[hirana kizumi]

A HEART'S A HEAVY BURDEN

Something was cooking in the back of Kizumi’s mind. Didn’t always bode well, but she had a good feeling about it this time; she just needed to let the thought simmer for a while, let it marinate. In the meantime, keep an eye on Shosuke, make sure he was adapting well to a higher rank and new responsibilities. Part of the recipe: tagging along on missions. Her council hated it when she went out in the field for anything less than an A-rank’s payout, but she wasn’t about to drag a chuunin along on such a high-risk mission, and how else was she supposed to monitor development if not by seeing it with her own eyes? Hayato and Eri would have things well in hand while she adventured in the mountains for a few days; and anyway, it would be a nice break from the endless administrative nightmare that was arranging the chuunin exams. Patrol reports had come back of some suspicious activity in the mountains of Sancho: exsanguinated animal corpses, odd bandit activity, movement coming in and out of a ramshackle, abandoned estate tucked away in a secluded valley to the north. Shitai shenanigans was what immediately popped into Kizumi’s mind, and she wasn’t too concerned about it, but it seemed like a wonderful opportunity to put darling, delightful, frazzled Shosuke to the test—especially in the aftermath of the shitshow with his eyesight. He seemed like he was adapting well and was taking to his new rank with gusto, but she wondered how he would fare with a jounin at his side. She’d set their rendezvous point for a small bar on the outskirts of Sancho, where she was cheerfully enjoying just a little glass of whisky, as a treat, while she waited for Shosuke to link up with her before they got this show on the road.

Yamamoto Shosuke -- 309

LAIKA OF THQ

SPOILER: Click to show

BLOODY SERVICE
MISSION RANK: B
NPC REQUIREMENT: Optional
PARTICIPANTS: 1-4
DESCRIPTION:
A small group of suspicious individuals have been identified by scouts in the mountain range surrounding Sancho. A team of shinobi is being dispatched to track down and eliminate these individuals, a mission which may take several days due to a persistent lightning storm in the region, and the mission objective’s proclivity for stealth. In your iteration of the mission, the individuals may be rogue bandits planning a raid on the capital; thieves scoping out a noble’s vacation home; cultists conducting strange rituals and sacrifices within their unholy sanctums. The group should have some access to chakra usage and will be a significant threat to even a small group of chuunin if caution is not heeded.

[Yamamoto Shosuke]

The idea of being paired with a Kage for a mission was a little... well, it was a little absurd. Given their rank and prestige, one would assume they wouldn't so much as leave the office for anything less than a true threat to their entire village. Ironic, therefore, that she was doing something that was essentially grunt work.

Sho had only met Kizumi on a couple of occasions and as such he couldn't help but wonder exactly what it was about this job that had pulled her out of her office. A quiet, pessimistic part of his brain said that it was to test him, that he was so worthless that she needed to accompany him to make sure he didn't embarrass the village or some such. The rest of his brain, however, knew that was merely paranoia. She wasn't that type of woman, and even if she had been she could have just sent any jounin and it would have done the same.

As for Kizumi herself, well... honestly, maybe this was just the equivalent of a joyride for her. She had always seemed a little unusual for a shinobi, she was a free-spirit (and a raging alcoholic, but that was a point for another time) and as such trapping her behind a desk seemed like it would be hard to maintain. Honestly, sometimes he wondered just how she had allowed herself to become kage in the first place. Not that she wasn't strong enough to deserve the position, it just seemed unnecessarily constraining for someone like that.

Well, whatever the case and whatever the reason for why they were out here, the simple fact of the matter was that they were out here and that they would be working together. Nothing he said or did at this point was going to change that basic fact, so he might as well learn to live with it. Besides, maybe he could use this opportunity to learn a little about the woman he had sworn himself to.

As such, Sho arrived at the small bar that he had been requested to attend almost exactly when he had been asked to turn up. Dressed in his usual combat gear, his flak jacket proudly standing as proof of office, he stepped through the small door into the bar area proper and headed directly over to her. There was no need to look around, both of them knew what he was capable of at this point so there was no need for the usual pretense.

"Lady Kizumi." Sho said, bowing his head a little as he approached. He knew she didn't like to stand on ceremony, but considering the fact they were working in an official capacity rather than just getting drinks he assumed this much was a basic requirement. "I hear you asked for me specifically? How may I help you."

