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kouri-chan_xx Vice Captain
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 Posted: Mon Jul 26, 2010 1:36 am
Here you post your time skip stories for evaluation and rewards.
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Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2010 9:21 am
Year 1:
When word had first arrived in the Land of Stone about a mililtary takeover in Konoha Heki's first reaction was to return to his Home land of Fire and stand up for the old ruler and the rightful owner of the throne. He then quit his training to begin preparing for the unknown in his homeland. The decision to quit this training would prove to be the worst decision he had ever made. He was totally untrained in any other type of fighting style or any type of ninjutsu. He went through the marketplace of Oto expending all savings he had gained from his right to take money from the Hyuuga clan treasury. He bought multiple weapons as well as soldier pills and obviously he bought plenty of food and water, but he didn't just buy any type of food he could find. He planned it out strategically and intelligently. He would cut himself down to two meals a day. These meals only consisting of rice and fish, and if he could he would find fruit and vegetable in Konoha. He spent a full week preparing to go off to Konoha at no point in this week did he train or otherwise physically prepare himself to possibly battle for the princess in Konoha. Near all of the weapons he had purchased in bulk he didn't know how to use. Clearly he had prepared and gone about this whole thing totally wrong.
Due to the fact that he didn't know how to seal objects within scrolls. Heki simply stuffed the hundreds of kunai and shurken he had purchased into a large napsack which he wore rather uncomfartably on his back. He then wrapped his portions of fish in in some thin paper. Then realizing that he couldn't carry the huge sacks of rice he had bought for his journey and stay in Konoha. He unwrapped his fish and filled the same wrappings which contained fish in them with loads of rice. He threw these wrappings into a large travel bag that could be worn over the chest.
Foolishly believing he was ready to go he departed the home he had known since he first left Konoha when the Fire master took over. Now he was returning to fight for the land he fled from not so long ago. As he stepped out of his refugee home door totally believing he was ready to return and fight for Konoha he thought on his own thinking about Konoha's recent history. He thought about how Konoha had traded the fire master for this new tyrant and now this tyrant gripped Konoha even more tightly than the last tyrant. He threw away these thoughts so that he could continue on with his journey.
Sooner than later he made it to the village gates and he was questioned as to where he was traveling to by the village. He knew that if he lied and said he was on a mission the gate guards could easily find out if this was a lie because they are informed of every expected exit from the village. So he did the only thing he could do he ran through the gates as the guards became suspicious of him. Of course this now made him a missing nin and within minutes a hunter-nin team was hot on his trail and catching up with him due to their specialization in tracking abilities. They ran quickly through the forest path that laid outside of the village. The green of the leaves on the trees became blured as he ran ever so quickly past them. Soon enough the whole forest scene turned into a blurred green and brown tunnel in his eyes. He was a rather fast boy for his age but he wasn't fast enough for this Hunter-nin team. Once they had caught up with him he was tackled and subdued so that they could enforce the standard Hunter-nin protocol. This protocol first required an interogation jutsu be used on the missing nin. They dug into his thoughts and saw his reasons for running and leaving the village. They considered returning him to the village but then found that he was a native of Konoha. And by a law created after the invasion of the masters Heki had the right to return to his village without disturbance. This law was created so that if the masters were ever defeated the refugees that had fled from the occupied villages could return to their homelands from wherever the now lived.
Knowing this the Hunter-nin set him free and allowed him to go back on his way. Once this happened Heki began walking towards his destination. After being freed Heki just followed the forest path till he came to somewhat of a larger road. This road led straight into the Fire country. Heki continued on this trail knowng that he could be in the Fire country by midnight. Although to Heki's misfourtune he was attacked by muggers on this trail, and stripped of his food and what little water he had. He attempted using one of the kunai he had bought. But because they were zipped up in a napsack he couldn't effectively and quickly get to them. He beat up unmercilessly and left there on the road.
After that night Heki had learned two things he should have learned in the in the Academy but because he skipped the experience to fight for Konoha he never learned them. He learned that weapons should always be kept at a place where they can be taken out quickly and he also learned that if you were traveling that you should survive off of what you find while you travel not off of what you brought with you. So awakening a few hours after the mugging he stood up. With bruises all over his body his lip was cut his left bicep was bruised all over, His left foot was likey broken from being stomped on, his face lay in ruins and he determined that he had a broken rib. After the diagnosis of his own body Heki limped over to a puddle on the side of the path to Konoha. He collapsed by it in tears from not only the pain but also his stupididty and his desire to return to the safety of Otogakure. He sipped up water from this puddle, and thought to himself about returning to Otogakure. Thats when he was found by a young woman most likey his age walking from Konoha it would seem. She immediately went to his aid. He pretended unconsiouness while she diagnosed his condition. After she had found every injury she ran back down the road. Hashirama saw this in the corner of his eye presuming she was going back to Konoha to get help. He thought of getting up and returning to Otogakure before she came but due to his condition he could no longer get up.
This girl returned with a duo of medics. They had brought a stretcher and then stuck him on it. Carrying him to the Village Hidden in the Leaves. Within a short time he found himself in what he presumed to be an apartment. His ribs were totally wrapped up in white bandage. his foot was casted. His lip was bandaged as well as any cuts or bruises on his body. His pain had nearly ceased and he stood up with barely any pain. He walked over to a nearby window in the place. He looked out and sighed a sigh of relief and he shed a tear of happiness. He was back home his village looked damaged and in need of help. This damage most likely from the newly ended war. He then felt a slight sensation pain in his ribs as a pair of arms wrapped around him then a soft feminie voice that he would never forget came about this voice said "I'm glad your ok I found you alone and hurt on the side of the road I thought you were dead" Heki said nothing back to her, and her arms released him she then said, "Not much of a talker are you" she paused for a moment with a little dissapointment in her voice now "That's fine as long as your ok". She then left him and went into another room. He continued looking out at Konoha glad to be back home. Now all that mattered was how was he going to stand up for the princess in the way he imagined and the way he imagined was epic battles for the throne.
With no other source of companionship he followed this new person into the other room. He asked "What's your name?". As he stepped into the room she quickly replied with " Hatake Kira of the Hatake clan!" "What's your name!? Heki replied " Uh Hyuuga Heki heir to the head of the Heki as well as next Hokage after Zephyr...well as long as the b*****d doens't die on me before I can get stronger. He said this with a bit of a tone. Kira became estatic and jumped up towards Heki gving him a good look over "Oh my god I saved the next Hokage!!" "Yeah I guess you did" Heki replied calmly. Kira then calmed herself for a moment looking as though she had instantaneously been lost in thought. While this happened Heki was able to finally give the girl a look over. She was rather attractive a slight tan and white hair the white hair most likely because of her Hatake blood. She wore a black mini-skirt as well as a tight white tank top. Her footwear consisted of standard Kunoichi footwear. Her white hair was controlled by a blue shinobi head band meaning sshe was a Gennin she used this headband to make a pony tail. She had a hefty load for breasts which Heki couldn't help but stare at until she sprang up with another excitment fill statement. "I've got to tell Daisuke who we've found. She ran out of the room into another room in the apartment. It now became apparent to Heki that the apartment was split in 3 rooms. The main room and two other bedrooms. Kira came back with a man with a slightly bigger build than Hashirama. He wore a white robe. A scar that stretched from his hairline to his jaw-line haunted his face he looked upon Hashirama with interest and asked him "Do you know any Jutsu Hyuuga? "Only the required Academy jutsu of Konoha" "Is that right?..." Daisuke said back with a little dissapointment in his voice. "Well you are truly the son of Hyuuga blood correct?" Daisuke continued. "Yes" Heki replied. Daisuke then said,"Well it shouldn't be to hard to teach you some useful jutsus to use in battle then. We'll go to the training ground in an hour". Heki was totally confused not only was he in terrible shape for a training session but he barely knew these people and they acted as though they were going to use him in battle. The number one thing that ringed in his head was What do the want me to fight for?. He looked to Kira after Daisuke had left back into his room. Heki then asked her "Is he serious!?" "Why wouldn't he be?" Kira replied with the utmost innocence "Oh I dunno maybe because I'm all banged up and should be resting not training" Heki said rather sarcastically. She looked to him and thought for a moment. Then without another word to him she grabed his hand and began power-walking towards the front door of the apartment dragging him behind. "Where are you taking me?" Heki asked. "I need to show you something" Kira replied. After that they went outside of the apartment door. Walking down the railing then onto a flight of stairs that lead down to brown dirt and little patches of grass. While Heki limped and stumbled as Kira dragged him along to their unknown destination. At this point Heki was getting a totally different view at Konoha then he had ever had up in the apartment. He saw that it wasn't just a little destroyed it was totally destroyed. The Konoha he had known as a child had changed. The crimson paint on nearly every roof and wall of the village was scraped off and destroyed. Entire buildings lay in ruin. The warm hearted and kind faces of the people of Konoha had now turned old and withered. Not only was Konoha destroyed by war but the times it's peoples strong hope in the military providing safety to them and the peoples prosperous times were long over. The Konoha he had known as a child was filled with times of festivals and happiness in life. The Konoha he saw now was the total opposite. This was all because Konoha had never known war on it's own land and the peaceful people of the village were devastated by it when it finally came. Kira and Heki finally stopped at a marketplace. Heki saw the food stands that had once always been filled with fruit and other foods were now barely making it. He found this out by noticing the decimated wood and the weak hungry faces of the people in the marketplace. When Heki was a child you could only see a marketplace as poor as this in Kusagakure or Amegakure or Otogakure, but times had changed the Fire master's ruthless attack on the civilians of the Fire country had changed times so drastically it now seemed Konoha would never return to its former glory. Just by the look of the once prosperous marketplace Heki knew that the expenses that had to be payed for to wage war against the fire master had nearly bankrupt his homeland. It took a strong tug on his heart. He could feel that he was going to cry. He could feel that he was going to cry tears for his war torn homeland which he loved so much. "This is why we need you" Kira paused for a moment then continued "We need you to train and get stronger so that you can help us to bring down the new Feudal Lord so things around here don't get worse" Heki began to wail "How could things possibly get worse here!!" Kira looked to him for a moment and Heki saw the truth in her eyes. " Daisuke thinks that the new Feudal lord is an imperialist and that he's going to invade the other countries." Something like that would bankrupt our country...Our people would starve and poverty will grip the land even worse then this. Kira said that with the most seriousness in her voice. Soon after the eye-opening experience Heki was on the training grounds with Daisuke before him and Kira a few yards to the side sitting down on the ground watching him. Heki stood before Daisuke and waited for him to start the training. Heki stood uncomfartably due to the fact that his foot was still healing from the mugging. Daisuke then began to look rather proud as he pulled out a withered scroll. Daisuke then threw this scroll on the ground ,and the hit too the ground unrolled the scroll. "This scroll right here holds the Hyuuga clan taijutsu" Daisuke paused then continued "Don't even ask how I got it". Heki knew how he had obtained this scroll from the second he spoke of it's contents. A scroll that held the Hyuuga clan bloodline jutsu could only be found in the Hyuuga clan compound. And the only way it could be taken from the compound is if it was stolen. Heki didn't confront Daisuke about it as to not cause problems in the training session. Even if the scroll was stolen it was in Daisuke's possession now and the other countries had bigger things to handle right now then buying a jutsu scroll holding the Hyuuga clan jutsu from him. So Heki's thinking was that this stolen scroll would do more good then harm if it taught him jutsu. The first and number one jutsu on the scroll was Juuken Kempo Ryuu. These jutsu were already in Heki's blood he knew them by heart and soul. This taijutsu style Juuken kempo Ryuu went naturally to him as he attempted it. He didn't master it the first day nor did he master it the next it had taken him seven days of training till he could finally say that he mastered the Hyuuga clan Taijutsu style Juuken kempo Ryuu. After the seventh day of training and after Daisuke said that Heki mastered Gouwan. Heki took a break with Kira out on the village. Heki's bruises and cuts were nearly all gone as well as his foot was getting much better. In the time he spent with Kira he spent most of it at Konoha's famous ramen shop. She looked ever more attractive in the street light of Konoha. They shared flirtatious words with eachother at the Ramen shop under the light of the stars and the the light of the Konoha night lights. Till it was near closing time for the shop. Maybe it was just the fact that they were young and unsupervised but Heki actually began to have feelings for this girl, but when they had arrived home and shared a goodnight kiss Heki felt that he was doing the wrong thing. The reason for this was the fact that he had found out from talking to Kira that night that Daisuke was Kira's legal guardian and Daisuke was also becoming Heki's sensei. If Heki did anything here it could easily destroy the two relationships. And training to become a stronger Shinobi was infinitely more important to Heki then a wild lustful moment with this girl. After the good night kiss Heki said nothing else to Kira and prepared for sleep in the main room/ living room of the apartment. After that night they were back to training. Within a month Hashirama had mastered more Hyuuga jutsu and was becoming a legitimate threat. He had learned Hakke Kuushou .After that month it took him near another full month to learn Hakke Rokujuuyonshou. After that heki went on to learn Hakkeshou Kaiten . It was at this point that Daisuke began to speak more with Heki. Heki was finally invited into Daisuke's room this room contained hundreds of blueprints and sheets of plans all of which strewn across the entire room. They sat down at a round table in the room which was also covered in blue prints. He began to speak with him about what he thought of the new Fire Daimyo and the princess. Obviously Heki supported the princess but Daisuke was rather paranoid and needed to make sure Heki's loyalties reigned with the princess. Although his paranoia wasn't all that bad because Heki, Daisuke, and Kira were about to do something that could leave all three of them dead if Hashirama turned out to be a traitor. After Hashirama had mastered three of the Hyuuga clan jutsu Daisuke began telling him more and more about his ideas and thoughts about the new Fire Daimyo. In summary Daisuke was not happy about the takeover of the throne of the Fire country. Daisuke believed that the New Fire Daimyo needed to be killed and that the Princess should be put in her rightful place on the throne of the fire country. But Daisuke knew that the fire daimyo was far to well protected to asssasinate him with just Heki and Kira. He also had suspicions that the Fire daimyo would invade the other big countries. So with these suspicions and Hashirama and Kira by his side. Daisuke planned to sabotage and spy on the baracks of the Fire Daimyo's forces. Daisuke planned to put this plan in action within a week. But he needed supplies to sabotage the barracks he also needed rations for the trio to survive on while they spied on the barracks. Soon after telling Heki the plan Daisuke went out to begin collecting supplies saying that he would be out for the rest of the day. After Daisuke had left Heki thought to himself about his part in Daisuke's plan. He knew he would be the one doing all of the fighting if anything happened on this mission it gave him chills to have the lives of two other people in his hands. As he thought and stressed about the mission at hand the same arms that had hugged him when he first came to this place and met Daisuke and Kira gripped him once more. Kira's lips lay next to Heki's ears "Did Daisuke tell you the plan?" she whispered
"Yes" Heki replied. He noticed that Kira had a much sadder and calmer tone of voice it concerned him. "I'm scared" Kira said to Heki with a little quiver in her voice. "I am too" Hashirama replied calmly. He expected a quick response from Kira but when he didn't get one he turned his head and looked at her face. Her face had tears running down it's cheeks her white hair stuck to cheeks in which had tears running down them. Heki knew that the fact that she would be in such danger concerned her. He hugged her putting his arms on her back and she hugged him back ever so tightly. "I love you" Kira said to him. Heki was slightly surprised by these words, but he knew she was only saying them because she thought she was going to die. "No you don't your just saying that" Heki said back to her. "No I really do love you!" "I love that you've stayed with us for so long" "I love that you came here to fight for your country" "I love you Heki! Kira began to cry so much more. And she hugged him more tightly then ever before. Heki saw it now Kira truly believed that she was going to die in a week when the plan came into action. He couldn't deny her happiness while she was thinking that so he said back to her "I love you too..." He did have feelings for Kira she tended to his wounds when he was going to die on the side of the road and she showed him the truth of modern day Konoha she was also beautiful, but he couldn't say truthfully that he loved her. He only said it to comfort her. Now Kira gripped even more tightly to him and said "I don't want to die a virgin". It was very possible that they could die in a week and he too was a virgin and he couldn't deny a girl he had known for so long a request like the one she was about to ask. "Before we go on that mission in a week I want to lose my virginity and I want it to be you" as said before he couldn't deny her that, but before he could respond she struck a kiss to his lips and the sensation of her plump lips ontop of his own totally changed his mood. He withdrew one of his arms from their hugging position and put it to her legs. He then lifted her up and carried her to her bedroom from Daisuke's room. One thing led to another and by the end of the night both Heki and Kira had lost their innocence. The next day as Heki awoke with his shirt thrown some where across the room next to the young girl he had given himself too he thought for a moment thinking that she could truly be the person he wanted to spend the rest of his days with. He watched as she slept totally different from the way she was last night. She was calmer now and she had what seemed to be a smile on her face as she slept. Heki smiled as well when he saw it. He got up out of bed and out of her room and into the kitchen where he splashed his face with sink water. After this he went into Daisuke's room only to find him looking at plans and blueprints. Heki was not expecting him to even be in the apartment his heart started racing as he hoped Daisuke had not seen him next to Kira on her bed. Before Heki could even say anything Daisuke called him to the round table in the middle of his room. "Look at these maps of the Fire Daimyo's fortress the barracks are inside and those walls are impenetrable we'll have to spy on the gates for a little while to see any patterns and habits we can use to our advantage to someday break into the fortres." "So what I'm trying to say is we have a change of plans we won't be spying on the barracks we'll be spying on the gates this time is that understood". Daisuke said calmly to Heki, and Heki nodded to Daisuke to let him know he understood the plan. Heki nodded with no excitement but inside he was very excited this meant the danger level of this mission had just dratically decreased he couldn't wait to tell Kira. A few hours later after that morning when Kira had awoken he told her the news and she shed tears of joy the moment those words came out of his mouth. She kissed him and he kissed her back this news meant that there was now nothing in the way of their new love they were so happy to begin life without the fear of death together. When the day of the mission had finally arrived the trio spent the most part of the day in Daisuke's room preparing with camoflauge and preparing rations as well as weapons. Their general espionage attire consisted of green napsacks and black shinobi/kunoichi sandals, but more specifically Heki wore a black muscle shirt with a green napsack black shinobi sandals and his skin was covered in green paint for caomflauge. Kira wore her everyday attire the only thing different was that her skin was covered in green pain. Daisuke chose to go with his everyday attire as well but with no green paint on his skin. After that they went off into the night on a mission to save the world. When they had arrived to the fortress they kept their distance as to not be seen by the sentries. Every hour or so Daisuke would log the events that happened in the past hour as Heki and Kira sat and waited for the mission to be over. When it came near morning and they were about to leave an arrow came down at their position. A patrol around the fortress had spotted them from a 100 yards away. Daiuke yelled "Heki put up a shield!" and so with his Byakugan abilities Heki yelled
"Hakkeshou Kaiten !" With a few handsigns and a sacrifice of chakra a large half dome appeared around the trio temporarily defending them against any other incomiong arrows or attacks. It was at that point that Daisuke yelled "Run!" and so they did but it wouldn't be that easy to escape. The patrol also had mercenary shinobi in it's ranks and with their jutsu they cast enourmus boulders at the trio these boulders crashed all around them blocking all routes of escape. They were trapped and speechless. Then suddenly another boulder came crashing down this one to close for comfort. It knocked Daisuke and Heki over into the brown dirt under their feet. This boulder kicked up a considerable amount of dirt leaving Daisuke and Heki in a daze. It was then the that Heki notcied something was wrong he hadn't heard Kira since the boulders struck it put him into a panic. He screamed her name hoping for a response but he didn't get any. When the kicked up dirt had cleared he saw a hand coming out from under a boulder. It was then that he realized where Kira was. He attempted to push the boulder but it was too much for him. "No!" he yelled in a surge of anger and sorrow. Daisuke yelled at him saying, "Shut up you idiot ! they'll hear us!" Those words which had no consideration for Kira's death made Heki go crazy he went at Daisuke with Juuken Kempo Ryuu strike to the chest with no intention of killing him just hurting him. But what Hashirama didn't know was that he had broken Daisuke's rib cage with the strike and now his broken ribs pierced his heart in multiple places. This caused Daisuke to gurgle blood it was then that Heki realized what he had done but he was too angry and sad to care that he was now alone against this Fire Daimyo patrol. The patrol eventually caught up with Hashirama because he was trapped by the boulders. They took him captive and left the dead bodies of Kira and Daisuke to rot. Heki was fully ready to die without Kira in his life any longer, but before they had even gotten close to the fortress which is where they were taking him a meber of the patrol said "my boulder shooting jutsu really worked huh?" he joked with another member with the patrol. Heki's rage spiked again. He tore his arms away from his captors as they draged him on his back he struck his two captors in their legs with two Juuken kempo Ryuu strikes, and ran off. Eventually escaping back into the village.
