Maybe Your Talk no jutsu Would Have Worked on Me

Chiba didn't court death by asking, "Who's there?" Instead, he chose to keep his mouth shut.

Just then, a faint light appeared somewhere in the darkness, gradually growing brighter.

Chiba could make out his surroundings now...

This was an empty wilderness. It was hard to imagine that, in the middle of winter, there wasn't a single snowflake in sight. Broken rocks and dead trees littered the ground.

Well... there was also a heap of bright red feathers mixed with meat.

Chiba smelled blood on himself and looked down to find that he was covered in "ketchup."

Oh, my god, that smells awful. If I ate it, I'd be sick to death.

"Kid, I'm very curious how you managed to fall from up there without dying." The woman's voice rang out again.

"Oh, maybe I was lucky," Chiba replied.

"..."

Chiba looked toward the source of the light.

A girl with twin tails stood there in a blue dress. She was so beautiful that one could even say she could "bring ruin to kingdoms and their people." A confident smile played on her lips, as if no one could defeat her. In her fair hand, she held a ball that looked like white jade, its surface glowing with a peculiar light.

Chiba was bewildered at first, then his pupils abruptly contracted.

That look... could it be...

Ultear!

The girl spoke, her voice clear and pleasant.

"What's your name?"

Chiba paused, then said, "Chiba..."

"An odd name..." The girl savored the words, then smiled.

"So let's kill you..."

Chiba jolted, nearly scared to death by her.

Damn, girl, are you really that ruthless? You kill people at the slightest disagreement? No, wait, we haven't even had a disagreement!

Seeing how frightened Chiba was, the girl suddenly giggled with delight.

Chiba swallowed. This isn't right. This girl's personality isn't like it was in the original!

He had no Chakra left in his body. Judging by the timeline, Ultear should have already learned the Arc of Time and joined Grimoire Heart, a dark guild that was one of the three members of the Balam Alliance, and was training under its master, Hades. By a rough estimate, her strength should have been at least B-Class by now, possibly even A.

At his peak, he could only take on a weaker B-Class opponent at best, and now his Chakra was just about gone. Yeah... he was screwed, seumnida.

Dark guilds were the collective name for guild organizations that represented the dark side of magic. Because they often took illegal commissions, they were not recognized by the Magic Council.

If ordinary mage guilds represented light, then dark guilds were the dark.

The Balam Alliance consisted of the three guilds at the pinnacle of the dark guilds: Oración Seis, Tartaros, and Grimoire Heart.

"I've been training in Time Magic here for half a year. It's taken so long to see someone other than the master. To be honest, I'm a little reluctant to kill you..."

Ultear walked gently up to Chiba, her slender fingers brushing across his face. Her extraordinarily bewitching scarlet eyes stared into his, brimming with the most primal, cold killing intent.

Chiba wanted to say, Girl, could you move a little farther away before you talk? You're really scaring me a little like this.

But the words stuck in his throat. He didn't even dare breathe too loudly.

Her killing intent... it's far too terrifying. That's the kind of intense killing intent only... someone who has slaughtered countless people could have.

Not even when Chiba had just fallen off the cliff had he felt so close to death...

"But letting you live seems like it would be a bit of a hassle, so it's more convenient to kill you!" Ultear raised her right hand, which held the jade ball.

"Wait! Wait! Miss, calm down. Let's talk this through..." Hearing that Ultear still intended to kill him, Chiba hurriedly spoke up.

"Oh? Give me a reason..." the girl said casually.

Chiba coughed twice and rubbed his hands together. "Well... look... I fell from so high up and barely managed to survive. If you killed me just like that, what a loss that would be."

"What does your loss have to do with me?"

"Hold on! Hold on!" Seeing that Ultear was about to strike, Chiba hurriedly stopped her.

"Any more last words?"

"Ahem! Well... well, look how boring it must be to train here all alone. Why not keep someone around to chat with?"

"Keeping you around is too much trouble... You're so badly hurt, keeping you around would be a hassle too..."

"It's fine, it's fine. Just give me some medicine, and I'll take care of the rest myself..."

"...Still too much trouble..."

But Chiba looked at her, hope shining in his eyes.

For fuck's sake, use talk no jutsu on me, just like you fooled Jellal! I'm easy to fool. Maybe if you tried talk no jutsu on me, it would work.

"To tell you the truth, I'm from a dark guild. I kill without blinking, and I've lost count of how many people like you I've killed..." Ultear said flatly.

"That's all right. I'm no good person either..."

I'm really debasing myself to stay alive...

"..." Ultear was probably rendered speechless by him too. She seemed never to have met anyone so shameless.

"Forget it. I'll spare your life for now, but don't expect me to help you with anything." Ultear tossed out those words and left.

She vanished into the darkness, as though she had never appeared.

Only then did Chiba let out a breath of relief. He slumped to the ground, gasping for air.

Perhaps Ultear had not yet been completely steeped in darkness, and training alone was truly dull, so she had let him live.

He felt the pain all over his body. Though his bones were broken, not many of them were; only his left kneecap and the bones in his left hand had been shattered in the fall.

His mental energy had fully recovered, his physical strength had recovered quite a bit, and so had his Chakra, but it still wasn't enough.

He planned to roast and eat the meat from those strange birds.

Time flew. By the time Chiba had roasted and eaten the strange birds, he no longer knew how much time had passed.

He had thought something mashed to a pulp would be hard to swallow, but who would have guessed it tasted pretty good once roasted?

In a word, delicious.

He could recover Chakra by eating.

"You really aren't as simple as you look..."

At that moment, Ultear appeared in front of him.

She startled Chiba, but he quickly calmed down.

Seeing him calm down, Ultear smiled. "I'm very interested in the power you use. I'll keep you around and observe you."

Chiba sneered. "Hmph! Observe me? Now that my strength has recovered, why would I be afraid of you?! Beat me first, then talk."

Little bitch, you want to observe me? Do you think the Uchiha king of showing off is easy to bully?

"You don't know when to quit."

Ultear gave him a pitying look, then beckoned with a finger. "Come on."

And then...

After a thorough beating...

"Ow! Ow! Take it easy, take it easy! Big sis, could you take your foot off my face first?"

In a dark corner, a girl with twin tails stood with her high heels on someone's face, while that someone lay sprawled on the ground, howling.