Chapter 316: Kurama, I'm Not Here to Fight You; Congratulations, Miss Mikoto! [HN]

Konoha’s night was filled with stars.

The Hokage Rock silently watched over the village beneath the moonlight, while the lights of countless homes resembled stars scattered across the earth.

Chiya stood alone by the window of the Hokage’s office.

However, his gaze was not directed toward the village below. Instead, he looked toward the distant direction of Uzumaki Kushina’s residence.

His sensory perception spread like invisible ripples, carefully covering the entire area. Any intense fluctuation of chakra would have difficulty escaping his notice.

Not long ago, Kushina had told him that she had decided to attempt a deeper communication with the Nine Tails that very night.

She even intended to try loosening part of the seal’s restraints.

She wanted to give the Nine Tails more freedom in exchange for genuine understanding and coexistence.

It was an extremely bold and dangerous decision.

Even though Chiya had confidence in Kushina’s determination and the Uzumaki Clan’s mastery of sealing techniques, he could not completely relax when dealing with the Nine Tails, which had hated humans for many years and possessed enormous, violent chakra.

“Chiya nii, trust me, and please trust it this time too.”

Kushina’s determined gaze from earlier still lingered in his mind.

Chiya gently exhaled, and his figure slowly merged into the shadows of the office.

When he appeared again, he was already standing silently on the lush branches of a large tree near Kushina’s residence, his presence perfectly blending with the surrounding Natural Energy. Even a sensory type ninja would have difficulty detecting him.

His Rinnegan opened slightly, allowing him to clearly see what was happening inside the house.

Inside, Kushina had already made all her preparations.

She sat cross legged in the center of the room, surrounded by a complex and precise double barrier technique drawn with specially prepared sealing ink.

The outer layer was used to isolate any powerful chakra fluctuations that might erupt from within, while the inner layer was a modified and more inclusive framework based on the Four Symbols Seal, providing the foundation for what she was about to attempt.

Her long red hair fell over her shoulders, and her expression was more solemn and peaceful than ever before.

She took a deep breath and began forming hand seals.

She moved slowly.

She knew that this time, she was not trying to take its chakra.

“Release!”

With her low shout, the sealing formula on her abdomen began to glow.

It was not an explosive release caused by the seal breaking apart, but more like opening a controllable gate.

A vast, cold chakra filled with hatred began spreading through the gaps in the seal like a black tide, filling the inside of the barrier.

Kushina’s body trembled slightly, and fine beads of sweat appeared on her forehead.

Directly facing this pure negative energy was an enormous mental shock for anyone.

“Hmph… Foolish human, have you finally grown impatient enough to seek your own death?”

A deep and hoarse voice filled with endless resentment and mockery sounded directly in the depths of Kushina’s mind.

It was the consciousness of the Nine Tails.

Kushina did not respond as forcefully as she usually would.

She worked hard to maintain her inner calm and answered through her own consciousness.

“Kurama, I’m not here to fight you.”

“Kurama?”

The voice in her mind paused for a moment, as though it was stunned by this long forgotten name.

Then an even more intense wave of anger erupted.

“Who gave you permission to call me that?! Tiny human!”

“I know your name, and I know what you went through.”

Kushina’s voice carried a strange gentleness, as though she were soothing an injured animal.

“You were deceived by humans, sealed away, and treated as a weapon… For all those long years, you had nothing but darkness and loneliness for company.

“If it were me, I would hate them too. I would be angry too.”

The Nine Tails’ roar echoed throughout the mental world.

“Stop pretending to care! All humans are the same! Greedy, deceitful, and only interested in using our power! Uchiha Madara was like that, that old woman Uzumaki Mito was like that, and you’re no different!”

“Lady Mito…”

Hearing the name Uzumaki Mito, Kushina could not help murmuring softly.

She remembered the kind elder who had cared for and guided her.

She was also the person who had first taught her the meaning of love.

“She once told me that the essence of sealing techniques is restraint, but their deeper meaning is protection and balance.

“She sealed you inside herself.

“It was not entirely to control you. It was also to protect Konoha.

