The week after peace returned to Lumina Square passed more... uneventfully than Lin Shuo had expected.
Or rather, it was an "uneventfulness" Yuzuha deliberately maintained.
Every morning at six, she appeared at the ramen stall's entrance on the dot to check whether Lin Shuo had secretly gotten up early to simmer broth-if she found the fire already lit, she puffed out her cheeks and stared at him with a look that said, "You promised to rest," until Lin Shuo reluctantly turned it off.
In the mornings, Lin Shuo was forced to sit behind the counter as the "cashier," while Yuzuha put on an apron and cooked noodles with a convincing air. Though the results over the first three days were either too salty or too bland, by the fourth day, she actually managed to make a decent bowl of ramen.
"See~ I told you I had talent!"
Yuzuha proudly swished her red ponytail, her green eyes sparkling.
Lin Shuo took a bite and nodded. "Mm, a passing grade."
"Just a passing grade?!"
"The broth needed another three minutes, the noodles were overcooked by seven seconds, and the chashu slices are uneven-"
"Aaah, you're so strict, Lin Shuo!"
Yuzuha snatched the bowl back, her cheeks puffed out. "Give it back if you're not eating!"
But that afternoon, she still secretly wrote down every detail Lin Shuo had mentioned.
Lin You and Lin Yue sat on little stools behind the stall, watching the two interact and giggling to themselves.
"Mommy really has Daddy wrapped around her finger."
Lin You spoke softly.
"Mm..." Lin Yue nodded, blinking her Three-Tomoe Sharingan. "But Daddy looks... really happy."
He was, indeed.
Though he was "grounded" at the ramen stall, though Yuzuha used all sorts of reasons to forbid him from training or going out, Lin Shuo found he did not dislike days like these.
During the day, he cooked noodles, collected payments, and taught his two daughters the basics of Shuriken.
After they closed up at night, Yuzuha dragged him to Kaidan House for dinner-Li Baorong really was a good cook, always managing to come up with new dishes.
After dinner, Yuzuha took him for walks around Lumina Square in the name of "helping digestion."
The streetlights stretched their shadows long, and occasionally, regular customers greeted them.
"Hey, Boss Lin, taking a walk with your girlfriend?"
"Mm."
"You two are so close~ When are we getting invited to the wedding?"
Whenever this happened, Yuzuha blushed and tugged Lin Shuo along faster, but her ears stood straight up, clearly waiting for his answer.
And Lin Shuo always said calmly, "Once she graduates."
Then Yuzuha's face grew even redder, but she held his hand even tighter.
Those quiet, heartwarming days lasted a full seven days.
Until the morning of the eighth day, when a notice that school was resuming arrived on everyone's communicators.
"Finally, we can go to school~"
Yuzuha sat behind the ramen stall's counter, munching on a sandwich while browsing Inter-Knot.
"If classes don't start soon, I'm going to forget how to do homework... Ah!"
She suddenly cried out.
"What is it?"
Lin Shuo looked up from teaching Lin Yue how to chop scallions.
"On Inter-Knot... loads of people are talking about urban legends!"
Yuzuha turned the screen toward Lin Shuo. "Look! 'The blue-flamed cat demon of Havarie Hollow,' 'the moving island beneath the waters of Perseus,' 'the giant lava turtle of Solov Volcano'-every post is getting so much attention!"
Lin Shuo's heart tightened.
He took the communicator and quickly browsed the posts.
There were pictures, blurry but clear enough to make out the general outlines-
Deep inside Havarie Hollow, a mass of blue flames leaped among the ruins, its feline shape faintly visible.
Beneath the waters of Perseus, an enormous crustacean moved slowly, its back resembling a small island.
Around Solov Volcano, patterns resembling a turtle shell emerged from the lava.
Every picture had thousands upon thousands of replies underneath it.
"I saw it myself! That blue fire cat was insanely fast. It vanished in the blink of an eye!"
"The thing underwater is definitely a new species! TOPS should send people to catch it!"
"The one in the volcano is even crazier. I almost got burned by the lava it spat out!"
And a pinned announcement made Lin Shuo's pupils contract.
[Official TOPS bounty: Anyone who provides valid leads on the aforementioned 'special Ether creatures' will receive a reward of 100 million Denny. Anyone who successfully captures any one of these creatures will receive a reward starting at 10 billion Denny, with no upper limit.]
Ten billion.
A figure enough to buy half a street in Lumina Square.
Yuzuha's eyes widened too. "T-ten billion? Has TOPS gone crazy?"
"They haven't." Lin Shuo's voice was low.
[Note: Although TOPS did not know what Tailed Beasts were, the special abilities the Tailed Beasts displayed had greatly piqued their interest.]
The value of Tailed Beasts.
As powerful beings from the world of Naruto, Tailed Beasts possessed combat strength far beyond the ordinary Ether creatures of this world.
