Welcome to Gaia! ::

"The caravan doesn't assist in any village affairs, we'll be walking there." Hatsuma stated bluntly. They had taken rides in many strange contraptions during their journeys but this would be a first for such a long trek. "This time you'll actually get a better view of the sights though, last time you had motion sickness for a majority of the ride." She commented remembering their trip from some time ago. They had really grown over the years but Hatsuma had a suspicion that Oasis might still have some troubles with locomotion. She probably find out sooner or later but for now they would work on hoofing it to fire country.

Roku laid in wait for the two Genin who had just assaulted Hanako. The Chuunin had been instructed by Jin to shadow them to ensure that their mission went on smoothly. Unfortunately they couldn't even make it out of the village before there was some altercation with the Jounin. The Kazekage had warned that the volatile nature of the duo may probably lead them to violence, and sure Hanako had a superiority complex, but rules were rules. It was a crime to attack one's superiors, especially now that medicinal supplies were limited. The six-armed man waited until he could see the duo emerging from the canyon between the walls before he addressed them.

"In the name of the Kazekage, stop right there. You have committed crimes against Sunagakure and her people. Your options are to turn back and turn yourselves in. Or i will have to bring you back by force. Your choice, but i would really hate to embarrass you further than you've embarrassed yourselves by your conduct."

Roku folded his arms together, listening to the one known as Shinken speak with an impassive expression on his face. He sighed after the boy requested to let him continue with the mission, hating having to repeat himself.

"The mission is of no consequence at this point." he said, opting out of filtering the raw nuisance in his voice. "Now you can choose to disregard my warning and continue your mission, but know that doing so is ill advised."

"I observed the entire altercation up until you sent Hanako back with some random individual. I don't fault you for protecting yourselves, however the act of turning on, and wounding, a superior ranked shinobi is tantamount to insubordination." Roku stood motionless in the shifting sands, waiting to see what the duo would try next.

"Enough of this already! Just turn around, go back the way you came, and be done with it! You're wasting my time. I have better things to do." Roku was already at the threshold of his patience. He drummed all twenty-four of his fingers against his forearms and tapped his foot. He didn't need this back and forth banter raising his blood pressure.

Michio had agreed to Shinken as he suggested that he and the Kaguya travel to the Grand Desert Market in order to peruse the merchandise that they had available.

As a result, the two of them had traveled from the Village entrance to the outskirts of the Sand Village and were now on their way to the Grand Desert Oasis. Despite not having drank anything last night, Michio felt like literal crap. His limbs were shaking and his stomach was turning with every step. But he needed a set of ninja tools, so he'd grabbed his ryo and had hit the road after having breakfast.

But now, he was regretting his decision immensely.

Michio had begun to vomit up blood, and it was a less than stellar experience. In fact, it was downright horrible. As the life giving liquid flowed out of his throat and past his lips in waves, it caused coarseness and irritation to his esophagus until it too began to bleed, adding to the flow.

Finally, the blood stopped for a moment and Michio was able to open his one good eye to see that he had vomited up so much blood that his hands and knees were surrounded by the sand that had taken a red tint by absorbing some of the blood. He began to panic, and that tossed his stomach again, forcing him to vomit again. Along with the blood running out of his mouth, he could feel something dripping from his ears down to his chin. His nose burned as blood flowed from it. And when he tried to open his eye again, all he could see was red as the blood was leaking from his eyes as well.

“Shinken...” he tried to say, but all that came out was the sound of gagging and sputtering. The whole world spun and Michio rolled onto his back, flopping into an area of the sand that the blood had not reached. His body began to convulse from the lack of fluid able to flow through his veins and despite the fact that the hot desert sun was beating down on his dark-colored clothing, the young Kaguya felt a chill all over his body. The veins all over his body became constricted and showed through his skin in a blackish color as the arteries, veins, and capillaries strained and squeezed themselves dry. Suddenly, he felt a new pain, one in each of his fingernails, and was barely able to look down to see that his nails had split away from his skin, leaking more of his blood all over the sand. The world then began to get dark as blood slid down the side of his face and his body became still.

