Workings of the Mind [SOLO]

[CorenKeitaro]

Coren finished the seal, sighing.
It had been, what, three days in here?
Yeah, there was no way he was actually gonna wait the 1080 years.
Maybe it was about time to check up on the other tenant in this place; she always knew how to toss things up.
With that, Coren blinked once and arrived in front of the large cage.
"Hey-o!" he said jovially.
"Go **** yourself."
Coren smirked as she growled.
Being God here meant he could censor her words, and there really wasn't much that was as fun as making her angry.
"That's not nice. Is that any way to talk to your only friend?"
"I could ask you the same question."
Coren chuckled.
"Are you ever going to be a bit more tolerable, Kiyomi?"
The woman, red-haired and in a red kimono, scowled at him.
"Are you ever gonna stop censoring my ****ing words?" she said, a loud beeping noise covering her up.
"The moment you stop swearing is the moment I'll stop censoring them."
"Well, then I suppose you've got your ****ing answer."
"...You're just swearing 'cause you know it annoys me, aren't you?"
"Maybe."
Uncool.
He looked at Kiyomi, who's red hair fell down to her lower back, who sat with her legs crossed on what Coren assumed to be a comfy chair. He was guessing that from the fact that her butt never seemed to leave it.
"So, how's the body?"
"It's not working as well as I'd hoped."
"Yeah, well, seducing the mentally unstable is a very tricky affair. Nice name you chose, though; it translates into 'beauty', doesn't it?"
"You really don't know much Japanese, do you?"
"Nope!"
She growled at him.
"Why did you even bother giving me a consciousness? I'm supposed to just be a coalition of your dark side, not be a god damn woman!"
"Because I knew you'd stop whispering in my ear the moment you had something more pressing to do."
With that, Coren sat down on a chair he whisked into existence.
"After all, little miss Cursed Seal of Heaven, I can't go letting you take control of me while I'm not looking, now can I?"
"You're a sick man."
"I'm not sick; I'll have you know I'm fit as a fiddle. Now sanity; there's a part of me that can't be found."
"You decided that giving the creepy voice in your head a consciousness, a body of their choice, free-roam of a large portion of your mind, and the comfiest chair in the whole of non-existence was a good idea."
"And last time I checked, I was still in full control of my own mind, and you're in a cage." Leaning his chin into his hand, his smile widened. "Perhaps that's how all should handle their little problems?"
"Nobody in their right mind is stupid enough to try and do what you do, you complete ****ing- WOULD YOU STOP THAT!?"
He laughed at her outburst.
"If you don't want to hear it, just don't cuss. I don't see what's so hard about it."
"I'll show you hard, you little..." She trailed off, shaking her head. "You're a prick, you know that?"
"Yet I'm the one who didn't censor that," he responded casually. "In any case, any progress?"
"...Maybe."
Coren frowned.
"Oh, come on; I've given you three days to work on it. There has to be something noteworthy."
"..." She turned away, sighing. "The Cursed Seal of Heaven has a portion of Orochimaru's soul in it; if he dies, he'll recreate himself in your body and take it over."
"..." Coren tilted his head slightly. "...That's a 'maybe'? That... Sounds pretty important."
"Yeah, well, you can go **** yourself."
She turned her chair around 180* degrees and walked away. On her chair. Without moving her legs.
...Stupid Mindscape; why don't you make any sense?
Sighing, Coren entered her cage.
"Alright, show me to the seal."
She responded with a sigh of her own, and she opened the portal there.
Orochimaru had contingencies in place so that Coren couldn't access the area, but there's nothing saying the seal itself couldn't show the way.
...Exploiting loopholes is fun.

