Naruto x Sekirei - Part 13

Miya had certain preconceptions about what she would see when she opened the door. These preconceptions consisted of a tall, horned blond with his chest exposed indecently and a tall, horned woman with white hair and dark skin.

These preconceptions were shattered when she opened the door and saw not just the expected duo, but also Karasuba, Akitsu and a teenaged girl that looked incredibly familiar. That was not all though, as Naruto was actually wearing a pale red shirt under his haori, which was something that defied all logic from what everyone told her.

Of course, their mode of dress was entirely secondary to the fact that Karasuba was there. It had been years since the last time they'd crossed paths, but that meeting had been as distasteful to Miya as ever.

"What is she doing here?" Miya hissed dangerously, hand already going for her sword. She only peripherally registered that the Black Sekirei was unarmed and appeared both unsurprised and unbothered by the hostile greeting. In fact, she was looking downright relaxed, which was quite odd for her to say the least.

"Greetings Asama-san." Naruto said with perfect manners, addressing Miya by her last name, using proper honorifics and even giving a proper traditional bow.

Miya blinked at the incongruous sight of the man which she had expected to be deliberately unbearable using such formalities. Still, the greeting did serve to highlight the fact that she had just committed something of a faux pas by adopting a threatening posture on first sight, even if there was bad blood between her and Karasuba, while the supposedly near barbaric pervert was the very height of politeness.

She had a suspicion that this had been done on purpose.

"Greetings Uzumaki-san." She said back at last, exercising a great deal of self control as she returned the bow. "May I ask why Karasuba is with you?"

"I was certain that either Homura or Kazehana had informed you that Karasuba was in my company and you had not specified how many of us may come." Naruto explained.

Miya's eye twitched imperceptibly. Yes, she had known that Karasuba had abandoned MBI in favor of Uzumaki, but this was obviously done to provoke her and it had worked. Well no matter, she could control herself for one evening and Karasuba was not being her usual self in any case. She could hardly tell them to leave now that they were here, at her invitation no less.

"Very well then." She said, eye ticking again when Karasuba gave her a lazy smirk.

Naruto moved the conversation forward before Karasuba could get any ideas about saying anything to provoke Miya. He didn't want the whole setup going to waste. "May I introduce my wife, Xanna."

He gestured to the horned woman, who gave Miya a look but did not otherwise react. They had decided that it would be better to let Naruto handle all the talking at first, as Xanna's pride would push her to immediately establish dominance over Miya.

Xanna had never truly understood how Naruto managed to discard his pride in a heartbeat if it suited his purposes, even if those purposes were sheer amusement. Anytime that she attempted to do the same, she was left with a seething desire to demonstrate superiority, which was oftentimes the reason behind the violence of her and Naruto's lovemaking. That, and it was also fun.

Either way, he was the one who wanted to go for elaborate plots this time instead of brute force, so she would oblige him. She knew the value of a good plot after all, and wouldn't go ruining it for him.

"I am not sure if you already know Akitsu." Naruto was saying, now gesturing to the Ice Sekirei.

Akitsu gave Miya a slight nod but no more than that. First and most powerful Sekirei Miya might be, but that meant nothing to Akitsu.

Miya had seen Akitsu only a few times and that had been as a child, but she was aware that the Ice Sekirei had had a miserable life. But she was clearly much better off now. She was wearing a silk kimono of exceptional quality and looked content, though it was hard to see on her perpetually sleepy expression. Her hair was parted to proudly display the Sekirei crest on her forehead, very much contradictory to her previous shame of it.

"And you've definitely met Sahashi Takami, though you may not recognise her right away." Naruto finished.

Miya blinked again and took a closer look at the teenaged girl. Now that she knew where the familiarity came from, it was easy to place the sharp features of MBI's lead adjuster.

"She's had a youthful experience recently and is physically eighteen years old again." He explained, seeing Miya's confusion.

Takami grumbled something under her breath, but too quietly for anyone else to hear.

"I...see." Miya did not actually see, but that would have to wait. "Please come in."

"Forgive the intrusion." Naruto gave the proper answer as the group of five walked in, taking off their shoes as they passed the entrance and laying them to the side.

Except of course for Naruto and Xanna, who remained barefoot.

"Not to worry Asama-san, our feet are quite clean." Naruto assured, seeing her staring at their feet and showing her his sole.

Miya saw that it did indeed look as if he'd just stepped out of a bath and not as if he'd been walking on asphalt and dirt. Useful trick that.

"You are a bit early, so dinner is not quite finished yet, but I can bring out some tea if you would like." The landlady suggested.

"That would be wonderful, thank you." Was his reply.

She led them into the dining/living room of the inn, which happened to be already occupied by Minato, Musubi, Homura, Kazehana, Chiho and Uzume. In short, everyone bar Matsu, who was lurking upstairs in her lair.

"Make yourselves comfortable while I go make the tea." Miya said and went into the kitchen, where she intended to eavesdrop on the conversation shamelessly. There was simply far too much that was suspicious about the situation and she intended to figure it out.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

There was a short moment of intense awkwardness as everyone except for Naruto, Xanna, Akitsu, Musubi and Karasuba uncertainly looked at each other, unsure of what to do. The fact that most of these people found or had recently found the Black Sekirei extremely intimidating was definitely a factor in this.

And then the moment was broken by Musubi's joyous exclamation.

"Naruto-sama, you're finally here! And you brought Karasuba-sama too! This is great!"

"Nice to see you again too Musubi-chan." Naruto returned her greeting with a restrained grin. Musubi was really something else, it was like looking a clueless, super energetic puppy. With breasts, really big ones.

while Karasuba simply nodded and sat down next to the fist fighter, since she was one of the few people that she was on good terms with. Her presence seemed to be seriously creeping out the wimpy looking Ashikabi that Musubi had gotten herself, which was also a plus.

In short order, everyone had settled themselves around the table. The head of the table was naturally empty, as it was reserved for Miya. Homura was seated closest to her spot on one side. Naruto ended up sitting next to Homura, with Xanna on his other side and Akitsu on Xanna's other side.

After Akitsu came Chiho, who was still giving Uzume a bit of a cold shoulder for suggesting an orgy, and then a single empty chair where Matsu would inevitably sit.

On the other side was Kazehana, a sulky looking Uzume, Takami, Minato, Musubi and finally Karasuba.