Year Two:
After the deaths of Kira and Daisuke Heki had multiple bouts of depression and thoughts of suicide. While this period of his life occured. The countries were invaded by the Fire daimyo. Realizing that if he could somehow help the invaded countries he could avenge Kira's death. So that's what he set out to do. He escaped Konoha into Otogakure the only true safe place in the world nowadays so that he could attempt to meet the Otokage to make plans with the Otokage about rescue missions to the devestated countries as well as plans for invasion of the occcupied countries.
End of Year Two
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Posted: Sun Aug 08, 2010 10:20 am
@Bel Biv Lucid: You are rewarded 1111exp for your timeskip story.
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Posted: Sun Aug 08, 2010 1:22 pm
Month 1
Masanori graduated. Hiru, Shin and Battosai as well. The situation in the city had worsend and people went missing from here to there. Luckily Masanori’s father, Kaijuu Dimi. Was highly valued by the government and where never threaten or assassinated. This resulted in that his family was also protected, which included Masanori. So during the two following years, Masanori could walk the streets in safety. Only needed to worry about the names of his girlfriends, and their birthdays.
Besides Masanori occasional mission together with either Mokujin-sensei or Andou-sensei, he had gotten a job as a librarian assistant at the local library. His pay was a low sum of 25 ryo a month but he got to read any book he wanted during the moments he had ANY sort of free time. Since his goal was to become a successful shinobi, he only read things that could assist him in that task. He started off by following a certain genjutsu writer by the name of Tsurugi Hoji. He wasn’t a very good genjutsu-user, but he had written a very successful collection of learning books. They weren’t meant to actually learn you jutsus or skill, they were meant to open up your mind and truly understand the capabilities of what it was capable of. The books were divided into three volumes. The first volume, which contained 10 books containing 600 pages each, had the duty of getting the reader to fully understand the limit of one’s mind. The exercises were about random historical events when people had done the amazing thing with one’s brain, like incredible shortterm memory, hypntosism without the assistance of magic. It took Masanori the first month to read the whole 1 volume. And the last book had set off something incredible in his mind. It was an exercise about sound and memory.
He performed this exercise only once in this two years, he didn’t need it any more than doing it once. The training was as follows: You sit yourself down in a secure and comfortable space, which is as sound proof as possible. Then you sit there for half an hour, listening and memorizing every sound that occurred during the time. But not only memorizing, you are to imagine that the sounds are put into a chest of some sort. Then when the half an hour has passed, you throw that chest with all the sounds(which you repeat while throwing them into the chest) into a larger chest, then throwing THAT chest into a LARGER chest – continuing this pattern ten more times. Then you repeat those sounds, ten times more as you open all the chests and throws them into the ocean.
It was frustriating and he started to sweat when he only on the second chest – it was really intense. But he did it. And when returning to a normal life, he noticed stuff so much clearer and the exercise that opened a whole new level of brain activity. “Amazing” he had commented when leaving the quiet library which he executed the exercise in. All he heard was squeeks and coughs out of people that read there, but a half an hour of squeeks and coughs were reaaaaaaally horrible after a while.
Month 2
But even tough he had three other classmates than himself, he didn’t spend much time with them during the time he was in Kiri. Only when he was called by Mokujin-sensei to do some patrolling across the city or walk dogs together with one of the other three. But there was one time when he had to spend time with Hiru. By accident. He was taking a stroll across the market when he heard a stranger ruckus than usual. Plastic bags were being russled around, tin garbage disposals were thrown back and forth, also a lot of grunting could be heard in a dark and narrow alley. He thought that it was some assassinations that the council had decided. He wasn’t scared but more worried that they would go after himself if he stayed there any longer, but, some stronger force made him turn around and see what was actually going on. At first he saw only fast shadows going about, but then, a blue shade were thrown across the alley hall. “Hiru..” it couldn’t be an assasinastion cause’ a recently graduated genin had a small percentage of causing that much fear into the council, that they needed an assassin to kill him.
Masanori rushed into the alley, and jumped into the group, he got a fist straight into his right eye which sent him flying into a garbage pile. He landed right beside Hiru who was just about to get up when Masanori’s arm forced him to get knocked down again. “Hi Masanori,” he said with his usually dumb and polite voice. “Yo..” Masanori replied holding his pulging eye socket. “I’ve been going easy on these, I’m go-..” Masanori stopped Hiru’s speech by holding out his arm in front of Hirus mouth. “No I’ll do it.”
He slowly rose and somehow avoided a kick by moving his face slightly backwards. The leg went flying passed him and landed on the ground again. “Wait!,” he shouted “I am Kaijuu Masanori.” He paushed for effect but they seemed to have never heard of the name. “I am not of knowledge to this man or to any of you. But what I do know that the arguments that occur in the world have gone to such an extent that you people,” he pointed “have actually taken to your fists to settle an disagreement. And, and, and.. You! Aren’t to blame!” his voice grew louder and he started to walk closer to them. “It’s the world! And all of it’s leader who think they know what it’s best of their fellow followers. No. They don’t know, only we know.” He had gotten close enough to see that they were simply bums that probably wanted something from Hiru’s equipment, but they were drunk so this could get tricky. “Only we know..” his voice sunk to a dramatic and emotional one, when leaning with one hand against one of the bum’s shoulder. The breathing of the man grew louder, and he was sure that he was about to get punched but then the sound of crying could be heard in a tone that after some time resembled a choir. “I did it!” the bums started hugging each other and crying, repeating that they are not the once who are to blame for their situation, and that they have seen justice!
Month 3
Masanori had spent his time doing nothing mostly. He occasionally hit on some random girl and fooled around but never anything that was worth working for. But one day it struck him. The kunai. He had worked with the kunai a bit when he had a time off at the Academy together with Andou-sensei. It was a blast, he fell in love with the kunai and it’s marvellous ways of flying through the air and destroying anything that was in it’s way. While at the same time keeping yourself at an distance where the opponent couldn’t reach you.
So one morning, Masanori took out a pen and paper and started to draw out an schedule for the upcoming training sessions. He thought of that the first two months he simply needed to drill his a** off on the control of the kunai, to really just get a feel of how it moved in it’s hand and how it flew in the air. So, he basically wrote down that the two month’s was crammed with two hours each day of kunai throwing. One at hour at the afternoon. and one hour right after dinner.
He started the training of the very same day he wrote the guidelines. He had gotten a pack of kunais from the academy, it was five of them, and he knew that he needed to sharpen them pretty soon if he was going to use them for two hours each day. He carved out a similar targeting board he had used in the academy. The first two months didn’t need much explanation since it were just continious amount of his arm going up and down or from side to side. But, in the last days of the month - he had become confident enough to start jogging into his toss or throw.
Month 4
Other than his daily kunai throwing. He found a woman that changed his life. He had decided one day to find the most beautiful girl in his village. He couldn’t go to the rich and wealthy brats since they were to picky about who they chose and would take weeks of sweat talking to get anywhere. So. He thought about finding a mundane woman but still very beautiful. He found one. But she wasn’t mundane. She was a punk girl, possibly goth. When he approached the girl with his beautiful sparkling eyes and confident smile. She simply laughed, knowing what his intention were and how hard he was rejected from her usual type of guys. But the laughter didn’t stop Masanori. He approached her, but she turned her back and refused to respond to any of his comments nor sweet talk. His response to this behaviour were nothing other than pure shock. No woman have ever ignored him at this level of ignoring, if he ever wanted he could get the girls before the day was done. But nothing he did seemed to bite.
As time passed, the womans laughter ran through his head and he could not forget about her. He had to get her. He approached her with flowers and candy but she slapped it out of his hands. He surprised her with a multiple amount of bunshins but to no progress whatsoever, she yawned as she passed through the clones. “GAAAH” he shouted through the streets when he had surprised her with hiring a bunch of neighbourhood kids to throw down rose pedals from the roof. Five hundred rose pedals and all she did was to sneeze Masanori right in the face.
After his humiliating shower. He walked the street with his head hanging low and his spirit lower. To his surprise after he had taken a seat at a local park - the punk girl sat down in his lap with her arms tangled around his neck. And as she was leaning against him with her lips pouting. He was thinking to himself: “YES! YES! VICTORY!” [/i. But the girl stopped as their lips were to stopped and whispered: “You are too much of a whimp”. And he understood completely. The thing that bothered and didn’t attract her at all. Was his clothing an general appearance. He had gone with the cute boy act as he knew it would make the girls around them sway, but maybe not as much as a hardcore one. The girl left, and he never saw her again. But he left him with a thought that would change his life forever. If he changed his appearance, he could get any girl. The younger girls, would find him more adult like. The pretty, rich and spoiled would want something new besides the spoiled boys, someone that would seem dangerous. And when it came to the males and people in between, the change of appearance would also benefit him. If they thought of him as dangerous and scary, possibly instable, it would benefit his intimidation moment. If he just wanted to use diplomacy, using a contrast of ones appearance compared to personality is the best way to chock one’s social pattern. So. He dyed one side of his hair black and the other white. While at the same time, changing his outfit and taking two piercings in his right ear.
Month 5 and all the other months
Months has passed and Masanori didn't do much than to continue with his kunai training. He went on a few missions but they weren't ones that were very acknowledgeable. Tough it earned him enough money to buy the local blacksmith to sharpen his kunais, which he continued to use daily. Before he knew it, two years passed and it felt like it had only gone a day.
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Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2010 7:30 am
1st Year
Okazai Tsuneo arrived in Otogakure after begging his parents to let him follow his brother and become a legendary shinobi. After finally getting their permission he was able to go to the Academy in Oto to learn how to be a shinobi and start to make a name for himself like how the current Otokage made his and become a legend in his own right. However stories start small.
Tsuneo being an academy student and only 7 spent most of his time in oto in about 2 places after the academy was finished being rebuilt. One of them being the academy the other being the Oto library. If Tsuneo was not reading history and any information he was allowed to read being some parts seemed restricted. He was in his classes were they were discussing the basics of being a ninja. Such as how teams are normally composed and why. How your weapons and equipment should be packed basics in navigation and survival . How chakra works and the basics on elemental affinity. Concepts of genjutsu ninjutsu and taijutsu the basic type of jutsu. The ranks of the ninja village. Tsuneo learned about the chkara system in the body. He even managed to learn the basics of controlling chakra even if it was the most basic. The other big component outside of learning the basics was the history of the village and the village system. His other time at the academy was the physical conditioning at the academy. Such as the running and the running as well as push ups most of all was the running Tusneo did not much like the running and their seemed to be a lot of it. and the practicing of basic tai jutsu. He also learned in his first year of the academy the first of some important jutsu needed to be a gennin Henge no Jutsu. As well as how kuni and shurikin are used and thrown.
For the most part his life pretty much for the first year moved in a strong routine on training and learning how to perform in a world of ninja. A big changing moment in his life was when his brother Tosh Okazi became a genin. Being his older brother it was not surprising he would become a genin before Tsuneo however Tusneo took it very hard. Believing he was some how being left behind and not stacking up to how he should be. It made him hard to do anything other then training or reading to learn more about the ninja world. Since every time he was standing still he just felt like he was wasting time. This caused him to spend even more of his free time in the Oto library to quickly learn as much as he could out side of the academy as well as in the academy. For Tsuneo knowledge was the key to becoming a legendary ninja. This increased his effort and he soon was able to learn Bunshin no Jutsu. His determination in training got so bad he had forgotten his own birth day and on the day he turned 8 his time was spent learning how do Bunshin no jutsu.
2nd Year of the Time skip
In the 2nd year Tsuneo spent all most all his time learning. For the first 3 or 4months. He was in a sheltered world being an academy student and heard very little about the fire daiymo and his war. He heard some information but it seemed to him like a distant dream and he quickly forgot about most of what he heard spending more time reading about the past or going to the academy to learn. Tsueno biggest problem he had was he seemed to stop he was having issues sleeping feeling it was wasting his time or even just relaxing for a day. His instructors at the academy did notice him seeming to never go home from the academy and going to library and even held a sort of intervention were Tsuneo told them about his worry of being left behind and not measuring up to being a real shinobi.
