Headshot

Naruto turned around and saw the enormous creature as well. At first, he could only vaguely make out its outer outline. When he tried to look closer, the Nine-Tails' body gradually appeared. Though it was still shrouded in shadow, it was no longer just a dark elf in the night with nothing but a pair of eyes.

He knew the Villagers hated him. He had occasionally heard things like "Fox Demon," but he had only taken them as nicknames. He had never seen a real Fox Demon, so how was he supposed to know what one was?

Naruto was equally dumbfounded. Though somewhat frightened, he scratched his head in response to Sasuke's question.

"To be honest, I don't know what that thing is either."

Sasuke explained it from a strange angle.

"If it were something fake, then it would have to be something you knew in your Consciousness Space. You can only imagine something if you know what it is."

"If you say you don't know, then it must be something real."

"My Sharingan clearly saw all that Chakra. It definitely isn't an illusion."

"Hehehehe..."

A gloomy, low laugh echoed through the Consciousness Space.

The Nine-Tails met Sasuke's Sharingan gaze.

"So, you are from the Uchiha Clan."

"So weak, yet already able to see this old man within Naruto."

"Evil Sharingan, and Chakra even more ominous than this old man's. Truly worthy of the power of the cursed clan. You are exactly like that brat called Madara Uchiha."

Pretending to be dumb, Sasuke ignored what the Nine-Tails was saying. "Naruto, what's its name?"

"I really don't know! You have to believe me. It seemed to be calling you evil just now... and it even mentioned one of your family members' names. It should be an acquaintance of your family, right? Ah, but it isn't human."

The bars holding back the Nine-Tails gave Naruto at least some courage to speak. "Big guy, what exactly are you? Why are you inside my body?"

A beastly roar came from the Nine-Tails' mouth. Its massive fangs made it feel as though they could reach him at any moment.

"Brat, want to know?"

"Then come closer. Let this old man eat you, and I'll tell you everything you want to know!"

Clang!

With a tremendous crash, sparks flew everywhere.

Several-meter-long claws scraped against the bars and stretched out from the cage.

No one knew where the lighting came from, but the massive shadow happened to cover Naruto and Sasuke. In reality, there was still some distance between them.

Naruto fell backward onto his butt in fright.

Sasuke was stronger than most children his age... but he was still human. He did not fall, but he immediately leaped back.

"If I get eaten, I'll die! You can't fool me!"

"Sasuke, what are you doing?"

Under Naruto's terrified gaze, Sasuke walked toward the Nine-Tails' claws.

Flesh and sharp claws stood an arm's length apart.

Sasuke raised his voice slightly to bolster his courage. He relied on his knowledge of the plot—later on, the Nine-Tails was a tsundere goofball, and among all the transmigrators, few who ended up around the two protagonists were ever afraid of it.

More importantly, this was only half of the Nine-Tails, locked in a cage.

"First, assuming you're only this big, then I'm safe at this distance!"

"Second, assuming you're made of Chakra, then with such an enormous amount of Chakra, you could definitely extend farther. You could have killed Naruto and me just now! But you didn't."

Sasuke lowered his head slightly and reached out to touch the very tip of the claw. As though he had seen through the truth, he said, "From the look of you, you're either feline or canine. Yet you can't get out. You must be bored from being locked up for so long."

Sasuke rubbed the Nine-Tails' claw tip and was about to reach farther back. "If you behave and don't move around, I can brush your fur for you~"

The Nine-Tails' eyes flew wide open. Red Chakra instantly extended from its body, covering the claw tip and lengthening it.

A huge Chakra spike pierced straight through Sasuke's head, blowing his handsome head apart in an instant.

Naruto's heart turned ice-cold. He screamed Sasuke's name.

They were in the Mental Space to begin with, and under these circumstances, there was no way the Nine-Tails would help Naruto erupt with power and grow tails.

Could it really use its own power to buff someone else so they could fight it?

Naruto was so weak, helpless, pitiful, and at a complete loss...

Sasuke watched as he was about to be killed in the next instant—and then it seemed he really had been killed.

For some reason, his perspective shifted from first-person to a god's-eye view.

There was great terror between life and death. The two tomoe in Sasuke's Sharingan moved slightly closer together, seemingly making room for a third tomoe.

Sasuke's figure appeared again beside Naruto at some unknown point. Once he realized he was safe, the abnormality in his Sharingan vanished. The brief interval also meant he had no chance to notice the change that had occurred in his eyes.

He could only watch the image of himself being blown apart in front of him gradually dissipate.

"I'm not dead yet, don't..."

Before Sasuke could finish, the Nine-Tails looked toward the two of them and let out a thunderous rebuke.

Hmph!

In the next instant, Naruto and Sasuke were kicked out of the Mental Space, and their vision returned to the living room where they had started.

Naruto threw himself onto Sasuke with a wail. "I thought you died!"

He really had been looking for excitement. But it was rare to encounter something so thrilling without being too dangerous, so of course he had to charge in. Having transmigrated here, he did not carry much of the original Sasuke's hatred over the clan massacre. How else was he supposed to awaken the Sharingan?

The only thing he could think of was taking risks—walking the line between life and death.

Seeing Naruto worry about him, and knowing this really was his own fault, Sasuke pulled Naruto off himself and comforted him.

"Please use some common sense. Instead of worrying about me, worry about yourself. That was your Mental Space. At most, some of my mental energy was dispersed. Unless that big guy can come into reality and attack my physical body."

"Obviously, it didn't come out. Looks like that cage is still useful. But you have something that huge sitting in your head like a time bomb. Your situation is far more dangerous than mine. If you suffer serious damage in your own Mental Space, you really could die."

...An exciting way of comforting someone.

Naruto was covered in snot and tears, and the worry on his face did not fade in the slightest. If anything, he looked even more frightened. It seemed Sasuke really was not very good at comforting people.

"I'm not learning genjutsu anymore. I feel like I might accidentally see that big guy again. Besides, you analyzed several possibilities earlier and said it was safe, but it became dangerous right away."

Sasuke also felt a little awkward after his bragging had backfired.

"I didn't think it through. You also said you've never fed it. The Uchiha Clan has some connection to Ninja Cats. Before they eat, they like to play with mice and the like until they're exhausted before eating them. I didn't consider that it might be something similar."

After hesitating several times, Naruto finally made up his mind and asked Sasuke, "Do you really think that big guy looked like a cat or a dog? I mean, is it possible... that it was a fox?"

Sasuke's expression tightened. He had been playing dumb, but Naruto had taken the initiative to expose the truth.

"Can you tell me why you think that?"

"When people in the village cursed at me, I heard them mention things like the son of a Fox Demon, a Nine-Tails monster..."

"And that big guy seemed to have a lot of tails behind it. Maybe I really am the son of a Fox Demon."