[Yuki Shuka]

Yuki Shuka --- TAG masahiro sango NPC - WORDS - - -

T

he jutsu was much more expansive this time. They managed to craft a very extensive environment, imagining it out in full, setting the mind to a very specific scenario. It was an impressive amount of detail, but perhaps too much, a larger chakra investment than strictly necessary. In creating such a large environment, it seemed like there were too many details to balanced and Sango was struggling to get all the moving parts to function exactly as intended.

Still, the mind was very good at filling in the gaps with assumption. Shuka could feel the intended cold even though she knew she shouldn't as a Yuki, and she could feel the chains bind her even if loosely, and she could feel herself beginning to be dragged into the water, heavy, difficult to resist despite it seeming like the chains should be loose enough to do so. If she were less knowledgeable, she could in fact see losing herself in the panic of this moment of confusion.

The illusion would break after a moment, releasing Shuka. She took a steadying breath.

"Much more vivid this time," she praised. "You captured the scene with greater detail and it was most impressive. You may have supplied too much detail this time, even. It seemed difficult for you to sustain, like you had laced it with much chakra. You created a very extensive image. Sometimes too much investment in detail can drain you swiftly. You must find the balancing point."

ISHY of THQ & ADOXOGRAPHY

[masahiro sango]

i am flesh and i am bone

Sango winced when the illusion broke without action from either of the shinobi. It took them a moment to realize what had happened: that they'd lost control just when things had been going so well. A sharp sigh hissed through their clenched teeth as they finally released the last handsign that they had still been holding.

Lady Shuka's praise this time was only a slight balm to their wounded pride. Well - perhaps a bit more than slight; the words 'most impressive' coming from a shinobi as talented and well respected as the leader of Yukigakure would stay in Sango's memory for a long while after that training session. Her critique wasn't terribly harsh, either, and her advice was... familiar.

Find the balancing point. 

It's a balancing act, Kōun'nōmamori-chan; you can't just brute force your way through an illusion like you do everything else. 

Clearly, they hadn't taken Yoshi's words to heart if they were still doing the same thing a few years later. Usually, it didn't matter if their genjutsu was laced with too much chakra; they used it quick and dirty during their fights, intended to create only a moment's worth of hesitation. Drowning Descent, clearly, was going to require more of them. Though frustrating... the chuunin rather relished the challenge. "Putting too much feeling into it will make the illusion collapse because I can't sustain that level of detail. But too little won't trick the victim into believing that they're trapped and drowning." Sango brushed some errant hair from their bangs back out of their face, before meeting Lady Shuka's eyes again. "So then - what is the balancing point? How do you find it?"

 Yuki Shuka
<3 <3

rise up, ting ting, like glitter and gold

[attr="class","mizocredit"]

MADE BY MIZO

[newclass=.mizocredit]font:bold 6pt calibri;color:#ffffff;[/newclass][googlefont=Open+Sans][googlefont=Karla]

[Yuki Shuka]

Yuki Shuka --- TAG masahiro sango NPC - WORDS - - -

T

hat inquiry sparked a soft laugh from Shuka. Not that it wasn't a good one - the exact opposite, really. That was the whole question, wasn't it? What so many people struggled with with genjutsu, why many abandoned the practice in favor of others that were more direct, easy to see, easy to control. So much of genjutsu was about feeling and instinct. One had to trust themselves to create it, to execute it well, to know it in-and-out without ever seeing it.

"I like that question," she informed Sango, hopefully before they could become embarrassed at the response. "It's a good one. The one you always want to ask every time you use a genjutsu." Now, how to phrase the answer?

"What I have always found is that you should keep in mind... the essentialness of features," she began. That was vague, but she could expand. "You don't want to exhaust your chakra pool on one genjutsu, so you don't want to spend a large amount of chakra constructing an image that can be created for less. The human mind is good at tricking itself, so you only need to emphasize the most necessary parts of the jutsu and if you do that well, your opponent will do the rest for you."

Using this jutsu as an example,

"What matters most for Drowning Descent? The chains, the water, the feeling of helplessness. Put all your detail into those and don't worry about the surrounding context so much. They don't need a landscape around them to feel as though you're drowning them. The place you are in and a pool of water at their feet is enough."

ISHY of THQ & ADOXOGRAPHY

[masahiro sango]

i am flesh and i am bone

When Lady Shuka started laughing, the poor chuunin's heart dropped right out from the bottom of their stomach as the strongest feeling of mortification that Sango was sure they had ever felt crashed into them. The tips of their fingers were actually tingling from the force of it. Gods let the earth swallow me whole now. Though the Lady Fifth didn't leave them drowning in their conjectured embarrassment for long - quickly telling them that her amusement had not been malicious but delighted - it still took Sango a moment to squash down all the invasive little thoughts about turning in their hitai-ate right then and there in shame that had immediately cropped up.

