"Human! You don't keep your word!"
Nine-Tails' screams echoed across the entire back mountain. Even though tailed beasts couldn't die in the truest sense, they could still feel pain. Every single one of Naruto's punches made Kurama's eyes water, chakra tears threatening to fall.
"Hmph. I, Uzumaki Naruto, always keep my word." Naruto shook his head, genuinely offended by the accusation. "I said one finger would defeat you, and one finger did defeat you. Now I'm using my fist because you've already been defeated. That doesn't violate my promise at all."
The fact that Nine-Tails would accuse him of dishonesty only made Naruto angrier. His fists fell even faster.
"BANG! BANG! BANG!"
Though the Seventh Hokage had retreated to a safe distance, his eyelids still twitched watching his partner's miserable state. Eventually, he couldn't bear to look anymore and closed his eyes. After all, Kurama had been his fighting companion for many years.
Still, the Seventh Hokage felt a certain relief. At least the object of Naruto's violent "education" was Nine-Tails and not himself this time.
Kurama, you have my sympathy, he thought silently. Good luck.
"Do you beg for mercy?" Naruto asked again.
"No! I won't... If you've got the guts, let me go and we'll have a proper fight!"
This exchange repeated for over an hour.
Just when Nine-Tails thought Naruto would never stop, the fists suddenly ceased. The finger pressing him down lifted away. Naruto stood on the ground and said casually, "Fine. Now I'm letting you go. Show me what you've got."
Released from that crushing pressure, Nine-Tails felt a surge of joy. He scrambled to his feet and declared triumphantly, "Witness my Continuous Tailed Beast Barrage!"
Nine-Tails opened his mouth wide. A strange sound emerged: "Blub-blub-blub..."
A series of bubble-like Tailed Beast Balls floated out. But before they could travel even ten centimeters from his mouth, they popped with soft sounds and dissipated harmlessly into the air.
Nine-Tails froze, staring in disbelief.
"What did you do to me?!" Only now did Kurama realize something was terribly wrong. He looked down at himself and discovered his body had shrunk to the size of a kitten. Weakness pervaded every fiber of his being.
He jumped up and down in outrage, confronting Naruto. "What did you do?!"
"What could I do? I just beat you a little." Naruto looked down at the kitten-sized Nine-Tails with amusement. This Nine-Tails is actually pretty cute like this.
"Unforgivable! Blub-blub-blub!"
Nine-Tails launched himself at Naruto's face with an angry expression, firing a continuous stream of Tailed Beast Balls. But these "attacks" were nothing more than bubbles that expanded and popped harmlessly when they touched Naruto's skin.
Zero offensive power.
Even cuter, Naruto thought, watching the display.
"ARGH! I'm so angry!" Seeing his attacks reduced to this pathetic state, seeing himself shrunk to this humiliating size, Nine-Tails understood that Naruto had somehow depleted his chakra so severely that he couldn't even maintain his normal form, let alone launch proper attacks.
The Seventh Hokage had kept his eyes closed throughout the beating. After all, if he opened his eyes while Naruto was still pummeling Nine-Tails and did nothing to help, that would make him a terrible partner.
But if he kept his eyes closed? Then technically he wasn't watching Nine-Tails get beaten.
The logic was clear and well-founded.
However, when the sounds of violence finally stopped, he cautiously opened his eyes. Instead of the massive demon fox he expected, he saw an orange kitten-sized creature bouncing up and down in front of Naruto, baring its tiny fangs and occasionally spitting blue bubbles.
"This... is my Nine-Tails?" The Seventh Hokage was utterly baffled.
Before Naruto could answer, Nine-Tails whirled on his container with righteous fury. "Naruto! Why didn't you help me just now?! We could have merged and defeated this guy together! We agreed to be partners who fight together, but you just watched me get beaten! Have you forgotten what Kakashi-sensei taught you about the bonds between partners?!"
"I kept my eyes closed the whole time," the Seventh Hokage said tentatively, his logic somehow both flawless and terrible. "So I wasn't technically watching you get beaten, right?"
Besides, even if we merged, we'd still lose to this monster.
"You—!" Nine-Tails was so blocked by those words that he couldn't find a proper rebuttal. But he was still furious.
And when Nine-Tails got angry, the result was...
"Blub-blub-blub!" A stream of harmless Tailed Beast Ball bubbles spat from his mouth, attacking both the Seventh Hokage and young Naruto with equal indignation.
Both completely ignored the assault and continued their conversation.
"Naruto," the Seventh Hokage said uncertainly, "is this really my Nine-Tails?"
The question earned him another round of "sweet critical hits" from the bubble barrage.
"Absolutely genuine," young Naruto confirmed with a nod. "I might have knocked out too much of his chakra. He can't maintain his size anymore. But don't worry—he'll recover in a few days. Your strength won't drop permanently."
The Seventh Hokage looked down at the "blub-blub-blubbing" Nine-Tails, still unable to accept reality. His Nine-Tails was supposed to be a ruthless demon fox, not this explosively cute ball of fluff.
"Naruto, are you absolutely sure this isn't yours?"
"It's definitely yours. Mine is still in my world. I didn't bring him with me."
"I see..." Understanding dawned on the Seventh Hokage's face. Naruto's strength must have allowed him to grant his Nine-Tails freedom without dying in the process.
After the Fourth Shinobi War, his own Kurama could have been freed as well, but under the Sage of Six Paths' arrangement, Nine-Tails had chosen to remain sealed inside him to help coordinate with the other tailed beasts.
But Naruto's next words made the Seventh Hokage freeze completely.
"My Nine-Tails left my body when I was five years old."
The Seventh Hokage's mind reeled. He knew that without the Sage of Six Paths' intervention, the tailed beast extraction meant death for the Jinchūriki. The symbiotic relationship was unequal—remove the beast, and the container died.
His own mother, Kushina, had been extracted by Obito during the Nine-Tails attack. Even the Uzumaki clan's exceptional vitality had only delayed death for a short time. In the end, she'd still died.
Naruto read the concern on his older self's face and offered an ambiguous explanation that satisfied without revealing the full truth about the Ultimate Taijutsu System.
"Anyway," Naruto said, changing the subject, "didn't you want to go home?"
"Yes, right!" The Seventh Hokage nodded quickly. He glanced at the Nine-Tails still spitting bubbles at both of them from the ground, then prepared to withdraw into his sealed space.
"Wait!" Naruto stopped him.
He looked down at the adorable miniaturized Kurama and smiled. "You know, the current Nine-Tails is actually really cute. Himawari would love him. How about I keep him in my sealed space temporarily? Let him play with Himawari and Boruto tomorrow."
Hearing those words, Nine-Tails—who'd just spit out another bubble—sucked it back in immediately. He raised his head and gave Naruto the most resentful look a tiny fox could manage.
Just that one glance spoke volumes of indignation.
Naruto communicated briefly with the system. The fake sealed space inside his body still existed from when his own Nine-Tails had lived there during the Wave Country mission. It would work perfectly as temporary housing for this world's Kurama.
In the next instant, Nine-Tails was pulled into Naruto's sealed space mid-"blub-blub."
The Seventh Hokage stood there, stunned.
"..."
Wait. I don't remember agreeing to this?
But Naruto had already turned away, clearly considering the matter settled.
The Seventh Hokage looked at the empty space where his partner had been, sighed deeply, and wondered what he'd tell Himawari tomorrow when she discovered her father's demon fox had been temporarily kidnapped by her other father.
This is going to be complicated to explain, he thought wearily.
But at least Kurama would be safe. Probably. Maybe.
Hopefully.