His instructors made him slow down a little and after awhile he did find some peace to the fact he was not falling behind and he was just going the right pace he should. He would still however get wrapped up in reading a scroll or book and spend all night reading it instead of sleeping. He never seemed ether to talk much with his other classmates or talk to very many people since he spent most of his time reading or trying to master what his instructors gave him to learn. In this Year he learned Kawarimi no Jutsu putting him one step closer to one day being a genin. He found it very hard to just sleep or eat or do something that didn't involve learning how to be a ninja or training since every time he sat still he just kept seeing images of his brother and the Kasuke Okazi doing their own training or becoming stronger and better shinobi making him feel like he was some how lacking behind making him always feel he had to do something so he would not be left behind. after his 9th birthday has passed he is still troubled by thoughts of being left behind by his brother and not measuring up to Kasuke who is after all the otokage. Making him more determined and worried about not becoming a genin soon enough. Since he is still at the academy and makes him feel like he is still miles behind the people he looks up to most. It seemed no mater how many times the instructors intervened or he talked to some one he always fell into the same trap of thinking he had some how gotten behind his brother.
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Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2010 10:43 am
Year One [1]
Not too long after the graduation ceremony Gennosuke began to try and study harder than before yet still somehow couldn’t get to class on time. This lead to Andou and Mokujin making him do push-ups every time he was late. This might have built him up a little muscle but not much due to his size and stature. Any time he didn’t spend at the academy he was spending at the hospital in hopes of learning how to help heal people. Unfortunately he wasn’t able to learn much as the doctors were way to busy. It seemed as though the civil un-rest and the assassinations caused many of the nurses and doctors to become irritated and unwilling to tell, let alone, teach him anything. So after a month of trying to get one of the hospital staff to teach him he finally gave up.
He continued to study at the academy and learn as much as he could. Eventually he learned Kawarami, Bushin, and Henge no jutsu with help from Andou, Mokujin, and the rest of his classmates. Gennosuke, now without a goal anymore, decided to continue helping out around the house. His parents found it odd for him to be home so early when they were used to him being home at a later time. They sat down and began to ask him questions and he finally explains the situation and told them he would just be a regular ninja. Neither of his parents were happy about his decision and after a week his mom, Kisa, had finally had enough and decided to talk to his teachers.
Kisa explained to them how Gennosuke wanted to become a medical-nin to help people and put smiles on their face and both understood but they in-turn explained the whole situation with Kirigakure. They did promise to talk to Gennosuke about giving up on his dreams which his mother agreed would help.
Gennosuke headed to the Academy the next day and although all of the students were there Mokujin filled in for Andou. Gennosuke just believed Andou was either on a mission or just off for the day but when the day’s turned to weeks and the weeks to months he started trying to figure out where his beloved sempai had gone. He eventually ran into Battosai and questioned him on Andou’s disappearance. Battosai told him of Andou’s exile which made Gennosuke unsure of what he wanted to do anymore. He could still study under Mokujin but it was always more fun with Andou. He went home and told him mom the bad news and she explained that sometimes that’s how life is. People are there one day and gone the next.
It took a couple weeks but eventually Gennosuke was back to his old self. Attending the academy and trying to become a better ninja. He began to grow closer to the rest of the students and they continued to challenge each other every day. Eventually with great friendships come great rivalries. Gennosuke however really didn’t have one. He decided that it was pointless with him still wanting, deep inside, to be a medical-nin. Eventually they all graduated with Gennosuke not so much as being at the top but then again he wasn’t at the bottom of the class either.
Year Two [2]
After graduating he was placed on a team with Shinzu Akara and Battōsai Hitokiri with Batou as their team leader. They have been training, doing missions for the village, and trying to better themselves. When not on missions Gennosuke had been going to the library and researching the human body and different medical related things. While there he runs into a nurse from the hospital named Mayumi. She agrees to teach him about medical skills and so begins Gennosuke on completing his dream.
Gennosuke starts his training by reading up on ailments, poisons, and different effects on the body. This continues for months with him learning how different poisons affect the body, how weapons tear through the flesh, and how genjutsu corrupts the mind. After months and months of readying and studying, when not on missions, Gennosuke finally asked Mayumi why she had not taught him any medical jutsu yet. She replied that sometimes it isn’t necessary to use jutsu and that most of the time the treatment for the body were outside of it. Gennosuke was still disappointed in not learning any jutsu but he still obtained a little knowledge.
His time learning at the hospital began to get shorter and shorter as he started to do more and more missions for the village. He studied less and less often but seemed to retain most of the knowledge. His bond with his team began to grow and grow as each mission made them better and stronger than they were before. Gennosuke finally after a year of being a Genin decided to start training to use his elemental affinity of water and the use of genjutsu. He plans to one day become the Mizukage and take back Kirigakure from the corrupt government and bring peace back to the land. That is with the help of his team and sensei. He is still a long way off but well on his way.
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Posted: Tue Aug 10, 2010 11:34 am
Year one
After the graduation Shinzu got right back to work on training his Taijutsu. He got into the habit of arriving at the academy two hours early everyday so he could 'fight' with the dummy and lift weights. He was able to build his muscles up to a good degree for a taijutsu fighter. The hardest for him to practice was his chakra control but after awhile of practicing at the shoreline he was able to build it up.For him the academy was never enough, he got tired of staying there all day and he grew bored of Kirigakure itself, the political situation not helping at all.
Despite his growing boredom for village he couldn't bring himself to leave. Not that he would be able to the shinobi standing guard where becoming fanatics about letting people out of the village, many times they'd even detained shinobi leaving on important missions for the village. He stayed at the academy and continued his training and began looking into using his chakra to attack the internal organs but all he could find out was that there was a clan in Konoha did it however they had a special kekkie genkai that allowed them to see the chakra points. All that reading on Konoha didn't help his thrist for new and different things he wanted to travel so much he even discussed it with Kumiko. She hadn't thought it was too good of an idea, at least not until they graduated.
Year 2
After a year of training hard everyday Shinzu graduated from the academy and placed onto a team with Gennosuke, who began he to simply call Gen, and Battōsai, who was nicknamed Bat by Shinzu. Even as part of the team Shinzu continued his individual training plus the team training they had everday. After some time of training they began to go on missions where Shinzu destinguished himself as a weapon and taijutsu fighter. Eventually he had to stop his extra training by himself as the missions piled on. That didn't stop him, however as he just began to work harder during thier training.
After his academy teacher Andou was forced into a self imposed exile Shinzu's desire to leave the village and travel grew. That didn't distract him from his training however and he still worked to see if he could cause internal damage with his chakra though he had yet to turn it into any sort of fighting style or jutsu, he was working on it. The political situation in Kiri that had forced Andou to leave was slowly affecting Shinzu though he tried as hard as he could to ignore it. Occassionally he would get a letter from Andou and in one letter he learned that Andou would be coming back for a very brief visit ideas of escape began to go through Shinzu's mind.
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Posted: Wed Aug 11, 2010 12:33 am
NARA RHAIM
KONOHAGAKURE
Part one, Proto grades Shortly after completing the Ninja Academy and being formally inducted as a genin shinobi, Rhaim returned to team one to carry out assignments with his teammates. Though he still did not have the grandeur or altruistic motivations of his fellow ninja, Rhaim had learned that his ability as a ninja would directly affect the lives of those around him. This knowledge and his own low self esteem shaped his training and actions as a whole for the early days of his genin life. Rhaim's first official mission was issued a mere two days after he had graduated. At the graduation his squad leader had approached him and informed him that they would be resuming team training after one day of rest. The boy took that day to ensure that all of his laundry was taken care of and his gear was clean and ready for the days to come. He wasn't certain of how much time he would be afforded to do things like clean and take care of his personal matters. It proved to be very much in his favor that he had done so as the next day he was handed a jacket and heavy pants. With a confused look he inquired to his leader why exactly he was getting new clothing. He was then informed that his first official mission was to take part in a snowball fight with the other villages. Though his first impression was that it was a joke, he soon came to realize how important the action truly was. It was a chance for the villages to gauge where they stood amongst each other. Based both on the strength of the ninja present and the amount of ninja that they could let attend the event. In the end Rhaim found himself to be the first person taken out of the event due to his tenacity and willingness to lead the assault. Not traits that he would try to develop further considering the results. Dear Rhiam, So far everything is well, I do enjoy being a Genin but it is odd not having you on a team with me. Working with your sisters at home has been quite entertaining and educational, so I do not mind. I hope you are enjoying your work as much as I am. Tenma When they returned to Konoha, Rhaim and the rest of team one was given another day off to recover from the event and get ready for more training with the team. Unfortunately the Nara child spent most of that day sick in bed from a cold that he had caught while playing in the snow. The next morning he dragged himself to the team training grounds and arrived exactly on time. However in the end he was looked at as having arrived late since he was the last person to show up. Not something that surprised the kid since that was sort of his pattern all of the time. When Rhaim asked as to what sort of 'boondoggle' they would be taking part in he was immediately shut down by a comment about how the Team Leader was disappointed in him. Apparently he felt that Rhaim had moved too slowly during the snowball fight and was still slow that very morning in arriving to the training grounds. Due to that it was decided that they would spend the next two weeks focused on running. Rhaim found himself not only conducted hours of sprints a day but also various long runs, including one that literally lasted eleven hours. In the beginning of this time he found that what he considered to be fast was by no means anywhere near fast enough. What was worse was that the Team Leader used Shunshin no Jutsu while he was stuck simply running around with the power of his own legs. Rhaim questioned the man as to whether or not it would be a good idea to simply teach him the Shunshin no Jutsu instead of running him into the ground. The answer he received caught him completely off guard. "What good is it to teach you Shunshin if you don't have the self control to know when you can conserve your chakra and simply just run?" With somewhat new inspiration in the running task the Nara boy carried on with the grueling hours of cardio work outs. The Nara child found himself getting some of the best nights of sleep in his entire life during those full running days. Though at first he soon found that his lung capacity was not great, he was able to use the pointers of his Team Leader to improve on his technique. Not to mention that he was getting more comfortable with his body and chakra flow. It had never occurred to the child that his chakra system was so important to his everyday workings however he was fast learning how intertwined it was. He also found that as the days progressed he was being given more and more of his own personal gear to carry as he ran. Though he knew that he would have a harder time running around with an extra backpack, the fact that simply carrying an extra supply pouch on his belt changed his entire form was a bit shocking. By the end of the whole ordeal Rhaim had discovered that he was better at running then he had originally thought and he knew how to adjust himself under different conditions. Rhiam, It is great to hear from you! I do not believe I have given myself time to adjust because I just returned from Amegakure. While there I was able to copy some jutsu scrolls so I can begin training with techniques specific to my home village. It was an...interesting trip, remind me to tell you about it someday. Anyways, never forget to enjoy your time with your team and teacher, you never know when they'll be gone. Tenma With the weeks of feet pounding on pavement, grass, and rooftops behind him Rhaim came into the training area for team one expecting to find his Team Leader with some new form of punishment. As it was he had no such thing for the Nara genin. In fact he had more of an insult waiting for the boy as he arrived late. He spoke to Rhaim in a calm voice about how he was almost useless to the village as a Nara that did not know how to conduct the Kagamane no Jutsu. He went on to express how he had hoped that the child had been training the technique in what little free time he had. Instead he had found that the Nara had not even approached other members of his clan outside of his immediate family to train him. To this the man told Rhaim the name of a woman that would give him the introductory basics of the jutsu but that it would be entirely on him to learn it in its entirety. A little down trodden from being placed back in his category of being useless the boy went the same day to seek out the female Nara and inquire her about the Kagemane no Jutsu. What he was expecting was for her to give him a lecture and a couple of days to show him how the technique was done. What he received instead was a rather old scroll with some very poor handwriting about the jutsu. She then prompted him to return to his Team Leader and not to bother giving her back the 'piece of junk' scroll. She then slammed the door on the boy and left him somewhat dumbfounded. The woman was not upset with Rhaim, nor was she a bad woman to begin with, she had simply had a bad argument with her husband and was in no mood to help the boy. Rhaim being the non-intrusive child that he was did not press the issue and simply left the home with scroll in hand. Which he soon discovered was for the most part, a 'piece of junk'. Most of the writing was blotchy, several areas were crossed out, ink was smeared, and words were constantly misspelled. However there was a certain bit about its structure that made it somewhat resemble the jutsu scrolls from the library that he was used to. When he returned to the team training area Rhaim was greeted by a kunai launched at his feet by the Team Leader. Before the boy could ask what it was about or explain that the woman had not given him anything that was truly useful, the man let loose another set of instructions. He explained to the genin that they would spend the next couple of months on working with his proficiency with kunai. It apparently was clear to the man that Rhaim was not made for close combat and should focus on medium ranged fighting. He also explained that the previous running lessons would be incorporated and that they had a few minor missions to conduct during the time. Thus the proposed training plan was approximately six months for the boy to stay concentrated on kunai use. However during that time he was expected to begin learning the Kagemane no Jutsu and that he had a year to learn the technique to an acceptable standard. Though normally Rhaim would have thought that two weeks would have been plenty of time to learn the ability, with all of the other tasks crammed in on him the year may actually be needed. Just as the man had said they began the next few days with simple throwing techniques and gauging distances. This was soon interrupted by several small missions in the village to rerun the phone and electrical lines that had been knocked down by the latest Senju rage about the growing rumors of war. Oddly enough his weird fixation with traps actually helped him understand the flow of current and made the repairs go slightly smoother. There were a few times that he found himself waking up at the feet of his Team Leader with a live wire lying beside him. Eventually the lines were completely run and the boy found himself sitting with his Team Leader being told about how there were many ways in which to harm enemy strongholds other than simply killing guards. It was obvious that he was talking about cutting power and the boy was absolutely enthralled at the concept of unconventional warfare. During that time the boy had his red gloves destroyed by simple wear and tear. That caused him to acquire a new pair of black fingerless ones. All the while tensions were mounting and unbeknownst to the Nara child, the village was on the brink of war. Rhiam, It is never a bother to write to you, I need to practice my literature skills anyways! Rewiring the village sounds like an interesting task, though I could be quite wrong in my guess. At least when this is all over with no one will be able to run as long as you can! Keep working hard and never fret about bothering me, I love hearing from you. Tenma The kunai training picked right back up for the boy where they had left off as soon as the job rewiring the village was completed. Again the running tasks that he had done previously were incorporated into the drills. Rhaim was made to run through certain vacated portions of the housing district and hit every target along a given path. This proved exceedingly difficult for the child since he would either have to waste time hunting around buildings for targets or simply ignore targets altogether in order to meet the time hacks. After a few days of frustration it was explained by the Team Leader that in a real situation he would have to make the same decisions as to what was the best course of action to complete his mission. This concept was really brought home to the boy when he was given specific conditions to meet on the kunai runs. Sometimes it would be a near impossible time to meet, causing him to overlook and avoid many targets. Other times it would be to eliminate all of the targets in the fastest time that he could, in which case he almost gave up speed for fluidity. Still other times the Team Leader would task him with hitting every target in the bullseye and still