"Oh," they breathed out a near-silent sigh of relief. Their shoulders didn't straighten from where they'd slumped slightly and the flush staining their cheeks and ears was proving to be particularly stubborn, but Sango managed to meet Lady Shuka's eyes again. The essentialness of features, she said, and slowly the pieces started to click in the chuunin's mind. Those last remaining bits of embarrassment melted away as they became absorbed again in the expert's explanations.

Their eyes glimmered with understanding. "The bones of the jutsu are what matters -" chains, water, helplessness, as Lady Shuka had said - "and trying to force my own vision of what it all should look like is not only foolish for practical reasons, but it would weaken the jutsu's effectiveness overall." Sango was thinking out loud now, their voice becoming more animated as they continued, "If the target is used to, say, large bodies of water that are warm, being plunged into some as cold as Yuki no Kuni's oceans could be jarring enough to break through the panic, rather than add to it. Er - couldn't it?"

 Yuki Shuka
the whiplash throughout this post ^^'

rise up, ting ting, like glitter and gold

[attr="class","mizocredit"]

MADE BY MIZO

[newclass=.mizocredit]font:bold 6pt calibri;color:#ffffff;[/newclass][googlefont=Open+Sans][googlefont=Karla]

[Yuki Shuka]

Yuki Shuka --- TAG masahiro sango NPC - WORDS - - -

S

he felt some guilt for causing that embarrassment, but decided that lingering on it would only cause Sango to become even more embarrassed. It was best to let it all drift away like snow in the wind when they began to focus again on the task at hand, becoming more animated as they seemed to come to understand the point of her explanation. They had a good mind for this kind of thing, reasoning through these concepts and fitting them into shape with very minimal guiding. Again she was struck with a soft pride at it. They would make a good genjutsu master with time.

"It could," Shuka agreed, nodding her confirmation.

"Some flourishes for the setting are alright, but generally you want to allow the target to have their own expectations that flow into it. The environment they're familiar with, the environment they're currently in, where they're standing, what they're wearing... All of it can have its own impacts on how they experience the genjutsu. As genjutsu users we are illusionists, yes, but we also have to remember that we are... masters of suggestion," she offered.

"We extend our chakra in to interact with sensory organs and produce certain imagined effects. Targets will respond differently. Trying to control for every single element is a waste of chakra that could be better spent elsewhere."

ISHY of THQ & ADOXOGRAPHY

[masahiro sango]

i am flesh and i am bone

"Masters of suggestion..." Sango said, voice soft and thoughtful. They rather liked the sound of that - it slid neatly into place alongside what they'd already learned by working in their family's shop. The art of persuasion, so necessary when it came to bartering and bargaining in a marketplace, required a delicate touch.

Push too hard, and you risked offending and losing the customer. But too weak, and you'd find yourself cheated out of money and quality goods.

Sango had learned that balancing point some time ago - and had learned to apply it in other situations, like convincing hot-headed and stubborn teammates to follow their lead. They could do the same now, the chuunin thought, and coax their target into falling deeper and deeper into their illusion's trap. A smile that was - not quite self-assured, but certainly the most confident expression that Lady Shuka might have seen from Sango yet spread across their face.

"That's what makes genjutsu so tricky for so many people, isn't it? Control is key in so many of the other shinobi arts -" bukijutsu was certainly no exception to that - "and it's widely taught that the winner of a fight will be the one who has, or takes, control of the battle." Sango thought about the stranglehold grip they usually kept on Daze and Ringing Bells: Chains, and grimaced slightly. "Giving up control over any part of a technique is almost... counterintuitive, I suppose, but it seems that that's what the stronger and more complex genjutsu techniques - require." 

 Yuki Shuka
me, throughout this entire thread tbh: that sounds... plausible-ish, right?? ^^"

rise up, ting ting, like glitter and gold

[attr="class","mizocredit"]

MADE BY MIZO

[newclass=.mizocredit]font:bold 6pt calibri;color:#ffffff;[/newclass][googlefont=Open+Sans][googlefont=Karla]

[Yuki Shuka]

Yuki Shuka --- TAG masahiro sango NPC - WORDS - - -

T

hey were exactly right and it was good to see their confidence building in it as they became more accustomed with the style, with the idea of genjutsu and its particularities. It was a very odd and misunderstood branch of jutsu for a reason. That was why so many struggled to break out of it if they weren't familiar with it as well. Genjutsu was, for the user and the target, all about control and the lack of it. How those two things interplayed and shifted. You give too much and it fails, you don't give enough and it fails. Walk the tightrope. Sango was comprehending this.