If they could be captured and studied, it might be possible to develop new weapons, energy sources, and even... military applications.
TOPS would stop at nothing.
"Lin Shuo..."
Yuzuha asked softly.
"You know what these are, don't you?"
Lin Shuo fell silent for two seconds, then nodded. "I have a rough idea."
"Are they dangerous?"
"Very dangerous."
"Then... should we..."
Yuzuha bit her lip. "I mean, the Spook Shack has received lots of similar commissions lately, but Lucia turned them all down."
"Lucia?"
"Mm." Yuzuha nodded.
"She was the first one to capture footage of these 'urban legends.' Apparently, she accidentally recorded them while adventuring in a Hollow at night-not with a phone, she doesn't have one of those. It was some kind of... Ether recorder?"
Lin Shuo recalled Lucia's character profile-a sheep Thiren, one of the "Night Watchers," an Ethereal fanatic who often wandered through Hollows late at night.
If she had recorded it, then it was highly credible.
"Why did she turn down the commissions?"
Lin Shuo asked.
"I don't know." Yuzuha shook her head.
"Manato asked her, but she only said, 'Those children aren't bad people. You can't catch them'... It's so strange. She actually called those monsters 'children.'"
Something stirred in Lin Shuo's mind.
Could Lucia sense the Tailed Beasts' "true nature"? Or did her unusual constitution let her communicate with them?
"Yuzuha," Lin Shuo said.
"After school today, get everyone from the Spook Shack together. We need to talk."
Yuzuha blinked. "You want to join our discussion, Lin Shuo?"
"...Something like that."
"Sure~" Yuzuha smiled. "Then I'll let them know after school this afternoon~"
She paused and leaned closer, a mischievous gleam in her green eyes. "But Lin Shuo, are you... planning to do something dangerous again?"
Lin Shuo looked at her and reached out to ruffle her hair.
"I won't go alone this time."
"Really?"
"Really."
Yuzuha nodded in satisfaction, then hopped off her chair. "Then I'm off to school~ Remember to mind the stall, Lin Shuo!"
She picked up her schoolbag and turned back at the entrance. "Oh, and I'm leaving Little You and Xiao Yue to you today~"
"I know."
After Yuzuha left, the ramen stall grew quiet.
Lin Yue asked softly, "Daddy, are those monsters... the 'Tailed Beasts' you mentioned?"
"Mm." Lin Shuo nodded.
"Two-Tails, Matatabi; Three-Tails, Isobu; Four-Tails, Son Goku."
"Are they... dangerous?"
"To ordinary people, very dangerous."
Lin Shuo said, "But to TOPS, they're valuable experimental materials."
He looked outside, where the streets of Lumina Square were beginning to bustle.
"So I have to find them before TOPS does and turn them into Bangboo-or at the very least, keep them from falling into someone else's hands."
"Are you going to catch them, Daddy?"
"..." Lin Shuo fell silent for several seconds.
"If necessary, yes."
But he knew perfectly well that his chakra had only recovered to seventy percent, and his ocular power had not fully recovered either.
He might be able to handle Two-Tails, Three-Tails, and Four-Tails, but if it were Eight-Tails or Nine-Tails...
Until he unlocked Perfect Susanoo, he would never take the initiative to go looking for those two sources of trouble.
After all, he did not have Naruto's talent for Talk no Jutsu.
Most of the time, he preferred to let his strength do the talking.
And his current strength was not enough.
At four that afternoon, on the second floor of Kaidan House.
The members of the Spook Shack had all gathered-though this "gathering place" was only the room Yuzuha shared with the younger girls, and it was a little cramped.
Komano Manato crouched in a corner-at nearly two meters tall, his head would hit the ceiling if he sat.
His red canine ears twitched slightly as he held the photos Lucia had taken with her Ether recorder.
Alicede sat on the edge of the bed, the rabbit ears amid her blond hair standing nervously upright, her mismatched eyes darting between the photos and the people in the room.
Today, she wore her school's pleated skirt, black tights encasing her slender calves, both hands clutching her skirt tightly.
"Th-these photos... aren't symmetrical! How scary!"
"Alice, the point is what's in them, not the symmetry."
Yuzuha sat beside her, smiling as she patted her shoulder.
Lucia sat cross-legged on the floor, her blue sheep horns gleaming faintly under the light.
She wore a hooded cloak, her green eyes sparkling, looking nothing like someone who had stayed up all night.
"I think they're really cute~"
She spoke in a voice full of energy.
"Especially that blue kitty. The patterns in its flames are super pretty! And that big turtle underwater-the patterns on its shell are like artwork!"
"They're monsters, Lucia."
Manato spoke helplessly.
"They're special Ether creatures!"
Lucia corrected him. "And they haven't attacked anyone first~ I watched them for several nights. They were just... playing?"
