Chapter 57: The Fox's Plight
'The Nine-Tails' strength is no joke,' Shinra conceded internally, even as his Susanoo dominated the fight. 'I've been at this for a while and still can't fully subdue it. It truly lives up to its title as the strongest.'
This was with the significant advantage of his own superior swordsmanship, which amplified his Susanoo's combat prowess to a level that could suppress the fox. Without that, their battle would have been a stalemate. Uchiha Madara had been able to treat the Nine-Tails as a pet because his Sharingan inherently restrained Tailed Beasts, allowing him to control it with a single glance. Without that specific hax, even Madara would have had a much tougher fight on his hands.
Of course, that was the Madara before the Rinnegan. A Rinnegan-wielding Madara would have treated the Nine-Tails like a misbehaving child.
While his Tenseigan was superior to the Eternal Mangekyo, it lacked that specific "Tailed Beast control" specialty. It couldn't easily dominate a beast of the Nine-Tails' caliber, otherwise Shinra would have used that ability from the start. His Tenseigan's puppet control was also useless here. Unwilling to expose his signature abilities, he was forced to rely solely on the Susanoo to win.
He knew he would eventually have to reveal his Tenseigan and Glint-Glint Fruit powers, but now was not the time. Using them risked exposing his identity, and Shinra had no desire to become a rogue ninja. Why live as a fugitive when he could live comfortably in Konoha?
That's why he stuck to the Susanoo. It had one useful, if rather bland, feature: it could change color and shape, making it harder to trace back to a specific user. The downside was its weaponry—it only came with two standard tachi, a far cry from the legendary, god-slaying tools that Itachi's Susanoo wielded. In comparison, his felt a bit… basic.
'This oversized fox is stubborn. A war of attrition is out of the question; I can't match its near-infinite chakra reserves. It's time to end this.'
"Susanoo: Gravity Blade!"
He poured his will into the dark warrior. As it swung its massive sword, Shinra subtly activated his Tenseigan, manipulating gravity to pull the Nine-Tails directly onto the path of the blade.
From Konoha's distant vantage point, no one could see the faint shimmer of energy around his real body. They would simply assume it was another strange ability of the Susanoo.
Caught completely off guard by the invisible force, the Nine-Tails lurched forward, impaling itself on the chakra blade. The sword cut through its form as if it were mist, shearing off a full quarter of its body. Since the fox was a construct of pure chakra, there was no gore—the severed section simply dissolved back into the raw energy it was made of.
The Nine-Tails wasn't missing any limbs; it was just significantly smaller. The tails Shinra had cut off earlier had similarly vanished, shrinking the beast's overall mass.
From within the Susanoo's forehead crystal, Shinra acted swiftly, using a sealing technique to capture and contain the dispersed chakra before it could dissipate or return to the fox.
'A quarter of the Nine-Tails' chakra... that's not enough.' He stared greedily at the diminished fox. His goal was half. He was only halfway there.
The Nine-Tails, now visibly smaller, thrashed its remaining tails in a fury. Its boast of "infinite chakra" was just that—a boast. Losing a quarter of its essence was a monumental loss that would take a considerable time to recover.
"You're just wasting your energy. I'm done playing with you." Shinra's voice was cold and final.
His Susanoo surged forward, pinning the weakened fox to the ground. Then, Shinra decided the risk was worth it. He raised a hand, and a shimmering green orb of light materialized above his palm. Using a core ability of the Tenseigan, he began to actively siphon chakra directly from the Nine-Tails, draining it like water from a tap.
The sensation of its very life force being stolen sent the fox into a panicked frenzy. It roared, a sound now laced with desperation, its eyes burning with hatred for Shinra, but also, deep within, a spark of genuine, primal fear.
Under the relentless drain, the Nine-Tails shrank further. Its once fifty-meter bulk dwindled to a mere thirty meters. When Shinra finally felt he had absorbed enough chakra to meet his goal, he ceased the drain. He looked down at the fox, which now lay on the ground, panting and exhausted, looking like a half-drowned, scrawny dog.
For good measure, his Susanoo delivered one last, contemptuous kick. Then, he glanced toward the distant lights of Konoha. The colossal Susanoo dissolved into nothingness, and in the same instant, Shinra vanished, teleporting away through space.
"What happened? Did he run out of chakra, or has he left?" Sarutobi Hiruzen asked, turning to the Hyuga Clan Head, who had his Byakugan active.
"The Nine-Tails' chakra is still there, greatly diminished," the Hyuga patriarch reported, his eyes scanning the distance. "But the other massive chakra signature is gone. The mysterious man has vanished."
"Never mind him for now! Our priority is to seal the Nine-Tails! Perhaps the stranger got what he came for and left," Hiruzen declared, taking the lead and rushing toward the fallen beast.
Seeing their Hokage move, the other ninjas, though still fearful, suppressed their trepidation and followed. A few kilometers was nothing to shinobi of their caliber; they covered the distance in minutes.
When they arrived, the sight that greeted them was almost unbelievable. The legendary Nine-Tails, the embodiment of catastrophe, was now a scrawny, emaciated version of its former self.
"What are you all looking at?!" the fox snarled, struggling to its feet and glaring at the Konoha shinobi with profound humiliation. 'Such a disgraceful state... The other Tailed Beasts must never learn of this,' it thought, its pride in tatters. 'I'll have to kill all these witnesses.'
It raised a paw to strike, but a wave of profound weakness washed over it. Its legs buckled, and it collapsed back to the ground with an undignified thud. The fox's face, if possible, looked even more mortified. The successive chakra drains and the final "weakness" debuff Shinra had applied as a parting gift had left it utterly drained.
Sarutobi Hiruzen, who had been tensed for another fight, let out a slow breath of relief. "The Sealing Team! Now!" he commanded.
"You vile, opportunistic humans!" the Nine-Tails roared, its voice lacking its former thunder. "Have the guts to fight me when I've recovered! I'll make you pay!"
It was the ultimate humiliation: a tiger fallen prey to a pack of dogs.
"Begin the sealing!" Hiruzen ignored its impotent threats. A weakened Nine-Tails was a sealable Nine-Tails.
"IT WON'T BE THAT EASY!" With a final, desperate surge of will, the fox erupted with a torrent of chakra, not to attack, but as a defensive blast that threw the approaching Sealing Team backward.
"All units, contain it! Sealing Team, prepare your jutsu!" Hiruzen ordered, his face grim. The fact that they were struggling against a Tailed Beast that had been reduced to a "first-degree disabled" state was a stark and embarrassing reminder of the power gap they had just witnessed.
But it also filled him with a sense of grim fortune. The mysterious masked man had gotten what he wanted and left. If his goal had been Konoha's destruction, the outcome would have been unthinkable.