making it to the end in a fast time. In only a few rather long days Rhaim had discovered not only that his proficiency with kunai under stress had been improved but also his ability to analyze what the true intent of a mission statement was. Somehow the Team Leader had turned a kunai lesson into a much more tactical exercise that required as much brain power as it did technical prowess. Also within this time the Nara boy began to actually try and decipher the Kagemane no Jutsu scroll during the evenings. It took every night of that particular kunai lesson for him just to get it rewritten on another scroll in some sort of organized and legible fashion. After a rest and recovery day Rhaim came to the team one training grounds to find that his Team Leader had another mission for the group. This one was simple and would still provide the team with ample opportunity to train. They were being rotated into the long range security duties which just meant that they would be patrolling the increasingly hostile village borders. Their team had been assigned to the western edge of the forest beyond the actual Konoha forest this time around. As it was though they were only given two hours to return home, pack, and be at the gates of the village ready to move out. As a result Rhaim was unable to actually tell his family goodbye and instead only left a letter in the foyer. The movement out to their area was rather uneventful with the Team Leader stopping every so often just to point out flora and fauna of significance. He didn't intend to make his team experts on the subjects but rather to have some familiarization. Rhaim was also put through several running exercises en route. Once they had gotten in place they got their first look at the map and a detailed report of what had happened previously from the team that they were replacing. The fact that the outgoing team had a genin about his age made Rhaim feel a little bit better about how safe the mission really was. All of the talk about the Fire Country’s feudal lord sending troops to assault the village was still had for the boy to grasp. Thoughts of getting a nap in and then starting back up on his training were more or less cast aside as the Team Leader wanted them to immediately begin going over break contact drills. They spent the entire rest of that day talking about which directions were the best egress routes, what their safe words were, and how they would position themselves to ambush any possible crossings. Apparently there had been a fair amount of surveillance teams moving through into the greater Konoha area in their region. Though most of the time the would-be spies would simply drop their wares and run, there was the occasional group or two that would fight back in an effort to gauge Konohagurian defenses. The last thing that they did on that first day was assign sleep schedules since the Team Leader intended for someone to be awake at all times. Rhaim ended up with the middle shift and soon got in the rythem of using that time to practice his Kagemane no Jutsu with the shadows from the sunken campfire. The first couple of weeks proved to be fairly uneventful with the team simply patrolling along the border for several hours and setting up one trap a day. The intent wasn't to over saturate the area with traps so that their job would become easier, but rather to provide a little bit of early warning against enemy border crossings. The devices that they set up were very primitive trip wires connected to bells. They were not emplaced to fool battle hardened shinobi so much as the low end criminals, refugees, or inexperienced soldiers. There was also the issue of them not wanting to emplace so many that it would be too hard to recover them all or tell the next team where they were. After setting the simple bells on strings Rhaim asked the Team Leader if he could try and set up some traps that he had read about in the library. The fact that the Nara had even done any such research caught the man off guard and he gave the child permission in order to see what it was that he had learned of. Thus the child set out to create small boxes that when stepped in would press down on a pressure plate causing a set of teeth to close on the object. The Team Leader then showed him how to improve the weapons by coiling up some makeshift springs to increase the snapping power of the teeth. He then emplaced the boxes on the side of the wire furthest from the border in manner so that when someone sawthe first wire trap and stepped easily over it they would have their foot clenched by the box. On the second circuit along the route of the region they were watching the Team Leader had the boy put in three such boxes behind each wire trap. Though seemingly simple they proved most advantageous in the time to come. While along their third time moving over the land that they had been assigned, team one came across their first real test since receiving the new genin. While Rhaim and the rest of the team were resting in the first tier of several trees, a group of three men in light cloaks walked across the border almost directly underneath them. At first the Konoha shinobi thought that it must have been a joke to have the enemy units moving so close to them. With that in mind the Team Leader hopped down to inquire whether the men were lost and to direct them back in the direction of the border in case they were in fact innocent. The cloaked men wasted no time in pulling out daggers and rushing towards the man in an attempt to kill him. The rest of the team in the trees, including Rhaim, simply watched completely stunned at such a bold move. After a half dozen swipes by the would be marauders the Team Leader finally called up to the rest of them as to whether or not they were going to join in. Rhaim shook his head in disbelief and hopped down in front of one of the men. Unfortunately for the boy it happened to be just as the cloaked figure was throwing a punch. The connection sent the child flying backwards over both the wire trap and the boxes. The criminal pursued the Nara, easily seeing the wire and stepping directly over it. However when he did he let out a loud yell of pain as the teeth almost sheared off his ankle. His cries were cut short as kunai were sent flying from Rhaim, who was still lying on his back. Two landed in figures right shoulder and the third sank into the throat, causing the body to lurch back and cease movement. Rhaim stared at the body for some time with his chest beating rapidly and adrenaline pouring through his veins. Eventually he pulled himself up and walked over to the lump that was a man and squatted over it to tilt the head to the side and see the face. To his surprise and fascination the look on the face was not some horrifying look of pain and anguish or serene peace. It was simply a face of a man that was no longer struggling with the rest of the world for oxygen. What was equally as interesting to Rhaim was the fact that the same sense of thrill and enjoyment he had had during the snowball fight was present when the man had hit him and the boy had stopped him. Before long the Team leader and the rest of the team approached Rhaim with the other two enemies bound in rope with very little wounds. The Team Leader walked one of the invaders over to the corpse and knelt the man down beside it as he began to explain something. He point towards the dead individual and told his living leader that he had died because they had fool heartily attacked a team with a brand new Genin. He went on to tell the man, more for Rhaim's sake that a new Genin is much like a baby snake in that it can be more deadly than a mature snake. For the baby snake and the new Genin do not yet know how little force is needed to restrain an opponent. Thus they end up using too much venom or force and assume that every situation is a life or death, kill or be killed situation. Whereas the mature snake or the mature shinobi understand how to control themselves, the young ones do not. He finished by telling the man and Rhaim that a kunai was just as deadly in the hands of a child as it was in the hands of a master ninja. He then led the man back to the other captured foe and instructed Rhaim to search the body for anything of intelligence value and to meet up with the team when he was done. The Nara boy did as he was told and only found several large bags of drugs, a canteen of water, and a lock of the man's hair that had been lobbed off by the kunai in his throat. Rhaim picked it up and reached into his utility pouch to retrieve the cord of monkey hair that he had brought. Somehow it seemed right that he keep the item as a memorial to the man. So that he would know for sure that at least he would never forget that, though he was an enemy, that man had once lived. He then made his way back to his team to report that there was nothing of value beyond the drugs themselves and proceeded to wait with them until another team came to retrieve the two captured individuals. The next two months of the border patrol operation were more or less uneventful, with the team continuing their normal routes and setting traps. Rhaim was starting to see the faintest signs of progress with his attempts at the Kagemane no Jutsu by the time that their mission came to an end. Just as they had done, another team met with them and received information and maps on the area of operations. The replacing team informed the Team Leader that they weren't needed in Konoha right away and so they could use an extra amount of time in returning to the village. The Team Leader took this opportunity, much to Rhaim's dismay, to show the team more flora and fauna. As well as different terrain features and how to use them as a tactical advantage against ones enemies. Thus what should have been a four day movement at the most, turned into ten. When they finally returned to Konoha Rhaim was more than happy to get himself a nice warm shower and see if he had any messages from the family. Not to mention possibly get someone to actually train him properly on the Kagemane. Rhiam, I have been in the hospital for the past few days, but it is nothing to be concerned about - last mission just didn't turn out as planned. For now I will be recovering at home and then it is off to the races again. Also, I am quite excited to hear you learned a new jutsu, you will have to show it to me someday. Keep working hard! Tenma To his satisfaction Rhaim was given a week off to recover and refit from the border patrol operation. He decided that it would probably be one of the few times he'd actually get to dedicate time to his family and clan. So he went to his sisters to request that they train him exactly how to perform the Kagemane no Justu. The second oldest had some free time and so agreed to help him on the condition that he show her just how much he had learned already. He showed her that he was able to distort and move his own shadow and even meld it with the shadows of other objects put couldn't fuse the chakra properly to bind the persons movements to his own. She explained that one of the biggest reasons that he was unable to achieve that was due to the fact that he had done very little training on real people. He apparently needed the different chakra of a living organism to be present in what he was trying to manipulate in order to properly control it. After a single day of focusing on fusing his chakra with his targets through the shadows he had fairly well mastered the concept. The next portion however was a bit harder as she went on to tell him that he was not truly controlling the other persons’ body as a Yamanaka did, but rather was coating their chakra with mirrored chakra of his own in order to fool the chakra into thinking it belonged to the Nara. He understood that though that was not exactly what it was doing verbatim, it was probably the best way to explain and digest it. His sister told him that she would stick around for him to have someone to train on but that once he had that final bit of the jutsu down he had actually learned the technique. Somehow it seemed like there should be more to the jutsu than what she had explained since she made it sound like he would have it learned before the end of his week off. With training himself to chakra fatigue repeatedly every day for five days though he did in fact find that he could adequately do the technique. It did dawn on him towards the end of the time though that he had been working on a jutsu that took most of his clan a week or so to learn, for three months. Despite the circumstances of mostly having to train himself on the jutsu he was still probably the slowest recording learning of the Kagemane no Jutsu in recorded Nara history. If there was any record of such a thing kept. Once the week off from team activities was complete Rhaim found himself being the last person to arrive at the team training site yet again. After a brief dissertation by the Team Leader as to why he needed to always be on time, it was explained that they would be continuing their kunai training. Though the man probably knew exactly how long they would have until their next mission he did not let the team in on the information. He rather decided to simply train them hard until such a time that a natural break occurred. In truth he didn’t want Rhaim or the others to have too much free time to consider what was going on with their village politically. Rhaim took right back up where he had left off conducting semi-urban runs for time and accuracy. After a day of the previous exercise to get back in the flow of things they started on a new drill. This time they were to move through a series of buildings and alleyways and only engage targets based on their final number value. On each target was written a simple math problem that when solved would determine the act that the Nara had to perform. For targets with a total that was odd he was to engage in the chest. Targets that were multiples of seven were to be engaged in the head. And finally targets that had a solution that did not meet the other two criteria were to be hit in the hand. The new task that Rhaim had been given proved to be fairly difficult with the number values and the rules for the numbers changing daily. Eventually the group even moved the exercise out in some wooded environments as well. Occasionally targets had Konoha insignia drawn somewhere on them and were not to be attacked at all. It took Rhaim quite a bit of time to take the pregnant pause of determining the location of the design and not choosing to attack it. All in all it was another full two months of kunai training before Rhaim got any sort of wind of some other activity concerning his team. The whole time they had all been picking up rumors of hostility that their own country seemed to hold for them. The team leader was hoping that he could shield the group from actual warfare long enough for them to be well prepared when they were finally thrust into it. Due to some bad weather a team that was sent out to provide long range over watch of advancing Fire Country forces was unable to make it into position in time. As a result team one was called upon to take on the mission instead. Despite the fact that they were not a team that was equipped or trained for such a task, none of the members complained when their team leader gave them the instructions. It was well known that something big was likely to happen and none of them wanted to be completely left out. Even though the team leader gave his members several hours to pack and regroup, all of them including Rhaim were reading to move within an hour. The actual movement to the position to keep eyes on the supply route was fairly quick and uneventful. Once in position the team leader went over break contact drills for the area and what their criteria for engagement were. In the end they were always going to run from a compromise unless anyone of them became unable to get away from a pursuer. Fortunately for the band of genin, they were never compromised and actually were able to improve their techniques for passing information back to the village while forward deployed. While the information that they collected on the logistical movements were beneficial to the village, their placement kept them from being involved in what turned out to be a rather large scale battle with the Feudal Lords’ forces. They came to find out that the movement they had seen was mostly in response to the heavy losses that the enemy had taken in that battle. When they had returned to the village Rhaim asked why they hadn't had their usual rounds of instruction along the way. The Team Leader explained that since they had other ninja assigned to missions with a high chance of casualties, it would be poor manners for them not to be back at the village in an effort to aid and receive them. The level of compassion and downright commonsense struck the Nara as almost odd. He was about to question why then it was ok to delay the team but came across the answer in his own ponderings. Since they were all on the same team all of their families would talk to each other as well and would have an understanding that they would be gone longer than the time allotted for the mission. Not to mention that since the Team Leader knew their schedule he was always able to work in some time for them to see their own families and have down time from work. Whereas with the shinobi he had no control over what they would do once they reported back to the village and needed others to replace or help them. With that new revelation explained to his team the man decided to give the team a few days off to rest and recover for resuming training. However he promised that once they started up again it would be nothing less than grueling. They would need it since their village was then in full scale war. Rhiam, As of right now I am training and working so that I can afford another trip to Amegakure. Someone I met there made some good points that I should probably heed. Hopefully all is well with you, though it does sound like your sensei is keeping you quite busy. Remember, you are going to have to show me all you learned! Tenma True to his word, the Team Leader was ready with an arduous task to present to the team and he expected them to fail miserably. And for the first few days Rhaim did just that. The Team Leader explained that they would be conducting the same few beginning runs of the urban obstacle course with kunai targets. He went on to tell the team that they would be doing such while wearing ten pound weights on each arm and each leg. Rhaim knew that the addition of weights would make the training much harder however he soon found that it was close to impossible for him to even complete the course with the weights, much less hit targets. What had become almost second nature to the boy was once again an extremely difficult drill that left him almost completely drained after every session. Often he would try to at least conduct the Kagemane no Jutsu after dinner in order to continually improve upon it, however he would always pass out midway through. As the weeks rolled on he began to get noticeably better at the exercise and was even to able to get all of his kunai to hit the targets yet again. Though their accuracy was still much less impressive than when he hadn't worn weights. After a couple of weeks had passed Rhaim finally asked the Team Leader why they had to train wearing weights if they would never be wearing them in actual combat or in any mission for that matter. The answer he got was that after doing some intense fighting or any other hard activity it would feel as if his limbs had weights on them and he had to be prepared to force his body on under those conditions. Plus the man found it quite amusing to watch his team get so tired with such a seemingly easy drill. Rhaim couldn't argue that the training was effective since it definitely had instilled a bit of confidence in him and he was getting to the point where, though slightly slower, he was able to complete the course with as much accuracy as he had done without the weights. The training however did not stop there as the Team Leader made them repeat every one of the running and kunai drills in both the urban and forest environments with the weights. Rhaim found that month to be more than just a little bit difficult.
