Chapter 312: The Chains of Uzumaki
Sarutobi Hiruzen gripped the Adamantine Staff, and the tide of battle shifted.
The Kongōnyoi was not merely a weapon. It was Enma himself—the Monkey King transformed into his most lethal form, a staff of unbreakable diamond that could extend at will, split mountains, and crush steel. In the hands of the Professor, a master of all five chakra natures and more ninjutsu than any other shinobi alive, the staff became an extension of his will. Their partnership was not one plus one. It was exponential.
Hiruzen's strength placed him among the top Kage of his era. The original timeline had seen him fight Orochimaru and two reanimated Hokage simultaneously while aged and diminished. Here, in his prime, with Enma at his side, he was something else entirely. Something closer to the legend the shinobi world remembered.
The Adamantine Staff became a blur. Hiruzen swept it in great, devastating arcs, each swing carrying enough force to level buildings. The Nine-Tails' Chakra Arms shattered against its surface. The staff left afterimages in the air, a cyclone of black iron that seemed to fill the entire formation. The Third Hokage pressed forward, his white robes whipping around him, his face set in grim determination.
But the Nine-Tails adapted.
The fox's chakra coalesced. Divided. From the seething mass of crimson energy surrounding Mito's body, new shapes emerged—smaller versions of the Nine-Tails, each one a perfect miniature of the great beast. They peeled away from the main body like droplets from a wave, their forms solidifying into snarling, snapping creatures that moved with feral intelligence.
Splitting. It was an ability rare among the Tailed Beasts. Only the progenitor—the Ten-Tails itself—had demonstrated this power in its full, terrifying glory. During the Fourth Shinobi World War, the resurrected Ten-Tails had spawned countless offspring from its main body, each one a lethal combatant with unique and deadly abilities. The Nine-Tails, as the strongest fragment of that ancient entity, had inherited a shadow of that power.
The split beasts swarmed Hiruzen from every angle. He brought the Adamantine Staff around in a crushing horizontal sweep, catching one of the creatures square in its midsection. The impact launched it across the formation like a cannonball. It crashed into the barrier of the Four Red Yang Formation and tumbled to the ground—then immediately scrambled to its feet, unharmed, its snarl more savage than before.
These things feel no pain, Hiruzen realized grimly. And the damage I can inflict is limited. If they were ordinary shinobi, one strike from Enma would be enough. But these are chakra constructs. Monsters.
The split beasts pressed their advantage. Hiruzen found himself hemmed in, the Adamantine Staff a whirling shield against an endless assault. He could hold them off. But he could not advance.
Then, without warning, the creatures froze.
Every split beast stopped mid-motion, their forms locked in perfect stillness as if time itself had paused. Hiruzen did not waste the opening. He vaulted backward, clearing the encirclement in a single powerful leap, and landed in a defensive crouch near the edge of the formation.
What—
"WRETCHED WOMAN!"
The Nine-Tails' roar was directed inward. The fox's control over Mito's body flickered, the crimson chakra receding like a tide pulling back from shore. Uzumaki Mito—the true Uzumaki Mito—was fighting back. Even now. Even at the edge of death. Her consciousness was clawing its way out of the darkness, struggling to reassert control over the body the fox had stolen.
For a breath, the crimson chakra dimmed.
Then it surged back with redoubled fury.
"That girl," the Nine-Tails snarled through Mito's lips. "She's the new container. If I destroy her now—if I kill the vessel before the seal can be completed—there will be no cage left to hold me. When this old woman's life finally fades, I will be free. FREE!"
Its burning gaze locked onto Kushina.
The possessed body moved. One moment Mito stood at the center of the formation. The next, she was gone—a scarlet blur cutting through the air, the phantom tails streaming behind her like banners of war.
"KUSHINA! IT'S COMING FOR YOU!"
Hiruzen lunged forward, but the split beasts closed in around him, their frozen forms suddenly animate again, pressing him back with coordinated fury. He could not break through in time.
No. NO—
"Die!"
The Nine-Tails grinned through Mito's face—a horrible, twisted expression of pure malice. Its claws extended toward the young girl, ready to tear through flesh and bone and end the Uzumaki bloodline's last hope.
"SEALING CHAINS!"
Kushina was not a vase. She was not a damsel waiting to be rescued.
She was Uzumaki Kushina. She had trained for three years under Mito's direct tutelage. She had learned the sealing arts of her ancestors, the techniques that had bound Tailed Beasts for generations. Her chakra reserves, inherited from the Uzumaki bloodline, were vast beyond her years. Her combat ability approached Jōnin level, and her will—her fierce, unbreakable will—was the equal of any shinobi in this formation.
Her grandmother's collapse had shattered her heart. But it had not broken her spirit. She would not let Mito's sacrifice be in vain. She would not let this demon fox destroy everything her family had protected.
In the name of Uzumaki. In the name of the future female Hokage. I will seal you, Nine-Tails!
The sound of chains echoed through the formation. Not the grinding, oppressive chains of the fox's cage, but something brighter. Something purer. From Kushina's back, golden light erupted—the Adamantine Sealing Chains, the ultimate expression of the Uzumaki clan's bloodline limit. They shot upward, illuminating the darkness, turning the blood-red sky to gold.