---

Kiyomi walked up to a door, which seemed utterly massive compared to everything else.
"So... Shall we?" she asked.
"Let's."
She opened the door and walked through, and Coren followed.
His first response to it was
"Holy s**t!"
To which she turned to him, and said with a confused expression
"You even censor yourself? Seriously?"
At that, Coren chuckled awkwardly, before refocusing on the situation at hand.
The room he was standing in was the size of an entire castle, and every inch of floor, wall, and ceiling space was filled with sigils; there were even hundreds upon thousands, if not millions more simply floating about.
"...I think I can see why you had trouble navigating this."
"No s**t."
Coren bit down his witty reply, instead focusing on following her through this chaotic amalgamation of symbols.
It took a few minutes, but she finally found what appeared to be the only sigil that wasn't writhing and moving about like some snake of ink.
"Here."
She placed her hand on it and it began to glow, until suddenly, a white snake began to slither out of it.
"...What're you doing?"
"If you want to control the seal, you'll have to fight Orochimaru," she casually responded. "It's only a small portion of his power, so you should be fine."
"...I get to keep my god powers, right?"
Kiyomi just started laughing before shaking her head.
"You're funny."
With a sigh, Coren stared as the white snake finished slithering out of the seal, before raising its head.
Its face began to morph until Orochimaru's face appeared on it.
"How did you find the seal?" he asked, surprised to see the boy here.
"Doesn't matter." Snapping his fingers, the entire room shifted so that Coren was staring down Orochimaru in a large, open plain. The entire place had a thick layer of brown dirt beneath their feet that seemingly stretched on for eternity.
"...You think you can beat me?" he asked, a smile busting through on his face. "You think you can defeat the Snake Sage himself?"
"I may not be using my god powers for this," he responded calmly, "but that doesn't mean I'm completely weak. This's my world; I've got the home-field advantage."
The grin on Orochimaru's face only widened as his body finally finished morphing into a human shape; he seemed to be wearing a snake-skin coat now.
"This I just have to see. Come, boy; show me your true power."
Coren smirked.
"Mental Inhibitors 1-15: Removed."
The entire area began to shake powerfully, and Coren yelled over the sound of screeching steel
"Authorization Code 666: Kingdom of Eternity, activate."
The entire plain suddenly began to morph; steel arose from the ground in giant pillars, criss-crossing in a seemingly chaotic manner. The steel pillars only grew larger and thicker as they erupted through the ground, and sky grew to be tinged with orange, the twilight approaching.
"Come, Heralded Sage," he said confidently. "Do you have enough snakes at your disposal?"
And with that, the fight began.
Coren ducked under a sudden blast of chakra, which tore a clean hole through a steel pillar. The pillar began to reform, though, and grew even larger.
Coren responded by warping behind Orochimaru and bisecting him, splattering blood across the field before leaping back and blocking a blade that he recognized well.
The upper half of Orochimaru's body held itself aloft by several snakes going from the bottom of his chest to the ground, and the god-slaying blade Kusanagi was there, where a hand would normally be.
His own blade held up well against such a renowned one, and Coren even managed to push him backwards, sending the upper body back to the lower one.
He sighed as he watched the snakes interlace each other, reattaching the body.
"How troublesome," he said, stealing the catchphrase of an old friend of his.
He ducked as Kusanagi's blade extended and nearly impaled him, barely avoiding it as he ran towards him.
Running through several hand-seals, he screamed out
"Fire Style: Demon Flame Armor!"
His entire arm flooded with chakra as he threw his punch hard enough and with enough chakra behind it that it actually tore Coren's arm clean off as the entirety of Orochimaru's mid-section was disintegrated.
Coren leaped away from the now-screaming Snake Sage, placing his hand on the stump that was his arm and willing it to grow.
He ducked under a vicious strike from his opponent as his body began reconstructing the arm's bones and muscles quickly. He dodged to the side yet again as he charged forward once more, this time forming one-handed seals.
"Water Style: Scalding Waterfall!"
He summoned up a river of water from a seal on his chest, before super-heating it with his will and slamming the entirety of it into Orochimaru, who responded by forming handseals of his own as his flesh melted.
"Fire Style: Flaming Dragon Bullets!"
The fire tore clean through the water, evaporating it instantly as Coren slapped his hands together and slammed them into the ground.
A pillar of steel suddenly shot upwards with him on it, taking him out of the hit-range of the fireballs and send him right into the air.
Forming another few hand-seals, he decided that perhaps a new technique would help. Or maybe five.
"Take this!" he yelled out from high above, "The Five Apocalyptic Dragons!"
If this weren't his mind, he'd die from chakra exhaustion.
But now, above him, there were the five dragons of the elements.
The Hellfire Dragon, Water Serpent, Earthen Drake, Wyrm of the Wind and the Thunderous Wyvern.
They all crashed down onto Orochimaru, obliterating every trace of his body as Coren fell to the ground gracefully, his hands still in the final seal.
Quickly whirling around, he blocked Kusanagi as Orochimaru hissed at him.
"You mimic the techniques of others and do nothing else; you even went as far to steal the Byakugan."
"Look who's talking, body-thief." Orochimaru smirked at that.
"I may be a body-thief, but I have a question."
As the Snake Sage's knee met Coren's stomach, he hissed into the boy's ear
"How can you say you're better than me now, hmm?"
He snap-kicked Coren in the chest, sending him cruising backwards.
As he tumbled painfully across the ground, he tried to stabilize himself, but couldn't do it fast enough. He slammed into a steel pillar and screamed out as his skull split open like a walnut.
He fell to his knees, feeling the concussion he just got.
He heard Orochimaru walking forward and could practically feel the smirk on his face.
"How can you beat me if you don't even consider yourself my better morally, let alone physically?"
Coren chuckled painfully, before making eye-contact.
"Morals are for the dead and dying."
He slammed his hand against the ground suddenly, the entire world beginning to shift.
"Restriction 367: Release!"
The entire world began to fade into a bleak white, before Coren said
"Eternal Oblivion!"
Then, all went black.