479 words | hirana kizumi

SPOILER: Click to show

B-Rank Mission: 2/20
Jutsus Used: None

[hirana kizumi]

A HEART'S A HEAVY BURDEN

"Hi, darling,” Kizumi said, knocking back the rest of her whisky in a single swallow and hopping up from her seat. She was a good few inches shorter than Shosuke, but made up for it in sheer musculature, her broad shoulders and muscular arms and thighs giving her a presence in density that she lacked in verticality. "You can drop the Lady stuff, it’s just you and I, and I should be using a codename on missions anyway.” She wrinkled her nose. "Don’t feel like it today, though.” She’d been wearing the hat for long enough now that she was starting to be recognized by name, if not always by face, though the commonality of her surname was something of a boon in this regard. If the mission were more oriented towards infiltration or something social, she might have done as she was supposed to, but she wasn’t too concerned about her name being used while they were checking out a dilapidated old mansion newly occupied by crazed cultists. "First chunk of this is gonna be scouting, and I’m no sensor-nin,” Kizumi said brightly, gesturing broadly for Shosuke to follow her outside. "Thought I’d lean on your tremorsense. It’ll go a lot quicker with your help.” Scouting could be done manually, and there were gaps in the knowledge that any ninja with a penchant for improved perception could glean from a distance, but sensory or tremorsense or superfoxhearing or anything along those lines provided a clean skip over a lot of extra steps. She led the way up towards the northern exit of Sancho, where smooth stone gave way to the hard-beaten dirt of a path that cut through the mountains. They’d need to take a few detours to get where they were going, but this main thoroughfare that led to the northern side of the island would get them most of the way. "Broad strokes: bunch of suspicious activity got reported coming out of the abandoned Reizei estate. Old noble family, got wiped out during the Plague, super sad business. No one ever bought the estate ‘cause of stories of hauntings and the like, and then squatters moved in and took it over, and that was that.” She wrinkled her nose. "Last I heard some Ryujin had moved in, but with these reports of blood-drained animals, I’m thinking it might be some Shitai nonsense going on. Hard to say for sure.” She glanced over at him as they walked, giving him a once-over. "Questions? How ya feelin’, bud?”

Yamamoto Shosuke -- 419
3/20

LAIKA OF THQ

[Yamamoto Shosuke]

Getting called darling by Kizumi - it was an experience that never got old. Course, it wasn't a romantic gesture or anything like that, and even complete strangers who overheard the pair wouldn't even consider so for a second. No, it was more like an aunt or a big sister, though considering their relative age that would be a hell of a distant gap between siblings.

"I noticed you were feeling pretty informal, Kizumi. Speaking of, why is it every time we meet you're drinking before noon? I swear, keep this up and we'll be on our kudaime before the end of the year."

The way Sho spoke, it was as if being given the permission not to have to rely on the Ladyship title gave him general permission to be far more social. Then again, he doubted he would complain, even if they'd only met once or twice before he could easily tell just what kinda woman she was. If he had been formal or rigid she'd have been trying to beat it out of him. Better to avoid that and adapt to the situation.

Still, he had a point. It did seem to be a recurring pattern that whenever they met she would be on the hard stuff. He didn't wanna throw around the terms "alcoholic" or "addict" too quickly, but when you had the power and position of a Kage you couldn't really be doing things like this. Not like anyone would stop you, but it wasn't a good look.

Whatever his opinion about her drinking though, one couldn't deny that he respected her as his leader and didn't hesitate to jump to her orders, following her barely more than an inch or so behind. As they walked, it seemed like he was hanging off of every word she said, listening to her with rapt attention.

"One of the noble houses, huh? I won't lie and say I'll mourn their passing, at least no more than I do everyone else who died in the plague. Even so, it makes sense; a place with nobles would be swarming with riches that any would-be thief would be stupid to ignore. Honestly I'm amazed there's anything left in those places though, vultures don't usually wait so long to pick meat off of a fresh carcass.

As for those two options... well, you know how I feel about both clans. Ryujin are a bunch of illiterate savages and Shitai are literal parasites. Thanks for sticking me with one of them, by the by."

Sho didn't know the shitai on a personal level, but their reputation wasn't helpful. After all, they were an additional tax on the already over-stretched hospital system of Kumo, what with their need to drink blood and such. They already barely had enough to go around without people drinking it like fine wine. Mitsuki for her part was a pretty nice girl, if overly formal, but if they were talking about the family as a whole? Well, it was hard to think of them too highly, no matter what airs or graces they put on.

"Either way, it'd be good to know what we're actually up against. Fighting the Ryujin's pretty easy, just stay out of punching range and aim for the meaty spots, but Shitai? They're far more flexible and could prove to be a larger issue.

That's ignoring the possibility that it's something else entirely. I mean, Akazaya's having almost daily prison breaks at this point. Could be some no-name bandits just trying to strike it lucky and avoid their whole sentence."