One after another, the chains descended. They moved like silver serpents, like the rules of order made manifest, wrapping around the possessed body of Uzumaki Mito with unerring precision. The Uzumaki clan's chakra held the same suppressing property as Wood Release—it could bind Tailed Beast energy, nullify its destructive power, force it into submission.
But the Nine-Tails was not an ordinary Tailed Beast.
The chains held it. Barely. The fox strained against them, its chakra boiling and thrashing, and Kushina could feel each link groaning under the pressure. Her sealing technique was strong—but it was not as strong as Mito's. Not yet. Without her grandmother's guidance, without Mito's power supplementing her own, the chance of successfully sealing the Nine-Tails alone was terrifyingly low.
She was not finished.
"SEALING TECHNIQUE: MYŌJIN GATE!"
Kushina's hand flew to a scroll—a parting gift from her grandmother, pressed into her palm before the ceremony began. She unfurled it now, releasing the seal that bound its contents. White smoke billowed.
From the sky, massive wooden gates plummeted.
They were ancient. Carved with sacred symbols. Imbued with the power of the First Hokage himself. The Myōjin Gates crashed down upon the Nine-Tails' possessed form, one after another, pinning its limbs, its tails, its thrashing head. This was Wood Release's ultimate sealing technique—a jutsu that could only be performed by those who carried the blood of the Senju. Kushina did not. But the scroll she held had been prepared by Hashirama himself, long before his death, when he had foreseen that the Nine-Tails might one day break free of its restraints.
Within that scroll, he had sealed his chakra. His will. His final gift to his wife and her successor.
"HASHIRAMA!"
The Nine-Tails' roar shook the heavens. It remembered. Oh, how it remembered. The fear. The helplessness. The absolute, overwhelming power of the man who had bent it to his will as easily as a child leashing a dog. The God of Shinobi. The one human who had ever truly made the Nine-Tails feel small.
Even dead, Hashirama's shadow stretched across decades.
In the distance, Sarutobi Hiruzen exhaled. The Myōjin Gates had held. The Nine-Tails was pinned. The immediate crisis—
Wait.
The Seal Space
"Give up, Nine-Tails."
Mito's consciousness had regained a foothold. The Myōjin Gates' suppression had weakened the fox's control, giving her space to breathe, to speak, to plead one final time.
"Stupid woman," the fox hissed. "You've imprisoned me in a lightless void for decades. Decades. And now you ask me to surrender? To crawl willingly into another cage?"
Its voice dropped. Became something colder. Something absolute.
"Try locking yourself in darkness for a lifetime. Then ask me again."
Its chakra surged. Not the measured, controlled release it had used before, but everything. All of it. The full, unfiltered, apocalyptic might of the Nine-Tailed Fox. The seal space cracked. The Myōjin Gates, even infused with Hashirama's lingering chakra, began to splinter.
The Physical World
The Nine-Tails' power erupted with renewed violence. The nine phantom tails behind Mito's body solidified, becoming real in a way they had not been before. The wooden gates groaned. Cracks spider-webbed across their ancient surfaces.
"You are not Senju Hashirama! You cannot hold me!"
CRACK.
The first gate shattered.
The sealing chains snapped, golden links scattering across the scorched earth. The Nine-Tails rose to its full height within Mito's body, the Tailed Beast Cloak blazing around it like a funeral pyre.
"After all these years, the chakra Hashirama left behind has grown weak." The fox's voice dripped with contempt. "Foolish humans. Did you truly believe you could hold me forever?"
One of the solidified tails lashed out. It transformed mid-strike, becoming a scarlet python of pure destruction, an iron whip of concentrated malice. It cut through the air toward Kushina with speed that defied comprehension. She could not dodge. Could not block. Could not—
CLANG.
A blade intercepted the strike.
Cold. Precise. A single slash that tore through the darkness like lightning rending the night sky. The impact sent shockwaves rippling across the formation, kicking up clouds of dust and debris. The tail—the attack that should have ended Kushina's life—was deflected, its trajectory altered by a fraction, but enough. It slammed into the ground beside her, gouging a trench in the earth rather than the girl herself.
When the dust cleared, a figure stood between Kushina and the Nine-Tails.
Black combat attire. A demonic mask. A sword that pulsed with faint, otherworldly light.
Ragnar did not speak. He did not need to. His blade was still raised, the edge of Yama still singing from the impact it had absorbed. And his eyes—visible through the slits of the Rakshasa mask—were fixed on the possessed body of Uzumaki Mito with an expression that was not fear.
It was cold, quiet, absolute fury.
"You," the Nine-Tails hissed.
"Me," Ragnar replied.
Behind him, Kushina's legs gave out. She sank to her knees, her golden chains flickering and fading, her breath coming in ragged gasps. She looked up at the back of the man who had appeared between her and death, and for the first time since the ceremony began, she felt something other than terror.
He came. He actually came.
(End of Chapter)
✨ If you're enjoying this story, please consider supporting me on Patreon! ✨
Patreon.com/TofuChan