[Kuronmeru Shiu]

♔

If he listened close enough, Shiu could hear the sounds of the river babbling over smoothed rocks and tune out everything else around him.

Through the cover of reeds, he spotted a grey heron down below. With cautious, delicate steps, it waded through the water. It paused where it was, and after a moment’s hesitation, it plunged its head down below the water’s surface to spear some fish Shiu could not see. When it came up, there was nothing to be seen on its beak. It shook its head to cast some of the water off, paused, then continued forward again.

Shiu was forced to look away and came to an abrupt halt as, once again, a pair of boys no older than six years old darted in front of him, chasing a girl that was the same age in circles, just as they had been for hours. Their goal seemed to be a never-ending pursuit to try to pull at her braided pigtails. They had succeeded multiple times, each time eliciting a playful screech from the girl that grated Shiu’s nerves, and she would continue to screech long after they had already lost a grip on her hair. It was enough to make Shiu want to stab every one of them, as well as whoever the parents were that allowed their children to run continuously amok, but he assumed the rest of the merchants they were escorting would not appreciate that if he did.

The other thing that was annoying him was the uninterrupted monologuing from a man that was situated in the middle of the line of caravans they were guiding. He was a gangly man, dark-skinned with a scraggly beard, a wide-brimmed straw hat, and a strange neck that seemed to jut out farther than it should. They had been en route with the same party for hours. At first, he hadn’t noticed anything in particular amid the murmuring chatter of the merchants and construction workers. Perhaps it was just because he’d had so little to do during all this time that he started picking out the individual voices from the caravan, but once he’d locked on to the merchant’s voice and picked up on his pattern of speech, Shiu couldn’t stop hearing the inexhaustible stream of consciousness this man seemed to have with no one particularly engaged audience.

"... must have been massive. I’ve had ikayaki before, but not like that. I’m talking about this big. If I had known they were gonna’ be that big, I wouldn’t have gotten a second one! I’d been wondering why they were so expensive. I just figured they were fancy, but no. After a few bites of the first, I was full. So now I’m wondering…”

The eccentric characters of the caravan were almost enough to make him forget about who exactly had been assigned to join him on doing this mission. Almost.

Shiu cast a glance, again, to the strange swordsman he had met just weeks prior. He had never introduced himself. Either that, or the genjutsu training he’d elected to conduct for him had rattled him enough to forget. Shiu suspected that the man had pulled some strings to arrange being assigned together on this mission, somehow, as part of whatever data collection he seemed to do to satisfy whatever strange obsession it was that he seemed to have with him. He still hadn’t cracked whatever nefarious purpose the stranger must have in store for him, but Shiu knew he didn’t like it.

The responsibility of navigating the caravans across Mizu no Kuni to where the ships would be docked did come as a small surprise to him. When he had traveled to Hishi Village with his assigned jounin-sensei, she led the way there. Before they had even met up with the people they were to be escorting, he had been given the map and been charged with taking the lead.

At face value, this was something that should have thrilled Shiu. He resented yielding to authority outside of his clan, and putting him in charge of a mission was the rightful recognition of his status as the Kirigakure elite he was. The actuality of the assignment, though, brought an unwanted timidity to the forefront of his consciousness. It was one he tried to quash beneath a tight, upright posture and keeping his eyes, for the most part, focused on the path ahead.

The use of maps in a classroom was an easy thing that could be measured out with a ruler and calculated on a sheet of paper. Being out in the open wild where so much of everything looked the same and anything could be mistaken as a key landmark, however, was a much more difficult endeavor.

The river where the heron continued its pursuit was much wider than the streams they had seen before, though, and up ahead the flat grassland they had been navigating up until that point was beginning to roll up into peaks. Both of these landforms demarcated the crossover between central Mizu no Kuni to southern Mizu no Kuni. They were almost halfway to the coast. If they kept straight ahead, they may even reach the archipelago by the end of the second day, and this was a mission that Shiu desperately, desperately wanted to come to an end.

"We’ll go through the marsh,” he announced to the other shinobi, carrying an arrogance in his voice he didn’t actually feel. "The rivers should thin enough that we can cross them, and it’s going to save us hours than if we tried to go around it.”

