Naruto x Sekirei - Part 10

Naruto could only facepalm at the general stupidity of the situation.

The first stupid thing to facepalm about was the fact that losing Kakizaki and subsequently Kochō had apparently made Higa both scared and stupid. Oh he'd no doubt deny being scared, but the spoiled corporate heir had no real idea what the fuck he was doing and that was before his and Xanna's arrival.

Hur hur, I'm going to destroy MBI by playing their game by their rules and without knowing the extent of MBI's capabilities, look at how clever I am. Retard.

But getting back to the point, Higa had seemingly come to the conclusion that his problems could be solved by getting more Sekirei for some unspecified future purpose. He planned to do this by apparently forcibly winging Tsukiumi, clearly unaware that this was no longer possible. Musubi seemed to have just gotten caught up in it by virtue of being present at the time, having been engaged in a friendly spar with the Water Sekirei in an warehouse that was unfortunately close to the eastern territory. They probably planned to either abduct or deactivate her.

Normally, those two together would have no great trouble defending themselves, as they numbered among the stronger Sekirei, which brings us to the second point of stupidity. Both of them had already been somewhat tired from their spar, yet they had decided to stick around because one was too proud to run and the other too much of a combat nut.

The third point of stupidity was the fact that staying to fight when there were eigth of them and two of you was generally a bad idea unless you knew for sure that you were stronger than them by a comfortable margin, which was not the case here. For sure, Musubi and Tsukiumi were stronger than each of them individually, but not all of them at once.

It was slightly surprising that half of those Sekirei were Higa's, but Naruto figured that was because of his meddling. Those four being Katsuragi, Shi, Sai and Kaiha.

Katsuragi and Shi were two that he had noted previously as ones that would definitely need someone to look after them for a while, allowing them a security blanket until they were comfortable.

Katsuragi was prone to frequent fits of melancholy, probably worsened by Higa's attitude towards Sekirei and could definitely do with some fun in her life.

Shi had been deeply insecure and shy even before she was released from the labs and her forced winging to Higa had only made that more pronounced. She was one of those Sekirei that was in serious need of a big brother, a position that Naruto was more than happy to fill.

Both of them were close combat types and it was nice to see that not all of them were just a few steps away from killing random people on the street.

On the other end of the spectrum, Sai was volatile and easily angered. Naruto had at first thought that she might be another one of those that he would have to kill, but it was fortunately not the case. She was just foul tempered.

And way off the deep end of the spectrum was Kaiha, who was at this very moment making her best crazy axe murderer face as she tried to skewer Musubi with her twin curved swords that made her look as if she was dual wielding two giant scythe blades. Clearly, she had no interest in keeping Musubi alive.

The other four were with Ashikabi that Higa had payed off. Naruto made a note to himself to make a more in depth check on those pairings. If those four were willing to be payed to attack two women at four on one odds, then there was a good chance that they had no business having Sekirei winged to them.

"Cowards! Cease this dishonorable attack and face us in single combat!" Tsukiumi was howling, using her water to fend off her attackers.

"Yeah! This isn't fair!" Musubi agreed, weaving around Kaiha's furious attack. She was actually less pressed than Tsukiumi because Kaiha's flailing could easily harm one of her 'allies' as well as the fist fighter.

Naruto sighed to himself in both amusement and exasperation. Single combat was nice and all, but it was a bit late to be insisting on it after you've already been attacked.

"I'm sorry!" Shi squeaked but continued attacking.

Okay, now that was just cute. He thought to himself and decided to interfere before somebody got hurt that shouldn't be getting hurt.

Many startled exclamations and a few curses later, the eight attacking Sekirei were being held aloft by chains. A clone had done the same to the four Ashikabi standing nearby.

"Naruto-sama!" Musubi exclaimed enthusiastically, looking entirely too happy for someone that had been on the verge of getting killed, though Naruto figured that she probably didn't understand the concept of dying too well in the first place. "There are two of you!"

"Hello there Musubi-chan." Naruto greeted the girl. He didn't normally bother with honorifics, but Musubi was definitely a '-chan'. He also made another clone and had it carry off Kaiha, no need to kill the murderous Sekirei in front of someone as naive as Musubi.

Musubi made another noise of awe at the feat and bounced around like a hyper energetic puppy. "Now there are three Naruto-sama's, so cool!"

"How did thou know to aid us?" Tsukiumi asked suspiciously, finding his timing to be a bit too convenient.

"I've been spying on you just in case you got yourself in trouble." He answered honestly.

"Perverted fiend, thou has been leering at me from the shadows have thee not?" The Water Sekirei demanded hotly.

"I resent that Sprinkles, whenever I leer at a woman, I make sure she knows it. Peeping on women from the shadows is just sad." Naruto rebuffed.

Tsukiumi was brought up short by the unexpected reply and fell silent, giving him time to focus on his captives.

First, he set down the four that were not winged to Higa and made a clone for each. "You four, go with my clones and we'll have a little conversation with your Ashikabi."

Bewildered and more than slightly frightened, the four women did so, disappearing out of sight along with their nervous Ashikabi.

Next he set down the three remaning Sekirei. "Alright you three, hold still for a second."

"Why? What are you going to do?!" Sai demanded to know.

"I'm going to unwing you." He answered and did so before they even stopped blinking in surprise.

"Naruto-sama that's horrible! Unwinging a Sekirei is a terrible thing to do!" Musubi protested.

"Don't be silly Musubi-chan, these girls were all winged by force. Go ahead and ask them if they'd like to go back to Higa."

Confused, Musubi proceeded to do so, asking them if that was what they wanted with unusual seriousness.

Katsuragi and Sai exchanged a look and shook their heads, looking rather lost now that they were free. They had no money and no way to support themselves, but they didn't want to go back to Higa.

Sai on the other hand..." Hell no! That bastard had his bloodhounds drag me over to him and winged me by force, I'm gonna kill him!"

"Don't worry about that, I'll be taking care of Higa shortly, but you're welcome to join if you want to." Naruto interjected and continued with something else. "Also, all three of you can come live with me if you want. I'm already looking after many Sekirei that I've unwinged and there's always room for a few more."

"What about Kaiha?" Katsuragi asked hesitantly. The dual wielder had always frightened her.

"Kaiha won't be coming with us, she's too dangerous." Naruto answered, getting looks of understanding from everyone bar Musubi.

"Where will you take her then?" The fist fighter asked cluelessly.

"Don't worry about that Musubi-chan." He told her soothingly and patted her on the head.

"Okay! Hey Naruto-sama, can you spar with me?" She asked excitedly, rapidly putting the fate of the other Sekirei out of her mind.

Naruto felt an absurd trickle of guilt at her blind trust. He knew there was nothing else to do for Kaiha except kill her, but Musubi's naive trust and excitement made him feel like he was lying to a puppy. An adorable, large breasted puppy. And he hadn't even actually lied to her!

"I'm a bit busy right now, but I'll make some time to spar with you soon." He assured.

"Yay!" Musubi cheered, pumping a fist into the air.

"I too would like a spar." Tsukiumi added, standing with her legs at shoulder height and pointing a finger at him in a very tsundere pose. "I will show you that I am the strongest!"

"Are you going to get wet for me again?" Naruto leered.

Tsukiumi blushed and sputtered, the innuendo not lost on her, which made him chuckle in amusement at how easily she was flustered.

"Hey! We've decided to accept your offer, under certain conditions." Sai interrupted.

Abandoning the byplay with Tsukiumi, the horned blond focused back on the three newly freed Sekirei. "Sure sure, lets talk while we walk. I think you'll find the arrangement to be very favorable to you."

"Bye Tsukiumi, bye Musubi-chan." He said back to the two Sekirei, getting an enthusiastic goodbye and wave from Musubi and a 'hmph' from Tsukiumi.

The last thing that the two of them heard was a question from Naruto.

"Have any of you ever wanted a big brother?"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Izumi Higa liked to consider himself a man of control, control of himself, of his company and of the things around him. With his money, cunning and ruthlessness, he had managed to get his way in just about every way imaginable for his whole life.

He did not feel particularly in control at this moment. That was understandable however, as it was hard to feel in control when you were hanging upside down, suspended over the ground only due to the fact that there was a hand holding you by the ankle.

The horned man had moved through the building with the inevitability of the Grim Reaper, cutting down three of his most violent Sekirei, four if you counted Kaiha, his favorites Toyotama and Ichiya included. Though it was a bit of a misnomer calling them favorites since he hated all Sekirei, he just happened to find those two the most useful.

The others he had simply unwinged and then created a copy of himself to speak with them. That had been a nasty shock to see on the cameras. With that kind of ability Uzumaki could be everywhere at once.

"You know Higa, I really don't get you. Hot women that love you pretty much instantly and don't mind sharing and your best plan is to treat them like slaves and use them to get more money? Were you dropped as a baby?" Naruto asked, peering down at the rapidly reddening face of the corporate heir.

"That's all that the freaks are good for anyway." Higa spat angrily, his usual self control eroded.

"Oh so that's how it is." Naruto said as if in realisation. "Well then, I'm sure you won't mind if I use you for the only thing you're good for."

Higa felt a block of ice drop into his stomach at the ominous words, which was quite impressive considering his inverted position.

"Have a nice flight." The horned menace said cheerfully and tossed him out of the window.