595 words | hirana kizumi

SPOILER: Click to show

B-Rank Mission: 4/20
Jutsus Used: None

[hirana kizumi]

A HEART'S A HEAVY BURDEN

"Noooo,” Kizumi drawled, the world’s most unaffected protest of Shosuke’s sharp observation of her drinking habits. "It’s like a morning coffee, gets me movin’. Don’t knock it ‘til you try it.” Not that anyone, objectively, should be drinking the way that Kizumi drank: like a fish. For all that she consumed, it was rare that she ever felt drunk, though—her estimation of it being like a morning coffee was fairly accurate, in that it often felt like her brain wouldn’t start working for the day until she got a shot or three in her system. C’est la vie. She refrained from commenting on Shosuke’s unimpressed evaluation of the nobles’ demise; though privately she agreed, she was just self-aware enough to know it wasn’t the kind of thing she needed to risk saying out loud in public. "Who?” she said, wracking her brain, and then: "Oh, Mitsuki? She’s a good girl, you’re fine. Shitai’ve got bodies running the machines of every healthcare, deathcare, and prison system in this country—we’d be very short-staffed without them.” Bit of a thorn in her side, if she was being honest, since some of the more vocal traditionalists were extremely unimpressed with how she was running things, but at least the modernists were still in power. For now. "The Ryujin—eh. They’ve had a tough time, and anyone in a vulnerable enough position can fall victim to a strong personality. Once your family’s in, you’re in, et cetera… it’s not great, the shit they get up to, but we’ve got some good Borutekkusu in the ranks, and no one is beyond saving.” She clicked her tongue, sparing a sidelong glance at Shosuke: neutral, evaluating. "No one’s entitled to your forgiveness, but no one is too far gone for redemption, either.” Once they’d gotten a couple of kilometers up the main road, a narrow side-path branched out to the east, and Kizumi followed the curve: the road less-traveled was now theirs to traverse. "There’s probably not much left in the estate worth taking, but you never want to underestimate a sturdy, defensible, unoccupied position," Kizumi said thoughtfully. "Prison escapees are a possibility, but you should always go in assuming that your opponent is more dangerous than you. Last thing you need is to go into a fight against what you think is a no-name bandit and then get ass-blasted with some crazy ninjutsu.” The puzzle of the bled animal corpses was what was stuck turning over and over in Kizumi’s mind: what was the point? Any worthwhile butcher wouldn’t leave a corpse behind, which meant the animals were needed for their blood or their lives, not their meat. After another few kilometers, Kizumi paused, evaluating their surroundings. There was a sheer cliff face to their left, rocky crags to their right, and the path continued straight along. The right side was pockmarked with thin, barren trees and the occasional large stony outcropping; Kizumi gestured for Sho to follow her thataway, and weaved three handseals to make a singular shadow clone with a katana in hand. Best to do it before they were in earshot of the estate's current occupants, since the poof of shadow clone creation could be noisy. "We’re getting close,” she said. "Let’s go around, wide angle, and approach the estate from the northeastern side. Good?”

Yamamoto Shosuke -- 550
5/20

LAIKA OF THQ

[Yamamoto Shosuke]

Sho raised an eyebrow to her comment, dismissing it with a puff of air out of his nose.

"Tried functional alcoholism? Thanks but I'll give a pass on that. I like my liver in the condition it's in, thank you very much. No need to give myself any more body parts to regenerate."

Societal ills like alcoholism and smoking were a funny thing in the ninja system. Unlike those outside of the villages, should someone have enough money or resources they could hire a medi-nin to regenerate one's liver or lungs to prevent cirrhosis or tar buildup, but that didn't make them any more pleasant to deal with. Besides, when you considered where all that poison had to go once it was removed from the body... well, let's just say, it didn't evaporate just because its source was repaired.

Though, she had more of a point about the Shitai than she did about the alcoholism. As much as he may dislike the concept of someone who thrived on others' blood, he had to admit that they were pretty much universal at this point. Probably because their techniques with medical ninjutsu and unique physiology had made them one of the clans least hit by the plague. To turn against the Shitai would be a foolish decision on anyone's behalf.

Besides, Mitsuki was a good person. Even if the idea behind their abilities disgusted him, that didn't mean that the people necessarily did. Not like the Ryujin did anyway.

"You say "anyone can fall into crime in hard times" like that is an excuse for what they've done. It's one thing to steal a loaf of bread if one's starving, its another to burn your neighbor's house down after looting it.

Don't expect me to have sympathy for people who's idea of processing trauma is giving trauma to everyone else so we're all just as miserable as everyone else. Misery may love company, but making others miserable on purpose makes you a dick."

Working in the hospital, Sho had had a first row seat to many of the Ryujin's victims. he wanted to have sympathy for their plight, he understood that morality and legality were never going to perfectly align, but there was no way to overcome the simple fact that the Ryujins were an abusive, toxic family. Crime could be, and sometimes was, a noble thing in the right situation but there was nothing noble about what the Ryujin did.

Stealing from the rich to feed the poor? Honorable, classy, timeless. Stealing from the poor to feed your own hedonistic barbarity? Disgusting.

---

Regardless of the conversation at hand, they managed to approach the estate from a minor side-road, taking pains to make sure they didn't run into anyone else on the path. With the noble family no longer in residence, there was nobody to pay local landowners to keep it tidy so the place was beginning to become overgrown with weeds and vines, nature reclaiming its rightful dominance over the land.

