Fry@Magnolia: "H-hello...! Sorry to bug you about this, but, I'm assuming you have laid curses on others before, right? I-if so, do you choose the curses others suffer or is it determined by their personality and such?"
That, my friend, depends entirely on the Ninetales.
You could say there’s roughly three types of curses. The most common one is generally pretty standard- the Ninetales in question decides what happens and for how long. They’re generally not too harsh, see, and are more as a means of… petty revenge. Turning someone into a Metapod with diarrhea for maybe… a few months. Maybe a couple years. Maybe turning them into a species they hate, or something. If you pull a Ninetales’ tail, that’s generally the kind of curse you’ll be hit with. They’re pretty easily broken, though- any green exorcist can do it.
You’ve of course heard of the old wives tale- “If you pull a Ninetales’ tail, you’ll be cursed for a thousand years” or something like that. A Ninetales won’t curse you for a millennium just for pulling their tail- that’s overkill. Do something heinous enough, though, and you’ll end up with a fury curse, and that’s where that “thousand years” comes from.
Fury curses have no reason- once a Ninetales has been pushed to that point, there’s no talking to them, and the nature of the curse is terrible… yet unpredictable. Their curses are strong, cruel, and long. Think about it this way- a curse takes a lot of energy, and a thousand year curse exponential more so. If that’s the case, it’s clearly easier to simply kill someone at that point, isn’t it?
But it doesn’t matter, does it? If a Ninetales casts a fury curse, it’s because, quite simply, they want their target to suffer, suffer every miserable moment of their lives. We’re emotional, vengeful creatures, at heart- with dangerous power- our anger only fuels such a terrible, crushing curse.
A fury curse can be broken however, but it’d take a skilled exorcist- someone who has spent their whole life training to be one. But at least it’s not impossible.
A grand Ninetales, clear of mind and hatred pure, can give their life to cast an eternal curse- the memento. Very few Ninetales possess this ability, this final swansong of power- truly, to give your life to curse someone is a final act of hatred and retribution. To die, yet at peace knowing they will suffer… eternally. There’s nothing more Ninetales than that.