Higa's terrified scream was abruptly cut off as he was suddenly deposited into the Interdimensional Storage Locker.

Naruto chuckled to himself. As if the douche would get to die that easily, not when there were still plenty of Sekirei pissed off at him for what he did to them.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Kazehana was no stranger to unpleasant mornings, what with her drinking habit and all, but this morning was a different kind of unpleasant.

She was not hungover, having not drunk enough to get to that point and the multiple powerful orgasms had the side effect of burning off much of the booze that she did drink. Speaking of orgasms, she would have been perfectly content to lay there for at least another hour or two and enjoy the delicious soreness in her nether regions, if not for one thing.

Laying in a bed that was thoroughly soiled with stale oil and sweat was rather disgusting.

And so, she made her way to the bathroom with a put upon sigh, at least she could soak in the super sized bath for a long while.

"Damn, even the bathroom smells like sex." She muttered to herself and started filling the tub with hot water, deciding to quickly shower off the worst of the oil and sweat so that she could enjoy the bath.

Living in the lap of luxury at someone else's expense sure was nice. She was in fact rapidly rethinking her idea to stay with Miya for a while. For all the kindness that Miya had adopted from Takehito, she was still kind of a meanie and wouldn't support the kind of self indulgence that Naruto provided so freely. She really had to figure out what he was planning, because despite her generally flighty behavior, she was cynical enough to know that this wasn't likely to last forever.

Though she'd been cynical about his claims on sexual prowess too and that had turned out much different than expected.

"I wonder if he'll ever sleep with me again?" She murmured to herself, now submerged in the hot water. It had been amazing and she would be more than willing, but she wouldn't be surprised if it had been just a one time thing.

"I'll go visit...later." She decided, her sentence interrupted by a yawn. The damn bathtub was way more comfortable than something made of porcelain had any right to be and the very convenient spot designed to rest one's head and neck weren't helping.

Considering that the tub had a system that allowed one to continuously keep the water heated to a certain temperature, even the water cooling that would have eventually forced her to get up didn't happen, so she fell asleep again.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Hours later.

"I'm telling you guys, Naruto has to be doing something weird with those women." Naoki insisted.

"And you're basing this conclusion on what exactly?" Yuno asked scathingly.

Naoki looked like he really wanted to say something but was holding himself back.

"You know something." Shou accused with certainty.

"I'm not really supposed to talk about it." Naoki defended awkwardly.

"You've already blurted out this much, you might as well tell us the whole thing." Shou reasoned.

"Don't worry, " Yuno hastened to assure him. "we won't tell anyone else."

Looking distinctly uncomfortable under the expectant gazes of his friends, Naoki eventually caved and started talking. "One of the maids was cleaning the bathroom in one of those empty apartments that Naruto is paying for when she suddenly heard people talking in the bedroom."

Yuno and Shou nodded in understanding, knowing that the bedroom and bathroom were connected.

"Well, she was about to apologize and leave when she recognized Naruto's voice saying something about getting naked. She was too afraid and embarrassed to open the door after that and just hid in the bathroom."

Once again, the two listeners nodded, knowing all too well that most of the maids were a mixture of curious, afraid and sometimes aroused around Naruto, the latter mostly because of his exotic appearance.

"Apparently they started going at it soon after that and Mi...the maid heard the woman pleading for him to slow down a bit, but he wouldn't listen. She got worried and opened the door a little bit. She swore that she could see a blue-ish glow around Naruto's fingers and that his tongue extended."

"His tongue extended?" Yuno asked sceptically.

"I know!" Naoki asserted." I didn't believe it either, but she swore up and down that he licked the woman's nipples from like...half a meter away!"

"And the blue glow around his fingers?" Shou asked, wanting to get the conversation away from Naruto's anatomically impossible length tongue.

"No idea, but Mi...the maid said that it looked like it was driving the woman crazy."

"It was Midori wasn't it?" Yuno asked flatly.

"What makes you think that it would be her?" Naoki evaded nervously.

"Because she's the only maid that's enough of a shy pervert to stay in the bathroom and peep instead of revealing herself right away and I know that she's been daydreaming of getting 'ravaged' by Naruto more than once." Yuno explained, making quotation marks in the air when she said ravaged. "The little pervert was probably creaming herself the whole time."

Naoki shifted uncomfortably, distinctly remembering that Midori had indeed looked more than a little hot and bothered when she recounted the whole thing to him earlier, as if the mere memory of it had gotten her aroused.

"And you almost said her name twice now." Yuno added as a finishing touch.

"You really suck at keeping secrets man." Shou chimed in.

"Please don't tell Midori that I told you guys." Naoki pleaded. "I promised her that I wouldn't tell anyone."

The other two agreed easily enough, though not without some teasing.

"So...was this woman that he was sleeping with one of those that are around him all the time now or was she new?" Shou asked curiously.

"Midori said that she was new, but very recognizable. Tall, dark hair and the most massive chest she'd ever seen." Naoki explained.

Yuno rolled her eyes, as the last part of that description had applied to most of the women that Naruto was bringing up there at one point until another woman came along with a chest that was slightly bigger.

"We'll probably see her when we deliver breakfast today in any case." Yuno asserted, bringing the conversation to a close.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"I never really understood the point of these mini bars before, but I think I get it now." Kazehana said in a tone of realisation after chugging a small bottle of whiskey. "It's strangely satisfying to empty these tiny bottles."

"You most definitely do not get it." Xanna told her bluntly without even looking up from her book.

"I'm with Xanna on this one, you're missing the point of the mini bar entirely." Naruto chimed in.

The Wind Sekirei looked back at them, chugging another bottle as she did so.

Meeting Naruto's wife had been a bit of a tense affair, as she had almost instinctively expected the woman to be hostile to her for sleeping with her husband. The expected hostility had not materialised though.

Xanna had been...well it would be a lie to say that she had been pleasant, because she hadn't been and still wasn't, but she hadn't been outright hostile either. The Wind Sekirei didn't often find herself intimidated by another woman's physical beauty, but this had definitely been one such occassion. Kazehana was one of those Sekirei whose preferences leaned much more heavily towards men than was normal for Sekirei, but even she found herself being attracted to the horned woman. It hadn't been hard to see why it was so damnably hard to get Naruto flustered if this woman had been his primary source of female companionship for pretty much his whole life.

The attraction was entirely physical though, as Xanna's attitude was highly off putting to the Wind Sekirei. That constant sense of aloof superiority and arrogance that permeated damn near every word and gesture tended to leave most people feeling quite sour if they had to put up with it for too long.

She even spoke that way to Naruto, which had left Kazehana quite incredulous when she'd seen it the first time. How could he possibly put up with that for an extended length of time, much less love her so much?

It had taken her a few minutes to figure out that Xanna looked more amused than condescending when she spoke to him that way and Naruto clearly saw some sort of humor in it. After that it became obvious that it was a running inside joke between them from which she was excluded.

The only one that seemed to be exempt from that attitude was Akitsu, which was ironic, because the Ice Sekirei was likely among the only people that wouldn't mind it. The Sekirei in question currently had her head in Xanna's lap and seemed quite content to stay there and doze for as long as possible.

Kazehana might have found herself feeling intensely jealous of Akitsu if Xanna had been a more pleasant woman. As things stood, she was happy that the Ice Sekirei whose life had been full of misery seemed to have found some happiness. For someone like her, it was incredibly obvious that Akitsu was just as attached to them as if she had been winged. She wondered if they knew it or not.

"What is the point of a mini bar then?" She finally asked, shaking off her reminiscing.

"It is obviously a transparent ploy to get more money by putting alcohol in miniature bottles and charging exorbitant prices for it. An excellent display of human greed by hotel management and human stupidity by anyone fool enough to actually make use of it." Xanna explained idly.

"Way to take all the fun out of it." Kazehana muttered, feeling oddly insulted, but she perked up and continued quickly enough. "But I suppose it doesn't matter since I'm not the one paying for it."

"Neither are we." Naruto snickered, clearly amused.

"What do you mean?" Kazehana asked curiously. "Last I heard, you were paying for everything."

"Our power is capable of affecting technology, but it requires great delicacy and does us no good in any case as we do not have an in depth knowledge of the banking system that is used to pay for most things here. Instead of bothering to learn it, my devious husband decided to track down a few wealthy criminal organizations and threaten them into paying for everything." Xanna explained, giving an amused smirk towards a grinning Naruto. "They are probably frothing at the mouth at the expenses we are accumulating:"

"Wait, so you basically bullied them out of their lunch money?" Kazehana asked incredulously.

"Basically." Naruto admitted.

"I thought you were just using your godlike powers to conjure money out of thin air or something." She said with a shake of her head.

"I tried." He admitted again. "We both did, but at the moment we still haven't quite figured out how to manipulate computer data without frying the computer."

"That's...kind of reassuring." Kazehana admitted, having been somewhat intimidated by the idea that they really could do anything.

"Don't get too comfortable, we'll figure it out eventually." Naruto advised.

"Indeed, the nature of our powers merely makes it simpler to manipulate things with few parts, such as solid matter, space-time and other such things as opposed to technology, which has many components working together to create virtual information." Xanna added.

"But what about actual paper money? I've seen you pulling it out of nowhere." Kazehana continued with her questioning.

"Yeah, we can make the bills easily enough, but the damn things have so many small traps to detect counterfeiting that we couldn't be bothered, so anytime we need paper money, we just summon it right out of a bank vault." Naruto admitted wryly.