"Playing inside a Hollow?"
Alice's voice trembled.
"Yep~"
In a corner of the room, Idhila leaned against the wall, her purple eyes half-lidded beneath her short yellow hair, looking languid.
She wore an off-the-shoulder top and hot pants, her long legs crossed, holding a small notebook in which she occasionally jotted something down.
"So."
Idhila spoke, her voice carrying a slightly husky resonance. "TOPS is offering a ten-billion bounty, and you captured firsthand footage, Lucia, yet you turned down every commission-because 'they aren't bad people.'"
She raised her eyes toward Lucia. "Could you go into more detail, Lucia? Why do you think that?"
Lucia tilted her head. "It's just... a feeling. I can sense the 'emotions' of Ether creatures. These children... are very lost, very lonely, like they're looking for something."
She paused, then added, "And they have no malice in them. They're completely different from Ethereals."
Manato frowned. "But their Ether readings are very strong. According to Defense Force data, the peak activity of that 'blue fire cat demon' in Havarie Hollow is at least close to that of a Mercury Class Ethereal."
"Mercury Class?!" Even Alice's rabbit ears went rigid with fright.
"That makes them even more dangerous!"
Yuzuha grew nervous too. "If they suddenly go berserk, then-"
"They won't."
Lucia spoke with certainty. "I got within fifty meters of it, and it didn't attack me. It just glanced at me and ran away."
The room fell quiet for several seconds.
Idhila jotted a few notes in her notebook, then looked at Lin Shuo, who had remained silent the whole time.
"Lin Shuo, what do you think?"
Everyone's eyes turned toward him.
Lin Shuo sat in a chair by the window, with Lin You and Lin Yue behind him-the two little girls were very well behaved, simply listening quietly.
"I have a rough idea of what those creatures are."
Lin Shuo spoke, his voice calm. "They aren't Ethereals, and they aren't ordinary Ether creatures either. You could call them... 'Tailed Beasts.'"
"Tailed Beasts?" Manato repeated.
"Yes." Lin Shuo nodded.
"Their defining traits are enormous amounts of energy, and... a certain degree of intelligence."
He looked at Lucia. "Your instincts were right. They do have emotions and thoughts.
"But that's precisely what makes them more dangerous-once an intelligent, powerful creature is enraged or controlled, it can cause more destruction than a mindless Ethereal."
Alice grew even paler. "Th-then what do we do? TOPS is going to capture them. What if they get angry...?"
"That's why we need to act," Lin Shuo said.
"Find them before TOPS does, and determine their intentions and condition."
He paused. "But our goal isn't to capture them. It's to communicate."
"Communicate?" Yuzuha's eyes lit up.
"Lin Shuo, you can talk to them?"
"...I can try."
Lin Shuo made no guarantees.
In truth, he could try to establish contact with the Tailed Beasts through the system, but the success rate was uncertain.
Besides, one of his real goals was indeed to "subdue" these Tailed Beasts-in a sense, the Tailed Beasts brought here by the system were fighting strength prepared for him. He absolutely could not let TOPS get them.
"Then what should we do?" Manato asked.
"Havaray, Perseus, Solov-three Hollows, three targets. We don't have enough people."
"Split up." Idhila closed her notebook.
"Teams of two. Safety first, with reconnaissance as our priority."
She looked at Lin Shuo. "Lin Shuo, you and Yuzuha can be one team. Manato and Ailisi can be another... Weng and Lucia-"
"No!"
Alice immediately hugged Lucia's arm. "I want to go with Lucia! Sh-she knows the Hollows better!"
"Then I'll team up with Manato," Idhila readily agreed. "Lucia, take good care of Alice."
"Sure~" Lucia nodded happily.
"Don't be afraid, Alice. I'll protect you~"
Alice blushed. "Wh-who's afraid?! I just... think two people would be more efficient!"
Yuzuha snickered beside them, then looked at Lin Shuo. "Lin Shuo, when are we leaving?"
"Tomorrow after school," Lin Shuo said.
"We'll prepare today."
"Okay~"
The meeting ended, and everyone left one after another.
Manato and Idhila left first. Lucia pulled the still-trembling Alice downstairs to look at gray porcelain crafts-saying they would "soothe the soul with the beauty of symmetry."
Only Lin Shuo, Yuzuha, and his two daughters remained in the room.
"Lin Shuo."
Yuzuha suddenly leaned closer and lowered her voice. "That 'communication' you mentioned... do you have something else in mind?"
Lin Shuo looked into her sly green eyes and knew he could not hide it from her.
"...Yes."
"You want to capture them?"
"If necessary."
"Why?"
Lin Shuo fell silent for a few seconds, then said, "They don't belong in this world. If we leave them alone, they could cause even greater chaos. Besides..."