---

Kiyomi sighed, watching the fight.
They were pretty even, but Orochimaru seemed to have the advantage.
Now if only Coren hadn't gone and darkened the whole damn room; if he didn't, she could watch him get mutilated.
She sighed again, checking Coren's various self-imposed mental restrictions for number 367.
"...Oh s**t," was all she could muster.

---

As light reappeared in the battlefield, Orochimaru laughed heartily.
"You can't run from me, boy! I will find you!"
"Who says I'm hiding?"
Orochimaru whipped around, but not before Coren's armored hand shot out and crushed his skull like a melon.
Next, he drove his blade into the snake's core, lighting it aflame and making it explode violently.
Stepping back, Coren created a massive ball of energy and dropped it on the entrails of the Sennin, obliterating him completely yet again.
"Oh?" he asked, now around thirty feet to Coren's left, "And what might that piece of fashion be?"
Coren turned his heavily-armored head.
His entire body was covered in armor as black as dusk. The metals were like nothing that existed in reality, but otherwise it seemed like a simple knight's outfit, the sword he was wielding excluded.
His katana had completely changed form, and now resembled what could only be akin to a cleaver. It was of black steel with a silver edge, and the handle seemed to be covered in bloodied bandages; the blade extended around as long as Coren's entire body, and now it was pointed towards Orochimaru.
"You have no idea how annoying using this form is," he said coldly. "I am a man of infinite personalities; my entire mind is an absolute hell-hole. It's like having DID on an impossible scale, because every bit of my mind is constantly going against itself. That's what the restrictions are for; each one is a different personality. Number 367 is this form; a mind made entirely from The Darkness."
Orochimaru's eyes widened.
"I'm running low on time," Coren said, a smile now appearing. "But somehow, I don't care."
And then, through the slits in the armor, Orochimaru could plainly see the boy's eyes.
Darkness engulfed them, and now only black orbs remained.
With a bestial roar, Coren launched forward, and it took every bit of Orochimaru's strength to simply block the first blow, yet he struck several times a second.
He leaped away, forming several hand-seals.
"Hellfire Dragon!" he screamed.
As the dragon blasted forward, Coren simply laughed.
"Let me show you the truest darkness."
With a single swing of his blade, the entire dragon was cleaved in half, and he didn't even slow down.
This right here wasn't Coren; 99% of his personalities were still called that, but there were some who weren't.
And Nightmare was one of them.
Orochimaru began to panic, throwing out every dragon from the Apocalyptic Five, only for them to be dismantled in a single swing. He couldn't even run away, either; Nightmare was faster.
As long as he was in his own mind, Orochimaru couldn't run.
Here and now, he knew terror.
With others, even with Sarutobi Hiruzen, Orochimaru could always weasel his way out because of his morals.
But this thing wasn't like that. It didn't have morals that could be exploited; it was fast, it was rageful, and it was powerful.
It was too damn stupid to not be a threat, and that filled Orochimaru with more fear than he'd ever felt.
Nightmare slammed his blade into Kusanagi again and again, and no matter how hard he tried, Orochimaru couldn't stop him as the blade bit into his flesh.
Nightmare should be infinitely weaker than him; he has techniques forbidden to the world, yet he was losing. Why?
Because Nightmare didn't care.
Not about fear, pain, agony, despair; all that mattered was the fight, the blood, the absolute terror on the face of his opponent.
It was intoxicating.
And that's why Nightmare's howling laughter echoed throughout his mind as he ripped and tore through Orochimaru, as the blood of the snakes splattered across the ground; it mattered not how many times he maimed and murdered his opponent, as he always stood back up.
It was not much of a challenge, but it was enough.
This was the pinnacle of life for him.
And as he slammed his blade down over and over onto the now impossible to recognize form of Orochimaru, he laughed harder and harder until all that remained was a bloody splotch of obliterated flesh that he still beat.
Finally, he stopped, looking over his handiwork with the grin that only appeared on those who have long-since abandoned the shackles of humanity.
And then, he let out one more thunderous laugh and impaled his blade right into the center of the flesh.
Light flooded the area, a seal forming upon the bloodied earth; every bit of flesh was crushed and disintegrated as it was wiped from his mind completely.
But his power still remained, embedded into the black blade of Nightmare.
The Cursed Seal was now the property of Coren Keitaro, and the power could be felt flowing through.
Slowly, Nightmare's eyes began to return to normal, his purpose here finished.
As Coren regained control, he slumped downwards, his cleaver transforming into his katana as he fell to his knees. His armor began to disintegrate, black ashes floating away from him in the hellish wasteland that the battle had created.
"I did it," he muttered to himself. "I won."