Before Kazehana could comment on their methods, the conversation was interrupted by the repeated 'schink' sound of a sword being half drawn and slammed back into its sheath, accompanied by a frustrated growl from the pacing Karasuba.

"Why are we just sitting around here, having this stupid conversation? You said that we'd get to kill those damn MBi adjustors already, and that asshole Higa."

"And we will Little Crow, we're just waiting for Uzume to show up. I did promise her that I'd call her once Higa's turn came up." Naruto assured calmly, not at all intimidated by her antics. Everyone else bar Kazehana, Akitsu and Xanna were intimidated by her almost rabid prowling though and had evacuated to another room.

"She better show up soon." The Black Sekirei muttered.

The words proved prophetic, as Uzume walked through the door no more than a couple of minutes later and then blinked owlishly at the Wind Sekirei. She wasn't surprised by Karasuba since Naruto had warned her that the Black Sekirei would be present and she trusted him when he said that it was safe, but Kazehana was unexpected.

"Kazehana? What are you doing here?" She asked quizzically.

"Drinking." Kazehana answered cheerfully, raising another tiny booze bottle in salute.

Uzume stared oddly at her fellow Sekirei for a few seconds, clearly puzzling something out and then a grin bloomed on her face as she turned to Naruto. "You boinked her didn't you big bro?"

"Mounted her like a mule." Naruto agreed.

"Did the no pants dance." Uzume countered.

"Fed the kitty."

"Swept the chimney."

"Checked the oil."

"Tested the suspension."

"Filled the cream donut."

"Made the beast with two backs."

"Stuffed the beaver."

"Did the horizontal hula."

"Attacked the pink fortress."

"Lusted and thrusted."

"Gave her a hot beef injection."

Uzume opened her mouth to continue but couldn't come up with anymore euphemisms. "Okay, you win."

"That's what she said."

Uzume snickered at the final joke, as well as Kazehana's red face. You didn't get to see the playful Wind Sekirei embarrassed often and that made it all the more funny.

"Meanies." Kazehana pouted.

Karasuba rolled her eyes and decided to butt in or else Naruto might stay there cracking bad sex jokes for the next few hours. "Lets go already."

"It's just going to be us, Beni, Haihane and Sai, since the others don't really want to see people die horribly and Akitsu seems to have fallen asleep on us." He said.

"I won't be joining you either, these days I prefer to avoid bloodshed if I can avoid it." Kazehana said, emptying another bottle.

"Suit yourself." Naruto shrugged. "Feel free to stick around if you want and empty the rest of the mini bar."

Their plans were disrupted by a knock on the door and a cheerful call of 'room service'.

"Come in!" Naruto called rather loudly, unintentionally waking up Akitsu.

While the three bellhops rolled in breakfast, the Ice Sekirei rubbed at her eyes and groaned quietly. "Ah...sleepy."

"Sorry Akitsu, I didn't mean to wake you." Naruto apologized. He knew that Akitsu didn't get enough sleep at night, so it was no wonder that she was so tired now.

She mumbled something to the effect of it being okay and was well on her way back to unconsciousness by the time the next person spoke.

"Damn bro, what have you been doing to her?" Uzume asked, actually rather impressed.

"Well, I was teasing her a bit and asking how many orgasms in a row she can take, and she said that she can take as many as we were willing to give her."

"And how many was that?" Kazehana asked, morbidly curious. She had been too tired to keep going after two...though each of those two might have actually been multiple simultaneous ones considering their strength.

"I think it was twenty six." Naruto admitted.

"Twety seven." Xanna corrected.

"Twenty seven?!" Came the incredulous exclamation from Uzume, Kazehana and even the bellhops who still hadn't left. Karasuba simply huffed impatiently at the fact that they still hadn't gotten to watching people die. She didn't really believe that it would be all that much fun, but Naruto had promised her a fight after it was over, which was what she was really after.

"How the hell did you manage that many?" Uzume squawked, having vague and very dirty ideas about talking Chiho into a threesome or even a foursome.

Instead of answering, Naruto simply extended his tongue and waggled it at her in a wavy manner before snapping it back into his mouth with a cartoonishly audible 'snap'. "My favorite technique, it's amazing what you can do to a woman with a prehensile, extra long tongue. Especially if there are two tongues at work."

The sentence was finished with a leer at Xanna, who gave a slight grin and shot her own tongue out to give Uzume's face a quick lick from a distance, knowing exactly what was going through her head. There wasn't even any mind reading required, as both she and Naruto could quite easily smell her arousal.

"She was most insistent that she could keep going even when she was barely clinging to consciousness." Xanna added while petting Akitsu's head in her lap.

Uzume bit her lip and pressed her thighs together in a vain effort to calm down the fire between her legs even as she wiped her cheek. She loved Chiho completely, but damn did she want to experience that. She promised herself that she was going to be having that conversation with her sweetheart as soon as possible. It would probably involve a lot of wheedling and cajoling, but Chiho shouldn't be too dead set against it. Naruto had saved her life and gave them the opportunity to be together after all. Even if Chiho was firmly on the all girls team, she probably wouldn't object too much,right? Right.

At least, that's what she hoped.

"Why do you keep seducing the women that I was intending to take as little sisters? I'm starting to think that you've got a thing for incestuous relationships my dear." Naruto teased his wife, seeing Uzume's extremely obvious arousal.

"You have no ground to stand on with that statement husband." She rebuffed with a smirk. "Was it not you who groped your own mother's ass the first time you saw her?"

The statement snapped Uzume back to her senses and she looked at the horned blond very oddly, along with everyone else.

"I am surprised at you Naruto-kun." Kazehana finally said, very much unsure of what to think.

"Bro..." Uzume simply trailed off, at a loss to find the words for a proper resonse.

"No way..." The bellhops chorused. "How did you even..."

Even Karasuba was interested in seeing how this would play out, which said a lot considering that she usually didn't give a damn about anything other than a good fight.

"Well, she was a zombie at the time..." He trailed off, realising that that wouldn't help.

"And that somehow makes it better?" Xanna asked archly, eyebrow raised.

"You set me up." Naruto accused. "You've just been waiting for me to say something about incest so that you could use that."

"Who says that I am finished?" She retorted with a predatory smirk.

Naruto wracked his mind for any other incident in the past that could be construed as incest which she could use as ammunition right now, but came up blank. He had teased Sakura about sleeping with her, but that was the furthest it had ever gotten and therefore didn't count, not to mention that they weren't even related.

"You're bluffing." He asserted after a few seconds of silence.

"Am I?" She countered, smirk widening.

Naruto narrowed his eyes at her in an attempt to figure out what she was playing at, but could discover nothing. Her face showed only the certainty of a predator going in for the kill and her mind was an impenetrable wall.

"Yes." He said firmly, calling her bluff.

The heads of the spectators was at this point jumping from one to the other as if they were watching a tennis match, eagerly waiting to see how it would unfold.

"Well then, I am sure that it will not surprise you to know that you called me mother long before you called me wife."

Naruto's jaw dropped and he stared at her for a long few seconds, trying to process this and remember when that might have happened.

Without warning several of her memories slammed into his head, memories of playing with her tails as a child and knowing with absolute certainty that she was his mother.

"You were quite persistent about calling me that, even when I told you not to." She said, with the accompanying memories reinforcing the words.

Xanna hadn't originally intended to ever tell him about that time, but had since changed her mind. It was a long time ago after all, and it wasn't as if it would change anything.

After the initial shock had passed, a small grin formed on his face. They were happy memories and he was glad to have them. Additionally, he had to admit that Xanna had gotten him good this time, but he wasn't going to ler her victory be absolute. He would definitely not be placed into speechlessness over something like that.

The spectators watched Naruto tensely as he lowered his head, not knowing how he would react to such an earth shaking revelation.

They all face planted when he surged to his feet, planted one foot on the coffee table and made the sign of the horns with one hand raised in the air, along with a victorious exclamation. "YES! I'm an even bigger pervert than I thought!"

Xanna had expected something loud and prevented Akitsu from hearing it, but the other Sekirei in the penthouse heard it loud and clear.

"Onii-chan, what's a pervert?" Kusano asked inquisitively, drawn by the loud noise.

"I'm a pervert Kuu-chan." He answered instantly. "The biggest pervert you'll ever see."

"Can I be a pervert too?" The little girl asked excitedly, having no idea what a pervert actually was, only knowing that it had to be fun if her Onii-chan was this animated about it.

"Of course you can sweetie, but you'll have to wait a while."

"Muuu, but I want to be a pervert now!" The little girl said insistently, much to the instinctive horror of every adult that was at least vaguely normal.

"Sorry Kuu-chan, but this is one of those adult things. Same as why you can't just rush into mine and Xanna's room without knocking and stuff like that, okay?."

"'Kay." Kusano said sulkily, feeling left out of the fun, but she had promised to listen when he said that something was only for adults.

"Don't be sad cutie, how about we watch a cartoon together while we have breakfast?" He offered.

"Okay!"

"I thought we were going to go see a bunch of people die fighting against monsters?" Karasuba growled angrily. There was only so much of this cutesy crap that she could tolerate in a day and she was most definitely not in the mood to wait much longer, even if the little incest bomb had been funny.

