"It's fine. Just treat it as some bizarre, twisted little dark comedy story. There's absolutely no need to take it seriously," Makoto said, gently holding Uchiha Hikari's hand to help ground her reality and make her feel a bit more at ease.
Yeah, Tailed Beast intelligence definitely couldn't be ignored.
Moreover, [Konan] had just completely skipped over the soon-to-be-captured Eight-Tails and Two-Tails, didn't even mention the Seven-Tails, and jumped directly to the Six-Tails.
There had to be some deeper meaning behind this.
Is the Six-Tails uniquely special somehow?
Uchiha Hikari took a deep breath and gradually calmed down.
[Konan] took this brief pause to comfort her new recruit.
"I know that for young people like you, these historical truths are just too cruel to hear. But what I'm telling you are the indisputable facts of our universe. If we want to change these cruel realities, we simply have to work hard to complete our grand plan."
"You're right. Just... continue." Uchiha Hikari curled her lips in disgust.
Indeed, the only way to end this utterly absurd world was to work hard and complete the "plan."
Collect all the Tailed Beast chakra and they could finally lift this nightmare Limited Tsukuyomi.
"Okay," [Konan] nodded solemnly. "The reason I need to tell you the Six-Tails' story right now is because the Six-Tails is incredibly special—it is directly related to the Sage of Six Paths."
"Related to the Sage of Six Paths...?" Uchiha Hikari muttered to herself.
"As if the other Tailed Beasts have nothing to do with him—wait. You don't mean that kind of relationship, do you?!" Hikari suddenly panicked, realizing something felt horribly off.
"You've misunderstood," [Konan] corrected her smoothly.
"Oh, thank god. That's a relief." Uchiha Hikari let out a massive sigh, her shoulders dropping.
"The kind of relationship you're currently thinking of? The Sage of Six Paths already had that with literally all the Tailed Beasts. What I'm saying is the Six-Tails has an even more special relationship."
"..."
'Aight.'
Uchiha Hikari's soul officially left her body.
She was completely numb!
'Fuck it.'
She'd just keep listening—at this point, she morbidly wanted to know what even more absurd, godforsaken things could possibly happen in this lore.
"Earlier, I mentioned that when facing his mother who violently opposed furries, the Sage of Six Paths joined forces with his brother to seal her away into the moon," [Konan] continued.
"According to mainstream ninja world legends, the Sage of Six Paths' brother, Hamura, was deeply disgusted by his brother's beastly degenerate behavior afterward. So, he left Earth and went to the moon to accompany their mother. There are even rumors that the brother went to the moon specifically to endure humiliation and train diligently to awaken the Tenseigan."
"Because he clearly knew he was no match for his elder brother who possessed the Rinnegan. To stop his brother's furry empire, he needed an even more powerful Eye Technique. Only then could he destroy this sick world."
"Alright." Makoto nodded in the background, remarking internally that there were still plenty of good Otsutsuki in the world to cleanse this filth.
"However, the authenticity of those mainstream legends is highly questionable—in fact, they're probably complete bullshit," [Konan] suddenly shifted her tone.
"Because our Akatsuki organization member, White Zetsu, actually discovered an alternative historical account while excavating the ancient ruins of the Hyuga clan—a secret diary allegedly left behind by the younger brother himself."
"He wasn't actually displeased with his elder brother's degeneracy at all. Rather, his brother was just a selfish 'pure love warrior' who flat-out refused to share any of the furry creatures with him!"
"In the end, after much bitter anguish, Hamura suddenly realized that their sealed mother seemed to be the ultimate, most beautiful bunny girl in existence. So... he went to the moon specifically to research how to crack it open and 'rescue' his powerless mother for himself, and then..."
"..."
After hearing this horrific piece of lore, even Makoto couldn't help but rub his temples and sigh heavily.
Are there even any actual, functioning humans left in this world?
"The Sage of Six Paths and his brother actually had major help from the Mount Myōboku Toads when they defeated their mother," [Konan] went on.
"But the Sage of Six Paths shamelessly betrayed their trust. After creating the nine Tailed Beasts, he became totally obsessed with their 'gentle embrace' every single night and completely ignored the toads."
"Gamamaru, the Great Toad Sage, was deeply saddened and incredibly resentful. To retaliate, he made a dark prophecy at the heavy cost of repeatedly falling into deep slumbers—"
"He prophesied that one day, a blue-eyed boy, laughing recklessly while calling out the names of the nine Tailed Beasts, would aggressively take everything from the Sage of Six Paths, steal all his beloved Tailed Beasts, and bring about a great revolution in the ninja world."