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Posted: Wed Aug 11, 2010 12:34 am
NARA RHAIM
KONOHAGAKURE
Part two, Proto grades The entire team seemed to get the hang of the running kunai drills with weights much quicker the second time around and thus the Team Leader decided to run them all from the beginning yet again. His instructions for the third time around was that each member was to conduct jutsus until their chakra was depleted and then without waiting for it to replenish, to conduct the exercises. Rhaim was tasked with maintaining the Kagemane no Jutsu as his chakra burn-out jutsu. The boy thought that the lack if chakra would not affect his performance too terribly much since he hadn't been allowed to use chakra to scale walls and did not yet know the jutsus to direct his weapons with his chakra. Nonetheless he soon discovered that his body did not react the same and that his overall abilities were far off par with the lack of chakra. The Team Leader told them that though chakra isn't actively used in everything it is still a vital portion of a ninjas system, especially those that use jutsus alot. He went on to tell them that their bodies could tell when chakra levels were low and would attempt to speed up chakra reproduction by taking from the other bodily functions. He said that it was much like how when running if the lungs become short on air they attempt to compensate by not sending as much oxygen to the muscles and supplementing with lactic acid. While the biology portion of the explanation went a bit over the Nara's head, the idea that every part of his body to include his chakra was heard and understood quite clearly. For the point in his life that he was at, Rhaim did not need the answers to the why questions so long as he understood what did and did not work. With his new handicap Rhaim and the rest of the team began forcing themselves through the all too familiar courses with weights and chakra depletion. As with every time before hand, the first couple of weeks were spent falling on his face and barely completing the courses at all. However as time wore on he found himself slowly getting accustomed to the feeling of not having his chakra freely flowing. An unexpected side effect was that as he continually drained himself of chakra before every run of the course, he found that it started taking slightly longer and longer to do so. Though he at first thought that it was because he slightly dreaded going through the exercise, he soon understood that he was rather slowly but gradually building up his chakra reserves. When he asked his Team Leader why such a thing would happen even though all he was doing was trying to use up chakra quickly and not doing the jutsu perfectly, he was given an astounding answer. Astounding for his young mind at least. The man explained at the end of the two months that their bodies had been pushed to the limits with physical, mental, and chakra stress so much that their bodies were undergoing the process of improving capacity and strength. Their bodies thought that since they were running out then they must not be creating enough in the first place so they had to start generating more from the start. Rhaim, though amazed, did not understand at all. Once all of the members of the team could properly complete the running kunai courses with weights and drained of chakra, the Team Leader decided to report into the Hokages office that his team was ready to accept missions. As it was there were all manner of shortages throughout the battlefield thanks to massive intelligence leaks. Rhaim and his team were given one such task, to conduct another period of patrolling to the western edge of Konoha forest. The Team Leader ordered that the members bring their Konoha headbands, though they should be packed in the bottom of their backpacks. He wanted the group to move about not as Konoha shinobi but rather as nomadic ninjas, in case they came across hostile groups. As they had previously, the group moved out to their assigned region in a manner that afforded the Team Leader ample opportunities to instill small bits of survival knowledge on his team. After they had arrived it became apparent how thin the village was running at the moment, as there was no team that they were replacing. Thus unlike the first patrolling mission, Rhaim and the rest of team one had to first ensure that the area was clear and search for any signs of recent activity. The team found no such indicators in their first few days and therefore proceeded to set small booby traps as they had before. Considering how menial of a task that it appeared to be, he wondered if the Team Leader was simply not impressed with the team's skill. The Nara silently vowed to intensify his training so that his Team Leader would not be so ashamed of him. Though the man was not. As they carried out their work emplacing traps for alert purposes the Team Leader explained that the traps that they had set the first time would not suffice to trick a trained warrior. He showed Rhaim and the rest of the team methods of running wires through trees and tying back branches so that they looked natural. He also went over how to conceal mine like devices activated by the chakra that one uses to grasp the tree limbs, in the tree trunks. The team did not encounter any enemy, bandits or even people of interest during their entire two months traveling about the wooded area. One thing that Rhaim did notice that it did was give himself a better understanding of the woods around his homeland and knowledge of how to navigate better through the area. During the days the team simply moved along the routes and monitored activity and any changes to the environment. While at night the Team Leader had enacted a rule that they could only sleep after using up all of their chakra with jutsus and climbing a nearby tree without any chakra usage. In the event that they could not make it up the tree, the team simply had to do a regimen of pushups and sit ups. Rhiam, Yet another mission took me out of town. Though I will never know why, the Hokage seems to be quite fond of sending me with random troops on escort missions. After all, when people see that a small child is the one protecting them, they can be quite unsure. Yes, the Fire Country is massive, I would like to travel it someday. Tenma By the time that the team had returned to Konoha they were all rather worn out from walking and looking forward to a few days off as the custom had been. However the Team Leader made it clear to them that they would be resuming training the very next day and would accept no excuses for anyone to not make it on time. Though he was not late, Rhaim was as usual the last one of the team to show up at the training area. Like the other members, the Nara had assumed that they would be continuing to train with weights and kunai and therefore had brought both. As it was the Team Leader had a different plan for how the team would be training for the time being. He explained that it would do the team no good to train on offensive techniques all of the time if they were so poor at defense that they never were allowed an opening to strike. He went on to explain that he would be training them on the Genjutsu Release so that they would not be completely worthless against genjutsu users. He told then that it was more important to take any sort of advantage away from an opponent then it was to find their own advantages. The logic seemed sound enough since the technique was a rather basic one for most shinobi to learn anyways. The method by which the Team Leader trained it to his team however was anything but basic. He spent the first couple of days going over the basic principles of genjutsu and how one was supposed to use the technique to escape from a genjutsu. Once that was complete he instructed the team that he would bring in other genjutsu users from the village to give one on one training with each member of the team. Rhaim was paired up with a young woman who he recognized as one of his sisters friends. The woman, unbeknownst to Rhaim, had cast a genjutsu on him from the instant that they met on the first day and everyday thereafter. The girl would gradually increase the intensity and severity of the genjutsu until Rhaim was able to recognize it as such. For the first few days that act alone took several hours. Next he was supposed to apply the release to the genjutsu and recover from it. For each failed attempt the girl was to mentally assualt the Nara boy further. Day after day Rhaim was blacked out by horrifying images from the girl's overpowering genjutsus. Sometimes is was scenes of hell, other times it was forcing him to give into his lusts, and still other times it was simply making him listen to a single bell ring on for hours. The ever changing moods and emotions caused by his start of puberty only hindered the boy further as he struggled through the training. No matter how much better he got at recognizing that he was in a genjutsu and the purpose of the different ones, he never seemed to have the will power to release himself from it. Every time he would regain consciousness the girl would assure him that he was using the technique properly and just needed to try harder. What she didn't tell him was that the purpose of his current training was not to dispel the genjutsu but rather to destroy any sort of fear of falling victim to one. The progress in that aspect was well seen as for the first week Rhaim would begin to freak out every time he failed to release the genjutsu and cause himself to pass out quicker. As time wore on he began to become dead to the idea of being trapped in the genjutsu and having his mind barraged so much. Though it did nothing to ease the actual affects of the genjutsu it did aid the boy in realizing that he had to keep as calm as possible once inside a genjutsu. For an entire month Rhaim and the others were continually placed into genjutsus that they as genin had no chance of escaping from. Finally the Team Leader brought them all back together to evaluate their progress. He played the act of being extremely disappointed by the fact that none of them had succeeded once and announced that their punishment was be subjected to twenty four - seven genjutsu entrapment until they could release themselves. None of the team showed any signs of great distress considering that it had become somewhat of the norm for them. However when they found that they were able to break the genjutsu that their Team Leader placed on them almost instantly, they all began to question. What the Team Leader had intended to be a "shock and awe" method of teaching the team that they could release most genjutsu from people slightly more experienced then themselves, had turned into quite the traumatizing event. The team members were having difficulty differentiating between imagination and reality, since they had spent so many hours in genjutsus. The fact that they could break genjutsus in a single attempt with their Team Leader, when they couldn't do it once over the period of a month, tilted them over the edge. It took a week in the psychiatric ward of the hospital with several ANBU interrogation specialists, including three of Rhaim's sisters, to finally straighten the boys out again. In the end Rhaim and the others found that genjutsu was not as fearful of a thing to them but still nothing they ever wanted to have to deal with. From then on as an addition to whatever training the Team Leader had, the team would execute a Genjutsu Release after every day's session. Rhiam, Hospital?! There had best be an exciting story behind that one! I find that the people who work there are quite kind and patient. Or at least they are with me! Please recover quickly, I would like to see you in fair condition someday! Tenma After they were released from the hospital, the team was given another week off from training for them to get back in touch with the reality of their home lives. Rhaim used that time to part with his red bandana that had served him so well through the previous years. With some of the savings from the previous missions he decided to buy a new black balaclava since it would be at least slightly more tactical than running around the woods with a bright piece of red. The most recent mission of patrolling had shown the boy how dusty the world could be and how useful a mouth guard could be. Needless to say his change to his look was definitely noticed by the team when he arrived for training once their time off was up. After a few laughs and minor poking fun at the boy they dropped the subject and accepted it as part of his adolescence and 'soul-searching'. To no one’s surprise the Team Leader had them move right back into running and kunai courses with weights and chakra depletion. To spice things up the Team Leader added five pounds to each limb, had the team working on new courses on the other side of the village, and would occasionally use a minor genjutsu on the members as they navigated to get them lost. As with every other time that they were re-introduced to the task with new difficulty, they fell flat on their faces in failure. However true to their nature, the team pressed on through the courses several times a day to complete chakra and muscle failure. Eventually the new runs and challenges became somewhat of second nature to the team, even Rhaim. The child found that his new balaclava added an extra bit of difficulty to the first couple days of training. He soon overcame them simply from continual use though. During this time Rhaims puberty induced mood swings came into full effect, though in slightly unusual manners. When he was supposed to be using up his chakra reserve while waiting for another member of the team to finish the course, occasionally Rhaim would catch his Team Leader with the Kagemane no Jutsu. The boy would get the man to do a couple steps of a jig before he realized what was going on and would break free of the jutsu. Since Rhaim intended no harm by the action and the Team Leader was at least glad to see the child doing something other than napping and waiting, the punishment was most often a more severe genjutsu for him to escape from during the running kunai course. The which, due to his chakra exhaustion, Rhaim would only be able to release a quarter of the time. With yet another month of progressively more difficult kunai and running training behind them, the Team Leader decided to give the team some extended time off to study under their respective families. As much as Rhaim looked forward to working with his father or sisters to further improve his use of the Kagemane no Jutsu, due to the war none of them were available. In typical Rhaim fashion he took his bored little behind to the library. After all it had been well over a year since he had spent time in the building that he had once considered his second home. To his amazement the same girl that he had interacted with much of the time a year prior was still working the front desk of the library. When she inquired as to which area he would study that day he responded by telling her that he was actually more interested in possibly doing some work in the library. He went on to explain that he had some time off from the team and that he needed something active to keep him busy. Thanks to the constant drive from his Team Leader the boy had lost much of his sleep desire and acceptance of being lazy. The girl, who seemed somehow more appealing to the Nara, understood what he was looking for and offered to let him restock books and scrolls during the day. She also was short staffed lately due to the constant fighting and members being called away to help the intelligence teams. Though he didn't get any monetary compensation for his time during the month, he was allowed to take out any scroll from the library for overnight study. The boy took advantage of the offer and soon found himself doing somewhat menial labor compared to his previous kunai training. As for the scrolls he would take home for the night, he found himself alternating between random jutsu scrolls and small skirmish histories. He figured that he should at least make himself familiar with as many jutsus as possible as well as continue the tactical training that his Team Leader had started during their time in the woods. All in all Rhaim's time as a library assistant accomplished the goal of occupying his time and making him somewhat of a better person at the end of it. The day before the team was supposed to come back together the Team Leader came to the library and found Rhaim. He told the boy that their assignment would be starting slightly sooner than originally anticipated. Once the entire team had met up at the training grounds it was explained that their next mission was to collect some medicinal herbs that the hospital needed restocked urgently. The constant combat was depleting their reserves badly. Though it was usually a mission that could be undertaken by one or two man cells, the herbs that were needed only grew on the northern border of the Fire Country. Rhaim and the others immediately set out to pack their gear and by nightfall of the same day the team was moving through the woods to the location of the plants. Along the way the Team Leader would quiz the team members on certain types of flora, terrain features and their significance, and their location on a series of different Fire Country maps. Rhaim inquired as to why they were studying anything other than Konoha provided maps since the village always gave them out before missions anyhow. The answer he got was that he might need to know how civilian maps were set up in case some little old lady needed assistance and only had a map from the capital city. The boy accepted the answer and figured that it definitely couldn't hurt to know more about the details of his own country. As for his results with the quizzing along the route, Rhaim scored par to the others. That is he got about a quarter of the questions completely correct and another quarter partially correct. The Nara found that he particularly enjoyed the new method of teaching since it required him to use reasoning and logic to figure out what and why something was, instead of simply having to memorize what someone else told him. Thanks to the training along the way to the border and their wariness of enemy strongholds it took the team an extra couple of days. The actual time spent gathering the medicinal herbs wasn't that difficult. Whereas finding useful plants in the immediate area of Konoha was a bit trying at times, there was quite literally several small groves of the plant exactly where the map said they would be. Rhaim later found out that the plants were carefully monitored and harvested around the same time every year to ensure that both the hospital didn't run out of supplies and that there would be enough to pick from in the following years. Though the boy was fairly unable to distinguish the herb at first, by the end of the first week it almost seemed to jump out at him every time he saw it. For whatever reason the Team Leader never gave the team the name of the plant and no one ever bothered to ask what it was called. They all simply would call it 'the herb'. Due to the nature of the herb it had to be extracted with the root completely intact for it to be of any use. That fact made what Rhaim assumed to be a fairly quick and easy mission into something that resembled more of a training exercise that would take much longer. On average each member of the team would properly uproot two to three of the herbs each day. The Team Leader however seemed to have the technique already down and was able to take out close to eight a day. During the hours of darkness the Team Leader decided to have the team work on their coordination in low light environments. To Rhaim, running and jumping through the trees at night didn't seem like it would prove all that more difficult. And it wasn't. Once the Team Leader started introducing traps, kunai targets, and eventually genjutsu into the mix, it became much more of a challenge. Unlike back at Konoha, the Team Leader didn't instantly make the training near as difficult so that the team wouldn't be too exhausted or hurt to continue the mission and be alert the next day. Though there were no reports of activity in the north, they were still on the border and were likely being watched passively. In the end though nothing out of the ordinary had occured and the team managed to gather up the required amounts of the herb in about five weeks. If it hadn't been for the nightly exercises Rhaim would have probably felt somewhat like a florist when he returned to Konoha. As with the trek out to the site of the herb, the way back to Konoha was slightly longer than it normally would have been due to the lessons given by the Team Leader on the way back. It seemed though that most of what he had been teaching the team over the past year was finally sinking in. Rhaim and the others were able to accurately identify over fifty percent of the flora, fauna, and terrain features. As well as cite their importance in a tactical situation. When they did eventually get to the village, they handed over the herbs to the hospital and were once again given a week off to recover from the previous mission. By the second day of the time off however, Rhaim and the others on the team were actually bored and went out of their way to bother their Team Leader into resuming training early. The man conceded but only on the condition that the genin would never question him on taking time off again. The team had yet to learn that it was just as important to the families of the boys that they get time off as it was to the boys themselves, especially in war time. With eager students in tow he announced, to no one’s surprise, that they would continue on with further running kunai courses. In the tradition of progression he also threw in a new problem for the team to overcome. Along with fifteen pounds on each limb, depleted chakra, and the occasional genjutsu, the team would be running the courses together. Previously they had all been doing it one at a time in order to give the team leader a chance to properly evaluate them all. His aim however now, since he was confident in their individual abilities, was to make them more aware of each other. Rhaim questioned why they hadn't been doing something so common sense beforehand. The Team Leader responded by telling him that they were too immature and it would be pointless to try and coordinate with someone else’s movements if you didn't understand your own. The entire team accepted the reasoning and vowed to prove their Team Leader wrong. They proved him right. For the better part of three weeks the three boys scrambled over each other in an attempt to hit the most targets and cross the finish line the fastest. Often times going out of their ways to hinder each other. To rectify the issue the Team Leader color coded the math problems on the targets so that a certain member of the team had to engage that target. Furthermore he made it mandatory for the entire team to wait until a target had been engaged until any of them could move on. The result was that without consciously thinking about it the team almost instantly began to rely on and aid each other to make it through the course as fast as possible. Fear of being the slowest and weakest drove Rhaim above any other emotion. Rhiam, Thank you for the birthday wishes, I will be turning nine in about two months! Also, happy birthday to you too! I do not believe that I was around when you were celebrating. Your sisters have been quite persistent on attempting to discover when my birthday is, but I am having too much fun making them guess. We'll see if it works! Oh, and stop beating people up! Tenma Since they had finally begun working with each other and planning out their moves to compliment the others in order to conserve energy, the Team Leader decided that he could give them some honest aggression. At the start of the fourth week of combined running kunai courses the Team Leader used a combination of Shadow Clones and Henge no jutsu to simulate enemy shinobi instead of stationary targets. Furthermore he had his clones use shuriken, kunai, and senbon to attack the team if they took too long to engage. Since this came without warning, the first run ended with all three genin members of the team rather bloody and beaten up. Once they understood what the rules of the new training exercise were though, they began to pull themselves together and soon had the concept down well enough to finish the course with minor cuts and scrapes. To further push the critical thinking skills of the team, the Team Leader used multiple Henge's of ninja of various shapes and sizes. He even threw in a couple of children and non-headband wearing opponents to see how the boys would react. Again the new additions gave Rhaim and the others a hard time, but eventually they learned to either specifically ask the Team Leader what their rules of engagement were or to attack once a threat was perceived. When the Team Leader noticed that the boys were getting ahead of him in their thinking he mentally praised them and added Henge civilian clones into the drills that were not allowed to be harmed. To his amazement the team never engaged an innocent target. Due to the ever changing nature of the courses and continual increase in difficulty of the clones that they were faced with, the team went through another six weeks of running kunai courses before being sent back to their homes for a week’s rest. After the week long break was over the team met up in the training grounds to something most peculiar. The Team Leader, though not actually late, was the last one to show up instead of Rhaim. Before any of the boys could begin teasing their leader for his tardiness, the man laid out the news to them. The team was being disbanded. Due to restructuring throughout the Konoha shinobi in order to organize teams in a more logical manner, their team and many others were being disbanded and organized. The Team Leader himself informed the boys that he was being rotated into an intelligence gathering duty and that they were simply being assigned to all new teams. Though the Team Leader did not know which teams they were going to he did know that none of them would be going to the same team. Apparently they were supposed to use the last two months of their time as a team in whatever way they as a team decided. The genin were agreed in their decision. They wanted to carry on with the running kunai courses until the Team Leader could think of no ways to make it more difficult. That of course would not happen. To meet the demands of his team the Team Leader gave a very concise brief to the start of their first day of their last training cycle together. Win. The boys understood just how difficult that was truly going to be when the first clone that they came across began raining down a Grand Fireball filled with exploding tags onto them. What had once been a running kunai course had turned into a free for all fight through an obstacle course that forced the boys to rely on each other. There was not a single time where the three genin beat a clone due to skill. The only times that the Team Leader would allow the clone to be beaten was when they would demonstrate coordinated attacks with proper communication and planning. However even then sometimes he would simply trounce the boys to build in them the same indifference to being physically beat as they had developed to being mental beat. Each time they went through the varying courses each boy treated the fights as if they were a life or death matter. They refused to hold back any aggression or call for a 'time-out'. This attitude was made easier by the fact that the clones that they fought were not made in the image of people that they knew and due to the rules of the training being simply to win. Though none of the team dared undergo the challenge without chakra, since they would need to perform jutsus in order to get by nearly every enemy, they did all agree to keep the weights on until they absolutely had to be removed. While they intended to hold on until the end, it ended up being every time they went through the course. The Team Leader had no intention of using the training to build up their confidence, but only to make them hungry and angry for victory. He wanted them to hate defeat more than loving victory. And his goal was definitely accomplished. By the end of the two months each of the three boys were more bruised, beaten and broken then they had ever been. But they refused to stop training until they had to walk away from an exercise dragging each other along. While the boys had never legitimately won a single time through the course, they had still shown improvement from the first day to the last. They however didn't notice since the Team Leader increased the ferocity of his own attacks to match the increase in his teams’ skill. Finally the man approached the team at the start of a new course that sat, awkwardly, on a stairwell in a back alley of the village. It was strange because it wasn't an abandoned area like they had been used to working in. However the man told them that he had no intention of training them that day. He told them rather that as of sunrise of that day he was no longer their Team Leader and that they would take the following week to recover from the previous training and would report to their new assignments thereafter. A hushed silence fell over the boys as they weighed the words. Though they hadn't been the type of team to enjoy picnics together, or treat each other to eat out, or even ever see where each other lived, they were still a team. The Team Leader broke the solemn mood by presenting what he called the only thing to prove that they had ever worked together. He gave each member of the team a kunai. However one edge of the kunai was serrated and on the handle was inscribed the names of the Team Leader and the other two team members. He explained that there was no need to put the owners name on the kunai since that person had only lived for the other three during their past two years as a team. Though it was a grand gesture appreciated by all, Rhaim and the others couldn't help but feel that it would be worth giving up the weapons to have the true bearers of the names instead. However that feeling would not make their parting any less of a reality. Rhiam, I am sorry to hear you were disbanded. Apparently the council is doing heavy renovations and I too am to become part of a team. We shall see what happens. Tenma A week later Rhaim sat on his bed with a letter in his hands instructing him where to meet his new Team Leader. All ten of his kunai sat in his double pouch on his left thigh, the newest one on top ready to be broken in.