This meant that Naruto was sitting across from Uzume.

Just As Planned.

Takami deigned not to speak to her son yet, wondering how long it would take him to figure out she was his mother. Judging by the coltish 'how did a sheep like me get surrounded by wolves?' look he was throwing around the room, it might be a while. Clearly Naruto had made a scary first impression on Minato, not that it was a very hard thing to do.

Still she was sort of impressed when he mustered up the courage to speak when the greetings were finished, and to Naruto no less.

"U-Um, Naruto-san, I would like to thank you for saving Musubi from Higa's Sekirei." He nervously said, but managed to speak with minimum quaver.

Naruto gave the boy a toothy grin, making him visibly shiver. "No problem, I do like Musubi after all and we've had a talk about the proper course of action when you get attacked by overwhelming numbers."

"I'm supposed to run away." Musubi announced with a fist pump, apparently pleased that she remembered. Then she deflated sulkily upon realising what she'd just said. "But I don't like running away, I want to fight!"

Karasuba chuckled, drawing many perturbed looks at the genuine humor in the sound.

"You can fight me anytime you want," Naruto offered amusedly. "that way you can fight with no chance of dying."

"Yay!" The enthusiastic Sekirei cheered. "You're the best Naruto-sama."

"I suppose I am." He agreed, drawing much eyerolling from Homura, Takami, Karasuba Uzume and Kazehana.

"By the way big bro, what's the deal with the shirt?" Uzume asked, shaking off her slight funk at having Chiho mad at her. "I was starting to think you had a phobia of having your chest covered or something."

Naruto looked down at the shirt he was wearing, privately forcing down his irritation at the article of clothing. He really didn't like wearing it, but it was for the sake of the plan so he would bear with it.

"Well, I know how Asama-san feels about these things, so I figured it would be polite to accomodate her." He explained, lying through his teeth the whole time.

There was much disbelief being directed at him due to that statement(both the words and how polite it was) from people who didn't believe him in the slightest, which Naruto promptly ignored.

"What the hell are you up to?" Homura hissed to the horned man quietly from the side of his mouth.

"Nothing." Naruto said back, also from the side of his mouth.

"Whatever it is, just stop it!" The Fire Sekirei insisted. He knew that it couldn't possibly bode well if the oafish plan wrecker was actually doing some plotting of his own.

"I have no idea what you're talking about." Naruto lied like a champion.

Meanwhile, Kazehana had been giving Takami an odd look, clearly trying to find out why she was so familiar but not quite managing to succeed. Finally she decided to just ask.

"Excuse me, but have we met? You look very familiar."

Takami sighed imperceptibly, already knowing what was going to follow. Being young again was nice and all, but the constant shock was more than a little irritating. Not to mention the hostility she would likely get from the Wind Sekirei for it. "Yes Kazehana, we have. It's me, Takami."

Kazehana froze in surprise. "Takami?"

Minato's head snapped to the strange teenaged girl at his side so fast that he nearly broke his own neck. "Mom?!"

He was rather horrified at himself for thinking that she was cute earlier, sort of like Yukari but with sharper features.

A small torrent of similar exclamations followed from those who hadn't known, such as Uzume and Homura. There was even a thump from the ceiling that clearly indicated that Matsu was also shocked. Musubi also made an exclamation, but she did it because it looked fun, rather than any actual shock.

"Yes Minato, it's me and I'm eighteen again thanks to that blond ox over there." The scientist confirmed for her son, gesturing towards the grinning Naruto.

"You're younger than me?" Minato spluttered, simply because he didn't know what else to say.

"Huh, I guess I am." Takami said absently, having not really considered that angle before. It certainly was a strange situation to be younger than her own offspring.

"But that's..." Minato started, not really knowing what he wanted to say.

"Just get over it already Minato, it's not that big a deal." Takami said irritably, wanting to just get past this already.

Minato ducked his head meekly and obeyed. Eighteen or not, his mother hadn't lost any of her scariness.

"I guess it'll be easier for you to suck Minaka's dick now." Kazehana snipped.

"I'm disappointed in you Kazehana." Naruto said with a frown before Takami could say anything in return.

"What? Why?" The Wind Sekirei demanded, feeling perfectly justified in her anger at Takami.

"Neither one of you wants anything to do with Minaka anymore, there's no reason to get angry over him now. Besides, she might have saved you from being bonded to that nutcase." He explained.

"She didn't have to be such a bitch about it." Kazehana muttered loud enough for everyone to hear.

"Sorry." Takami muttered back at the same volume, gaining a look of surprise from the Wind Sekirei.

Takami knew that she really had been a bitch about that perceived victory over Kazehana. She'd been just a geeky twenty something scientist back then and had a certain amount of social insecurity, so having the charismatic Minaka choose her over the gorgeous Wind Sekirei had been a great personal victory and it had somewhat gone to her head. Her character had only hardened later on, after she'd needed to start fixing Minaka's messes and eccentric outbursts.

In retrospect, acting so smug in front of a scorned woman who had the power to command the wind had not been a particularly wise decision. Years later, when she'd become thoroughly disillusioned by Minaka, she had suddenly realised that it was a small miracle that she was still alive. That had been a day when she'd just stared at the wall for two hours, going over every smug little look she'd given Kazehana and wondering why she hadn't been turned into paste a long time ago.

There was a moment of awkward silence as everyone was unsure of how to continue from then on.

Minato was especially poleaxed as he had no idea that his mom used to be involved with that crazy MBI president.

"What's a bitch?" Musubi asked innocently.

"A female dog." Naruto explained. Explaining things to Musubi while people were around was always fun. "It's also an word that you call another woman when you want to insult her."

"But why would calling a woman a female dog be insulting?" Musubi asked, perplexed. "Dogs are great!"

"That...is an excellent question." Naruto replied pensively. Come to think of it, why was that even a slur? Sure, it sounded bad, but if you think about it, most dogs had a better personality than your average human, so it should really be a compliment rather than an insult.

Hey baby, you're so hot you must be a bitch in heat. He almost snorted at the ridiculous, newly made pick up line. That probably wasn't going to catch on.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Miya had of course been eavesdropping on everything(except for the whispering between Homura and Naruto, which had been too quiet to catch), but it had been less informative than she'd hoped, just small talk really. There had been no clues about what Uzumaki was planning and he'd been the very model of politeness. His wife had said nothing at all and seemed content to simply sit there silently.