"Keep your panties on Little Crow, it's not like I can't do both at the same time." Naruto chided and made a few clones to handle things, such as putting Akitsu to bed and cuddling her, watching cartoons with Kusano and anything else that the others might need. "Or you know...don't, you can give them to me if you want to."

The Black Sekirei simply rolled her eyes, more than used to his off handed perversions by now.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

No more than a few minutes later, the three bellhops found themselves standing in the hallway in a state of immense confusion. They had pretty much been background decoration during that 'conversation', but they had heard a lot of weird stuff.

There was only one particular thought going through their minds at that moment.

What the fuck?

"His tongue extended." Yuno stated flatly, deliberately focusing on what had not long ago seemed so incredibly weird and yet now ended up being positively mundane in comparison to the rest.

"Yeah..." Her compatriots said absently, clearly not sure what to think.

"I...have no idea what the hell is going on." Shou finally admitted.

"And he can clone himself at will, without the use of any kind of machinery." Yuno continued in the same flat tone.

"Better not tell that to Midori." Naoki muttered. "Or that he and his wife gave that Akitsu woman twenty seven orgasms in a row."

Shou snickered at that, slowly getting over his shock and taking a philosophical approach. "Ah well, it's not like we didn't know that they weren't normal."

The other two nodded slowly, also overcoming their shock.

"But seriously...groping his zombified mother? There are so many things wrong with that that I don't even know where to start." Yuno said.

"You're not the only one." Naoki muttered, mostly to himself.

"And didn't that scary woman with the sword also say something about watching people die fighting monsters?" Yuno asked with a frown.

"Yeah, but it's weird." Shou commented. "He's so nice to that kid and then he pulls something like that."

"You think we should call the cops?" Naoki asked, clearly dubious about that course of action.

"I get the feeling that it won't do any good." Shou said with Yuno nodding along.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Those three are so cute." Naruto chuckled. "Always trying to figure out what's going on."

"They disappoint me." Xanna said with a frown. "I thought they would do something."

"They're just ordinary people, so you can hardly blame them." He responded with a shrug.

"I suppose." She agreed with a sigh. "Well, time to get on with the fun then."

A large number of people made noises of 'oof', some screaming and similar vocalization as they fell on the stone floor. Following those noises was confused conversation as people tried to ascertain what the hell had just happened.

A clapping sound drew their attention and shut them up. They looked up and saw that the clapping originated from a balcony on which a horned man that all of them were at least aware of if they hadn't already encountered him was sitting. Also sitting with him were a similarly horned woman and several Sekirei, the entirety of the now disbanded Disciplinary Squad most notably.

"Ladies and gentlemen, you are here because you have been selected to participate in this exciting once in a lifetime adventure."

"But I didn't apply to anything." A nondescript looking man protested.

"I don't recall saying anything about anyone applying." Naruto said pointedly. "But to elaborate so that the uncertainty doesn't torment you too badly, you're here mostly because I really don't like you."

He gestured towards the Sekirei sitting in a line to his left. "All of you have, in one way or another, contributed to making the lives of these and other girls miserable. Some of you because you eagerly exploited Minaka's lunacy or in the case of Akitsu, his approval, to perform painful, demeaning and dangerous experiments on them."

As he continued speaking, his gaze shifted away from the suddenly nervous group of scientists towards Higa and Kakizaki. "Some of you because you heartlessly exploited their need for help in order to force them to do your bidding or winged them forcibly."

The two men in question showed no reaction beyond a cool look that showed no remorse. The effect was somewhat ruined as they had both appeared screaming like little girls, but they were trying really hard to seem unruffled.

"Or in the case of your two female companions, because they were insecure, jealous bitches that couldn't resist the temptation of getting some revenge on them for daring to be more beautiful than they were, as well as the other reasons." The last was said with a gesture towards the two women, who, while not hideously ugly, were definitely not anywhere close to equaling the bodies and faces of pretty much any Sekirei, even the ones who were quite flat.

"But we didn't even work on any of those Sekirei." One of the women protested as she looked over the gathered Sekirei.

"That's besides the point." Naruto dismissed.

"And what exactly, do you intend to do with us?" Higa asked codly.

"You will be run through a gauntlet of life threatening challenges and released should you manage to survive." Xanna answered in Naruto's place, smirking. Not that the chances of actually surviving were anywhere close to realistic.

"Now I know what you're thinking;" Naruto picked up before anyone could get a word in. " 'They can't do this!', 'But they're just Sekirei!', 'That's barbaric!', 'The punishment is too harsh for the crime!', 'How is it possible for any man to be that sexy?', 'Who is that babe with the horns?'."

Everyone looked rather unsure of themselves, as that had indeed been many of their thoughts, except the last two, which Naruto had made up himself. But it did get him an amused smile from Xanna, which had been the whole point.

"To answer in order; yes we can, well fuck you too, yes it is barbaric but it's also fun, do we look like we care?, fuck you that's how and finally, she's my wife and she's better than you." He listed out, getting another smile from Xanna as she placed her hand in his.

She picked up the narrative as another man dropped into the room with an 'oof' sound of his own. "This fool will be your guide as he has already gone through it once and survived. He finds himself here once again because I found his previous insolence particularly offensive."

"I'm back here again?" Minaka said, his tone somewhere between horror and elation. Horror because the last time had been far from pleasant and elation because he might yet get Amaterasu-chan back. He certainly hadn't been having any luck rebuilding her in his lab.

"Be grateful that you are being allowed weapons right from the start this time." She added in a tone that stated that they should indeed be grateful. Weapon racks containing a variety of melee implements appeared on the walls as she finished speaking.

"We will not play your games and I will most certainly not listen to him." Higa hissed, staring at the recently appeared Minaka, who was already grabbing weapons.

"If you wish to experience a messy death right away, then feel free to stand still and die." She replied dismissively, punctuated by the clang of steel on steel.

Everyone spun around towards the source of the noise and were left staring wide eyed as they saw a walking skeleton banging on the bars of a heavy portcullis with a steel mace.

Several moments of stunned silence passed before one of the male scientists started speaking in a flat tone that indicated he was trying to deny reality. "That's impossible. A skeleton only acts as support for the body, it can't move without muscle."

"Normally you'd be right." Naruto agreed. "But this is our world and in this world, if we decide that the Sun is going to be triangular, then the Sun is going to be motherfucking triangular."

There were a few seconds of silence and then a sudden storm of protests as it finally penetrated their minds that they were being held captive by a madman.

"Enough!" Xanna's voice cut through the noise like a blade and silenced them. "You have committed actions that have earned you the anger of my husband, there will be no appeal. Your only hope of survival is beating the odds. The portcullis will open in fifteen minutes, I suggest you spend them wisely."

After a moment of stunned silence, they all scrambled towards the weapon racks, grabbing everything that looked fairly easy to use and wasn't too heavy. Somehow they knew just from the horned woman's tone of voice that arguing would be worse than pointless. Even Higa and Kakizaki were grudgingly forced to grab weapons as survival instinct forced their pride to bend.

There were also shields on the racks, which nearly everyone took. Of course, the process of arming themselves was anything but smooth and much of their fifteen minutes was wasted by squabbling.

"We can't all take spears!" Minaka was protesting. "Everyone knows that skeletons are almost immune to piercing damage!"

"This isn't a video game Minaka-sama, if we stab them in the head or pelvis it should be just as good as smashing it with a mace and it will be much safer." One of the adjustors protested.

"And you have so much skill with a spear that you think you can hit it just right?" Another one scoffed, trading his spear for a flanged mace and giving it a few test swings. He grimaced when he realised that it was much heavier than it looked and was certain to throw him off balance quite badly if he missed.

"Well no, but I've got even less skill with a mace and I get the feeling that a few walking skeletons will be the least of our worries in here." The first man admitted.

"Take a halberd, it has plenty of reach, needs minimal skill and does good impact damage as well being able to cut." Minaka advised.

"Keep your advice to yourself Minaka." Higa hissed. "I suspect we are all in this mess because of you in the first place."

Minaka shook his head and replied. "It matters little now Higa-kun, we will need to work together if we are to survive."

"I will never work together with you!" The corporate heir hissed again, his hatred of Minaka plain for all to see.

"Suit yourself Higa-kun, but be warned that things will get more dangerous with time."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Meanwhile on the observation balcony.

"Already practicing for your coming position as Empress?" Naruto asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Well it has been a while and since I doubt that you will act with the regality required of the position of Emperor, I will have to compensate."

"Hey, I can totally be regal." Naruto protested.

Xanna sighed and gave him a look. "Emperors do not say 'totally'."

"She's totally got you there bro." Uzume snickered.

"Oh har de har har." Naruto laughed sarcastically. "What kind of Emperor am I supposed to be if I can't even talk however I damn well please?"

"Rulers must project a certain image if they wish to lead effectively. An Emperor that is a joke to his people cannot lead." Xanna lectured.

She failed to mention that she suspected that the overly charismatic idiot she had married would somehow manage to project authority even when acting like a fool.

"Okay I get it, but can we please not ruin the fun with lessons on proper dictatorship?" He huffed. "I'm already dreading the next several centuries enough that I don't want to start them any earlier than necessary."

Xanna gave his hand a squeeze. " I think you will find that it isn't as bad as you think. It will be slow at first yes, but the years will pass quickly as our work continues."

"Easy for you to say." He muttered. "You're actually looking forward to it."