Kizumi summoned her own clone, and Sho nodded, moving to do likewise. A trio of rapid handseals later, and a small cluster of clones were prepared to follow Kizumi's own into whatever situation may lie further ahead. For now, they simply walked alongside their creators, taciturn in both body language and words.

Should they continue to follow along this path, they would be able to get there shortly. Though, with the foliage being as sparse as it was, they would have to be careful about choosing their avenue of approach to minimize guards being able to see them coming from a mile off.

Nodding to her tactical suggestion, Sho followed obligingly behind her. making sure not to step too far out of step with her. He was a sensor-nin, but they weren't yet within his range and thus she probably had a better sense of tactical superiority than he did considering her years of experience over him.

"What's our rules of engagement?" Sho asked, his tone one of curiosity. "The noble family no longer run this place so if things get messy, is that fine? At this point, this entire area is pretty much a lost cause. If the place ends up burning down, Kumo's not going to end up footing the bill, right?"

714 words | hirana kizumi

SPOILER: Click to show

Jutsus Used
NAME: Moku Bunshin no Jutsu [Wood Clone Technique]*
RANK: B
CHAKRA USAGE: Medium
CLASSIFICATION: Ninjutsu
ELEMENT: Mokuton
HANDSEALS: 3
DECRIPTION: A clone that is created by altering the user's own cells with chakra to create vegetation. Possessing more endurance than the normal shadow clones. the doppelgangers are more resilient to damage. The clones have the ability to travel far distances from the user and are able to communicate with the original albeit the can only pass reconnaissance or simple messages with more complex thoughts and strategies depriving them from their full combat potential. The clones can be as simple in function as a wooden dummy for use in the Body Replacement Technique.

This makes this technique extremely convenient and a perfect clone technique that only the most powerful and fully developed dōjutsu will able to see through. By directly touching the wood clone with their hand, the user can absorb the information it gathered or change the shape of the clone. Because clone is made up of the user's own cells.

[hirana kizumi]

A HEART'S A HEAVY BURDEN

"I put the fun in functional!” Kizumi countered brightly, and that was the end of that. He was starting to sound eerily like her sister, and she did not want to think about her sister right at that moment—their letters had been even more sparse and terse since the Kuwana exams, Akemi having not forgiven her for what had happened to Katsuo. Shosuke was particularly impassioned on the topic of the Ryujin, it seemed, a hard streak of righteous anger that was not, Kizumi had to admit, entirely unjustified. She was a soft touch, she knew that, able to contextualize just about any behavior if she contorted her worldview hard enough. She did not agree with Shosuke’s wholesale dismissal of the clan writ large, but she didn’t disagree strongly enough to argue with him about it, and so she only hummed softly in acknowledgement and scribbled strong sense of justice in her mental notebook. Rules of engagement. Valuable and necessary when it came to protecting human life, frustrating and worthless when property was the asset that needed protecting. Kizumi grunted, a coarse noise of disgust. "Bad news, kiddo,” she said. "On paper, the estate technically belongs to the Daimyo now. The inheritor it got willed to handed over the deed as a gift in exchange for some position or another in the court in Sancho, or something like that. ‘s worthless to him right now, but mission directive from up top was pretty clear that the estate should be cleared out and secured so it can be renovated and habitable. Vacation homes, yanno.” She was trying in vain to stay positive, but frustration was writ clear on her face: if the estate accrued unnecessary damage, mission pay would get cut. For a B-rank, that was no small amount. "Use your best judgment,” she said. "If it comes down to a decision between saving your life and knocking out a wall, knock out the damn wall. Just try not to get too crazy with it, m’kay?” As they progressed up the right side, the elevation grew higher, until eventually they were on even ground with the sheer cliffs on the left side: the estate was nestled into a naturally-formed valley, an impressive manse with a large courtyard, though it was all scuffed and worn from lack of maintenance. Kizumi and Shosuke had enough of a height advantage that if they kept low, they and their clones should remain out of line of sight of any potential guards on the estate, but they were within range of what Kizumi understood to be Shosuke’s active tremorsensory range. Kizumi drew her bow and flattened herself against the ground, using the scope attached to the bowshaft to get her own read on the movements around the exterior of the estate. If Shosuke focused, he would be able to detect movements in various sections of the estate: three on the upper floors of the eastern wing, closest to their position; two on the lower floors of the western wing, farthest from their position; an additional six in the most central area of the estate. Five individuals stood in a circle surrounding a singular individual, though it would be difficult to discern any information beyond that. An additional two people patrolled the front courtyard. Kizumi herself could only see the guards in the courtyard and caught movement of people through the windows of the upper floors of the eastern wing, but nothing else. "Whatcha pickin’ up?” she asked, squinting through the scope. "How would you approach, if you were leading?”

