Chapter 146 - Panic

Nuwa sharply inhales and her upper body bolts upright to hug Zagreus the moment her consciousness returns. She looks around to find herself back in the familiar dark pantheon of Chaos' Lair, but with a body this time, instead of as a soul. Her lungs do not hurt anymore, but her head aches. Most of her hair-snakes are unresponsive, presumably dead.

She notices that she is being princess-carried by Zagreus, who looks worse for wear as well. His health had been brought back up to 30% before jumping due to the Boon from Dionysus, but now he looks like he's about to die. Nuwa's heart melts at how he is more worried about her than himself, even though he is on his last legs. She whispers, "I'm ok.. Don't be so reckless next time."

At the end of the floating pantheon, there is the ocean of black-purple void substance and the large eldritch form of Chaos with its eyes closed, at about the height of a two story house. Even Zagreus had been spooked at the pressure emanating from the statue, so he froze up and caught Nuwa when she fell in after him. He returns an apologetic smile to her for getting them both hurt by jumping in.

Nuwa hops out of his arms and, while trying to ignore her headache, shoots him in the heart with two Casts, leaving her with 10 heals remaining. They only recover 10% of his health each, but having him back at 20% gives her peace of mind that he will not just topple over dead. Normally, landing in a dark and small area with a statue would be the cue for a final boss fight, but Zagreus is not the type to ever attack first, so he remains calm but vigilant. Nuwa whispers to Zagreus, fully expecting Chaos to hear, "This is Nyx's parent (no gender). Be respectful."

Zagreus feels the tension drain out of him, "Why didn't you say so? We're family then."

He walks up and habitually the statue much like he would a Boon, "In the name of Hades..! Oh woops. Um.. I mean.. Hello."

Nuwa awkwardly stifles her giggles amidst her rising terror.

Chaos opens its many eyes and proclaims in a tone resembling a cacophony of numerous voices, "The Olympians have all grown soft.. would you not agree?"

Zagreus does not know what to say. He's especially grateful to many of them for their help, but he does not want to outright disagree. Nuwa replies vaguely on his behalf, "You could say that."

Chaos continues, "Balance is the way of all things. Even I, Chaos, am not exempt. You have each paid in blood, now choose your Blessings."

Nuwa thinks, 'Phew.. it seems Chaos is not going to act against us further. It disagrees with the free Boons from Olympus, huh? Thankfully, it only wants to drain some blood and not seal me all over again.'

Zagreus gets a choice of powerful Boons on a floating panel, all of which have to be earned by defeating a certain amount of chambers with a handicap applied to him. He picks the one that increases his attack speed by 30%. This would synergize with Artemis' Support Fire arrow spam. To unlock this Boon, he is not allowed to Cast for 3 chambers, which will lower his DPS slightly, but not by too much.

The other choices are hardcore. There is a Boon that lowers his vitality to a third of his max, but he would restore health with every successful attack. The handicap for that is to go without using his regular attack for 4 chambers. He would have to kill enemies only using his spear throw and Casts, which he cannot imagine doing unless Nuwa becomes a lot stronger than she is now.

The final Boon allows him to toggle a rage status on himself that lets him do 3x damage on auto-attacks in return for continuously damaging his body at a slow pace. He would have picked this one if he did not have Support Fire. It would have been a nice surprise for Megaera. He hopes that Chaos shows up more often so they can get another shot at Boons as powerful as these.

Nuwa's three choices focus on improving the healing aspect of her Casts on Zagreus, her mobility, or the 'sync rate' of pairing with Zagreus. Her penalties vary between not being allowed to Cast to lowering her movement speed by 40%, which would be devastating. She picks the 'sync rate' Boon, since it has the lightest penalty of not being allowed to use her regular attack of normal arrows. Her Cast does not count as a regular attack, so being unable to attack is fine in her case, unlike Zagreus'.

After selecting their respective Boons, Zagreus and Nuwa watch the panel burst into black-purple smog and enter their body through their mouth and nose. Nuwa can tell she is still capable of using her regular attack, but she has a feeling she won't like it if she attempts it. Zagreus has that same feeling for his Cast.

Chaos declares, "Go forth then, Son of Hades. I shall speak with the Deathwalker in private."

Nuwa pulls up her courage to object, "It's fine. There's no secrets between my brother and I."

Zagreus nods, holds her hand, and squeezes it to calm her nerves. She needs it because she has a bad feeling about what's coming next.

"Deathwalker, I have established contact with the place from whence you came. I sense you will be displeased with the current trajectory of fate for your progeny." declares Chaos. It then projects a screen with the eye on its forehead.

Nuwa's eyes bulge out and the snakes that are still alive hiss in utter rage! Zagreus is forced to let go of her hand out of fear that his own rage would snap her bones. Upon the screen, Zina is getting gangbanged publicly in a bar by 3 older men!

~ ~ ~

Naruto wonders, 'What is a Normality Ring? It definitely isn't normal.. how confusing.'