The only real surprise had been Karasuba's laid back manner. Karasuba didn't do laid back. Despite still being irritated by the Black Sekirei's presence, she was also intrigued.

Either way, it was time to bring out the tea. There was only so long you could delay the act of boiling water and adding tea leaves before it started being very odd.

And she really didn't want the naive Musubi learning any more questionable things.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The awkward silence that followed was broken by the arrival of Miya, who brought in a tea set with enough cups for everyone.

Being the hostess, she grabbed the large teapot after everyone had a cup and went to pour the tea.

She hadn't quite been able to help herself from enacting a little petty revenge for Naruto's previous rudeness and had made sure to keep the tea boiling hot, while using her thinnest cups.

For the others, she poured the tea in such a way that they didn't need to actually hold the cup while she poured, but she used his large size as an excuse to enact her plan.

"I cannot quite reach around you Uzumaki-san, could you please lift your cup?" She asked pleasantly.

"Of course Asama-san." Naruto agreed easily and carefully lifted the cup. Damn thing was so fragile that he would probably destroy it if he dragged a claw over it gently. "And please just call me Naruto."

Miya began pouring the boiling hot tea into the incredibly thin porcelain cup, hiding a smirk at his expected burned reaction. "As you wish Naruto-san, please call me Miya then. That is an interesting name if I may add, I assume it means 'maelstrom'?"

Naruto also hid a smirk at her rather transparent attempt to burn his fingers. It was going to take a lot more than that to make him even slightly uncomfortable. "Actually, I was named for the ramen topping."

Hiding her irritation that he hadn't spilled any of it or even twitched, she sat back down and continued the painfully forced small talk. "How surprising, I would not have thought that a man such as yourself would be named after something so inane."

"Well I suppose I didn't look very impressive as a fetus." Naruto commented dryly and then continued pensively. "Either that, or my parents were intending to eat me after I was born. Good tea."

Before anyone had time to do anything that look deeply disturbed by the idea, Xanna spoke up.

"Indeed." She agreed, also drinking the boiling hot tea. "Could be hotter though."

Her comment drew some baffled looks at that statement, since the tea would be steam if if was any hotter.

Akitsu made a small noise of appreciation, beads of frost on her cup betraying the use of her powers.

Everyone else simply had to deal with the too hot tea the normal way.

"What of yourself Xanna-san? I have never heard a name quite like yours before, does it mean anything?" Miya asked, shaking off the disturbing thought of an infant as a ramen topping and turning the conversation to the even more mysterious horned woman.

"It is the name I chose for myself, it needs no other meaning." Xanna replied mildly.

"So it is not the name given to you by your parents?" The landlady asked in honest curiousity.

"I had no mother and the closest analogue I had to a father gave me a name I disliked, so I abandoned it and chose another." The horned woman explained.

Everyone else had so far been just observing the conversation as if it was a tennis match, somehow expecting violence to break out at any moment. Seriously, there was more tension and promise of violence in the air than you'd find in a war. But this last comment was too much for Uzume to stay silent.

"But how can you not have a mother?" She interjected in bafflement.

Xanna smiled, showing just the points of her fanged teeth. "A story for another time perhaps."

Kazehana was the only one there who actually had a good idea of the truth, having convinced Naruto to tell her about his and Xanna's unorthodox romance during their night out. Miya could have known about it, if she had been willing to listen to Kazehana's retelling of it.

Of course, Kazehana could have also just given her the cliff notes version that told all of the important facts without any of the drawn out storytelling, but doing that kind of thing was unthinkable to her. She loved that story and couldn't possibly bring herself to reduce it to a dry list of facts.

Not that it was a huge secret or anything, but Xanna did not intend to speak of it just because someone asked.

"I need to finish dinner anyway." Miya suddenly said, realising that she really should get back to that and not liking how much control the horned duo had on the conversation.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

A cloud of unseen tension loosened when Miya left the room and more than one person breathed a sigh of relief.

Karasuba chuckled instead, finding the entire situation very amusing. "You were right Naruto, this is hilariously awkward."

"I know right?" Naruto snickered in agreement.

"Since when are you so relaxed Karasuba?" Kazehana asked, giving her old teammate an odd look.

"I'm always like this for a day or so after he fucks me." The Black Sekirei explained with an off hand wave towards Naruto.

The following pause as everyone digested that bit of information gave Musubi the perfect opening to ask one of her innocent but awkward questions.

"What's fucking?"

"It's another word for sex, usually meaning rough sex." Naruto explained before anyone could distract the naive fist fighter.

"But I thought sex was like common sense, how can common sense be rough?" Musubi continued her line of questioning, now confused. She completely missed Minato's frantic attempts to stop her.

"You didn't actually ask Matsu to show you what sex is, did you Musubi-chan?" He asked, amused.

"Minato-sama told me not to." She pouted.

"Well that's not very nice." The horned man said disapprovingly. "Keeping a girl ignorant for your own sick pleasure is not very nice at all."

"T-That's n-not why I did it!" Minato insisted, his face going very pale.

"Of course you didn't." Naruto said back snidely.

While Minato spluttered and tried to justify himself another sound came from the ceiling.

"Fuhuhuhuhuhuhu, it's a soap opera."

"You can come down now Matsu." Homura said irritably.

"But what if Karasuba tries to kill me Homura-tan?" The skulking pervert asked.

"If I wanted to kill you, you'd be dead already." The Black Sekirei said off handedly.

"So scary." Matsu said in a hushed tone but slithered down from the ceiling and into the only empty spot. "You'll protect me, right Mina-tan?"

Minato looked like he was about to say something, but caught sight of Karasuba's sinister smirk and just swallowed nervously.

Naruto sighed at the display of spinelessness, with Takami unknowingly echoing him. "He doesn't look like he could protect you from a butterfly."

Minato slumped even further at the harsh assessment.

"Fuhuhuhu, would you protect me then Naru-tan?" Matsu asked instead, even if the dig at her Ashikabi did kind of sting.

"From Karasuba?" He asked back in faux shock. "But the Little Crow is such a cute kitty cat, you've got nothing to be afraid of."

"I will cut you." The Black Sekirei said flatly.

"I'm sure you'll try really hard." Naruto said reassuringly, getting a growl from her.