Xanna looked over him with an eyebrow arched. "Now you are just fishing for sympathy."

"Maybe." He admitted.

Xanna merged their separate thrones into a single large one and pulled his head into her breasts. "There there beloved, it will be alright." Her tone was very, very patronizing.

A grin pulled at Naruto's lips as he buried his nose into the most spectacular pair of breasts in existence. In short order, Xanna was sitting in his lap and he was feeling much better about the idea of being Emperor. As long as they were together, how bad could it possibly be anyway?

"You really think it's not going to be boring?" He asked and nibbled on her ear.

"Not at all, building an Empire from the ground up is a lot of work and it will only get harder once we begin conquering the rest of the galaxy." She answered with a murmur and leaned her head to the side to expose her neck to him.

"When did we decide that we're going to conquer the rest of the galaxy?" He asked distractedly as he eagerly scraped his teeth over the sweet spot on her neck.

Xanna let out a rumbling purr and ground her backside over the erection that was already pressing up against it. "I decided on it a short while ago."

"Might as well, I guess." Naruto agreed in a tone that really should not be used when deciding on things such as planning your day, much less conquering a galaxy. Then again, his nose was currently flooded with the scent of her arousal and he was not inclined to care about too much else.

"Oi, can you two horndogs please not go at it right here? The show's about to start." Haihane interrupted.

"Seconded!" Benitsubasa piped up.

"I suppose they have a point, there will be time for that later and I actually do want to see this." Xanna said, though not without some reluctance.

With much greater reluctance, Naruto navigated his hands away from where they had wandered beneath her clothing and situated them around her waist. He wasn't letting her get off his lap though.

"This still seems pretty stupid to me." Sai huffed, upset that she couldn't punch Higa's lights out herself. "We should've just killed them."

Karasuba agreed, but stayed silent. At the very least it was an interesting idea and she had to admit that there was a dark amusement in seeing them wander around like rats in a maze.

"That would be quite dull." Xanna pointed out.

"But you even gave them a chance to get away, what if they survive? Are you going to just let them go?" She argued.

"Yes." Xanna admitted without concern.

"But if they make it, they'll be getting away without paying for what they did!" Sai insisted.

"Well sweetie, anything is possible, " Naruto answered her with a grin. "but it is not very likely."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The group of scientists had by now managed to get a hold on themselves for the most part. The first few encounters with various undead enemies had badly rattled their composture and one of the two women had died from a trap that shot an arrow out of the wall, which had certainly not helped to calm them down.

But eventually, the need to survive had allowed them to push down their fear and continue. Aside from Minaka, only the other woman had any experience with weapons and that was with a bow, but they eventually managed to organise themselves so that the occasional enemy encounter was dealt with with a minimum of difficulty.

Minaka's prior experience did not end up being useful in the sense of giving direction, as the dungeon was clearly different. Whereas it had been a claustrophobic labyrinth before, now it was more along the lines of a castle and the path frequently took them outside as well as into its bowels.

"What did the exit look like when you were here last Minaka-sama?" The surviving woman asked in a hushed whisper.

"It was on top of a great cliff, but I had the good fortune of being randomly teleported on top of it." Minaka answered, keeping an eye out for a Die of Power. They had managed so far, but he had no doubt that Amaterasu-chan would be needed if they wanted to escape.

"And how exactly did you get teleported onto a cliff?" Higa hissed.

Predictably, his temper had been fraying constantly because Minaka had automatically assumed a leadership position. That it might have been because most of the people present were his employees did not really register to him.

Kakizaki was only barely managing to convince his boss that wandering off on their own could prove quite fatal.

"I rolled a ten." Minaka answered absently, walking carefully around a corner with his spear extended in front of him in case there were beasties lurking in ambush.

"What the hell does that mean?" Higa demanded, but Minaka did not hear him.

The reason for this was because he saw what he had been looking for. Sitting innocently on an ornate dais in a dead end was a twenty sided die.

Overcome with the compulsion to roll it and hope for eighteen, Minaka ignored all further questions, grabbed the Die of Power and tossed it without hesitation.

6

Ogre!

An angry bellow resounded, followed by the pounding footsteps of some heavy beast.

"What did you do?!" The surviving woman shrieked.

"I rolled poorly." Minaka answered and started snapping out orders. "Retreat back to the courtyard we passed earlier, we will need room to fight it."

Not even Higa protested, though he seethed quietly.

They made it just in time to see the lumbering creature crash into the courtyard from the other side and roar at them in challenge.

It was an ugly thing with greyish skin and a somewhat distended stomach that made it look fat. That initial impression was belied by its powerfully muscled limbs. Saliva poured from its sharp but blocky teeth in thick rivulets and there was nothing in its eyes except for bestial rage. It was rather intimidating to look at because it was at least twice as big as the biggest of them in all directions.

"Spread out and try to keep it in the middle, don't let yourselves be cornered and don't try to block its attacks with your shields." Minaka advised.

The scientists tried to obey, but several ended up getting in each other's way. The Ogre wasn't in a very patient mood and randomly charged at two of them who were trying to figure out how to position themselves.

Its roar warned them of its intent, but it was too late. The younger of the two scientists threw himself away desperately while the older froze in fear and ended up pulverized .

"Attack it now!" Minaka cried out and stabbed his spear towards the beast. He only managed one thrust before at its thigh before feeling that it was time to back off again.

Unfortunately, the panicking scientists were too frightened to notice this and did as he had commanded, but only after the opportunity was already lost, stabbing their own polearms at it. The creatures thick hide acted almost like armor and prevented their clumsy attack from doing any real damage, as well as giving the Ogre plenty of time to bring one of its arms around in a backhand that sent another man flying across the courtyard with a broken neck.

"Shoot it!" Higa yelled at the woman with the bow, trying to hide somewhere so that the Ogre wouldn't charge him next.

"I'm trying!" She snapped back, having extreme difficulty firing the bow with her shaking hands. The High School archery club had been a long time ago and there had been no monsters trying to kill her at the time.

Higa's plan to have the woman draw attention to herself by firing at it backfired when it was instead drawn to his shout and charged at him with another roar.

With a frightened yelp, the corporate heir sprinted towards another of the male scientists, brushing past him with enough speed that the older man was knocked down. He looked up from the ground just in time to let out a scream as he saw the Ogre stomping towards him before he was trampled.

Higa breathed a sigh of relief when he managed to dodge and the Ogre crashed into another wall.

This time around, Minaka was not alone in attacking the creature's back. While the MBI president stabbed his spear at the back of its knee, the largest and by default the strongest man there swung the axe he'd taken at the other knee.

While Minaka's spear thrust did little against its thick skin, the axe blow was a lot more effective. Even though the man had been aiming at the back of its knee the same as Minaka, he missed and accidentally struck lower, hamstringing it.

They both quickly retreated before it could retaliate and claim another victim.

The now much slower Ogre turned out to be much less of a threat as well since it could no longer charge effectively. It still tried of course, but it was slow, predictable and easily dodged.

They finished it off by baiting it into another charge while two men swung their halberds at its exposed belly, causing a pile of steaming, stinking intestines to spill out.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Okay, I'll admit that that was kind of fun to watch." Sai commented.

"What a bunch of bumbling morons, three of them dying because of that stupid thing." Karasuba snorted.

"Yeah, it was pretty one dimensional with its attacks." Haihane agreed.

"We figured that they'd all die if we made it any smarter than that." Naruto admitted.

"We appear to have been correct in that assessment." Xanna added.

They lapsed into silence as they watched the shaken group get their wits about them after their victory and step away from the stinking carcass.

"What are they doing now?" Benitsubasa asked bemusedly, not really expecting an answer since it was pretty obvious.

"What humans seem to do best, attempting to place blame." Xanna answered anyway.

Nothing further was said as they observed the argument. It was basically everyone blaming everyone else for getting their three compatriots killed.

Higa was blaming Minaka for rolling the Die of Power, with Kakizaki backing him up.

The others were blaming Higa for getting the third man killed.

Several people were also blaming Minaka for ordering them to attack and getting the second man killed, but this was tempered by the fact that he'd given actual good advice during the fight and had contributed to finishing it.

There was also some minor blame going around for everyone else for their poor performance during the battle. Some of the men felt guilty for being useless and the woman outright burst into hysterics from the stress, though she did manage to get herself together fairly quickly.

"Looks like they might be at it for a while." Haihane commented with a sigh, slumping in her chair boredly.

"Lets help them get a move on then." Naruto said and waved his hand towards the Sekirei, causing a holographic screen to pop up in front of them.

"What's this?" Uzume asked curiously, inspecting the array of icons on the screen.

"Think of it as a limited ability to affect this world." He explained. "Push one of those buttons to draw on my power and make a change."

The Sekirei looked at each other with grins and inspected the buttons eagerly, trying to decide what to do.

Skeletons spawned due to group inactivity!

Everyone looked towards Haihane at the announcement, who had apparently already decided to push a button.

"What?" She asked defensively. "I wanted to get them moving."

Deadline activated!

In fifteen tolls of the bell, the Minotaur will come to slay you.

The second announcement had everyone looking towards Uzume, who raised her hands away from her screen and gave a weak defense. "I thought it looked interesting."

"Oh it is, but the Minotaur will be both stronger and faster than the Ogre, as well as armed with a massive two handed battle axe. They will stand no chance against it with their current weapons." Xanna explained.