Kakashi and Azula notice Naruto running dry on chakra, but when they look back and see him looking wondrously at his hand, they pass it off as him still being high and flubbing random jutsus. They soon arrive at the undamaged and imposing south gate and walk alongside the vehicles exiting. Shinobi using Eight Gates are much faster than vehicles, so they are mostly used by commoners. There used to be aerial vehicles until it was discovered that they were too easy to get shot down by tailed beasts.

Passing through the open metal doors, the Kakashi leads the team on a run as he shoots off-road in a southeastern direction. The teens need some effort to keep up, especially Naruto, who is out of chakra, and therefore lacks the shock absorption to handle the rougher landings as they leap rapidly from hill to tree or tree to tree. The Eight Gates technique itself is a means of unlocking the power of the human body and does not require constant chakra input. Only the opening of the gates for the first time does.

Thankfully for Naruto, Kakashi stops at a clearing with relatively sparse trees after only 2 km (1.3 mi). He's got his hands in his pockets, looking relatively laid back. Earlier, he did not mean to come off as a creep. He just has no idea how to talk to girls after reading too much Icha Icha Paradise.

All children start their education with learning basic chakra control and agricultural jutsu. Most drop out after learning these and go on to become commoners, mostly farmers and other trades. This allows them the basic chakra control of powering vehicles and ready-made seals. Only the more motivated and gifted go on to learn combat jutsu.

Kakashi had been very good at combat jutsu, but terrible at social skills and teamwork. That's how he ended up placed in the same box as Naruto by Azula, which is somewhat of a misunderstanding, because he is not interested in her body due to knowing that she is a futanari. This is in contrast to Naruto, who doesn't care at all. He'll perv on anything female.

Azula lands her jump lightly next to Kakashi. She is used to aerial movement from her days of firebending, so she easily picks up traversing the forest at high speed with just the strength of her body. What had been more difficult was cushioning her leaps and landings so they do not cause destruction. It takes fine muscle and chakra control to launch her body high into the air from a thin branch without breaking it. She had picked it up over the past year though.

The two adults wait for the teens to arrive. Sasuke arrives first, followed by Shikamaru, Ino, Hinata, and Naruto. Hinata had slowed down to make sure Naruto did not lose track of them. He closes his eyes, takes deep breaths, and plops himself down on his butt. Hinata leans down to attempt some first aid. Chakra is tied closely to one's spiritual body, so it cannot be gifted or stolen safely. Between two people, it can only be traded in equal quantities through dual cultivation.

Hinata cannot give him chakra, but she does use some basic medical ninjutsu to treat his bones and muscles. Naruto calms down and begins to recover some chakra from his Crown Chakra point. He feels a cooling sensation on his legs and sees Hinata's side profile with her conservatively covered big boobs hanging down almost to her thighs as she bends over and heals him.

His penis unavoidably rises to form an obvious bulge on his trousers, but an odd circumstance occurs next. Naruto opens his eyes wide and thinks incredulously, 'What's this!? She is healing me and my erection is in clear view, but she's not blushing, recoiling, slapping, or kicking me! Is she pretending not to see it to save herself the embarrassment?'

Hinata's casual nonchalance to the tent on his crotch continues even as her healing approaches his upper thighs and the bulge on his crotch is almost right next to her hand. By now, Naruto knows that she cannot be pretending, otherwise she would have stopped much earlier. 'This isn't normal. How is this possible? Hang on, "normal"?.. the Normality Ring?!'

Azula and Kakashi begin exchanging blows in the distance. Sasuke can barely see them move, except for the times they are forced to stop momentarily by the clash of their extremities, which let out loud sounds of dull impacts. Shikamaru is uncharacteristically paying attention to the fight, but Ino gets bored. She glances over at Hinata, Naruto, and his bulge, before returning her attention to the fight, but continues to peek at Sasuke as she had been doing on the walk.

Naruto notices Ino's gaze pass over his crotch and finds that even she has no reaction! 'What the heck! Does this ring make anything I do "normal"..? Well then, what if I do this?'

With the intention of testing the ring's limits, Naruto manufactures an accident where he brushes the back of his hand on the bottom of Hinata's left tit as he gets up to his feet. Sure enough, he feels his hand stroke along the soft, heavy boobflesh across several layers of cloth, which makes the subsequent total body paralysis that Hinata gives him by slamming his chest with two of her knuckles a worthwhile trade.

Now fully paralyzed, Naruto reconsiders his earlier thoughts. '..Maybe that's not how it works.'

Hinata blushes profusely as she covers her boob with her arm and shoots a chakra string at his Throat chakra and connects her end to her own Throat. She transmits privately, "..Naruto, you dummy! Don't make me feel weird in public."

Naruto can still speak mentally so he quickly asks, "Hold on! You would have been ok with me groping you if it was in private?!"

Hinata's blush begins to fade and she replies as if stating the obvious, "Yeah, that'd be normal."

Apparently, Naruto's paralysis does not extend to his third leg because it immediately goes full mast. He cannot believe how lucky he is to have found this ring! Without even having to learn seduction or train his shinobi skills, he can already begin to worship the female body of his busty classmate! No one pays any attention to his tent!