---

Kiyomi's eyes were impossibly wide.
That killing intent...
There was nothing that she had ever heard of that was that bloodthirsty.
First Hanako having DID, and now Coren having DID on steroids?
"What the Hell is wrong with this team..?"

---

Coren's eyes opened, his body feeling fine but his mind feeling like someone used it as a battlefield.
Oh, wait, that actually did happen.
He looked around; the medical bay of Konohagakure was a comforting sight. Lilligant was probably his nurse, and was also probably going to walk in soon, slap him in the face, then hug him tearfully, saying something like
"Don't you ever do that again!"
Coren blinked, reaching his hand to his cheek.
Damn, he really needed to pay more attention. He was supposed to be predicting, not narrating as it happened.
"...Sorry, Lilly," he said to the teary-faced girl. "I honestly wasn't expecting that to happen."
"That's a load of bull!" She glared at the boy, her anger beating out her sadness and relief. "I watched everything happen on the TV, and I know that you knew what would happen!"
Coren turned his gaze away from her, feeling disproportionately guilty.
"...Sorry," he said again, his voice somber. "I went overboard; I wanted to know who was stronger, and I wasn't willing to give up. I'm really very sorry for making you worry, so please stop crying. I don't know what to do when people cry."
She closed her eyes for a moment, taking a deep breath.
"...No, I'm sorry. I... Forgot about your predicament."
The boy just nodded.
"I guess we're both sorry, huh?" she asked, her tone getting a bit more upbeat.
Again, he just nodded.
"Damnit," she thought, "Now what? I'm supposed to be his friend, but I just slapped him and yelled at him..."
Coren's thoughts were a bit similar.
"Great, I made her cry. I can handle a fight with a Sennin, but I can't even move a muscle when it comes to crying women. Some friend I'm supposed to be."
They both sat there in silence for a moment.
"Want to get some-"
"Again, I'm really-"
The both stopped, having been speaking at the same time.
"...Some pizza?" Lilly finished. "You've been getting fed intravenously, so you're probably pretty hungry."
Coren tilted his head slightly, but then nodded.
"...I suppose I am."
With that, Lilligant stood up, her frown replaced by that caring smile of hers as she offered Coren her hand.
"Well, let's go then!"
With how infectious hers was, Coren couldn't help but smile himself.
"Yeah; let's."
And with that, he took her hand and they walked on out to get some food.
All the while, Coren looked around and said to himself
"It's good to be home..."

[CorenKeitaro]

This thread has been concluded.
A journey of the mind was undertaken, and Coren Keitaro came out victorious.

Deep within the recesses of Coren's mind, he went to the cage of Kiyomi, the foul-mouthed manifestation of the Cursed Seal of Heaven. Letting her lead him to the Cursed Seal itself, he found a room larger than he had expected with millions of sigils all around the area. It was here that Orochimaru was found; quickly changing venues, Coren began to fight with the Snake Sennin, though through the strength of being within his own mind and Orochimaru's weakness from being such a small portion of himself, they were on even levels for a time.
However, Coren then led with a big reveal; his mind was, by far, the most damaged of his team, with him having an infinite number of personalities, all different from each other. Number 367 was released; the demonic beast by the name of Nightmare. Fast and powerful were his strikes, and his mindless hounding after the blood of the sage inspired fear even in the Snake's stalwart heart.
In time, Orochimaru found himself completely obliterated under the brute force of Nightmare's strikes, his body no longer any more than a fleshy mass of blood and bones that look like naught more than dust. The power of the cursed seal was absorbed into Nightmare's blade, and now Coren has found himself awake again. After a short meeting with his closest friend, nurse, and psychiatrist all in one woman, and a meeting of her hand and his face, she took him for a meal.
This has brought a complete end to the Chunin Exams Ark, with Coren finally free of the worry of endless combat, of backstabbing and pain as they venture towards their goals. Now, he can simply be happy living here, in his home with his friends.
But the life of a ninja is never so easy; soon enough, he will be proclaimed chunin, but that simply means he will be placed on even harder missions, and that means there are far more stories to tell.
And what of the Cursed Seal? Why is Kiyomi there, and what purpose shall she serve? And what could this power mean for Coren?
Tune in next time to find out, at www.TNTNaruUzu.forumotion.com

Bonuses:
Completed Solo Thread: +5 EXP
Trained in Sealing (3 Days): +15 Sealing
Defeated Orochimaru - Mindscape: +20 EXP
Absorbed the Power of the Cursed Seal: Story Perk: Cursed Seal (+5 Sealing, +5 Endurance, -5 Luck)>Story Perk: Cursed Seal (+10 Sealing, +10 Endurance, +10 Chakra Levels)
Released Restriction 367: Gained Story Perk: Nightmare Mode (Can replace current consciousness with Nightmare, permanently changes Byakugan eye black)