“Perhaps… in that chaotic era, she was also trying to give you a relatively stable place to stay.”

“Ridiculous!”

The Nine Tails scoffed, but its violent emotions seemed to pause for a brief moment.

“Perhaps.”

Kushina did not argue. She simply continued speaking, as though chatting with an old friend.

“But I’m different from her.

“I don’t want to treat you merely as a monster that needs to be suppressed, nor do I want to live forever in fear of being hated by you or having you lose control.

“Kurama, fate has bound us together. Why can’t we try… to understand each other?”

“Understand? Hahahahaha!”

The Nine Tails let out a sharp, wild laugh.

“You and that man who possesses the Rinnegan are both on the same side, aren’t you?

“Your power is enough to suppress me, and now you’re talking about understanding? What a ridiculous joke!”

“Chiya nii’s power is indeed strong, but he has never wanted to completely destroy you.

“He… he only wants to protect me and protect the village.”

Kushina’s voice carried a hint of choking emotion, but it quickly became firm again.

“And ever since I took some of your chakra last time, I’ve felt that you’ve always been completely consumed by hatred. You must… have been in a lot of pain, right?

“Locked inside a dark cage with no one to talk to and no one who understands you, forced to repeatedly chew over the betrayals and pain of the past…”

Her words were like a key.

Without realizing it, they touched the deepest part of the Nine Tails’ heart, the soft place that had been wrapped in a hard shell for decades.

The endless darkness.

The imprisonment that seemed to have no end.

Inside the seal, it had watched its Jinchuriki grow and die.

Yet it had always remained trapped in the same cycle, feared and used by others.

Loneliness.

Yes, that was something even more deeply ingrained than hatred.

The Nine Tails’ roar gradually faded.

In its place was a heavy and suppressed silence.

The cold chakra filling the barrier also seemed to lose some of its aggression.

Kushina sensed the change and gathered her courage to take an even bolder step.

She slowly and deliberately weakened the restraints of the inner barrier.

At the same time, she guided her own warm, burning, life filled chakra toward the gaps in the seal without holding anything back, like a gentle stream flowing toward the dark space belonging to the Nine Tails.

“What… what are you doing?!”

The Nine Tails’ voice was filled with uncertainty.

What it felt was no longer suppression or rejection, but something… it had never experienced before, chakra filled with goodwill that was trying to approach it.

“My chakra represents my life and my will.”

Kushina’s voice was gentle yet firm.

“I want you to feel that not every human is filled with hostility.

“I want you to know that in this world, at least one person is still willing to try to understand you and share your loneliness.”

That warm chakra was like sunlight, slowly seeping into the Nine Tails’ cold consciousness.

Its instinct was to resist and tear apart this false goodwill, but the sincerity and complete trust contained within that light caused the hatred built into its heart to develop tiny cracks.

It remembered a very long time ago.

When it had been beside the Sage of Six Paths, it had once experienced what it was like to be treated as a companion rather than a tool.

The memory was vague, but it had never truly forgotten it.

“…Why?”

After a long silence, the Nine Tails’ low voice sounded again, with much less violence.

“Why are you doing all this? What do you gain from it?”

“Because I don’t want to be lonely anymore.”

Kushina answered softly, a trace of remembrance appearing on her face.

“When I was young, I was bullied and isolated because of my red hair and because I came from another village.

“I understand what it feels like to be rejected and have to hide alone in a corner.

“Kurama, we… are actually the same kind of people.

“We were both thrown by fate into a world that seemed hostile to us.”

“So I want to become your friend, a true friend.

“Not a Jinchuriki and a Tailed Beast, but Uzumaki Kushina and Kurama.”

“Friend…”

The Nine Tails quietly repeated the unfamiliar word.

Inside the sealing space, the violent aura in those enormous crimson eyes slowly faded, revealing a deep weariness that seemed to have crossed countless years.

And beneath it was… a tiny desire that even it was unwilling to admit.

Inside the barrier, the originally cold and violent dark red chakra began to change silently.

Tiny golden points of warm and bright light began flickering and spreading through it like sparks.