"Your power over Sekirei is quite impressive." Matsu noted, glasses gleaming in a manner that might have been sinister if you didn't know her well enough.

"And what power do you think I have over the Sekirei that I don't have over anyone else?" He asked humorously.

"You can unwing us." She said.

"True enough." He agreed. "Would you like me to unwing you?"

"No!" She exclaimed, looking ready to bolt. "I'm quite happy with Mina-tan, thank you very much."

"I'm not going to force you." He assured her, once more amused. "And I can restore your wings as easily as I can take them away. Think of it as an experiment, just try it and I'll put everything back later if you want."

Well, Matsu always did like to experiment and it would certainly be interesting. Though Minato was proving to be disappointingly disinterested in doing any experimenting. Or perhaps disinterested was the wrong word, more like...too indecisive.

"Fuhuhuhu, I wonder how many Sekirei Naru-tan has experimented on." She chuckled perversely, getting sidetracked by her own dirty thoughts for a moment.

"Not as many as you think." He answered, grinning. "Now, would you like to try the unwinging or not?"

"Don't do it Matsu!" Musubi interjected passionately. "We are Minato-sama's Sekirei!"

"Hush Musubi-chan, let Matsu make her own decision." Naruto chided.

Musubi puffed her cheeks out in offense at being shushed, but she did stay silent. Though her silence was replaced with a stare at her Ashikabi, who simply shrank into his seat. He really didn't want to gainsay the scary horned man and he certainly wasn't going to tell Matsu that she couldn't be unwinged if that was what she wanted.

"Well, if you promise to bring them right back, then I guess it would be okay." Matsu agreed with hesitant wariness.

"I promise." The horned blond assured and moved closer to her, pressing a single finger to her chest.

A moment later, Matsu was blinking and looking around as if everything was different, yet familiar. "So strange."

"What's strange?" Takami asked, her scientific curiousity roused.

"I feel...different." Matsu answered vaguely and then her eyes alighted on Minato, who also looked curious.

She stared at him searchingly for several long seconds, clearly working something out, before she finally spoke. "Mina-tan...you're really unattractive."

Naruto started laughing like a hyena at the blunt statement, while Xanna, Homura, Karasuba and Kazehana chuckled and Uzume and Chiho giggled.

Minato just slumped into further depression and Musubi looked confused.

When the laughter subsided a bit, Takami took the opportunity to voice her curiousity. "So removing your wings also removed your attraction to your Ashikabi?"

"Yes." Matsu confirmed. "While he was my Ashikabi, I thought that he was the greatest thing since high definition porn, but now that I've been unwinged it's like a curtain has been lifted, allowing me to see how unimpressive he really is."

There was more snickering at her explanation, though Takami was starting to get annoyed by the constant digs made at her son, even if they were true. Or to be more accurate, she was getting annoyed that he was just sitting there and taking it instead of saying something in his own defense or retaliating.

"Yeah, the winging does that. Rather insidious thing really." Naruto finally said after he was done being amused.

"So, how does it feel to get ditched by one of your Sekirei bro? " Uzume jibed at Minato.

"Well, if that's what she wants." Minato muttered, but was obviously upset.

Naruto sighed at the fact that the wimp wasn't even going to try winning her back. "I can't believe you have the same name as my father."

"Your dad was named Minato too?" Uzume asked in interest.

"What was he like?" Kazehana seconded the interest.

Several similar inquiries followed until Naruto raised a hand to silence them and turned his stare on Minato, who also looked interested.

"Well, he looked pretty flaky, though not as bad as this guy." He gestured at Minato, making the boy slump. Again. "But he was still hardcore."

"How hardcore was he?" Uzume asked, very much interested.

"So hardcore that he once killed five hundred ninjas in four seconds." Naruto grinned. "He was known as the fastest man alive. Probably just in combat though, I doubt my mom would have tolerated him long if he was that fast at everything, she didn't seem like the type when I brought her back from the dead that one time."

"You are so full of it." Homura rolled his eyes.

"Actually, that is the truth, plus or minus a few dozen ninjas." Xanna seconded.

"And we've already heard about Naruto bringing his mother back from the dead as a zombie." Kazehana added her own two cents.

"Don't forget about him groping her." Uzume was quick to add.

Homura had heard that particular story and had been quite incredulous at how perverse the horned man was. "But seriously, ninjas?"

"Don't believe me?" Naruto asked challengingly.

"I might have if you hadn't brought ninjas into it." Homura snorted.

"What if I told you, that I was trained as a ninja?" The horned blond grinned.

"You were a ninja?" The Fire Sekirei asked sceptically, taking note of the man's brutish physique and decidedly non-ninja behavior.

"Nobody expects a ninja to be the most obvious guy in the room." Naruto reasoned.

"That's actually a good point." Uzume conceded.

"You really shouldn't take his word at face value." Xanna commented. "He was terrible at being a ninja and ignored almost every rule about being one."

"I still kicked ass." Naruto defended.

"That's because you had accumulated enough brute force to shatter mountains and are probably the most tenacious man to have ever lived." The horned woman countered.

"You know you love it." He shot back, grinning cockily.

With an amused smile, Xanna inclined her head in agreement.

"Xanna-sama! Are you a ninja too? Can we spar?" Musubi asked excitedly, nearly bouncing in her seat while holding her fists under her chin.

"No child, I am not a ninja and I do not spar." Xanna replied, rather amused by Musubi's exuberance. She had to be the most happy go lucky person that Xanna had ever seen.

While Musubi pouted at being denied a spar with another strong person, Takami asked the question that was currently burning a hole through her mind. "What are you then?"

"Something better than a ninja." Xanna answered unhelpfully, arching her back slightly and quite purposefully manifested ten pure white tails.

There was much ooh-ing and ahh-ing over the sudden appearance of the beautiful appendages. Akitsu especially was looking at them in wonder and Chiho looked as if she was having trouble restraining herself from grabbing one to pet.

On one side, they draped over Naruto's shoulder possesively, while on the other they slowly wrapped Akitsu in a cocoon of white fur. The Ice Sekirei had an ever deepening blush on her impassive face as she was wrapped in the warm and soft fur. Eventually, she was fully covered up to her nose and leaned forward to take a deep whiff of the tails, sighed contently and settled down to enjoy her new situation. It was like a super hug.

"Show off," Naruto muttered quietly and reached up to pet one of the tails on his shoulder. "But I did miss these."