"I wonder if any of them will clue on to the fact that they can block the summoning if they prevent the bell from ringing." Naruto snickered.

"Hey, I can't push any of the buttons." Sai complained, echoed by Benitsubasa.

"Well, we can't have you swamping them with too many enemies right away." Naruto explained with a grin.

The two girls huffed in disappointment and decided to keep careful watch to make sure that they got to pick next.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"We have to find the bell and stop it from ringing." Minaka stated with authority.

"That's stupid! Why would stopping the bell stop the Minotaur from coming after us." Higa scoffed disdainfully.

"Simple logic." Minaka insisted.

"I am not climbing all the way up to that bell tower on some wild goose chase that will end with us trapped when that thing shows up! Stopping the bell doesn't even make sense, it just lets us tell how much time we have."

"It is possible that he is correct Higa-sama." Kakizaki inserted. "This entire place doesn't make any sense to begin with."

"Shut up Kakizaki." Higa snapped, angry that even his secretary was agreeing with Minaka and his composture badly frayed due to stress.

Kakizaki looked back at his boss for a moment before backing down, unwilling to argue the point any further. Minaka might be right, but he could also be wrong and both were irrelevant. He and Higa would be better served if they stuck with the group and the group was more likely to follow Minaka than them.

In any case, they were still together for now and had been able to fight their way out of the attack by the skeletons without incurring any further casualties.

It did not take long for more argument to erupt from the group as they came upon another Die of Power, which Minaka once again hastened to grab and roll.

9

Zombies!

The attack by the slow, lumbering and not particularly threatening undead was intersped with much cursing and yelling.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"You didn't really put Minaka in there as a guide did you?" Uzume asked suspiciously. "You put him in there because you knew he'd keep rolling that Die at every opportunity until he got what he wanted."

"Maybe." Naruto said noncommittaly, though his grin betrayed him.

"We also put him in there because we knew it would cause tension between him and Higa." Xanna elaborated.

"Looks like they're going to split up." Benitsubasa commented.

"People that go off alone always get slaughtered first in every game or movie." Haihane snickered.

"Clearly, Higa doesn't watch a lot of movies or play enough games." Naruto said in agreement.

Giant spider spawn, beware of ambush!

All eyes turned towards a smug looking Karasuba, who had been paying attention to when another monster spawn would become available instead of talking.

"No fair, I thought you didn't even care about this." Benitsubasa pouted, upset that she didn't get to do it.

"I don't, but that one looked fun."

Sai and Benitsubasa huffed at being beaten to it, but turned their attention back to what was happening.

Higa and Kakizaki had indeed gone off on their own, not wanting to deal with Minaka's compulsive rolling anymore, especially as the MBI founder refused to explain why it was so imperative that he continue rolling.

Much to their dismay however, none of the others wanted to go with them despite that. They were still quite sour and distrustful of him for the way that he had gotten one of them killed, along with his obvious hostility towards all things MBI.

Higa and Kakizaki's independece ended up being quite short lived, as they blundered into the previously spawned spider ambush no more than fifteen minutes later. Their deaths were particularly grisly as the oversized arachnids surrounded them and tore them apart, the two men unable to effectively defend themselves due to lack of manpower and proper weaponry.

Despite hating them the most out of all those present, Uzume and Sai blanched and paled at the sight, being unused to that kind of ugly death.

The other three Sekirei had no such problems, having been inured to it before their final inclusion into the Disciplinary squad, or in the case of Karasuba, having long since lost any sense of squeamishness.

"You girls alright?" Naruto asked with some concern, wondering if he'd made a mistake bringing them in on this.

"Uh...yeah, sure." Sai answered faintly, swallowing down her discomfort.

"You want to get out of here?" He offered.

Uzume and Sai exchanged glances before nodding. At first it had seemed like poetic justice to have Higa, Kakizaki and those scientists blundering around in some sick survival game just like they'd been forced to do, but now it just seemed cruel.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Sorry Naruto, I didn't think it would bother us that much." Uzume spoke for both herself and Sai.

"No big deal, I hear it's actually pretty normal to be bothered by something like that." He brushed off with a grin. "You wanna go watch cartoons with me and Kuu-chan?"

"Maybe for a while, then I really should be getting back to Chiho." Uzume agreed and then frowned. "But aren't you going back to finish watching their dungeon run?"

"But I never stopped watching it." Naruto answered in amusement.

Sai and Uzume frowned in confusion for a moment before figuring it out. "Right, clones."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Meanwhile...

"You have to let me roll it!" Minaka insisted fervently, trying get to the Die of Power they had just found. Unfortunately for him, the other scientists were pointing their weapons at him suspiciously, not wanting another repeat of the Ogre incident.

"Why?!" One of them demanded impatiently. Minaka might be the most capable of keeping a cool head and he had led well so far, but his scattered and pointlessly enigmatic behavior did not exactly inspire trust. "We only have six tolls of the bell left before the Minotaur shows up and we don't have time to deal with any extra monsters. The ones we run into on the way are bad enough as it is."

Minaka huffed and decided that he would need to explain himself for a change. "The Die has helpful effects if a roll higher than ten is made, we've simply been unlucky with the rolls thus far. I don't believe that we can fight the Minotaur with our current weapons, so it is imperative that we get something better before it shows up."

He neglected to mention that his real reason for wanting to roll so desperately was his desire to get Amaterasu-chan back.

The others exchanged looks and decided that in light of this new information, rolling the Die of Power was an acceptable risk. Especially considering the fact that they'd heard the obviously painful deaths of Higa and Kakizaki at the many legs of the giant spiders. They had all very pointedly gone the other way after hearing that.

13

Guns!

Everyone except Minaka cheered at the appearance of all sorts of firearms, while the MBI president simply looked disappointed that he hadn't rolled eighteen.

"What should we take?" One of them asked quizzically, not really knowing anything about modern weaponry except for what he'd seen in the movies.

"Shotguns and high calibre pistols, automatic weapons will go through their ammunition too quickly." Minaka answered, his tone ever so slightly sad. "Someone should still take an assault rifle though, just in case."

The others didn't really notice his tone in their haste to equip themselves with guns and figure out how exactly they worked.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"That lunatic has luck almost as good as yours husband." Xanna sighed.

"I know, it's uncanny." Naruto agreed.

"What'd you mean?" Haihane asked curiously.

"Now that they are armed with guns, they have a good chance to defeat the Minotaur without casualties, if they position themselves wisely." Xanna explained.

"Which they look like they're going to do, since Minaka is being pretty smart about it. They even took a good selection of weapons." Naruto added.

"What's so good about what they took?" Benitsubasa asked in confusion. All guns seemed similarly useless to her.

"The shotguns aren't going to be too much use agains the Minotaur, since they'd need to be almost in range of its axe for them to do any damage, the others will be more useful though. Both the pistols and the assault rifle have enough range and stopping power to do some serious damage to it." Naruto explained.

"You seem to know a lot about guns." Haihane commented idly.

"What can I say? Even I'm not immune to the allure of a weapon that makes loud banging noises." Naruto shrugged. "Even if they are kind of underwhelming in comparison to all the other stuff I can do."

"It is times like this that I am reminded that despite everything, you are still young and childish." Xanna jibed.

"You know you like it." Naruto countered and nibbled on her neck again.

"I never said I didn't." She retorted and deliberately rubbed her posterior against his crotch.

Haihane rolled her eyes as the two of them were clearly going towards sex again. Seeking a way to interrupt it, her eyes gleamed when she saw that the monster spawn option was available again.

Zombie wolf pack spawn!

Naruto and Xanna looked over when they heard the announcement and looked on with interest to see what would happen, their thoughts derailed away from sex for the moment.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The reason that the horny pair of gods had gotten distracted by their libidos was due to the goings on in the dungeon. Namely, they had forted down on a corner of the castle wall that could only be accessed from two sides and both sides had a long staircase leading up to it. Their intention was to wait for the Minotaur to come(which would happen at the next bell toll), shoot everything they had at it and hope for the best.

"I still think it would have been wiser to make for the bell tower before our time runs out." Minaka said somewhat sulkily, having been outvoted on a course of action.

"I know Minaka-sama, but our time is almost out and there was no guarantee that it would even work to stop the Minotaur from being spawned. You said yourself that this was the most defensible position we've been able to find so far, so we might as well wait for it to arrive and get rid of it." One of the others argued.

Minaka had to concede that all of that was true, but it didn't change the fact that he still thought it was a bad idea. Thus far, every time that they had stopped in an area for an extended length of time, trouble had soon followed.

Zombie wolf pack spawn!

Before so much as a curse word could spew from anyone there, the bell rung for the fifteenth time, followed immediately by a loud roar in the distance.

"I knew this was a bad idea." Minaka said in resignation.

Left with nothing else to do except fight, the group readied their guns and prepared for the attack.

"They're coming from this side!" The only woman in the group called frantically, hoping to get some backup. There were only eight of them left and she'd feel much better if there were eight guns being pointed at the approaching pack of zombie wolves instead of four.

"They're over here too!" Another man yelled from the other side.

For a short time there was nothing to be heard except the sound of shotguns firing as they struggled to keep the undead wolf pack away from them. To their credit, their choice of location for making a stand was actually quite good. The narrow walkways made it very hard to miss with the shotguns and the wolves were far from sturdy. Added to that, the staircases gave them the high ground advantage.