Yamamoto Shosuke -- 593
7/20

LAIKA OF THQ

[Yamamoto Shosuke]

As Kizumi spoke, Shosuke could feel his blood run cold as she described the situation. He simply stared at her for a moment as she spoke, her words clearly eliciting a deep sense of rage, even if it was equally clear that it wasn't at her.

Everything about what she had just said disgusted him; the idea of prizing property before human lives, being able to kill wantonly at the express permission of the daimyo but not being able to harm his precious belongings? It showed how little the daimyo truly valued both them as soldiers and their enemies as humans. Sho didn't think of himself as a squeamish person, he did what was needed for missions to work and his hands were far from bloodless, but to ever consider property before people... the very notion was disgusting.

He knew at his core that it wasn't Kizumi's fault, that she was just passing on orders from above. Even the Kage, it seemed, was unable to escape the bureaucratic nightmare that was dealing with Sancho. But even so...

"Yeah, yeah, Vacation homes." Sho said, his tone clearly filled with distaste at her words. "And since our precious daimyo is going to be sunning himself here next summer, I take it we should avoid burying any of our dead foes too close? Maybe scrub the smell of blood out of the floorboards whilst we pass, make it nice and pretty for him?"

Sho knew that this talk, this open disrespect towards the daimyo, could get him executed were the wrong person to hear it. Even such basic slander could be construed as a crime against the court and could get him either exiled or worse. Hell, they'd probably enjoy ordering it, just to remind Kumo who belonged to whom and who was in whose pocket. Even so, he got the feeling Kizumi shared quite a lot of the same sympathies as he did, or else she wouldn't have employed Azarea as her aide.

Either way, the pay getting cut was the least of Shosuke's worries at this point. Perhaps he was a little spoiled because he always had the mountain to fall back to if his flat got repossessed, but he already had a nestegg of other funds earned through duty to the village. He was barely what one would consider middle class, but he had enough to be somewhat comfortable if this job fell through. What was more his concern was how they were going to be able to prosecute this duty whilst having to avoid so much as staining the walls with blood.

Stupid arrogant whoreson...

Whatever the case, the pair continued to infiltrate closer and closer towards the building. As they did so, Sho gestured for his clones to move and disperse. Though they would be of less help without them immediately around him, by setting themselves up on different points of the estate, they were able to maximize their scouting capability. In the meantime, Kizumi drew out her bow and Sho took a moment to appreciate the sight of it.

Though swords and the like were frequently carried even by Shinobi who didn't use bukijutsu, Kizumi's bow was one of a select few ever actually used in battlefield situations. She was the only true shinobi he'd ever seen use such a thing, let alone utilising it for scouting as she was. It was a thing of elegance and beauty, sleek yet deadly and built for purpose. He wasn't what one would necessarily call a "weapons guy" but even he could admire one when he saw it.

Taking the moment to scout the position once the clones were properly deployed, he paused for a second to get his bearings, before answering Kizumi's question.

"All in all, there's 18 of them within the estate. Unless they have some means of signaling a further group beyond my range, that should be all we're dealing with. You could probably take them out on your own without me even being here anyway, but we're lucky; they're split up pretty disparately.

It's almost as if they don't expect anyone to hold them to account, they've clearly gotten comfortable and aren't paying the most attention.

Nearest to us, in the Eastern wing? There's three of them. I suggest one of us finds a way to distract them whilst the other infiltrates and takes them out. Beyond that, there's..."

Sho went on to explain the layouts and distribution of the estate, including some tactical asides about avoiding open areas. It wasn't the most indepth explanation in the world, but it should do to prove the worth of his tremor-sense, the entire reason she had selected him in the first place (or at least so he thought).

790 words | hirana kizumi

SPOILER: Click to show

Jutsus Used: None

[hirana kizumi]

Kizumi listened quietly as Sho explained the layout of the estate and the patterns of their enemies, her brow creasing ever so slightly as he described the central ring of five, surrounding one—utterly still, no movement at all even as the minutes ticked by under quiet conversation. Something tickled at the back of her brain, some buried memory striving to break free… but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it yet. The primary flaw of tremorsense, Kizumi thought, was that it lacked a sensor shinobi’s ability to discern strength of chakra. But as she peered through the scope of her bow, turning her eye from the east wing to the patrolling guardsmen in the courtyard, she thought that any combatant of shinobi caliber would be armed with less ratty-looking equipment, less reliant on battered swords and poorly mended armor. She’d killed enough bandits in her time to know them when she saw them, and at least those external forces were undoubtedly nothing more impressive than standard civilians. "Alright,” she said softly, once she had digested the bevy of information Sho had given to her. "I’ll stay here to take out the courtyard guards from a distance once they patrol back this way. The clone’ll be the distraction you need to take out the three in the eastern wing, and once I’m done with the guards out here I’ll rendezvous with you on the eastern side. From there we can pop up to the roof and go overhead to the western side, take out the two there, and then see if we can’t get the jump on the guys in the middle. Sound good?” The shadow clone performed a basic transformation technique, disguising herself to look approximately like one of the courtyard guards—though how accurate she was in the face was debatable, since Kizumi wasn’t liable to get much detail through the scope. The clone would wait for Sho to prepare himself, then follow his lead, waiting for his direction as to how he wanted his distraction to play out. Kizumi, meanwhile, sat patiently waiting for a head to creep into her sightline, her hands and breathy as steady as stone. OOC: I realized as I was writing this that you/Sho got the count wrong, and I thought about clarifying over text, and then I thought: why do that when I can just make a map instead?? I'm a novice mapmaker so pls don't take this as a 1-to-1 representation of what we're dealing with, it's just meant to be a general visual aide and obvs we can both still use theater of the mind to flesh out the surroundings etc.