He looked out the window. TOPS's bounty notice was still displayed on the Inter-Knot homepage.
"We can't let TOPS get them."
Yuzuha stared at him for a long time, then sighed.
"You're always like this, Lin Shuo... taking all the responsibility onto yourself."
She took his hand. "But this time, I'm going with you-not as a burden, but as your partner."
Lin Shuo looked at her serious expression and finally nodded.
"...Okay."
Behind them, Lin You whispered to Lin Yue, "See? Mom's got something on Dad again~"
Lin Yue blinked. "Got something on him?"
"It means... Mom knows Dad will definitely say yes to her~"
Yuzuha blushed and turned to pinch Lin You's cheeks. "Little You! No eavesdropping on adults!"
"I wasn't eavesdropping! You were just talking too loudly!"
"Still making excuses!"
Watching Yuzuha and Lin You tussle, Lin Shuo's lips curved slightly.
Then he looked at Lin Yue.
"Xiao Yue."
"Yes?"
"When Yuzuha and I go out tomorrow, you and Lin You should go to Kaidan House. Li Baorong will look after you."
"Will you be gone for a long time, Dad?"
"...Maybe."
Lin Yue lowered her head and said quietly, "Be careful, Dad."
Lin Shuo ruffled her hair. "I will."
That night, Lin Shuo stood alone in front of the ramen stall, watching the constantly updating urban legend posts on Inter-Knot.
They were drawing more and more attention.
Someone claimed to have seen the silhouette of a "blue-flame cat demon" on the outskirts of Havarie Hollow.
Someone had picked up a "glowing turtle shell fragment" on the Perseus coast.
Someone had even photographed a "giant eye" emerging in the lava during an eruption at Solov Volcano.
At some point, TOPS's bounty had risen to fifteen billion.
The comments were going wild.
"Looking for a team! Experienced Hollow Raiders wanted!"
"TOPS is really going all out this time!"
"Catch one and you're set for life!"
Lin Shuo turned off the screen and looked up at the night sky.
The stars over New Eridu were bright, but tonight, there seemed to be a few extra, unusual "shooting stars"-streaking across the sky with blue, red, and ocher trails.
Those were traces left in the night sky by the Tailed Beasts' Ether reactions.
They really were on the move.
And... they were getting closer and closer to the Hollows' outer edges.
Lin Shuo closed his eyes and checked Shukaku's condition through the system.
Little Shukaku, in Bangboo form, was sleeping beside Lin Yue's pillow, the ocher tail on his back twitching now and then.
Shukaku, Lin Shuo called inwardly.
"...What?" Shukaku's groggy voice came through.
"The other Tailed Beasts... can you sense them?"
Shukaku fell silent for a few seconds.
"...Yes."
"What condition are they in?"
"...Chaotic." Shukaku sounded a little more awake.
"This world is rejecting them, just like it rejects yours truly. But unlike me, they don't have the system's help. They're... struggling."
"Will they attack humans?"
"Not necessarily," Shukaku said.
"But if they don't stabilize soon, it's only a matter of time before they go berserk."
Lin Shuo opened his eyes.
There was little time left.
He had to act as soon as possible.
But before that...
He looked toward the lit second-floor window of Kaidan House.
Yuzuha's silhouette moved behind the curtains, seemingly preparing something.
This girl was clearly afraid of him taking risks, yet she had still chosen to face them alongside him.
Warmth welled up in Lin Shuo's heart.
And so did determination.
This time, he would protect everyone.
Including those bewildered Tailed Beasts.
[System notification: New side quest triggered-"Tailed Beast Containment Plan"] [Quest objective: Find Two-Tails, Three-Tails, and Four-Tails before TOPS, and complete "Bangboo transformation" or establish stable contracts] [Quest reward: For each Tailed Beast subdued, unlock its corresponding chakra trait (such as Two-Tails' blue flames, Three-Tails' Water Release, etc.)] [Failure penalty: Tailed Beasts go berserk, causing a large-scale Hollow disaster; or Tailed Beasts are captured by TOPS and become enemy fighting strength] [Note: No signs of activity from Eight-Tails or Nine-Tails detected yet. Host is advised to prioritize the targets already exposed]
Lin Shuo closed the interface and took a deep breath.
Tomorrow, it would begin.
He had to be the one to put an end to this urban-legend mix-up caused by the Tailed Beasts.
(PS: Work's been getting busier lately, and my slacking-off time has shrunk drastically. There's nothing I can do-I can only do my best and try to put out a massive amount of updates every day.
Of course, that doesn't mean I don't want to write more. Faced with reality, some things can't be done just because you want to do them-I have to consider whether what I put in will actually be proportional to what I earn.
Still, thanks are due to all you wonderful readers-thank you for your comments, thank you for urging me to update, and thank you to everyone who has rated this book.)