Of course, their luck ran out when the Minotaur arrived, thundering across the walkways and up the stairs in a furious charge, interposing the flat of its huge battle axe to use as a makeshift shield. To make the situation worse, their shotguns had run out of ammunition and would need reloading.

The few remaning wolves turned out to not be much of a problem as the Minotaur either flattened them or smacked them over the wall as it charged at the petrified scientists.

Not being trained soldiers, they frantically kept pulling the triggers of their empty weapons instead of switching to the pistols they'd taken. Only two of them still had shells in their shotguns and most of the buckshot ended up being deflected by the axe.

Consequently, they accomplished very little by the time the Minotaur reached them and swung its own weapon in a wide arc, instantly killing two of them and sending the other two plummeting off the wall.

The other group had by now taken care of their own wolves and were able to turn around just to see this happen.

"Switch weapons!" Minaka ordered hastily and grabbed his own pistol, knowing full well that they had no time to reload the shotguns.

The other three snapped out of their horrified staring at the monstrosity and obeyed on autopilot, two of them pulling their high caliber pistols while the other grabbed for the assault rifle.

The Minotaur once again charged towards them with its axe held as a makeshift shield, but ran into considerably more resistance this time as three rounds from the powerful handguns struck it and forced it to stop. The scientists didn't exactly have great aim and the handguns kicked like mules with every shot, but aim didn't really matter at that distance and they had enough stopping power that even something as strong as the Minotaur couldn't ignore it.

Three more shots rang out, only one being blocked by the axe while the other two stuck it in the leg and abdomen respectively, causing massive tissue damage.

It was at this point that the man with the assault rifle had finally gotten himself ready to fire and let loose with his automatic weapon. He'd expected the recoil and had aimed deliberately low, but it still took him by surprise and forced his aim upwards a lot more forcefully than expected.

By some stroke of dumb luck, he stitched a line of bullet wounds upwards across the beast's chest and even took out one of its eyes.

The weight of fire caused the Minotaur to stagger back and clutch at its damaged face, its charge interrupted.

"Keep firing!" Minaka called, seeing their chance to kill it.

They others did so, emptying their clips and making short work of it now that it was a sitting duck.

All of them were breathing heavily and staring at the bullet riddled corpse of the Minotaur as if it would get up at any second and breathed a sigh of relief when it vanished. Though dread replaced relief when a Die of Power appeared in place of its corpse.

Minaka moved to roll it, but was stopped by the other before he could take more than a step.

"Don't do it Minaka-sama, our weapons are empty and there are only four of us left."

"Alright, lets reload first, then I will roll it." Minaka agreed.

"That's not what we mean." The other man said, sweatdropping. "I think it would be best to leave it be and continue towards the exit, we can see it now." He finished, pointing over the wall where they could now see a massive valley with an arrow formed of small rocks pointing at the other end. The valley had been hidden in fog that had liften with the death of the Minotaur.

"And what if we run into something that these weapons will not be enough to handle?" Minaka argued. He hadn't even gotten Amaterasu-chan back!

After several minutes of heated argument, Minaka finally convinced them of the need to rool the Die.

1

All enemies despawned

?

They all felt a block of ice drop into their gut at the number, though confusion followed at the mysterious and strangely helpful effect of the worst possible roll.

"Strange, I had not expected to still be alive if we rolled so poorly. I wonder what that hidden effect is?" Minaka said to himself.

"Uhhh...Minaka-sama." One of the scientists said faintly.

Minaka was too deep in his self muttering to hear him though. "Perhaps some kind of trap that will only become visible when it is too late?"

"Minaka-sama..." Another said, staring in the same direction as his collegue.

"Perhaps a boss monster of some sort and all others had been despawned to make sure we reach it." The MBI founder continued to mutter.

The third scientist had by now lost patience with the whole thing and forcefully turned Minaka around and pointed his eyes towards the bottom of the valley.

"Oh...well, that's bad." Minaka said in consternation after staring at it for nearly a full minute.

Now occupying the previously empty valley was a gigantic dragon.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Isn't that the same dragon that I already killed once?" Karasuba asked in amusement.

"Yes, but smarter and deadlier now." Naruto confirmed. "And a different color."

"What does it matter what color it is?" Benitsubasa asked huffily. She was upset because she hadn't gotten to use the monster spawn thingy. It had vanished when the dragon had been summoned and she'd been acting sulky ever since.

"Trust me, it matters." Naruto assured, getting a contemplative look from Haihane.

"That thing almost killed me because I got careless, there's no way that they're getting past that." The Black Sekirei said with certainty.

"It can certainly be done, if they find another Die of Power and roll high enough, along with one other way." Xanna said with a smirk.

"What other way?" Haihane asked curiously, already having suspicions on what that other way might be.

"A secret way." Naruto teased.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Meanwhile, the group of dungeon crawlers had made their way through the castle and finally reached the valley where the dragon waited.

They had needed to backtrack and go the same way as Higa and Kakizaki. That had been quite the nerve wracking experience, walking through a spider web infested room that held the mangled corpses of the corporate heir and his secretary.

Fortunately, the spiders had been despawned along with everything else and their way was unimpeded.

Now that they were on the same level as the dragon though, it only sunk in just how massive it was. It completely blocked the exit and lit up the otherwise dark valley with the sheen of its silver scales. Fortunately it seemed to be sleeping

"There's another Die over there." One of them men whispered in a barely audible voice, fearing that they would wake it up by speaking too loud.

His words were indeed true though, tucked into a corner just before the exit from the castle and into the valley was another dais with a Die of Power on it.

"Might as well roll it, not like it could make things any worse." Another man said fatalistically.

With a shrug, the roll was made.

16

Plasma rifles!

Minaka sighed despondently as Warhammer 40,000 style plasma rifles appeared, one for each of them. Powerful weapons to be sure, but they weren't Amaterasu-chan.

After a short discussion on tactics, they came up with something very simple. They were going to tip toe right up to the sleeping dragon and shoot it in the face, hopefully melting its brain before it could wipe them out.

Sweating profusely from nervous tension, they approached it ever so slowly until they were close enough that they could aim their shiny new guns at its head with reasonable accuracy.

Just as they were preparing to fire, its eyes opened and it fixed them with a reptillian gaze that froze them where they stood.

The standoff lasted for a full five seconds before one of the scientists' nerve inevitably broke and he pulled the trigger.

The superheated plasma bolt missed its head and struck it on one of its horns instead, visibly heating up the silver colored protrusion.

The dragon growled threateningly and opened its mouth with the clear intention of releasing its breath weapon, causing the others to fire at it as well. These shots hit it in the face, but also did little more than heat the metallic scales.

Minaka was the only one who hadn't fired yet, as he had frozen in remembrance of a little fact on D&D dragons. It didn't help him much right now though, as they were all about to die.

Making a last second decision, Minaka turned tail and ran like the win back towards the entrance to the valley, leaving his petrified employees to die as a blast of freezing cold issued from the dragons mouth and flash froze them, only missing Minaka because the angle of the attack had been aimed at the others more than at him.

Trying to catch his breath, Minaka gazed back at the dragon, seeing that it was apparently returning to its nap, contemptuously batting aside the frozen statues and shattering them.

Gnawing on his lower lip in contemplation, he sighed and threw down his plasma rifle. Next, he approached the dragon again, but this time without any attempt at sneaking, hoping that the two gods that had created this place weren't completely ignoring D&D conventions. The fact that the dragon had been spawned by a roll of one on the Die of Power worried him, but he didn't see himself having any other choices but to risk it.

"I apologize for our earlier attack on you, please allow me passage." He said with a bow, keeping his voice steady despite the nervous sweat beading on his face.

The dragon continued to look at him for a few pregnant seconds and then let out a snort that nearly blasted him off his feet. Still, it shifted aside slightly and moved its tail to open the way out.

"Thank you." He said with another bow and walked out, forcing down the impulse to burst into a sprint. He had to keep telling himself that he wasn't in any actual danger.

After all, metallic dragons were of Good alignment.

He was still sad about not being reunited with his beloved Amatersu-chan though.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"That is BULLSHIT!" Benitsubasa roared. "It moved because he ASKED NICELY?!"

Naruto and Xanna snickered in amusement, having expected that Minaka would be enough of a nerd to know that D&D detail and crazy enough to try it.

Haihane snickered too, but mostly at Benitsubasa's expression of red faced rage. Clearly the Red Sekirei felt that she'd been cheated out of something by Minaka's easy escape.

"Well, it saves me the effort of having to get him out of there myself. I do still want him alive after all." Naruto said, still snickering.

"What for?" Haihane asked in confusion.

"Something ironic, don't worry yourself over it." He answered.

"Are we finally going to have our fight now?" Karasuba asked impatiently. Sure, this had been somewhat amusing, but she wanted that fight.

"No, first he is going to be joining me in the bedroom since he saw fit to arouse me." Xanna cut off any further plans.

"Can't he just do that with a clone?" The Black Sekirei huffed, failing to see what was so great about sex anyway. Sure, she got riled up when she had a good fight, but that didn't mean that she understood what the big deal about sex was.

"Do not be obtuse girl, he is my husband and thus will always place me first and I will not be pawned off to a copy." The horned woman said challengingly, almost daring Karasuba to argue further.

Karasuba wanted that fight, she really did, but knew an unhealthy course of action when she saw one.