"Can I...can I touch one? Please?" Chiho asked hopefully, looking hypnotized by the movements of one of the tails that was still 'free'.

Xanna looked at the near starry eyed girl archly, but did swing a single tail over to her. Chiho struggled against herself mightily and managed to grab hold of it gently and start petting it, instead of snatching it from the air greedily as had been her first impulse.

"I want one too!" Musubi exclaimed joyously and leaped towards one.

Xanna was about to smack the overexcited girl out of the air with the very tail she'd been aiming for when she sensed that the problem would be taken care off from another source.

A rock was hurled out of the kitched with unerring accuracy and handily smacked the fist fighter out of the air.

"Jumping is not allowed in Izumo Inn." This was accompanied by a fearsome Hannya mask as Miya stood in the doorway that connected to the kitchen.

She had been eavesdropping on the conversation while finishing dinner, though the food had actually been ready for some time already and she had been merely delaying in the hopes of learning anything new. And learned she had.

For one, Uzumaki clearly had no difficulty manipulating the Sekirei core like it was the simplest thing in the world and knew rather more about the core itself than she was comfortable with. His easy handling of Karasuba was another oddity. Though his handling of her was definitely unorthodox, she couldn't argue that the Black Sekirei was absurdly easygoing right now.

Xanna's display with her tails was rather shocking and had come out of nowhere, but in and of itself revealed little of use.

His little story about his father was interesting, but not really relevant. What really drew her interest was the reminder about him bringing his mother back from the dead. She wasn't sure if she could believe that, but she had to struggle hard to force down the hope that it might be a way to get Takehito back. She had no doubt that even if such a thing were possible, that it would have a huge price tag attached to it, but that was one thing that she would have paid nearly any price for.

She would have continued listening in if not for the fact that things had gotten a bit too lively. She'd been willing to pretend that she hadn't heard the cursing because it wasn't worth sacrificing an eavesdropping opportunity, but things had started going out of hand. She had actually been surprised(and somewhat suspicious) that Uzumaki hadn't started with any of his reputed perversions yet. If he hadn't given her so much provocation in the time leading up to this dinner, she might have been willing to assume that he was truly being respectful for her sake and she also knew that he had no fear of her. For all that his respectful attitude might indicate some wariness of her, he was far too self assured and relaxed. It wasn't hard to see that the horned man was a warrior born and would relish a battle against a challenging opponent rather than fear it.

Now it was time to see how he and Xanna reacted to her Hannya mask. The psychic manifestation exuded a fearsome aura that had never failed to cow most people before, but she suspected it would not be so simple this time.

And she was right.

Karasuba remained unimpressed as ever. She had never been scared of it, so that was not surprising.

Xanna merely looked at it with disinterest, clearly unimpressed. Even Akitsu didn't look bothered, wrapped as she was in the tails and probably feeling rather safe in there. Chiho had squeezed the tail she'd been petting in instinctive fear and had had it pulled away.

Naruto on the other hand...

"Are we having a mask show?" He asked with blatantly fake excitement. "Does it do tricks?"

Unsure of how to respond, Miya intensified the menacing aura.

"Let me try that one too." He continued as if nothing had happened, comically sticking his tongue out of his mouth in a cartoonish parody of concentration.

A moment later, her dreaded Hannya mask was joined by another, though this one was somewhat...different. It was white instead of purple, its expression could only be described as 'stoned', it had a blush on its cheeks and a garishly sex-toy pink bow on the side of its forehead.

And then it spoke. In a ditzy, airheaded female voice.

"Duuude, wasaaaaap? You wanna come back to my place for a little head? Get it, head?"

The ridiculous situation made a mockery of her usually intimidating Hannya mask and dispelled the aura of dread it projected, making most everyone at the table collapse into a giggling fit.

Eye twitching imperceptibly, Miya stopped projecting before a further mockery could be made of it.

"Bro, how are you not scared of that thing?" Uzume asked in awe once she'd settled down from her giggles.

"I see something scarier every time I look in the mirror." He deadpanned.

"Your face is not that scary Naruto-kun." Kazehana demurred.

"Oh really?" He asked challengingly.

Next he extended his tongue from his mouth in a serpentine fashion, backlit his head with an ominous red-black miasma and made his eyes glow creepily. "I will swallow your soul!"

Before any overt reaction could be had from anyone at the sudden thundering voice and demonic aura that Naruto had been projecting, Miya threw one of her ubiquitous rocks at his head.

"Sticking your tongue out so lewdly is strictly forbidden in Izumo Inn!" She asserted firmly, though even she'd been rather creeped out by that display just now.

The rock was halted from actually hitting Naruto's head though, as he'd caught it with his tongue and then crushed it with the prehensile appendage.

"Dude, you crushed a rock with your tongue." Uzume said numbly.

Instead of answering verbally, Naruto waggled his eyebrows at her and Kazehana suggestively, making both women flush at the obvious implication.

"Fuhuhuhuhu." Though not in a good spot to see the eyebrow waggle, Matsu's imagination was more than up to the task of imagining other uses for a tongue like that.

"That was so cool! Can you teach me how to do that Naruto-sama?" Musubi exclaimed. Minato, being the supressed pervert that he was, developed a nose bleed at the imagery that the question conjured up.

"I'm not sure actually, probably not. Sorry, Musubi-chan."

Musubi pouted. It looked really cool too! There had to be all kinds of amazing combat techniques possible with a tongue like that.

"Settle down everyone. It's time to bring out the food." Miya interjected, feeling rather annoyed at how she'd been forgotten. "In the meanwhile, you can clean the pieces of rock you've left in my dining room Naruto-san."

"Sure thing Miya-san." Naruto chirped with far too much cheer.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

A few minutes later, all the food was settled on the table and the eating was just about to start.

Miya was glad that she had made more food than she had expected to need. She hadn't thought that anyone aside from Xanna and Naruto would be coming, so it worked out fairly well.

She still didn't like the fact that Karasuba was in her inn, relaxed as you please, and Miya had play the polite hostess to her. At the very least she was more tolerable than usual, but it still rankled to even have her there.

"Is that a fugu I see?" Naruto asked, spying the old Japanese delicacy on the table.

"Indeed it is." Miya said tightly. She'd been intending to serve it to him as a way of intimidating him with its poisonous nature and getting him to eat it out of politeness, but he was obviously eager to do it, making the whole point moot. "Would you like some?"