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Posted: Fri Aug 13, 2010 11:32 am
@Yin voidblade You are rewarded 234exp for your timeskip story.
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Posted: Fri Aug 13, 2010 11:48 am
@Hademaru: You are rewarded 248exp for your timeskip story.
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Posted: Fri Aug 13, 2010 12:16 pm
@Gideon Commando: You are rewarded 126exp for your timeskip story.
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kouri-chan_xx Vice Captain
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Posted: Wed Aug 18, 2010 8:12 am
@Dimi Deiod: You are rewarded 650 exp for your time skip story.
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Posted: Wed Aug 18, 2010 8:20 am
ANDOU burning_eyes
After a few months acting as the unofficial leader of Kirigakure, Andou found himself the victim of a coup d'etat of sorts, in the same way that he was a leader of sorts. A close political rival was murdered, he was accused and convicted of the crime a bit too quickly, and he was forced to skip town. Andou could probably have stayed and protested, and eventually lived out his fate, but he preferred to stay alive for the remainder of his natural lifespan. After saying goodbye to his (few) friends, and promising to return one day, Andou fled the village with the help of his student, Hitokiri Battousai. He also asked Battousai to retrieve some of his more precious belongings that he couldn't bring with him from his house. For example, a few books, family scrolls, the good weapons... it was a good thing Andou had given away some of his weapons to his students recently really. All that teaching was good for something finally, in practical terms anyway. Better his swords went to his students than to the unscrupulous politicians and the crumbling government. Andou brought only his katana, tanto, wakizachi and kozuka, a photo of Cassie, a few books (mostly on kenjutsu) and personal effects with him. Oh and he made sure to transfer all his money to many various accounts, half of them belonging to him. Yes, money laundering - he had to wash the Andou-ness out of them before bringing them back under his name of course. What? Andou liked his greenbacks.
As he kept up his money washing, he travelled far from Kirigakure. He couldn't exactly get on a boat without producing adequately "genuine" identification, which he didn't have yet, so instead he walked up north. Every time he stopped, he would read the kenjutsu books, because he needed to get his skills up to scratch he told himself, but mostly it was due to boredom. Andou eventually found himself in the middle of the icy mountains to the north of Kirigakure, in a random village where nobody knew his name. At this point, nobody knew where he was, not even Battousai, which suited him just fine. He heard of a famous sage who lived in the mountains from the villagers and sought him out. There Andou lived for just over six months meditating, attaining zen, clearing his mind, polishing his arts, studying his books, all that good stuff (and washing his money. Andou developed quite a few multiple identities at the time and spent his money according to his identities' fake personalities. There was Harusame the thrifty housewife, Minako the flirt who loved exotic luxuries, Makoto the art collector... He became so good that it was a bit alarming). How he managed to do all that at once no one knows. Andou even shaved his head to remove his worldly attachments, which turned out to be quite useful because around that time, a shinobi squad from Kirigakure turned up around the village looking for him. Being a bald sage-in-training was a much more convincing disguise for Andou than being a blonde shinobi-in-hiding.
Of course, Andou knew that Kirigakure, despite being in political turmoil, wouldn't be deficient in sending hunter-nin squads to hunt him forever. This episode convinced him that he had to go. Of course, he was also tiring of the life of a sage, and his master told him as much. In no uncertain terms he informed Andou that yes, it was quite nice to have had some company over this year, but to be honest, you aren't cut out for the life of a sage. You are totally spoiling my zen and chi. You were made for great things, so gtfo and do them. Presumably much meditation on Andou's sage master's part was needed after that passionate outburst. Anyway, Andou did as he was told - he gathered his possessions, pretty much unchanged except for the personal effects (obviously, he'd had to change them over several times...), thanked his master, promising to return one day (though both of them knew that he wouldn't and thanked the heavens) and started to wander. To survive, Andou did odd jobs and withdrew moderate amounts from his bank account. During this time, he assumed a false identity (his favourite one, "Toshi the Nutty Chef") and travelled the world, just a bit - he went to the snowy plains of the Snow Country that reminded him of home, and eventually to the Lightning Country with its storms. (Andou didn't go anywhere else, it was too far)
Kumogakure was really pretty, and hidden from strangers, which was why Andou stayed. In fact he wondered how he had managed to find it in the first place but brushed it off as destiny. Yes, his half-year as a sage had influenced his thinking somewhat. He opened his own sushi shack in Kumo and enjoyed moderate success since Kumo was such a foodie land, even though Andou couldn't get as fresh ingredients as he would have liked. It was then that he got to know Satsuki Biorr Yuria, the Raikage. Andou had heard of his exploits even before he had been exiled from Kirigakure and had been moderately impressed; but now after he really got to know the guy he was thoroughly charmed the pants out of. And if you know Andou, that is a mean feat indeed. Satsuki was everything Kirigakure had needed - a strong, wise, generous and passionate leader. Something Andou wasn't. Something Kirigakure still didn't have. It was a real pity. Satsuki was another reason Andou stayed in Kumogakure for six months, spending his time tending to his sushi restaurant, chatting with Satsuki and in general just being a passive Satsuki fanboy. Satsuki also helped him get out of his emotional shell a bit. Once he got Andou drunk and made him pour out all his worries but that's another story...
Eventually his conscience called, though, in the form of homesickness. Six months spent away from the home country was too long and Andou returned to the Water Country, meeting up with Battousai once again. He intermittently taught Battousai moves as he trained himself, working on honing his craft. Andou's time spent running his sushi restaurant and just being a normal civilian for a while had given him a whole new perspective on shinobi arts. Why couldn't he apply the principles he used in the preparation of sushi into his sword style? He'd heard about a clan of shinobi chefs that inhabited the Fire Country or something. While he wouldn't stoop down to their level of passion (bringing pots and pans EVERYWHERE they went? REALLY?), he could definitely use all the cuts specially developed for fish and animal meat for humans. It was mostly the same texture anyway. It would work well, wouldn't it? It sure wouldn't hurt to try. Andou's logic was truly merciless and frightening when you got right down to it.
But first, Andou had something he needed to take care of. One of the scrolls that Battousai had retrieved for him had mentioned an ancient sword created by an ancestor of his, that was now hidden deep in a compound in the mountains. How do I put this? Basically, Andou wanted it. He figured that now would be the best time to get it, since later on he might have responsibilities or be dead. After spending a few days studying the encrypted scroll, Andou was confident that he'd decrypted the code properly and set off.
He disappeared for around three weeks in his efforts to locate the compound, in a remote location in the mountains that only he knew. He brought the scroll with him to constantly check if his course was right. Of course even with the scroll the journey wasn't easy and he even got lost once, missing the small road to the side that he was supposed to follow and continuing along the main path instead. The backtracking took about 3 days... but hey... he had time. Andou ascended higher and higher, battling freezing weather and a gradually steeper and more slippery incline, cursing his ancestors with every step he took after a while. He ran out of food during his "detour" but made do by digging up berries and just killing random animals (sometimes in self-defence, and then he figured why the hell not. It was also convenient for seeing the effect of sashimi slices on different types of creatures, on creatures of a size much more similar to a human's). There was no shortage of water of course.
After 4 more days and a VERY convoluted route, Andou found the compound. He could definitely see where he had inherited his obsessive compulsive nature from now. And his paranoia... The compound was long abandoned, possibly because his ancestors no longer had the shinobi to spare or just plain forgot what was inside the compound, and the defences and traps were dilapidated and old. Which was good. Andou slipped in easily, even the lock was broken. The only thing that saved the building from being raided was its remote location probably. Unfortunately he didn't get very far before the bad part to the traps being old revealed itself. He found a series of flaming arrows heading straight towards him - the trap probably had been activated prematurely. So he didn't even know when to expect the traps. Sometimes when he stepped on the traps, nothing happened, and other times when he was on safe ground large rows of spikes suddenly rose before him just as he was about to take the next step. And then you had the explosives that exploded before he even got to the room. It was good some times when he was far away, and it was bad other times when the explosives were strong and he didn't even expect them... nonetheless, Andou lived through it all and navigated through three underground floors to reach the central room. The clan sword, the Daiyanagiba was there for the taking. When Andou saw it, he just had this feeling that it was just all meant to be.
Explanation: The Daiyanagiba was basically a large katana-sashimi knife hybrid. Apparently it was reserved for ceremonies way back when it was still being used but of course it could still slice muscle tissue up like no tomorrow. Andou had known that his family had dealt with sushi way back when, but he hadn't expected them to be... /that/ passionate about it. His acquisition of the sword led him to fully brainstorm and actually figure out how a fighting style based on sashimi slices would work. It had been a half assed joke before but now he was completely serious. As he made his way back south to the nice relatively WARMER area he used to hide out in right after his exile he thought about it and did much experimenting on fish and random other animals that he hunted for food over the next few months. Of course, Battousai helped as well as Andou one day gave him an odd request to buy him groceries. Good thing Andou had such a loyal student willing to suffer... As Andou experimented, he mellowed out even more, as the creative process of developing a new style forced him to become more flexible and accepting of life's challenges. He even started to resemble the sage that had kicked him out of his cave just a year ago. Andou was becoming more mature, more open-minded, more worldly, or you know just more silly. Whatever it was, Andou eventually adapted several common cuts associated with food preparation to usage on the human body. All the while, Battousai was the sole witness to this bizarre transformation, although of course what he thought of it was known only to himself.
As Andou wrapped up developing the first phase of his style Battousai's constant updates of the news in Kirigakure started to worry him. It seemed that things in Kirigakure were starting to start to settle down. Although Andou hadn't liked his fellow politicians during his short tenure in the Council, he had worked with them, and he knew the one politician that Battousai mentioned. He was a strong politician, one Andou knew was perfectly capable of uniting Kirigakure again, given time. And when that happened...
So Andou decided to make his move. A selfish part of him wanted to bring his former students along with him. He didn't know if they missed him at all aside from Battousai's teammates Gennosuke and Shinzu. He had heard practically nothing of Masanori and Hiru over the two years he'd been missing from Kirigakure. He hadn't even talked with his best friend in Kirigakure at all! {Battousai had brought messages in between them for a while though.} So he wrote up a letter in code, and instructed Battousai to bring it to Batou, his most trusted friend. It would be the only thing he put on paper and of course the letter would burn if it was opened by someone other than Batou due to a difference in chakra signature. In there, he said that he would be visiting Kirigakure with the intention to leave the Water Country. Andou thought it was time to visit some old allies in Konoha, but to get there, he would need a ship... and, in the mean time, he would find who wanted to join him, and bring them along as well.
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kouri-chan_xx Vice Captain
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The Ghost of Xmas Awesome
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Posted: Wed Aug 18, 2010 11:22 am
Kimiko's time skip!!!!!!!
**Separation, gives birth to determination**
The sun was bright. It was warm, and it was was bright. Her eyes closed Kimiko Momoe
sat on the roof of her home, staring up at the clouds as they slowly moved by. Maboroshi
had been gone for a few hours now, left on a training mission of some kind with Mister
Crow. Even forgetting the fact that their team shouldn't have been broken up... why was
he going with her mother's old friend? Was there some connection between the two? Now
that she recalled, Maboroshi had said something that struck her as off. That one of her
mother's old friends had apparently asked her too look after Xenon. Her mother didn't
have too many old friends that she knew of, the list was rather short. This though, wasn't
what really weighed on her mind.
She didn't really know why she felt so...what did she feel? Alone? That was probably the
closest thing. She felt alone without her rival around. While she didn't really like to admit
it, she didn't have many friends, and even if Xenon was a bit of jerk...he had always been
there for her. Now that he would be gone for months or more... well... she just didn't
really know how to react. She still had Raine of course, he was her friend now too...but
why didn't it feel the same? She let out a small sigh.
At least the sun today was warm.
"Hey."
Kimiko turned her head slightly. It was her dad.
Keisuke was climbing up unto the roof with a smile in place, holding a basket in his
hands. "Hey kimi!" he seemed to be trying to cheer her up. "I brought...Cookies!" he
opened the basket with a cheesy grin. "Come on! You like Cookies don't you? Go on and
have some, I won't tell your mother." he seemed to be trying to waft the smell from the
basket over to her.
"I'm not hungry...and I KNOW that she was the one that made those Dad..."
Keisuke nearly face vaulted unto the roof, before looking a bit more sobered, and walking
over to sit down next to her. "So...your mother told me that Xen is going to be out of
town for a while."
"Yeah." Kimiko sounded bored.
"I suppose you're going to miss him huh?"
Kimiko puffed up her face slightly "No way..." she then looked a bit more sobered herself
"Well...maybe...kinda." she sighed and jumped up into a standing position. "It's not
really that though..."
Keisuke looked surprised. "Oh? Then what is it?"
Kimiko crossed her arms still looking up at the cloud dotted sky, the warm sun still
beaming down happy rays upon them. "It's something Maboroshi said to me before he
left." she seemed suddenly pensive.
"Kimiko-san." Xenon Maboroshi turned to look at her exclusively, his manner the same
as ever, almost lazy, as he spoke. "When I get back...I want you to fight me...and I don't
want to be able to know the outcome before hand." Kimiko's eyes widened to their brim,
her own eyes suddenly caught by the intensity of her rivals. "Can you do that for me?
Think of it as...a welcome home present." he smiled "I'll bring you something too. A
souvenir." he turned about and gave a small chuckle "I suppose I should get some for
Raine and Dash as well shouldn't I...what do you think they'd want as a gift...I suppose I
won't really have to worry about it until I'm preparing to head back will I..." he started to
walk slowly after his new Sensei, Mokutan on his shoulder while Medusa seemed to be
quite bored by the whole affair, standing to her master's right with an almost childish pout
on her face. She'd probably have liked to be off kicking a puppy or something...Kimiko
still didn't like that snake girl...
"Maboroshi!" She finally found her voice and he turned his head back to look at her. She
seemed uncertain for a moment, then she gave a wide grin, giving him the thumbs up.
"Sure thing. but you realize that in order for you to not know the answer before hand,
you're going to have to be really strong yourself." she put her hands on her sides. "So if
you really want your present, then you'd better be unbelievably strong before you even
think about coming back." she then seemed to look cocky. "Of course, if you take to long
I'll just have to come kick your butt and drag you back here."
Xenon smiled, his glasses shimmering in the sunlight, "Duly noted, Kimiko-san." he
turned and took a single step, before stopping and turning again. "Kimiko-san...there was
one more thing..." he looked back at her seriously. "Don't...change too much."
Kimiko's eyes went to their brim yet again, her ever feature turning into shock as he said
the next words in his sentence, his declaration. Mokutan nearly fell off the boy's shoulder
and Medusa wheeled about looking suddenly venomous, that tendril of black chakra
waving in front of her face.
Kimiko could only here her heartbeat now, even the wind seemed to have died down.
Xenon seemed to linger for a moment, then he picked up his pace, heading off down the
Road to catch up with Crow.
What he had said...
"If you grow up too much, I may have to fall for you." his tone had implied he was
joking...but, his expression...just for a moment...