"Initially, the Sage of Six Paths paid absolutely no attention to this jealous toad's prophecy. His power far surpassed Gamamaru's, and he sensed zero threat to his existence. But the very next day, the Sage of Six Paths was horrified to discover that his main companion, the Six-Tails Saiken, was pregnant!"
"And she directly gave birth to his second child, whom he named Asura. His first child, Indra, was born from a forced union with a normal human woman, and the child's human mother had long since died of illness."
"A widowed man suddenly having another child completely out of wedlock—even the god-like Sage of Six Paths would likely face severe gossip and rumors in that ancient era!"
"The Six-Tails eagerly seized this golden opportunity to deliberately spread the news of their intimate relationship, desperately hoping to force his hand so she could become his official wife."
"Actually, the Sage of Six Paths originally had his own normal name. But after this scandalous incident spread, the people who learned of it spontaneously began calling him the 'Sage of Six Paths,' implying he was a sage who shamelessly 'possessed' the Six-Tails, or something along those lines."
"Only much later did the Sage of Six Paths realize that this great 'honor' was purely due to the Six-Tails secretly spreading the story. Completely enraged, he fought her in a fierce domestic-abuse battle that literally darkened the skies."
"It's said that the Six-Tails was originally a beautiful transparent creature, much like the Bubble Ninjutsu used by its current Jinchuriki. But after getting beaten in this brutal battle, the Six-Tails permanently turned a sticky, pale white."
"Sometime afterward, the Six-Tails actually gave birth to another offspring. But as I mentioned earlier regarding Kisame, just as the Three-Tails could only produce weird, non-humanoid beings like the sword Samehada for its second birth... the exact same thing happened with the Six-Tails."
"The second biological child of the Six-Tails and the Sage of Six Paths was none other than Katsuyu, the giant Slug of Shikkotsu Forest!"
"So, do you finally understand now? Why both Hashirama Senju and the giant Slug possess such insanely powerful self-recovery abilities? And exactly why Tsunade, the Hokage of Konoha, can so perfectly form a contract and synchronize with her...?"
[Konan] finally finished recounting the cursed legend of the Six-Tails...
Uchiha Hikari felt that these past few minutes were significantly longer and more painful than her entire lifetime.
She was utterly at a loss for words.
...
Up on the spectator stands in the sky, Tsunade's face flushed a furious bright red.
She aggressively clenched her fists and screamed at the top of her lungs.
"DON'T YOU DARE INSULT KATSUYU LIKE THAT!!!"
"Heh. Well, at least Ryūchi Cave wasn't mentioned," Orochimaru chuckled, wiping a bead of sweat from his pale forehead.
Among the Three Great Summoning Sage Regions, only the snake-infested Ryūchi Cave still miraculously maintained a normal respectable impression in people's minds within this godforsaken universe!
...
"Hey, since two of the three Sage Places have already been mentioned... what about Ryūchi Cave? Is it also weirdly related to the Tailed Beasts?" Makoto casually asked a question the moment [Konan] finished speaking.
The second Makoto opened his mouth, the relieved smile on Orochimaru's face up in the spectator stands instantly froze and shattered.
'Wait, this isn't right, is it? Why the hell would Makoto voluntarily ask about it?!'
"Oh, Ryūchi Cave actually has nothing to do with the Tailed Beasts biologically. But according to our former Akatsuki member, Orochimaru..."
"I SAID NO SUCH THING!" Orochimaru's expression darkened into pure terror, his survival instincts screaming that something was terribly, terribly wrong!
"...Orochimaru told us that in ancient times, the White Snake Sage of Ryūchi Cave once blindly burrowed upward from deep underground but didn't quite break through to the surface. Instead, she accidentally entered a very mysterious, dark 'cave'."
"Inside this cave, the White Snake Sage encountered a miraculous, fleshy 'fruit'."
"After aggressively eating the fruit, the White Snake Sage felt her power surge dramatically to god-like levels. After finally leaving the cave, the White Snake Sage officially founded 'Ryūchi Cave' based entirely on this miraculous event."
"This matter was originally just a bizarre unsolved mystery in the ninja world," [Konan] noted casually.
"But another ancient document records that once, while intimately 'communicating' with the Tailed Beasts in the wild, the Sage of Six Paths was suddenly ambushed from below by an unknown creature, which viciously bit off his 'window of wisdom'."
"?"
...
window of wisdom = balls = family jewels etc.