"Does anyone mind if I take all of it?" The horned blond asked, getting many shakes of the head since everyone knew that the damn things required rigorous preparation from highly trained chefs before they were safe to eat and no matter how good Miya's cooking was, she was not really qualified to be making fugu.

Except for Musubi of course, who had no concept of 'poison' much less that food might somehow be dangerous. "I want some too!"

"No Musubi-chan, that's dangerous!" Minato insisted, trying to convince his sole remaining Sekirei out of a possibly lethal decision. No matter how strong Musubi was, TTX probably wasn't good for her.

"But it's food." Musubi argued, confused as to how food could be dangerous.

"Hey Musubi, isn't that curry over there?" Naruto asked, pointing at the pot full of the aforementioned food.

"Ooh, curry!" And just like that, the potential crisis was averted.

"Uh, big bro? Isn't that...you know...toxic?" Uzume asked hesitantly.

"Yes, toxically good." He responded and was about to grab a bit of the fish with his chopsticks when it was swiped away by another set of chopsticks.

Giving his smug wife a narrow eyed look, Naruto slowly reached for the fish again, only to once again have that piece swiped away.

In an instant later, the situation devolved into an intense chopstick battle between the two deaities as they fought over the toxic fish that nobody else wanted.

Everyone else watched in blatant fascination as pieces of fish were swiped, knocked down, stolen and re-stolen, with the occasional piece actually making it to someone's mouth.

Naruto smacked aside Xanna's chopsticks, speared the liver and quickly shoved it into his mouth before she could recover.

Knowing that her husband had the advantage in the area of finger dexterity since she had never bothered to learn any kind of martial arts or anything similar, Xanna cheated and used a tail to pull him off balance. In the instant that it took him to recover, she snatched the ovaries and swallowed them whole without bothering to chew.

"That is enough!" Miya snapped. "Eating with such a deplorable lack of table manners is forbidden in Izumo Inn."

Naruto and Xanna froze, having gotten a little carried away and completely forgotten that they were in the middle of something.

There was now a terribly mutilated fish on the plate between them and Naruto had a strip of its skin hanging out of his mouth, which he slurped up like a noodle.

Xanna looked as if she was deciding whether it was worth keeping up the charade or if it would be more satisfying to show Miya where she ranked in the food chain, But Naruto acted faster.

"Our apologies Miya-san, it was a really good fish." He said, though he didn't sound like he meant it at all.

While his head was turned away, Xanna's tongue lashed out, wrapped the mutilated remains of the fish in it and then drew the whole thing into her mouth, whereupon she proceeded to chew once or twice and swallow.

"Now that's just cheating." Naruto complained sourly at her backhanded maneouver.

"There were still bones in there." Miya said with a pale face, though it was debatable whether she was pale out of mortification or anger.

"I know." Xanna answered, unperturbed. "It was quite crunchy."

Miya had the disturbing sensation of steadily losing control of the situation. Still, she truly did need to have a serious talk about the future of the Sekirei with these two and thus couldn't really kick them out.

"I do not care how you eat in your own home, but you will exercise manners in my inn." She finally said. Her pride would only bend so far as to not tell them to leave for that kind of behavior, but she still felt the need to say that much at least.

Xanna looked to be on the verge of doing something extreme, just for the sake of showing the uppity purple haired woman how foolish it was to be telling those greater than yourself that they couldn't do something. She would have done it too, if Naruto hadn't started rubbing her back soothingly to calm her down.

Everyone exhaled the breath they'd unknowingly been holding when the air stopped being so oppressively heavy and the ten tails behind Xanna ceased their agitated movements.

The meal proceeded with awkward silence for a short time, nobody being quite sure what to say after that.

Well, it was awkward for almost everyone. Musubi didn't understand the concept of awkward too well, so she was just happily eating her mountain of curry rice. Karasuba and Naruto were smirking at the whole thing and kept eating without a care in the world and Xanna was vindictively pleased that she had enforced this awkwardness on the room. Served them right.

The silence was eventually broken by the most unlikely person imaginable.

"Mistress..." Akitsu said quietly, giving an imploring stare towards the horned goddess. She had been quiet the entire time, just enjoying the feeling of being wrapped up in the tails and slowly eating her food after they had loosened enough to allow it.

It didn't take Xanna long to figure out what Akitsu wanted and re-wrapped the tails around her, having unwrapped them in her earlier agitation. The passive Ice Sekirei's small request served to get her mind away from the irritation she felt that someone dared tell her what to do and how to act.

Akitsu hadn't really intended to be heard by anyone other than Xanna, but in the oppressive silence even a whisper was clearly audible to everyone.

Minato flushed at the obvious implications.

Chiho also flushed, for similar but still very different reasons.

Kazehana and Uzume grinned, having seen this kind of thing before and thinking that it was rather cute.

Homura, Karasuba, Takami and Musubi didn't really react to it for a variety of reasons.

"Fuhuhuhu, looks like Akitsu has been doing a lot of experimenting." Matsu chuckled perversely.

As for Miya...well, her pride was still smarting over the sudden realisation that she was more than likely not in the presence of equals, but those who were much stronger than her. It hadn't been obvious until the moment when she had felt a monstrous menace saturating the air with the promise of death and violence. It had lasted only a moment before Naruto had calmed his wife down, but in that moment she had seen herself die.

A sobering experience to be sure, especially for someone who had always been assured of her own superiority, but her pride still wouldn't allow her to just let it go.

"Are you so depraved that you would demand that she refer to you so deferentialy?" Miya snipped.

Akitsu gave a slow blink of confusion as she looked at the purple haired landlady. She didn't recall her mistress or master demanding to be called anything. In fact, she couldn't recall anything at all being demanded of her since she had become theirs. Indeed, Naruto still occasionally tried to get her to call him by name. She sometimes did so just because it was funny to see him become exasperated when she went back to calling him 'master'. Both she and Xanna wondered how long it would take him to pick up on that.

Just because she didn't talk much didn't mean that she didn't have a sense of humor.

"Yes." Xanna answered honestly. She was indeed that depraved, nevermind that it had nothing at all to do with the situation. "And so is Naruto."

Miya was brought up short by the blunt and shameless answer, for a moment unsure of how to respond. Musubi butted in before she could come up with anything.

"What does 'depraved' mean?" She asked innocently.