Yamamoto Shosuke -- 361
9/20

LAIKA OF THQ

[Yamamoto Shosuke]

Of course Kizumi was right - Unlike other sensor-nin like Uemon, he was unable to track the strengths of his opponents' chakra, unable to tell just how much of a threat other people posed. But in exchange for that, he had far more information and was able to tell things that other sensor-nin simply wouldn't be able to.

Pairing him with a more traditional sensor-nin was a recipe for success, like when he worked with Kazui or Uemon, but as it was? Well, he was essentially a pair of all-seeing eyes for the physical world, leaving the metaphysical behind.

Either way, Sho nodded without complaint as Kizumi began to describe her tactical suggestions. They made sense to a certain degree, although he couldn't help but notice that he was the one being sent into the lion's den first, like a front-guard unit.

That may make sense from an observational perspective, he was able to keep his eyes out and avoid being detected slightly easier than she could, but she was significantly stronger than him. Should something go wrong, if it turned out they were underestimating their opponents... well, it may end badly.

Though, he supposed with a moment of self-reflection, so could just about any mission he ever went on. If he wasn't willing to put himself at this basic level of risk, he really shouldn't be a shinobi at all.

With one final nod of confirmation, Sho and his clones moved forwards as a unit, stopping only to channel chakra into their feet before scaling the wall. 

---

The only entranceway from their current position into the house proper was through the relatively small window, which fortunately seemed to have had the glass smashed out of it quite some time ago. As they walked up the wall, Sho's focus was entirely on the trio of men on the other side of that frame.

From this distance, it was unclear exactly what they were talking about, though the distant sounds of raised voices and flared tempers made it pretty clear it was an argument. He might not even need the distraction at this point... 

Even still, Sho gestured for Kizumi to trigger the distraction, waiting as patiently as he could until it went off. Supposing it went off without a hitch, one of the men would approach the window frame, staring out of it only to find themselves suddenly being aggressively yoinked, Sho's fist moving to their collar and grabbing them out before they were even able to scream, letting them fall headfirst to the floor below. 

Normally a fall from only the second floor wouldn't be enough to kill a man, but with his weight landing on his head and neck, there was no way for him to survive the fall. 

With the first gone, Sho crossed the mantle, drawing his katana, charging silently towards the opponents. 

476 words | hirana kizumi

SPOILER: Click to show

Jutsus Used
NAME: Kinobori no Waza [Act of Tree Climbing]
RANK: D
CHAKRA USAGE: Very Low [Continuous]
CLASSIFICATION: Ninjutsu [General]
ELEMENT: None
DESCRIPTION:
An advanced genin level technique, it serves as a means to both enhance chakra control when mastered as well as a means to change one's advantages on the battlefield. By applying chakra to the soles of the feet, the shinobi gains the ability to walk and stand on vertical surfaces or even upside down.

[hirana kizumi]