"Don't worry Little Crow, you'll get your fight soon." Naruto assured and teleported them all out. He had a wife to satisfy first though, and it would take a while before he was done.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

OMAKE, the continuation.

Takami sat with her head in her hands at what had once been Minaka's desk. Technically it was still his desk, but the man hadn't sat behind it in quite a while already, preferring to stay in the labs and work on remaking Amatersu-chan.

She was not here to do work though. No, she was in the office to hide from everything and enjoy the quiet so that her poor head would stop hurting.

Everything was going to hell(literally according to most people these days) and she was the one who had to bear the brunt of the shitstorm because of it.

Every single day since that stupid asshole Uzumaki had started a new religion by demonstrating his boob enhacing abilities, there had been people yelling at her about it.

Every world leader that was able to actually do anything on an international scale had been demanding explanations and blaming her for the chaos that the world was descending into. You'd think that a member of a pharmaceutical corporation wouldn't be getting blamed for this kind of thing, but thanks to Minaka and his usurping of the Japanese government, they were technically responsible to at least some degree.

Oh sure, she'd told them that Uzumaki was basically uncontrollable and couldn't be stopped, but then they just badgered her because they didn't know what else to do. They'd done everything from demanding that the Sekirei be released to their custody as a possible means of stopping the lunatic to trying to manipulate the horned man somehow.

All of it was useless of course, since Uzumaki had taken over protecting the Sekirei and had become increasingly vicious with every attack against them. As for manipulating him...well, you'd probably have more luck manipulating a thunderstorm. Both would just ignore you and do whatever they wanted.

Naturally, things had gotten even worse once the various religious leaders of the world had somehow caught on to the fact that MBI had some remote connection to this whole mess. She'd had to deal with their stupidity too when that had happened.

Being a scientist, Takami had a rather dim view of religion as a general rule, but the sheer levels of religion inspired idiocy that people were descending to lately were astonishing.

While Naruto's ever larger horde of perverted followers raised hell around the world with their demands that he be recognised as an official deity, everyone else was naturally resisting it as if all of existence depended on it.

Takami would have found the whole thing darkly amusing if she wasn't the one that everyone complained too. To her, the whole thing was retarded since Naruto didn't really strike her as the type that would care whether anyone acknowledged him as a god or not, but humanity was all too eager to sink back into Dark Age level mentality on the issue.

Honestly, with how things were going, she wouldn't be surprised if some trigger happy idiot with access to nuclear weapons pushed the big red button while aiming at Japan.

At the very least, it would take care of her migraine in a storm of nuclear fire.

"You look stressed." Naruto said sympathetically, having just appeared behind her.

Takami didn't even jump this time, having become sort of used to his random appearances, nor did she react when he put his hand on her head and her migraine suddenly vanished.

"Why are you doing this?" She asked without lifting her head.

"Well, I seem to have made one hell of an oopsie by giving Beni bigger boobs, so I figure that I might as well have fun with it." He explained without any shame in his voice whatsoever.

"Did you know I had the Pope on the line earlier?" She asked idly.

"Oh really?" He asked with interest. "What did the chief replacement have to say to you?"

"He was most upset over the fact that your followers organized an orgy in the Vatican and sent him the DVD." Takami said, still perfectly calm.

"Oh that, yeah those guys were a bunch of horndogs, but they're not bad people. Papa Smurf is still alive and unharmed after all, though he might be under the impression that he's going to Hell when he dies." Naruto said with a snicker. "But I don't understand why he went whining to you about it."

"Because you don't own a phone Uzumaki." She answered, once again with the same calm.

Naruto shrugged again. What the hell would he need a phone for?...other than calling room service that was.

"He was also upset that you apparently visited another nunnery, replaced Jesus on the cross with your naked and fully erect self and then asked the nuns if they wanted to 'wield the Lance of Longinus'." The silver haired woman said, spinning around in her chair to finally look at him, making air quotes on the last part.

"I'm not apologizing." Naruto said, grinning. "Besides, you can't tell me that 'Lance of Longinus' doesn't sound ridiculously phallic."

"DAMNIT UZUMAKI!" Takami suddenly roared. "YOU CAN'T JUST MOCK PEOPLES BELIEFS LIKE THAT, EVEN IF THEY ARE STUPID!"

Naruto was unphased by her outburst, knowing full well that she was just pissed because of all the chaos and the headache it was causing her, not the mocking itself. He didn't even need to hear the last part to know that she thought religion to be the height of stupidity.

"Does that mean that Xanna can?" He asked with another grin.

Takami took a deep breath to calm down, knowing perfectly well that she was just being baited. "She shouldn't, but just like you, I don't see how anyone could stop her from pretending that she was God."

Naruto wanted to make another jibe, but Takami spoke first. "Why are you picking on Christianity so much anyway?"

"We're not, but we drew lots on which religions each of us gets to mock and Christianity was the odd one out, so we decided to share." He explained.

"You drew...lots?" Takami asked in disbelief.

"Yep, I got Buddhism and Hinduism, while she got Jews and Muslims. We did Christianity first since we had to share." The horned blond explained further.

"And now you're going after the Buddhists and Hindus?"

"I'm already done actually." He admitted.

"What?" She frowned in confusion. "But I didn't hear anything about that."

"Well, it turns out that Hindus and Buddhists are a lot more chilled out than Christians, so I didn't really get to do a whole lot."

"Explain." She demanded.

"Well I tried the Hindus first, but it only took a few demonstrations before they declared me the Tenth Avatar of Vishnu. Things got kind of awkward after that since they started taking everything I said way too seriously." Naruto elaborated, scratching at his face as he remembered that little incident. "Mind you, I have only the most basic idea of who Vishnu is supposed to be and I have no idea why he'd need ten avatars, so I figured it might be a good idea to move on."

Takami looked at him sceptically, finding it hard to believe that he would just leave without causing some kind of incident.

"As for the Buddhists...well, I did show up right in front of the Dalai Lama and started giving him tips on proper meditation."

Takami rubbed at her forehead in consternation.

"I also transformed into a sexy naked blonde woman and gave the monks a little show."

Takami's head firmly hit the desk.

"They didn't really react much aside from some surprise, which was pretty boring all in all. The old guy just thanked me for the meditation tips and asked if I could not transform into a woman any more. Very politely even."

Takami was actually rather relieved. Buddhism was likely the most peaceful religion on the planet and the one that least deserved Naruto's unique brand of humor being inflicted on it. At the very least, the Dalai Lama wasn't likely to be badgering her over it.

"He did call me an Outer Path heretic though, which was funny because it's true." Naruto snickered and then frowned. "Well, sort of anyway."

Takami looked at him oddly and was about to ask for more clarification about that, when he continued.

"Xanna's been having a much more...eventful time though."

"What did she do?" Takami asked, her blood turning to ice.

"Well the Jews are similar enough to Christians that she did her 'I am God, I'm pissed at you for thinking I was a man' shtick again, but they didn't really buy it. Not much happened there except for some spontaneus beard combustion and other minor tricks."

"I note that you left the Muslims for last." Takami said, resignation in her tone.

"Yeah...about that..."

"What did she do?" Naruto's words all but confirmed her suspicions.

"Apparently she picked those Muslims that were, shall we say, a bit more extreme in their beliefs and are thus a bunch of humorless bastards that couldn't take a joke to save their lives."

"Over a billion Muslims in the world, so naturally, she would end up mocking the ones that wouldn't take it well." Takami spoke, feeling her migraine returning already.

"No kidding, telling them that Allah is a woman and that the only thing waiting in the afterlife were seventy two sweaty men did not go over well." Naruto said, as if in agreement.

"What happened?"

"Well...one of them called her an infidel whore, pulled a gun and declared that she would 'be shown her proper place' when the holy war began in earnest."

Takami sighed and closed her eyes. "And what did she do in return?"

"Take a look." He said and formed a viewing screen.

Almost immediately, Takami saw the horned goddess in question cutting down scores of Islamic extremists that kept popping up no matter how much anyone tried to get rid of them. Naturally, since this was Xanna she had to be ostentatious about it and was doing it with a sword made of bright white fire, with a shroud of black fire roiling around her.

"Don't you feel at all obligated to try and stop her from burning people alive?" The scientist asked, blanching at the obviously painful demise of dozens of people.

"Hey, they were the ones that declared war on her, they're just getting what they wanted." Naruto shrugged uncaringly. "I feel more pity for the grass when I see someone mowing their lawn."

"This isn't war, this is a slaughter." Takami said, unsuccessfully trying to rub away her shiny new migraine.

"War is always a slaughter." Naruto dismissed.

"Couldn't you just go back in time and make it so that all of this never happened?" She asked.

"Never tried going back in time before..." He said contemplatively.

At that moment, another Naruto appeared in a strange whirlpool.

"Hey dumbass." The new one greeted.

"You're not a clone." The original accused.

"Duh, I'm you from the future."

"Cool, how did you do that?" The original asked, impressed.

"You're too stupid to understand it." The newcomer said dismissively.

"I'll show you too stupid." The original growled and focused intensely. Suddenly he vanished in a strange whirlpool.

"Ha, I knew that would work." The now solitary Naruto crowed victoriously.

"Did you just...manipulate yourself into figuring out time travel?" Takami asked incredulously.

"What can I say, I'm amazing." Naruto shrugged.