"Morally corrupt." Miya answered snippily before Naruto could do it.

"Well, at least we're not deprived...of sex. Like everyone else in this inn." The horned man retorted cheekily, getting a few snorted laughs from people who then quickly shut up under Miya's glare. "Though I've never told Akitsu to call me 'master'. Don't trust that cute, innocent face of hers, underneath that she's as much of a pervert as me."

"Master makes me scream." Akitsu said in a forlorn tone that would make you think she didn't like it if you didn't know better. Well, she didn't like screaming because she was uncomfortable raising her voice, but the cause of the screaming was very much enjoyable.

"What does 'deprived' mean? And how can you be deprived of sex if sex is like common sense?"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

After it had been explained to Musubi what 'deprived' meant, she probably still didn't get it. She probably wouldn't until sex was very thoroughly explained to her and she stopped trying to equate it with common sense.

Naruto hadn't expected how successful he would be at confusing the girl when he'd told her that.

Miya had apparently decided to try steering the conversation back onto more normal topics and experienced much frustration as it kept backsliding into something perverse every so often.

Naruto took great pleasure in explaining his theory on critical perversion mass to her. Well, it wasn't much of a theory to be honest, just a scientific sounding hypothesis on how, when a certain number of known perverts were sitting at a table, conversation would inexorably gravitate towards sex.

Miya had not been amused, but unlike most situations, she was unable to intimidate anyone into obedience. Even her usual residents were showing progressively less fear of her at having so many people present who were completely immune to her displays.

She did not dare tell them to leave though, now certain that this whole conversation was not a requirement for them, but an amusement. If she told them to leave, they might very well do so, but that would mean that she would be completely cut out of the loop as they continued their plans with impunity.

She was not an obstruction to them like she had been to MBI. They would work around her without fear, or over her if she proved too troublesome. Being relegated to the position of 'novel curiosity' after being the most powerful being on the planet for years was not a situation that Miya enjoyed, but she would bear it so that she could retain some control over what happened to her feathers. She had failed them too many times already.

As the conversation progressed, Xanna kept teasing Chiho with one or two of her tails, fully intending to seduce both her and Uzume. It was made fairly easy by Chiho's obvious fetish for furry appendages and Uzume could have been considered 'seduced' for a while already.

Before, she had intended to do this just to mess with Naruto and his intention of gathering little sisters, now it was also to step on Miya's toes. Her irritation at the landlady was perhaps somewhat excessive considering the offense, but she had always had a short fuse when someone tried to tell her what to do or not do, especially when they had no power to back it up.

She knew that Naruto had his own plans to rile Miya up, which was fine with her. They were far from mutually exclusive after all.

It was as the dinner was winding to a close that Naruto finally made the move that he'd been planning on making by sitting across from Uzume.

The Veiled Sekirei had two characteristics that had made him want to sit where he was sitting. Namely, she was prone fits of explosive laughter when she heard something funny and she liked to eat by stuffing her mouth full of food.

Naruto waited until Uzume had so much food in her mouth that she had trouble chewing and then spoke.

"That was a really great dinner Miya-san." He complimented politely, though a grin was escaping his self control. "With the way you feed your tenants, I must ask if anyone has ever called you Mama Miya?"

As he had predicted, Uzume burst into laughter at the joke that was also a question that was also a pun and also a veiled insult. However, since she had her mouth full to bursting, she ended up spewing a torrent of half masticated food all over Naruto.

"Well, that was a new experience." The horned man said dryly, wiping curry off his face. The shirt he was wearing was a lost cause though.

Just As Planned.

"Bro, I am so sorry." Uzume croaked out in between her giggles.

"It's alright, serves me right for cracking my bad jokes at the dinner table." Naruto said with false contriteness.

"Damn right it does." Homura muttered, cleaning off himself as much as he could. He'd gotten a bit of splash damage since he was sitting next to Naruto. Curiously, Xanna was entirely spotless, as if the food had somehow managed to veer away from her...which it had.

"My apologies Miya-san." The horned man said to the landlady whose eyes was twitching in anger at how an otherwise civilised dinner had devolved into a series of disgusting displays of bad manners, perverse implications, bad jokes and other things. "You wouldn't happen to have a shirt I could borrow do you? I know how you feel about indecent displays and I wouldn't want to offend you by having my chest bare."

He sounded sincere, but everyone knew that he really wasn't. Several people were already giving him suspicious looks, wondering if he'd planned that out. After all, there was simply no way that any shirt that anyone owned in the inn was going to fit him.

After Naruto, Minato was the tallest male there, but he was skinny as a stick. Naruto had to be twice as wide as him and a good deal taller. There were some old clothes of Takehito's still lying around, but he had been shorter than Minato and thus wouldn't be of any use.

"I do not believe so." Miya ground out. "You may use the bathroom to wash and I will allow you to stay shirtless provided you wear your haori and close it as much as possible." It annoyed her severely that she couldn't do a damn thing about it either way.

By this point she just wanted to get this farce of a dinner over with so that they could get to the point. Usually she enjoyed these things, but it was a lot less fun when she couldn't intimidate anyone when they inevitably broke her rules.

Within a few minutes, Naruto was back and sitting at the table, now in his usual mode of dress. He could have just cleaned himself through the use of his powers, but it was too much fun riling Miya up with this. Actually he could have made himself a new shirt too, but the same thing applied and nobody had seen him do that yet, so they wouldn't think that he was capable of it.

Miya was focusing on her plate and using her chopsticks with excessive force. It irritated her even more that everyone except for her seemed to find it normal for the horned pervert to be shirtless, as opposed to having his chest covered.

Uzume and Kazehana mouthed 'smooth' at Naruto in unison, having deduced that it had been done on purpose. He gave them a confirming wink in return.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"You want me and Musubi to go to another dimension to live in an empire ruled by...by...them?!" Minato was whispering loudly and with surprised incredulity as his mother brought up the issue.

"I know it sounds crazy and the idea of that idiot " She gestured towards Naruto."ruling an empire is pretty scary, but he does have a point that the Sekirei won't be safe here and I doubt you want to be separated from her." Takami explained.

"But..." Minato said hesitantly.

"Just agree to it Minato, or else he'll keep nagging you until you do." Takami said tiredly. "Even if he is full of shit and obviously hasn't taken more than a cursory look at how this world works, he did make a few good points and this empire of his probably isn't going to be as bad as I'm afraid it might be."