The words still didn't seem real. Like they'd been a dream Maboroshi had conjured up in
her mind. It certainly felt like a Genjutsu. it had delved into her heart and even now was
making her mind a mess of confused thoughts. She couldn't even bring herself to ask
coherant questions about it though, couldn't even really acknowledge the words, or the
consequences of them. She would much rather just forget she had ever heard them...
She put her arms behind her now, clasping her fingers as she gaze upwards at the clouds.
and she smiled. "You know dad..." she looked around at him, startling him with her cheer
returning so suddenly. "Never mind...it's nothing." she turned back to look out over the
village. "I've gotta go. I'll see you later." she jumped off the roof top, heading over to the
next one, and the next one, and so on, heading towards the teams training grounds. She'd
just forget she ever heard those words...in fact, maybe she'd just imagined them...yeah...
that was probably right.
Although...maybe she could stand to be a bit more mature...
Kimiko stood amidst the storm of falling leaves, her eyes closed as she listened. She
listened to every single twitch, every single brush of a leaf against another, the wind itself
conducting this grand musical. She had to become faster...she had to stop relying some
much on just her eyes, as she had during her fight with Harima, or else, as again she had
against Harima, she would pay for it. Her sword cut in a wide arc... and then she opened
her eyes. None of the leaves had been cut. She sighed.
"Not a bad idea."
Kimiko jumped and turned to see her mother standing against a nearby tree. "Did you
think of this excercise yourself?" Kimiko nodded, looking slightly discouraged.
"Yeah...not that it's done any good yet though..." she turned away and looked up at the
shifting trees. "I've decided that...I need to be more...diverse...I need to be smarter... I
need to be able to do more than just fight," she frowned. "I do need to get stronger...but I
feel as if that's not enough...I think maybe if I can make myself better at other
things...maybe I'll grow stronger all on my own without even realizing it. And I want be
stronger for just me...not just because I'm trying to catch up to Maboroshi anymore."
Sanako smiled at the glimmer of spirit in her daughters eyes. "That's a pretty determined
stare kiddo." she gave a short laugh. "From now on, I'll be training you non-stop." Kimiko
looked at her mother surprised. "If you're really serious about this...then I'll help you in
every way I can. It'll be tough...but if you really think you're really ready...then I'll believe
you."
Kimiko smiled at her mother, before her stare became twice as fiery, and she nodded.
**Excerpt End**
Over the next three weeks, Kimiko's life went on much in the same pattern. She would
wake up, and train with her mother for a an hour every morning, the sound of their blades
ringing from the basment dojo without fail at the coming of every dawn, before Kimiko
went to work on her standard workout, still wanting to keep her muscles in shape. After
breakfast, she would then go out unto the roof and work on her chakra control. This, was
actually her own practice, smething she'd decided on alone, but her mother agreed with it.
Kimiko's chakra reserves were large, but her control over them was limited, it would do
her good to get it up a bit.
Though Kimiko's mother didn't know Kimiko's real motivation. Get it up a bit? No,
Kimiko wanted her Chakra control to be near perfect, beyond perfect. It had been
something she had said to Mokutan when he was with her while Maboroshi was in the
labyrinth. About flying. He'd actually unintentionally given her an idea. An Idea that
maybe it wasn't so out of the question for someone without Wind Jutsu to be able to fly,
more specifically, for a fire user like her to be able to fly. It was just a distant dream for
now...but...
After her chakra control practice, she would either head to meet up with Dash and Raine
for Missions, or take some little ones on her own for some spare spending money...and of
course to help out the village. This also helped, she reminded, to diversify her skills,
which was still at the fore front of her mind. Then after returning from a few hours of
this, though indeed sometimes missions ran longer, she would return home to begin her
more serious training.
Her dexterity training was grueling, and it wasn't made easy by her natural clumsiness, yet
still she gave it her all, her mother's "DODGE!" method apparently one passed down
since the olden days of the villages founding...though Kimiko wasn't certain she believed
her. Some days they worked on balence, some days they worked on stealth, but always
this time was dedicated to making Kimiko faster, to increasing her speed, and making her
all the more agile.
After that it was a late Dinner, and from then on until bed, she srested up...physcically at
any rate. In truth for Kimiko this was the most grueling part of the day. Kimiko studied.
She studied and she read and she mediatated. Her mind, she knew, though she didn't like
to admit it, was not exactly her...strongest asset, and though it probably never would be, it
didn't mean she could just let it fall behind. Besides, if she was smarter, it might help her
be more mature...not that she had that as any real goal.
This day, harrowing as it may have seemed, always left Kimiko smiling as she drifted off
to sleep at night, eager to wake up in the morning and do it all again. Every day she was
starting to notice it more and more. Improvement. Sweet, glorious improvement.
As the weeks blew by, Kimiko barely even noticed Maboroshi was gone anymore, and
her own wisdom was starting to grow as well. By the time Sanako at last deemed it time
to teach Kimiko the Hien technique, Kimiko had a begun to change...and more then
merely in body and spirit. Maybe it was her constant study, maybe it was merely her rival
being off and about, or perhaps...just perhaps, it was her work with chakra control, but
Kimiko Momoe had started to become more calm. Her spirit still shone in her eyes, and
her fire seemed to be only all the brighter and stronger, but her grin was more relaxed, her
sincerity more determined, and her confidence more honed and focused. She wasn't
having the dream about the sword as much anymore, and most notably she was no longer
frightened of dark water.
Indeed it was nothing short of amazing, but she seemed to have brushed of her phobia.
though she would still jump if she saw something shift in the murky depths, she was no
longer as irrationally afraid of it as she once had been.
The Hien technique was a three day endevor for the young girl, putting all her training
and missions on hold for a while, but at the same time, she took to it like a fish and water.
With her recent work with chakra control, the technique was far easier for her, and when
the time came for her to master it, she wasn't even surprised to see her glimmering,
almost flame like chakra, lighting up the edge of her sword.
Her swordsmanship became nearly twice as lethal over night.
With the Hien technique, Kimiko's two strengths, her swordsmenship and her chakra,
were folded into a single weapon, and what a weapon it was. Cutting through an entire
tree was like slicing butter with her chakra fortified blade, her mother's work with her
sword skills every morning truly showing themselves. Kimiko was even quickly catching
her mother up, the young girl slowly reaching the point of surpassing her teacher. Sanako
merely took it with a smile. She'd know the minute the girl had first spared with her this
day would come...it had only been a question of when. Though Kimiko wasn't quite as
strong as her in her prime just yet...her skill with a blade was exceptional.
Kimiko learned two more Jutsu within the span of this period though, Touei, the
reflection technique, which allowed her to focus her chakra into metallic objects and
create a powerful blinding flash, and of course, a technique she KNEW she would have to
master if were to ever face Maboroshi with hopes of victory, Genjutsu Kai. With her
powerful chakra, she actually was rather good at this technique, her impressive control
despite the size of her reserves aiding her even further.
Kimiko's life seemed to pass by in a pleasant haze to her, her 14th birthday having come
and gone a week, when she was called personally into Kasuke's office. Her Hero worship
of the man had ebbed slightly, that is, she didn't swoon over him any more, though she
still held him in the highest respect. It was because of this, that when he asked her to take
a mission to the border escorting refugee's from the Fire Country's War, with a Makeshift
team, she had accepted without question, learning that Dash had already given his
permission.
It was at this point that she found herself standing by the villages south entrance, looking
out over the countless rice patties while she awaited the arrival of her team.
**Setting out..Zam.**
She adjusted her coat, still marvelling at how comfortable it was. Though it was little big
for her now, she was sure she'd grow into into. Her parents had given it too her as a
birthday present, and she had to admit it was a lot better then socks, or another set of
sword polish. Why did everyone get her that? Was she the only Ninja in Oto that used a
Sword? Of course not! She could think of bunch of people who used
them...like...Sensei...and... She blinked. The gave a slight sigh. Okay, so maybe she and
Sensei were in the minority, but was that really the part about her that stuck out the most.
"Yo." Kimiko turned her head slightly, before breaking into a smile. "Oh, hey Atsuki."
Sure enough, standing there in his standard Genin attire head band about his brow, was
the tall and generally silent Atsuki Saijo. Though they hadn't spoken much, Saijo hardly
ever talked to anyone anyway, and they had gone to the academy together. They'd even
become Genin in the same exam.
"So is it your team that we're going with?" She asked turning to face him.
"Nah." Saijo said in his emotionally devoid voice.
She raised both brows looking quizical "Oh? Do you even know who we're going then?"
Saijo nodded "Yeah," he pointed over his shoulder. "That Zam girl and Miki."
Kimiko looked even more quizical. She assumed Miki meant Mikito Kaito. He was a
Chuunin that was little older then themselves, a friend of Maboroshi's if she remembered.
She hadn't seen in him in months, but she'd heard that he'd foiled a mysterious plot from a
Phantom thief, most likely the same one her own team had faced, and he was actually a
fairly highly thought of Ninja now among the other Chuunin. But, "Who's The Zam girl?"
Saijo blinked in his usaul monotone fashion. "Hm..." he turned slightly and pointed.
Kimiko leaned sideways slightly to see around him, only to spot a small box sitting
innocently on the other side of the road. Had...had that been there before? She raised an
eyebrow. "Um...a-" Yet suddenly the box exploded in a burst of smoke, a dminuitive
figure springing from it as she preformed a flip in the air, before landing before them in a
dramatic pose.
"A white flow in the dead of night, Zam." the girl said with an oddly myserious voice.
"The lily of the sound who cuts down all who stand before her...Zam." she struck a final
pose. "Villains and cowards beware, her cold justice will find you, and drag your
misdeeds to light Zam!" a spot light shone down from above her, Kimiko's eyes widening
slightly... had she learned the Dramatic spotlight no Jutsu from her Father!? "Yukimaru!
Amazing Genin of Oto, champion of the Rice....Zam." the girl's face was utterly serious,
offsetting the apperently whimsical nature of her actions completely. She suddenly stood
at attention, staring at Kimiko with an utterly intense stare. "It is a pleasure to meet you
Momoe-Senpai, Zam. I am a new Genin assigned to Saijo-san's Team to replace the
member that fell in battle, Zam."
Kimiko, if she'd been anything like most people, might have been completely thrown off
by the girl's out right Bizaare behavior, however, Kimiko Momoe had been raised by her
father, the girl's behavior was quirky at best. "One of your teammate's died Atsuki?"
Saijo shook his head, Yukimaru clarifying. "No Momoe-san, he fell, and hurt his leg, I
am substituting for him while he recovers, Zam." Kimiko nearly fell face first, but
managed to hold her balence.
"Oh...I see." she looked the girl over more carefully. She certainly was dressed like a
Kunoichi, but...she was so short. Kimiko knew that she herself was very tall for her age,
but even so, the girl had to be a little over half her size, and yet didn't seem that much
younger. She was so petit she might even have been a large fairy.
"You may ask, Zam." Yukimaru said without breaking her apparently serious emotional
mask.
"Hm?" Kimiko looked completely unassuming.
"You may ask why I'm so short, Zam."
Kimiko looked slightly pleased. "Oh, wow, I wasn't going to ask anyway, but I guess I
would like to know."
"I am naturally this short, Zam."
Kimiko nearly fell again. "T-that's all? You made it sound like it was something else."
Yukimaru was now looking into the distance, her hair billowing almost unessecarily as
her glazed eyes met the horizen. "....Nope." There was a slight pause. "Zam."
Kimiko blinked a few times herself, before caving in. "Okay...um...not to poke the
elephant in the room...but...um...why do you say that?"
Yukimaru looked at her with that same glazed expression, that, despite her strange nature,
seemed almost exactly like Saijo's. "Say what, Zam?"
"That." Kimiko was now pointing at her innocently, her eyes wide and chilidish as though
was a toddler pointing at something she'd never quite seen the like of before. "Zam."
"Zam? Zam. What are you talking about, Zam? I have never said such a thing in my life,
Zam. A Serious killing machine such as myself would never humor such a whimsical
word...Zam."
Kimiko's eyes twitched slightly, as though she was resisting the urge to poke the girl with
a stick. Was...was she serious? "Right...um, nevermind."
"Of course Senpai, Zam, I shall completely wipe this brief nonsenical exchange from my
memory, Zam." she then returned to staring at nothing, Kimiko's actively eye twitching
now.
'What...what is wrong with this girl...even my Dad isn't this bad. Although, she did have a
pretty good dramatic entrance. I have to give her that I guess...though it wasn't perfect.'
She raised a finger, as though teaching a class inside her mind 'Everyone knows you have
to appear from a high place. A box is okay for side characters, but real heroes know that
altitude counts.' She nodded to herself.
"Well...looks like everyone's here." Kimiko opened her eyes and turned to see Mikito
walking toward them, a large pack on his back as he secured his ski cap. It looked like
he'd taken to wearing his Chuunin vest over his dark burgundy coat sometime since she'd
last met him, she supposed she'd always liked their villages vests, they looked lot better
then those green things the Leaf had. The Sand's were pretty cool too though...
"Oh, Kaito-san, it's been a while. So your leading this mission."
Mikito seemed, as usaul, to have his prefered gruff scowl on, making the 16 year old boy
look far older then he was, yet his voice was casual, and while low, not at all threatening.
"Yeah, you're Kimiko right? Maboroshi's girl."
Kimiko's eye twitched. "I'm not his girl," she said squinting at him as though he was
intentionally trying to anger her. "I'm his rival and best friend." she clarfied, "Besides, I
haven't seen him in months anyway, so if even if I HAD been his girl, I wouldn't be right
now." she nodded, as though this cleared her of all charges.
"So he dumped you huh?" Mikito drawled.
"Harsh." Saijo was patting her on the shoulder encouragingly.
"Poor Momoe-senpai, her stud dropped her like an unwanted gym sock...or dog
poo...zam."
A vein in Kimiko's fore head was ticking, a small spurt of fire escaping her lips. "YOU
WANNA DIE!?" her eyes were burning with dramatic flames while Killing intent
flooded over them all.
While Saijo muttered something about, "Terrifying..." Yukimaru pointed with blank faced
admiration.
"Amazing, dramatic flames from her eyes, truly she is a master of dramatic over reaction,
Zam. I am in total awe at your skill Momoe-senpai, zam!" Her voice didn't seem nearly as
enthusiastic as her words implied, but she clearly was like Saijo in the sense that her tone
never varied. Was there something in the water they'd drank as a kid or something?
Mikito just laughed while Saijo cowered behind the much smaller Yukimaru, his
expression completely unphased despite his apparent alarm. "Relax, I was joking," The
Chuunin assured as he walked passed them all. "Xen told me that you two were just
friends. He went on that Training mission right? He ain't back yet?"
"No." Kimiko had calmed in an instant, putting her hands in the pockets of her coat after
lifting her own traveling bag from the ground, the journey apparently starting
unnoffocially, Mikito setting off without concensus. "He and Mister Crow are safe
though. Mister Crow sends us a letters alot, apparently their over in Fire Country right
now."
Mikito looked sidelong at her, the other two members of the group falling in behind them.
"Fire Country...heh, he not know there's a war on? Why do you think we're heading to
border to pick up refugee's?"
Kimiko didn't look at all troubled. "Maboroshi's fine. Not only is he in the south of Fire
Country, even if that stupid Fire Daimyo found him, I doubt they could take him down
that easily...especially with Mister Crow with him." She remembered well the stories her
mother had told her of her old Teammate's abilities.
Mikito nodded, looking unconcerned himself. "Heh...that guy. I tell ya." he looked ahead
down the road, the rice stretching for miles ahead of them. "I figure you're right...by the
way, my brother given you any trouble?"
Kimiko looked at him somewhat surprised. "You have brother? I don't think I've met
him."
Mikito looked amused. "Sure you have, you kicked his a** up and down a grave yard
once."
Kimiko looked at him innocently bewildered for a moment, before he face split into
asurprise. "Wait...you mean...my first mission back when I was student?! One of those
guys was your brother?!"
Mikito looked tickled. "Heh, heh, yeah, stupid little rat." he cracked his neck sideways.
"He was whining about revenge for a while a couple months ago, so I beat the living
breath out of his bones and told him to get a life. I was wondering if I got through to
him." Kimiko looked slightly shocked. "Since you haven't heard from the weasel, I guess
it worked...or he's paralyzed...he has been sitting down every time I've seen him
since...hmmm." Kimiko sweat slightly. "Eh, whatever, I washed my hands of that family.
moved out last month and everything." He was smiling wider then Kimiko thought
nessecary, but Saijo, seeing the meaning of this, stepped up beside his friend, and gave
him a silent thumbs up.