The first thought he had before he lost consciousness was how much he hadn't accomplished before he died. The second was 'Shisara just bought these clothes... she's gonna kill me...' And then he lost consciousness.

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“Michio....” a voice rang out in his head. “Michio.... wake up....”

“What....?” he asked, unable to form words out loud, but in his head, he words rang loud.

“Despite what you think... you're not dying.... this is just a change of skills...”

Michio opened his eyes, his internal body still having both, and realized that he was in a dark room. Before him was a shining light coming from a floating glob of fluid. The fluid was red in color and it hung in midair.

“Are... are you blood? I mean... are you made of blood?”

“Yes to both. I am the blood that flows through your veins. I'm sorry for the worry, but in order for me to inhabit your body, I had to get rid of all of the blood you had previously. A Kaguya's genetics don't mesh with the genes of a Ketsueki.”

“A... a what?”

“A Ketsueki.”

“What the hell is a Ketsueki?”

“Well, it literally means blood, so think of yourself as now a blood person. In that I mean, you can manipulate blood. Specifically, your blood.”

“No... I manipulate my bones. It's why I have claws.”

“You used to be able to manipulate your bones. But no longer. Now, you control the flow of your own blood, both inside and outside of the body.”

Michio stared incredulously at the floating blob before him as his brain tried to comprehend what he had just been told.

“This is crazy. I'm inside my own head space while my body is dying... and I'm talking to a floating puddle of blood.”

“YOUR floating puddle of blood.” the puddle corrected him, and he let out an exasperated sigh.

“Okay, MY blood. Regardless, this is absolutely insane. How am I talking to my own blood about my genetics changing, or as you put it 'my skills changing'.”

“That, I cannot tell you. What I can tell you is that you have been purged of all of your Kaguya genetic material, and that a new genetic code has replaced it. It's called Ketsueki. You are now capable of manipulating your own blood.”

“How? How did this happen?”

“It is a complicated process. One way is to simply be born into the Ketsueki bloodline. Unfortunately, that does not seem to be the case for you. Which means that you must have ingested the blood of a carrier of the Ketsueki bloodline's genetic material and you must have been genetically capable of supplying the bloodline with an apt supply of blood. As blood is made of bone marrow, it is highly likely that your previous ability to create and manipulate bones gave the Ketsueki genes an appropriate cultivation center for replicating the cells necessary. Although, it is unusual for it to have taken this long. You must have been fighting the virus off throughout the entirety of the night and well into the morning without even knowing it.”

“Wait... you mean when I swallowed some of Enko's blood, I infected myself with this virus?”

“If Enko is the last person whose blood you had ingested, then yes, it is highly likely that is the case.”

“And what now? I'm a manipulator of my own blood now? How does that work?”

“The Ketsueki genes present in the bloodstream are infused with chakra of the host. In this case, yours. As a result, focusing your blood is exactly the same as focusing your chakra.”

“So I just focus on controlling my chakra and the blood flows accordingly, huh?”

“It does, but only within your own body. To be used effectively, you must create an escape. You have been given a great opportunity, Ketsueki Michio. You are chosen, from all of the others who were given this chance and perished, to carry on the legacy of the Ketsueki.”

“There are others like me? Where?”

“I am merely a figment of your imagination, Michio. I cannot give you answers that you, yourself, do not have. Now I suggest that you cease with asking these questions. Katsuna Shinken, your Uchiha partner, is losing every inch of sanity he possesses as he watches you lie still. Perhaps you should wake up and tell him that you're not dead.”

“Oh crap... Shinken...”

“Wake up, Michio. You have great things in your future. Wake up.”

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“WAKE UP!!!” Shinken screamed into his partner's face, his hands clasped on Michio's right shoulder and stomach. Michio's eyes fluttered open and then closed again as the bright light of the desert's sun

“Ugh... good morning, Shinken.... what time is it?” he muttered, his head still spinning from the previous loss of blood.