"Hold on just a minute here." Naruto interjected. "I thought you agreed with me on all the problems that this world has?"

"I agreed with you on a few things, such as the pollution and the problems that the Sekirei would have if they lived here for an extended period of time, but a lot of what you said was a load of crap."

"You mean you were just humoring me?" He asked incredulously.

"Yes you lummox, I knew you wouldn't shut up so I let you think that I agreed with you." Takami smirked. "I more or less decided to accept your offer before that conversation ever happened."

"Well damn." Naruto frowned, wondering how he'd missed that. He hadn't been reading her mind or anything, but still. "Now I really want to have sex with you."

Takami rolled her eyes at the semi-predictable response, while her son choked on air at the mental image.

"Truly husband, it is unseemly for someone so young and inexperienced to be making uninformed observations on politics." Xanna said with a sigh.

"That's what you're bothered about?" Homura asked incredulously, but was ignored.

"You speak as if you have experience with politics Xanna-san." Miya commented, all too glad to shift the conversation away from anything sex related, even if she didn't usually like to talk about politics.

"I do." Xanna confirmed, showing no hint of the earlier tension between her and the landlady. Retaliation for that was already planned and there was no need to be angry over it anymore. "Twice before have I ruled."

"Really?" Takami asked in surprise. She'd known that the horned woman was old, but she hadn't considered that she might have already been a head of state before. "Which empires did you rule?"

"You would not know their names, they were not in this world." Xanna said dismissively.

"How long did your reign last then?" The scientist pressed, wanting to get some more details about what kind of Empress Xanna would end up being.

"Not long, ten years for the first one and twenty for the second."

"That seems a short time for an immortal." Takami mused, not noticing Miya's startled expression. The idea that the horned duo were immortal had never entered her mind, despite their claims of godhood.

"Yes well, I was quite the tyrant and I had...anger management issues at the time. " Xanna said dryly, making Naruto snort at the understatement. 'Anger management issues' was a rather poor description for the trouble she'd had at controlling the rage she'd inherited from the Juubi. "I destroyed both empires in fits of rage, it was not until a thousand years later that I finally calmed down some, but by then the desire to rule had left me and I have only recently regained it."

"What could have angered you enough that you would destroy your own empire?" Miya asked warily, having the suspicion that she wouldn't like the answer.

"The people did not like the way I was ruling and rebelled." Xanna explained as if there was nothing wrong with that.

"And you want my feathers to live in an empire under a rule where absolute obedience is required, under pain of death?" Miya asked with an edge to her voice.

"Have you not been listening?" Xanna asked archly, the implied 'idiot' clear in her tone. "That was long ago and I was much different then. Besides, the Sekirei are Naruto's little pet project and he intends to make certain they will be well cared for and happy."

"Why would you do this? What do you hope to gain from sheltering them so?" Miya asked challengingly, turning towards the horned man.

"A sense of satisfaction." Was his airy answer.

"And here I thought that you cared about us big bro." Uzume pouted, but both Naruto and Xanna could tell she was genuinely stung despite her joking tone.

"You needn't fret girl, he does care about you, he is merely not so foolish as to delude himself into thinking that his actions are not rooted in selfishness." Xanna explained dismissively.

"But how can caring for others be selfish?" Kazehana asked in bafflement.

"Everything is rooted in selfishness if you can manage to think about it with clarity of mind." Xanna asserted. "Take yourself for example, you seek love and are always happy to see people who are in love, but you are not happy for them, you are happy because it affirms your own views and gives you hope of finding such a thing for yourself."

Kazehana opened her mouth a few times to refute the words, but had trouble coming up with anything, since it was true to a certain point. Maybe if she had time to think of it she could eventually have come up with something, but as it was, she just grabbed at the most obvious example in an attempt to argue. "Well...what about a mother's love for her child?"

Xanna raised an eyebrow and turned towards Takami. "Do you love your children Takami?"

Takami looked annoyed at having been put on the spot, but answered anyway. "Of course I do."

"You urge them to be better because you love them?"

"Yes..." Takami answered again, starting to get wary of this conversation. Apparently Naruto had picked up his habit of leading a conversation like this from his wife.

"If you love them, why then do you not allow them to live their lives as they please instead of trying to mould them to your liking? Your forceful manner has reduced your son to a whimpering coward that allows every woman he meets to walk over him."

Takami was deeply disturbed by the words. Seeking to refute them, she turned to her son and made a harsh sounding demand. "I didn't do that, right Minato?"

"No mom!" He squeaked, suddenly terrified of the pissed off look she had on her face.

Takami went a bit pale as she realised that her son was indeed afraid of her. She had only wanted him to succeed in life, not give him a fear of women. It was severely disturbing that she had never considered that his timidness might have been caused by her.

"Do not worry yourself over it too much." Xanna continued dismissively before Takami could get another word in. "He was likely predisposed to that sort of timid behavior to begin with and leaving him alone would have meant neglecting your duties as a mother, which would have also been an act of selfishness. Even if every action has selfish roots, it need not be a bad thing. Selfish acts can benefit others just as easily as harm them."

While a somewhat troubled Takami thought it over, Miya decided to speak up. "That is an...interesting philosophy."

"Call it what you wish." Was the dismissive reply as Xanna turned away to look at a rather sleepy looking Akitsu and laid the Ice Sekirei's head in her lap. She did enjoy the occasional philosophical debate, but it was obvious to her that they weren't willing to see things from her point of view. Which was too bad for them, because her point of view was the right one.

Naruto snickered for no apparent reason, catching what his wife was thinking and finding it as terribly amusing as ever. While he did agree with her that more or less everything was rooted in selfishness, the whole thing was pretty abstract and not at all important.

Just like him, his wife sometimes enjoyed poking fun at humans and their morals.

Miya's eye twitched at the supremely arrogant dismissal. She was rapidly discovering a deep dislike of arrogant people who were indisputably more powerful than her.

"Well this was fun, but enough screwing around." Naruto said with a clap of his hands. "Miya, you ready for that talk?"

The purple haired landlady noted how he had stopped bothering with honorifics or politeness and felt oddly relieved. This somehow felt more natural, whereas seeing him doing his best polite act felt like seeing a wolf attempting to impersonate a sheep.

"Yes, I believe I am."