Mikito just grinned while Kimiko looked bewildered, like she'd missed something.
"You...have a family fight or something?"
Mikito looked slightly bitter. "Nah...nothing like that." he looked ahead again. "I just
promised myself that I'd be better then that...the only thing keeping me tied to them was
fear, after all..." he smirked "You wanna know who told me-"
"Maboroshi." Kimiko now looked completely in understanding of the situation all of a
sudden.
Mikito looked amused. "Heh, wow, you really must be his rival...yeah, that's right. Was it
that obvious?"
Kimiko rolled her eyes. "You have no idea. It sounds exactly like something Maboroshi
would say, I figured my odds were good." she looked at him more earnestly. "But...they're
your family...are they really that bad that you'd want to be rid of them?"
Mikito was stern for a moment. "Lemme just say this," Mikito seemed perfectly casual.
"You're parents aren't you real ones, right?"
Kimiko blinked. "Of course they are." she said without hesitation.
Mikito seemed to have suspected this answer. "Heh, exactly, but they aren't related to you
by blood right?" he turned his gaze upward at the clouds. Kimiko now looking at him
seemingly raptured by sudden realization. "Well, just because we're related by blood,
doesn't mean that those people are my family. I realized that." he then turned gruffer
again. "Ahem, anyway," he ignored Kimiko's smile "So, you three are my team huh?"
"Indeed Sir, Zam. It is a pleasure to serve under you sir, Zam. Just think of me as your
personal killing Machine,Zam, Say the word and I shall gladly make the veins of any
foolish mortal that stands before you fall cold...Zam." Her petit appearence, cute voice,
and yet utterly serious tones, made this sentence a verbal collision of several layers of
irony, to which Mikito could only raise an eyebrow.
"Right...if I need any Pathetic Mortals 86'd, I'll give you shout."
"Indeed sir, Zam, hollar back and I shall unleash my limitless fury at your whim...Zam."
Mikito blinked, then looked to Kimiko and Saijo. "She got Brain damage or something?"
Kimiko merely shurgged while Saijo gave a silent thumbs up. "Right...any way, I guess
we'll be spending a bit of time together for the next few months so..." he seemed to
consider how to do this. "Let's see...I think it's something like introductions first? But we
already did that...huh..." he reached up into his hat and withdrew a deck of cards,
shuffling them in his hands rather expertly. "Whatever, I guess we'll just skip to the, likes
and dislikes thing." He pointed to himself "Mikito Kaito, and I like a good game cards,
club soda, and people who ain't to proud to know when to shut up. I dislike...heh, alot
stuff, but Carrots and brats of the snot nosed variety are at the top of the list." he tilted his
head. "Hobbies? Eh...I'm working to hard right now to have any." he pointed to his left
without looking. "Short stuff, you're next.
Yukimaru saluted, still walking along twice as fast as the rest so as to let her short legs
keep up. "Sir, Zam. Yukimaru Yuki, I like studs, Zam, snapping the necks of
unsuspecting lesser mortals, and bunnies...the fluffy ones...the other ones can die
slowly...like lesser mortals, Zam." The other were looking at her slightly unnerved now,
though she didn't seem to notice. "My dislikes include the weak pathetic souls who dare
to stand in my path, Zam, the color Salmon, and, Zam, people who walk around with their
pocket's hanging out." she then seemed to think "My Hobbies...let me
think...yes...murder, manslaughter, selling the farm, premature ending of human life, and
various compound words which end in "Cide"." Her statment hovered in the air for a
moment. "I also enjoy lithographic art."
There was a moment of silence, before Mikito remarked. "Really? Lithography?"
"It gives me quite pleasure, Zam." Yukimaru explained. "Unlike the murdering, that is
much louder, Zam."
Kimiko's eye tiwtched again in pure disbelief.. There was aseriously something wrong
with that girl...
"Sai-" Mikito blinked as he looked at Saijo. "Ya know what, since we all know you
already... it's cool right?"
"Yeah." Atsuki nodded.
"Okay, Kimiko, you're go."
Kimiko gave a smile, bouncing back quickly from her exasperation over Yukimaru's
odditities. "Kimiko Momoe, I like reading manga, Heroes, fighting for Jutstice, My team,
training-" she actually seemed like she might go on for a bit, tallying each one off on her
fingers "-reading other kinds of books, so long as they're stories about heroes you know,
Happy endings..." she seemed to think for a moment, as though castin her mind about for
something she'd missed. "Um... I like Swordmanship too I guess." she smiled contentedly.
"It's a great way to leave your worries behind sometimes." She then moved on,
"Dislikes...hm..." she resisted the reflex to shout out "EEEEEEEVIIIIIL!" and instead
calmly went on. "I dislike people who are willing to cast away morals for their own
selfish ends, even more so when they actually pretend they're fighting for a good cause. I
also prefer to avoid water, ghosts, and..." she shivered slightly, looking alarmed at the
very thought "Walruses..." she immediately returned to normal, finishing up. "I guess my
hobbies are swordsmenship and Ninjutsu..." she sweat slightly. "Maybe I'm too busy
working these days too..."
Mikito gave a subtle chuckle. "Don't worry about it, I can understand. Everyone's been a
little jumpy since this war started. With that lunatic on the Fire Countries throne, it's
probably only a matter of time before we get dragged into this thing."
Kimiko put her hands back into her pockets, trotting slightly as she'd been letting herself
fall slightly behind. "I wish I could use that as my excuse but...it's...really just the way I
am." They moved on down the road, the four getting aquainted as the rice fields guided
them on towards the distant woods, their mission had begun.
**Excerpt end**
Their Group passed on down through the Land of the rice, passing through various
villages on the way, one village in particular held quite the adventure for them, albeit an
anti climatic one. A child had gone missing, and Kimiko was simply unable to refuse the
parents help. In the end the child was perfectly alright, and hadn't even realized that the
time had gotten away from him. He did hold a certain degree of hero worship for Kimiko
afterwards though.
The events in that little village however, were inconsequential when compared to the
events that transpired when Mikito had chosen to take them by a short cut, which he said
only made common sense, and that there assigned route swung about needlessly. Unlike
many people's short cuts, Mikito proved to be quite correct, and while it saved them time,
it also took them by the very thing the roads had been shifted to avoid...
The Ghost village Tokotiki.
**Village of Ghosts**
Kimiko felt completely at ease, despite the strange emotion that seemed to be building on
her friends faces. The Tall green tree's were lush, the grass as lively as she'd ever seen it.
Though it seemed that the forest was making an attem,pt to reclaim the village, the
flowers and vibrant plant life made it seem far more alive than creepy. Mikito was right
though, there was no one anywhere to be seen. "It's beautiful here..." she held he hand
over her eyes to block the bright sun from above as she peered about at all the empty
houses. "Do you think everyone just left? Why would you want to abandon a nice place
like this?" she bent down slightly as she seemed to test the grass. "The Soil here would be
find for growing rice...I wonder what the matter was..."
Mikito though was looking slightly suspcious, his air tense now as he cast about a wary
eye. "I don't like this...this place seems like it's been abandoned for years, But Kimiko's
right, with the short cut through here, this place should be in a good shape. It would be
one thing if it was abandoned during harder times, but you'd think they'd have reinhabited
it now things are in the green again."
Yukimaru poked one of the houses with the hilt of her sword. "These dwellings are not
damaged at all, zam..." she even wiped the dust away from the surface of a window.
"Indeed, it seems as though everything within is also intact, zam, it is unlikely this
happened because of violent action, zam." she looked back at them. "It looks as though
Momoe-senpai was correct, the people within just...left, Zam."
"But why?" Kimiko put her hands on her hips as she continued to look around.
"Tokotiki." Saijo said, as though he'd suddenly reached a conclusion. The others looked at
him.
"Tokotiki?" Mikito seemed to think a for a moment. "Oh yeah...that's right." he seemed to
look around with new under standing. "The Village of ghosts right?" Kimiko suddenly
looked slightly pale.
"G-ghosts?" she grabbed the hilt of her sword on reflex, her eyes inhumanly wide, as
though she wished she had heard them wrong.
Mikito gave a short laugh. "You can relax. I don't think there's really any ghosts
here...though I'm sure some people probably think so." he put his hands in the pockets of
his burgundy coat. "From what I heard, this place used to be a nice little hamlet, till one
day, poof."
"Poof?" Kimiko still didn't looked convinced there weren't ghosts about.
Mikito nodded. "Everyone in the whole village disapeared one night. Right down the
smallest child." he shurgged. "Some people say a one or two got away, but I don't know. I
think that's probably just the rumor mill doing its thing."
Kimiko though looked somewhat alarmed. "But...but why did they all disapear? What
happened?"
"Nobody knows." Mikito said bluntly, causing her to look freaked out again. "From what
most people guess though, something bad happened that night, something that pissed
someone, or something, off."
"What do you mean SomeTHING!?" Kimiko, normally completely fearless, was looking
more and more panicked by the second.
Mikito shurgged. "Point is, it wasn't just people in the village at the time. Over the next
few months, other people who'd lived in the village disapeared, some were just found
brutally murdered." Kimiko now was huddled on the ground with small dramatic ghost
lights hovering about her head. "At any rate, no one's lived here since."
Kimiko was now looking around in a paranoid way, as though a ghost might just pop up
any second now. "But then...we should leave right? I mean we wouldn't want to...waste
time?"
Mikito though didn't seem bothered. "We've saved ourselves plenty of time by taking this
short cut. I'd say we can spare the time to stop for dinner." Kimiko looked discouraged
while the Chuunin turned to the others. "Atsuki, you're on cooking duty, so get the stuff
ready, Yuki, you get the go find see if you can find some water to boil, I don't wanna use
ours if we don't have too," Saijo nodded while Yukimaru saluted, Mikito turning again to
Kimiko " Kimi, you collect fire wood, I'll scout around the area and see what I can."
Kimiko nodded, looking rather uncomfortable, but compliant. As they split up, Kimiko
couldn't help but recall that splitting up was the very last thing that you wanted to do in a
ghost village...oh just great. Her hand on the hilt of her sword, Kimiko went about her
task swiftly, spotting dead branches hanging limply up in trees, before running up them
with chakra, a slicing them cleanly with her katana. Lugging two considerably sized
branches over her shoulder effortlessly, she jumped back down the ground, pleased that it
seemed her task was done already. Now she could head back and...what was that noise!?
Kimiko turned about quickly, her face split with an almost comical child like fear, as she
stared at the empty woods around her. She could've sworn she'd heard something...that
wasn't just her imagination. She was highly trained Ninja darn it! She didn't imagine
things like that! She blinked a few times, and tried to calm herself down. "Okay...um,
mister or missus ghost, We're just passing through okay? So...um...you can just go back to
haunting or...whatever is it ghosts do, and we'll be out of your way soon...okay?" she
smiled at the empty woods.
"I'm sure the ghosts appreciate your manners dear." there was a soft giggle from behind
her as Kimiko's blood froze. She turned about slowly, only to see a tall figure standing
behind her. Kimiko was about to scream out loud, but the figure tilted her head slightly,
the sun which had been blocked by the branches above, shining down on her golden hair.
"Are you feeling alright? You look like you've actually seen a ghost."
Kimiko backed away slightly, but her fear had mostly vanished upon noting that the
woman seemed to be quite coporeal. Before her stood a tall blonde woman around her
mother's age, perhaps a tad older, and dressed in a long dark cloak that hung about limply,
her attire underneathe plain village garb. "I...oh...we...we didn't think anyone was here."
Kimiko looked uncertain as too whether or not she should be apologizing. "Mikito
thought-"
But the woman held up a gentle hand, her smile strangely calming, she seemed tickled by
Kimiko's uncertainty. "You needn't be so nervous dear. I quite understand. It's quite
understandable to think no one was still living here. In fact, I'm the only one."
Kimiko's curiousity shone through. "You? But then...you live in this village?"
The woman gave another soft laugh. "Well... I wouldn't really call it a village
anymore...but yes." she turned, pointing "I live just on the other side of those tree's there."
she then cast an eye at the large logs Kimiko was carrying so carelessly, and gave another
giggle. "Gathering fire wood are you?"
Kimiko blushed slightly. "Oh...yeah."
The woman laughed good naturedly. "Indeed, I've never seen anyone do it so effciently."
**Excerpt skip**
The Woman introduced her self as Hikari, a name which Kimiko thought somewhat
familiar, but didn't have much time to inquire about it as her team came to see what was
keeping her. Hikari invited them to eat at her house, since she so seldom recieved vistors,
and despite Yukimaru's insistance that this sounded very much like a children's story
about a witch, Mikito accepted the offer.
**Excerpt continue**
Kimiko marveled slightly at the small cottage, overrun with flowers and plant life. It
seemed so pitcuresque she thought it might very well have been pulled off a post card.
Beside the houses vast flower garden, was an even larger garden where vegatables were
planted, the source of the no doubt amazing smell that soon filled the air as they sat down
inside. The interior was just as quaint and pleasant as the outside, the entire place
smelling like fresh flowers before the smell of the cooking overpowered it. Looking
around though, it seemed as though no one else was in the house.
"Do you live here by yourself Hikari-san?" Kimiko asked somewhat sympathetically.
Hikari smiled. "Yes, but I don't mind." She was stirring the contents of the pan on the
oven, setting in some meat to cook in the oven. "I'm not as frail as I look you know," she
teased. "There's plenty of game to hunt in the surrounding woods since everyone's left,
and I find the quiet peaceful." she winked at them all. "Besides, I actually travel around
quite a bit. So it's not as though I haven't seen another person in months."
Mikito was examining some pictures on the mantle. "You travel around?" He had to
admit she DID look in expsically good shape. She reminded him of Kimiko's mother
Sanako in a lot of ways...not even including her good looks at her age.
"Yes." She confirmed pleasantly. "It's a...hobby, I suppose you would say. I guess I'm just
a born tourist."
Kimiko raised an eyebrow at her. "Have you been to many places? I've never even been
outside of rice."
"Oh yes," Hikari confirmed. "Many places." she smiled somewhat reminicently. "I was
just going to set out again in a few days as a matter fact."
As their discussion continued, Kimiko growing to like the woman more and more, Mikito
picked up yet another picture on the mantle. His eyes were growing more and more
focused with each picture, his face twisting into a slow frown. With the subtlest of nods,
he gestures Saijo over to his location by the fire place, and hinted to the pictures. While
the exchange was silent, Hikari took notice, her discussion with Kimiko flowing into
"Oh, are you enjoying those?"
Mikito gave a slightly forced smile, his eyes remaining intense. "This your family?"
"Yes." Hikari said, still with a smile.
Kimiko and Yukimaru looked bewildered. "But," Kimiko inquired. "If you have a family,
then why do you live here alone?"
Hikari's smile turned slightly sad. "I'm afraid my husband died many years ago..." she
looked slightly distant. "And my son is...well..." she tilted her head. "He's a very difficult
boy. He ran away after his father died."
Kimiko looked instantly empathetic again. "Oh...I'm so sorry..."
"It's alright." Hikari assured. "I've checked in on him many times. So I know he's happy
where he is now. And...it's my fault he ran away."
Kimiko looked instantly perturbed. "What? But, Hikari it wasn't your fault! You'd be a
great mom! Anyone who'd run away from you has got to be crazy! Why don't you go find
him and bring him back?"
Hikari was staring at the food now. "It's...difficult." she sighed. "As I said...he's happy
now. I don't want to take that from him, again..." even Yukimaru's usaul mask of
emotionlessness softened slightly as both the girl's looked at the woman with growing
emotion, while now both Mikito and Saijo were staring at her intensely.
""Again? But-" But Hikari interupted Kimiko.
"Please Kimiko-san," she shook her head. "I know you're trying to help, but..." she took
the pan off of the oven, filling out each of their plates as she took the meat from the oven.
"Of course I would like to hold my son, of course I would like to see him again and tell
him how much I love him...but that time is gone." she still had a sad smile in place as she
set their food before them. "Suffice to say I cannot face him...and let us leave it at that."
Kimiko looked very much like she would rather speak further on the matter, but Hikari's
sad smile disuaded her. As Mikito and Saijo sat down as well, Kimiko began to dig in,
her eyes somewhat softer for the having heard the womans tale.
Dinner was delicious, and not, as Yukimaru had previous suspected, poisined, enchanted,
or secretly a Genjutsu they were all trapped in by some malevolant spirit. As they
finished, and Mikito said it was time to go, Kimiko having long revived pleasant
conversation from the earlier sad topic, Hikari got up to see them off.
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