"Precisely. You know, you're a clever young shinobi. A lot of people who specialize in this area take a long time to come to that conclusion," she said. "Control is important in many situations, but it can also become a crutch. Knowing how to utilize your abilities efficiently is much better than focusing on concepts of control. Genjutsu thrives the most when you allow it to work instead of forcing it to work." A subtle distinction, but a necessary one.

"Do you feel ready to give it another try now that you've come to this understanding?" She was confident they would do a decent job this time.

ISHY of THQ & ADOXOGRAPHY

[masahiro sango]

i am flesh and i am bone

"Thank you, Lady," Sango said almost shyly, after their leader complimented their cleverness. They knew that they were smart - that they had a mind for strategy and puzzles - and they were proud of that fact, but knowing it and hearing it put so blatantly by an esteemed shinobi was... well, it was something else. Especially since genjutsu, despite their real enjoyment of the art, had a way of making the chuunin feel rather stupid at times.

But this - this felt like a breakthrough. Allow the illusion to work, rather than force it to work. Sango latched onto that advice and met Lady Shuka's question with a small but determined smile. "I do," they said, before, once again, channeling their chakra and activating the genjutsu.

This time, the level of detail from Sango's last attempt and the stability from their first met each other and combined to create an illusion that was more like Lady Shuka's example than not. The chuunin poured their focus and chakra into the bare bones of the technique - chains, water, helplessness - and left the rest to the Lady Fifth's imagination.

Oh, it wasn't perfect, nor close to perfection. That would take hours of more practice (thousands of hours, until they'd depleted even their chakra reserves and their fingers ached and their brain felt more like mush than anything) until Sango would dare to proclaim such a thing... but when the technique ended, whether on their terms or Lady Shuka's, satisfaction would mix with triumph in an almost dizzying rush. They would look up to their leader with a delighted grin, seeking her approval.

Yuki Shuka
Apologies for the wait! lmk if you'd like more to work with~

rise up, ting ting, like glitter and gold

[attr="class","mizocredit"]

MADE BY MIZO

[newclass=.mizocredit]font:bold 6pt calibri;color:#ffffff;[/newclass][googlefont=Open+Sans][googlefont=Karla]

[Yuki Shuka]

Yuki Shuka --- TAG masahiro sango NPC - WORDS - - -

T

he vision came to pass in a very compelling manner. Shuka could feel it, those first strings tugging at a loose memory that she had brought up herself in her earlier thoughts. Her childhood experience when she had discovered her kekkai genkai. Out on the ice, it cracking beneath her feet, plunging into the water. Frigid water swallowing her head as she, too, swallowed it. The Yuki clan experienced cold in a very unique way that would be difficult for an outside mind to reproduce. They wouldn't die from it because it was a part of them, that iciness, but that didn't mean they couldn't still feel the sting.

She could remember the sensation. It was replicated now as the imaginary chains grabbed her and pulled her down. Lungs screaming as she took a gasp she shouldn't have, but body strangely comfortable. Not hypothermia-warm, but still cradled even as she thrashed to get above water.

Shuka could feel some holes, but they weren't ones that would be especially notable to people who weren't genjutsu experts as she was. She allowed the jutsu to play out until her lungs began to ache and then she allowed herself release from it, catching her breath. She smiled proudly.

"That was a significant improvement. The environment you guided my mind to construct was very convincing. Someone in combat would be significantly distressed by that," she told Sango.

ISHY of THQ & ADOXOGRAPHY

[masahiro sango]

i am flesh and i am bone

The blush that rose up into Sango's face this time was one of pleasure, rather than mortification. Their cheeks ached from how widely they were grinning - a broad, crooked expression that was a far cry from the usual polite, shopkeeper smile they stuck to. They didn't think they'd ever managed to learn a genjutsu so quickly, and the success, so soon and so well, was heady.

(that Sango had managed to do it without barely a trace of Yoshi's voice accusing them of succeeding now after he was dead and buried and their team ruined and -)

"It's all thanks to you," Sango said softly. Their bright smile had dimmed down into something more appropriate, for a subordinate to their leader. The chuunin bowed to Lady Shuka, taking the chance to take a deep breath and reach back for that warm glow of pride and delight. It - hovered just on the edge of their reach, but at least when Sango stood back up, they felt more composed. "I'll keep practicing it, but your help has really been - invaluable, Lady Shuka. For more than just this technique."

They would be walking away from this training session - which had started on such a sour note - not only with another technique in their arsenal but as a better genjutsu user, who had a more thorough understanding of how the entire art functioned.

 Yuki Shuka
I'm good to end it here or on your next post, if you'd like!

rise up, ting ting, like glitter and gold

[attr="class","mizocredit"]

MADE BY MIZO

[newclass=.mizocredit]font:bold 6pt calibri;color:#ffffff;[/newclass][googlefont=Open+Sans][googlefont=Karla]