Shosuke’s sharp observation that he was being sent as a front-guard unit was an accurate one: it was, in fact, purposeful. He was not completely without backup with her clone at his side, and Kizumi herself would be able to make her way quickly to him should things suddenly turn south; primarily, though, she wanted to see how he conducted himself. Observe his strategy and decision-making process, evaluate his performance with her own eyes instead of through written mission reports. She had plans for this boy, if all panned out well. Her clone followed close behind, obediently following Shosuke’s lead as the entire group scaled the wall and lingered outside a smashed window. Once given direction, the clone snapped a loose chunk of wood off the window frame and smacked it sharply once against the frame: loud enough to distract the three men from their argument, not so loud that it would alert the rest of the estate. One of the trio came over to investigate, and swiftly met his end on the ground below, landing squarely on his head and cleanly snapping his neck. The clone waited briefly to confirm the kill before following Shosuke inside. As he charged towards the second of the trio, the third startled with a shout, sprinting for the door—presumably to get reinforcements. There was the thought in the back of Kizumi’s mind that she should let Shosuke handle it, see how he dealt with a fleeing enemy; but she didn’t want to risk his safety, or the mission for that matter, so instead she fired an arrow cleanly through the man’s neck, and he collapsed to the ground with a gurgle and a thump. The final of the trio had just barely enough time to react to Shosuke’s attack, drawing his own sword in a sloppy parry that still sliced deep into his chest—it just wasn’t quite enough to kill him. With a heavy grunt of severe pain he pressed the offense, launching a counterattack with a swift thrust to Shosuke’s midsection; too wounded and out of breath to be able to call for help. Kizumi herself, still up in her perch, was peripherally aware of the interior of the state, keeping an ear out for any alarming noises or cries for help. She didn’t hear anything, and no clone-memories came rushing back to her, so it seemed fair to assume that the frontal assault was going well, for now. After a few moments of waiting, a head came into her sightline. She breathed in slow and deep, then loosed her arrow as easily as though she were releasing a bird; it flew straight and true, piercing clean through the patrolman’s eye. Kizumi descended quickly, confirming her kill before dragging the body into the cover of some nearby shrubbery; once that was done, she quickly and quietly ascended to the roof, crawling on her belly and peering over the edge through the scope of her bow to wait to take out the second patrolman. She had to wait until he was out of sight of the windows on the eastern side of the estate as well as away from the front door—she saw now for the first time eerie tracks of dried blood leading into the estate, a sight that sent a shiver up her spine. Cultists in the mountains, indeed. Shosuke side: - first of the trio is dead - clone!Kizumi shoots the fleeing second of the trio - the third of the trio is barely standing but fighting back against Shosuke Kizumi side: - first patrolman is dead and body is hidden - Kizumi moves to the roof to wait to take out the second patrolman tl;dr: numbers 7, 9, and 13 are dead. Shosuke is in combat with number 8. Kizumi is waiting to take out number 12.

Yamamoto Shosuke -- 561
11/20

LAIKA OF THQ

[Yamamoto Shosuke]

As Shosuke shot forwards, one of the two surviving people within the room let out a shout of surprise and began to move towards the door, though whether it was a smart decision to alert the rest of his companions and get backup or whether he was simply a coward attempting to flee from the immediate threat was unclear.

Either way, the end result would be the same if he was allowed to act freely; The others within the mansion would be alerted and they would have to deal with a much bigger problem. Taking them out would be relatively easy as long as they remained cloaked and concealed, but fighting all of them at once? Well, with the Raikage as his companion it shouldn't prove much of a challenge, but if he was alone he was certain it would have been a death sentence.

Before Sho was even able to move a hand off his blade's handle and towards the kunai secured in his belt, the problem was immediately resolved by Kizumi's clone firing a well-placed arrow, shooting through the man's throat and silencing him before he could let out another scream.

Falling to the floor with a loud thud, Sho could feel the man's pulse slowing more and more with each passing second. The poor bastard was still alive, but the arrow in his throat kept him from calling out to his friends. It was an unpleasant end, being able to feel his death coming on with each passing stroke of his heart, but it would be quite some time until he actually died unless someone put him out of his misery.

Sho, for his part, brought his sword down and cut the other, though the hit was more glancing than he had expected. It slashed across his chest, drawing forth a spray of fresh viscera but not sinking deep enough into the man's chest to claim his life as intended. Instead, the man attempted to launch a counter-attack, moving to thrust towards Sho with a desperation that came from being on the line between life and death.

With the man being in shock and already having lost a lot of blood, the man thrust forwards but the efforts were ultimately fruitless. Sho, fully healthy and prepared for the attack, simply side-stepped out of the way, his arm moving up in a single smooth motion and bisecting the man's head from his shoulders, causing them to both fall to the ground with a pair of anticlimactic thuds.

Turning back to his clone companion, Sho shot the raikage a small smile before walking over and finishing the other man off.

"Alright - I think we managed to avoid getting noticed, but we cut that a little too close. These kinds of thugs are messy and clumsy so the thudding shouldn't be that surprising, but if we had let either of them call out they would have definitely alerted the rest of their friends. We need to be careful from here on."

He wasn't sure why he was saying this - this was the Raikage after all, she surely knew infinitely better than he did as a mere Chuunin. Yet, somehow, it felt almost like he was having to give the working to a maths problem back at the academy. She wasn't psychic, as far as he knew, and so it was important that she be able to see what was going through his head if she was going to accurately grade him, regardless of whatever rubric it was she was using.

There was no point in wiping the blood off his blade, it would soon get dirty again and if anyone was able to smell the iron-like aroma of blood then the larger problem would be the ever-growing puddle spurting from the headless corpse behind him. Instead, he simply moved down the ramp towards the central room, taking the time to scout ahead with his tremorsense. It couldn't be undervalued as a boon in these sorts of stealth situation.