It was Kushina’s chakra and the Nine Tails’ chakra beginning to cautiously and slowly merge.

There was no rejection and no conflict.

Instead, they formed a strange, balanced, harmonious field of energy.

A relieved and joyful smile appeared on Kushina’s face.

She could clearly feel the heavy barrier and pressure that had always existed between them gradually disappearing.

In their place was an unprecedented sense of ease and fullness, as though every cell in her body was cheering.

She formed hand seals again.

This time, she was not reinforcing the seal.

Instead, she guided the newly formed chakra, which now contained the will of both sides, and drew a new runic mark over the original sealing formula.

It represented a contract and coexistence.

“With this contract as witness, I, Uzumaki Kushina, am willing to share chakra with Kurama, bear our fate together, and become partners until the end of our lives.”

In the mental world, the Nine Tails remained silent.

It looked at the contract runes gradually taking shape within the mental space, radiating a sense of equality and respect.

Then it looked at the red haired girl before it, whose eyes were filled with pure hope.

In the end, it merely snorted.

It did not agree, but it did not object either.

However, the chakra filling the barrier completely stabilized.

Dark red and golden chakra intertwined and flowed together, without the slightest trace of violence.

Instead, they radiated a vast and dignified power.

It had worked.

Outside the window, Chiya slowly closed his Rinnegan, and a relieved smile appeared at the corner of his mouth.

He could sense that the two chakra signatures inside the house, which had originally been completely distinct, had already merged into one.

They had become harmonious and powerful.

Kushina had succeeded.

With her sincerity and courage, she had truly knocked on the heart of the Nine Tails, which had been closed for so long.

He did not stay any longer.

His figure silently faded into the night, leaving this hard earned peace and new beginning completely to the two partners inside the house.

…

Time quietly passed, and two months went by amid peace and hidden undercurrents.

The news of Tsunade’s pregnancy was kept within an extremely small circle.

Her abdomen had already begun to show a slight curve.

Although it was not obvious beneath her loose robe, those close to her could still notice the difference.

She reduced her frontline work at the hospital and devoted more of her time to management and guidance.

Her Sage Jutsu training had also become gentler, focusing mainly on nourishing herself and the baby.

That afternoon, Uchiha Mikoto came to Konoha Hospital as usual for a medical examination.

However, a familiar sensation suddenly struck her without warning.

It was the same sudden dizziness and nausea that Tsunade had experienced a month earlier.

The booklet in Mikoto’s hand nearly slipped to the ground.

She quickly steadied herself against the table, and her face instantly became pale.

“Miss Mikoto, are you all right?”

A medical ninja beside her asked with concern.

“I’m… I’m fine. I might just be a little tired.”

Mikoto smiled and shook her head.

But inside, turbulent emotions were already surging through her heart.

This feeling…

Could it be…

An unbelievable thought caused her heart to pound wildly.

She did not dare delay.

She hurriedly finished her work and, with a mixture of anxiety and anticipation, found Shizune, whom she knew well and who was aware of Tsunade’s situation.

When Shizune saw Mikoto’s pale expression and the hesitation on her face, she immediately sensed that something was wrong.

She simply took Mikoto’s hand gently and led her to a quiet examination room.

Half an hour later, the door of the examination room was gently pushed open.

Mikoto walked out, tightly clutching a small medical report in her hand.

Her knuckles had turned slightly white from how hard she was gripping it.

The gentle and composed expression she usually wore was gone.

In its place was a blush filled with joy.

Shizune followed behind her.

“Miss Mikoto, congratulations!~”

Mikoto stopped walking and took a deep breath, as though she wanted to completely absorb this immense happiness into her lungs.

She raised her head and looked down the hospital corridor, as if she could already see the figure she had been longing for.

She was going to become a mother too.

Chiya nii’s child…

“Is Tsunade nee still working?”

“Lady Tsunade? She is!”

“Please follow me!~”

Mikoto followed behind Shizune, her steps light yet firm.

Under Konoha’s sunlight, a new life was quietly growing.

Just as the saying went, the shadow of fire would illuminate the village and allow the new leaves to sprout.