Hinata regains her composure and feels guilty for automatically using her recently learned chi-blocking on Naruto when she got caught off guard by his groping. She approaches him and undoes her block, before getting embarrassed that she is touching him so intimately.

Meanwhile, Naruto is amazed how close she allows his tent to come to her crotch and her sudden embarrassment at her own actions, but not his. 'So far.. I think this Normality Ring will let me watch, but not touch? At least not freely. This would have made my peeping so much easier, but I am no longer satisfied with that inferior goal. I need to fuck, which means I need to figure out exactly how this ring works!'

The fight between Azula and Kakashi reaches a climax. Azula throws a large fire jutsu consisting of a chain of fireballs. Kakashi activates his Byakugan to identify the weakest point in the fire entrapment, penetrates it with a lightning-boosted charge and redirects his charge after passing the jutsu to slam into the shoulder of the unsuspecting Azula with an open palm.

If he had been attacking more seriously with a lightning-charged weapon and not avoiding lethal blows, he could have stabbed her through the heart. Kakashi had even covered his body with chakra armor to block the flames that did land on him. The winner is clear. He says, "Good fight." To which Azula reluctantly grumbles back, "Good fight." She is still not used to not being at the top of the food chain.

She checks the kids to make sure they are not up to something. Ino is a little suspicious with how close she is to Sasuke. She finds that Naruto and Hinata are directly next to each other, but that's normal, and so is Naruto's raging erection. Giving a short warning glance at Ino, Azula says, "Let's move."

Naruto has recovered a sufficient amount of chakra at least for the short few dozen of miles that they have to cover to make it to the bandit camp's purported location. They stop halfway along to fill up on food, drink, and answer nature's call. Since shinobi have heavy diets and lots of hydration to support their body training, they also regularly answer nature's call by urinating.

Azula does not, since her Phoenix Dao bloodline does not work like a shinobi. Noticing Naruto following Ino and Hinata into the woods instead of Kakashi, Sasuke, Shikamaru into another nook of woods, Azula narrows her eyes, sensing that something is wrong, but is not quite sure what. She cannot think of anything. Naruto is just behaving as normal. She shakes her head and thinks, 'I must still be frustrated over that loss.'

In psychology, there is a concept called "social norms". Norms are a set of standards, rules, or laws regulating acceptable behavior within that society. They tend to vary wildly between different societies, and punishments for violating these norms also vary wildly. People utilize their perception of social norms to inform them on how to behave in a given situation.

For example, in the Fire Nation, the teenage Nuwa had broken social norms with her perversion so regularly that her friends began to treat her actions as normal, occasionally even getting dragged along for the ride. She escaped consequences by either not getting caught, or for the times that she did, with her high social status and charisma. When Nuwa had sex with Zuko, Mai helplessly convinced herself, "This is just how she normally is."

Another example would be that in Konoha, it is expected that ladies and men do their business separately. No one is going to jail for peeping, but they will be heavily ostracized and disdained, much like Jiraiya is by women today for doing exactly that. Similarly, if Hinata were to squat next to Ino's vagina and watch her pee from one or two steps away, this would heavily violate norms, even though she is a girl. Hinata would be breaking the norms of personal space, creepy staring at others' private parts, not minding her own business, and a slew of others that would make Ino extremely uncomfortable.

Naturally, Naruto decides to violate these norms to test the limits of his Ring. To his surprise and delight, Ino pays no attention to him even though he is only an arms length away. She removes her utility belt and lowers her shorts, exposing a set of purple lacy panties, which match her purple clothes. She seems to be hoping for some action during this mission. Naruto opens his mouth wide with incredulity at the close-up view of Ino's toned hips and ass.

When Ino carefully lowers her panties, taking care not to tear them, Naruto cannot resist anymore. He unzips his fly and starts jacking off at the sight of Ino's bare hairless slit. This is the cameltoe admired by all of his classmates! There will be hundreds of elite shinobis hoping to dual cultivate with Ino the moment she graduates, but none of them have seen her cunt from this close!

This is his privilege alone! He is the owner of the Normality Ring! Ino squats almost all the way down and Naruto readjusts his position to retain his view. She begins to pee into a clump of grass.

If asked by anyone other than Minato and Kushina, Azula would identify Naruto as a thoroughly kinky little fucker. True to her judgement, Naruto's first foray into watersports only turns him on even more, so he starts jacking off even harder. A quiet moan comes out of his mouth seeing Ino's vagina opening and closing as the stream of pee stops and starts again. Naruto's whole body freezes and his heart nearly stops when he sees Ino's head turn to face him directly while he is mid-pump.

(A/N: Went over to my cousin's place this weekend, so that's the reason for the slow update. She's getting married soon. Work is also going to get busy the next few weeks for me, because my coworker resigned. Not sure how regular the updates will be, but I'll keep chugging away at it. The plot is too intense for me to leave it hanging, hehehe.)

(A/N: https://discord.gg/VD3C2BFPAu)