668 words | hirana kizumi

SPOILER: Click to show

Jutsus Used: None

[hirana kizumi]

Kizumi, original flavor, was accustomed to waiting… though she hated it with a passion, she was good at it, and before long her target wavered into view. Again she loosed an arrow, this time firing clean through her target’s throat, and again she dropped to the ground to confirm her kill before hiding the body as quickly and stealthily as she was able. Once the deed was done, she carefully, quietly lifted herself through a broken window; the glass scratched at her skin, drawing thin welts of blood, but she was silent through the ordeal until she had fully entered the western wing. Its two occupants were conversing by a bedside on the opposite side… standing remarkably close to each other, clearly engrossed in this moment of apparent intimacy they were sharing. A spike of guilt shot through Kizumi’s stomach, but a mission was a mission, and between one breath and the next she had darted across the room to stab an arrow through the neck of one of the bandits, then looped the string of her bow around the throat of the other to quietly strangle them over a couple of long minutes. Then the rendezvous. Rather than risk crossing into the center room and attracting the attention of its occupants, Kizumi made her way back outside and looped around the back of the building, following the path both Shosuke and her clone had taken and slipping up behind them, keeping her profile low and her steps light as she approached. She tapped her feet ultra-light on the floor behind him as she approached; she was used to working with Eri, and the abnormal vibration would ideally subtly draw his attention towards her without alarming him. She surveyed the carnage with approval, then sidled up alongside Sho before they entered the central room. "Good work,” she whispered. "West side is clear. Any updates?” As they got closer to the central room, they could hear an ominous chanting coming from the center of the foyer—it sounded, oddly enough, like a prayer. When they entered, a circle of figures would come into view, five individuals circled around one woman in the center. She wore black robes and held a ceremonial knife in her hand; at her feet was a massive creature, large enough to be a direwolf, slowly bleeding out via a multitude of stab wounds. "Jashinists,” Kizumi hissed, whisper-soft, and ducked back into the eastern room. They would need to strategize properly before engaging. "Son of a bitch, that sucks. Have you ever fought a Jashinist before?”

Yamamoto Shosuke -- 433
13/20

LAIKA OF THQ

[Yamamoto Shosuke]

The idea of them being intimate with one another seemed almost laughable. It was easier, cleaner, to think of the thugs here as some sort of... well, to use modern parlance, NPC. They had no secret interiority, no hidden life or love or desires, they were just meat-sacks to plunge a blade into. They were villains, enemies, things to dispatch and conquer rather than considering true people. Such was a core tenet of the training many of the shinobi in the village were given, an attempt to reduce the mental damage that would otherwise come with having to admit one’s culpability.

Sho, unfortunately, knew better.

With his background in the hospital, with his time spent both as a field medic and as a doctor in his own right, he knew that every person on the field of battle was a real, genuine person. He had been on both ends of the blade – both stabbing and trying to fix the person who was stabbed, and had been by enough dying people’s bedsides to be unable to recognise what he was doing. Perhaps that explained his tendency to lose himself to his anger, an instinctive desire to not think about the actions he was taking, to come up with some cognitive distance between his mind and his body.

He had joined Kumo’s Shinobi Corps in order to protect people, to be the shield between the people of the village and the swords and arrows of their enemies, both internal and external. Unfortunately, that meant that he often had to make choices like this, to decide between the lives of thugs like these and those of the village’s people. It wasn’t a hard choice to make, but at the end of the day killing was still killing, whether justified or not.

---

It took another few moments before Kizumi came back to him, but when she did he gave her a quick synopsis of the developments that had happened in the last few minutes – the slaying of the three guards, the arrow through the throat of the would-be alarm-raiser, and the congregation of the peoples in what appeared to be a communal area. Being unable to see colours or markings beyond the fact that the paint existed where it did, he could tell they were wearing some kind of makeup but it was far from clear what of.

As such, when Kizumi asked if he had ever fought a Jashinist before, Sho was taken aback. This was a Jashin cult? He had thought they were merely bandits, hadn’t even considered that this could be something more significant.
As to what he knew about the cult, he had to be honest and say that there was far more he didn’t know than what he did. Being a doctor in Kumogakure general, he had an encounter with some of their victims – autopsies, mostly. Jashin was, as far as he understood (and that was only somewhat), some sort of death cult that went around murdering innocent people under the belief they were liberating them from the fear of death… or something like that? He was going off of the words of his seniors in the hospital, and he had no way of knowing how correct they were in the first place.

"… No?” Sho couldn’t help but whisper back, in a tone that seemed to suggest whether that was something she had expected any other answer to. How big even was that cult for that to be a question he needed to answer?
He had, however, interacted with the Hotei enough to know that some religions had an ability to generate a Kekkei Genkai-like ability. He could understand why she was worried, he was operating at an informational loss here.

"What do we do, ma’am?”

For once, he had no suggestions. She clearly knew better than he did.

649 words | @open

SPOILER: Click to show

Jutsus Used: None