?" Mana inquired, playing up the curiosity angle of the act.