He nearly bit his tongue trying to silence himself. He didn’t need to explain himself to the swordsman. Not waiting for a response, Shiu continued walking ahead.

coded by pinn @ thq

masshiro

[masshiro]

    For all that Masshiro could talk the ear off a rock in the midst of training, he wasn't one to say much on missions, staying quiet and focused. Usually this was due to the extent that he watched and listened, using his abilities for sensing even the most miniscule of movements, but this was a bit different than the missions he had taken in over a decade. He had gotten accustomed to working in small groups to infiltrate and gather information, more often than not doing so alone, so having to escort a group like this, especially with some talking as much as they did, made it hard to focus. 

    It was near impossible not to hear one particular man going on and on, seemingly to no one, but yet he just kept talking. This was Shiu's mission to lead, and if he wanted to tell the man and the rest of the group to stay quiet, that was on him, he was here to make sure everything went smoothly, and more than anything watch out Shiu took charge of the mission. Every genin had to start somewhere, and this was like Shiu's first chance at leading a mission, regardless of rank, if he had to guess.

    The droning voice just kept going, as if the man never had to breathe, his words just a jumbled mess in his mind as he kept focused around them. Every time Shiu glanced towards him however, he returned the look with narrowed eyes, but said nothing. It was clear they still weren't close, likely never would be, training or not, but this wasn't about two friends traveling together. Even if this was a much lower rank than he would have preferred to take mission wise, it was still important, and the lives of these civilians were in their hands. If they were sent to protect them, then clearly there was good reason.

    For all that he wanted to give this young shinobi a few pointers or direction in leading like this, it was more a matter of sink or swim. If forced to, he would step in, but like most situations he wanted to observe how Shiu would take charge. He had specifically asked to join this mission and more so for Shiu to lead, which of course came with some raised eyebrows as he could have done it himself in truth, but once he explained his reasoning, it was nothing but a shrug. 

By this point he knew these paths fairly well, not without minimal use of a map, but he had traveled this way on other missions, other training, but again, he would let Shiu completely lead them. He wouldn't learn anything if Masshiro stepped in and changed the route after all. The announcement however did cause Masshiro a raised eyebrow of his own, but he kept quiet, giving a not and a raised arm motion to show he understood. He wasn't by any means a fan of going through the marsh normally, and especially not with this group, and he knew full well that now he needed to be on his toes and not lazily follow.

    Nodding further to Shiu he looked over the group as he had been walking off to the side, now falling back completely behind them, his guard fully raised. 

    

[Kuronmeru Shiu]

♔

When after a moment he heard no verbal response from the other shinobi, Shiu looked over his shoulder back at the swordsman. Much to his pleasure, he caught the tail-end of his nodding back in affirmation to his implicit orders and him falling back in the ranks. He thought for a moment how nice it was to say something and have others simply obey it. The Kuronmeru family had no shortage of servants, but it was a different experience ordering a civilian around who was paid to listen than it was for a shinobi who outranked him to fall in line without question.

Whatever small bit of pleasure he felt from this was short-lived, however, as just as soon the trio of small kids made their way around him again. Even after Shiu stopped, one of the boys rammed into his side and stumbled over his foot, displaying a clumsiness that made Shiu suspect he’d done it on purpose to begin with. He frowned an angry death glare down at the pile of child right below him, but the boy seemed to completely ignore him, scrabbling back to his feet in a tired sprint to try to catch up with the other pigtail-chasing boy.

He pressed on. As the party came closer to the swamp, the more the terrain before them changed. Patches of shallow beds of water cropped up against the ankle-length grass, and the closer they got, the more thin films of moss he saw frothing at the surface of the water. A couple of times, he had to wind their path well around these modestly-sized bodies of water. It would not have been a problem for a couple of shinobi to cross over, but the ox-drawn wagons seemed more difficult to turn, and he didn’t trust in the stability of their wheels.

By the third time he had to circle around, he was beginning to doubt his decision to plow through the marshlands. Not only did it seem like there could be segments that wagons such as these simply could not navigate, but there was also a strange salty smell in the air that he wasn’t sure he liked. Shiu may have been able to tolerate that on its own, but in addition to the raucous noise of the children and the meaningless drivel of the straw-hatted peasant, it felt like an assault on his senses.

Much to his chagrin, just as he was about to admit they needed to change the trajectory of their course, he heard a change in the straw-hatted man’s tone, and a foreboding silence from him. This was, apparently, because he had just told whoever he was talking to that he would be right back, and he had hopped off his seat on the wagon to run ahead to talk to Shiu.

The man rounded on him, sticking his torso out in front in such a way that was meant to block him from walking any further. Shiu could have simply walked around, or pushed him over like he wanted to, but he restrained himself and came to a halt, settling with meeting the man’s toothy smile with an icy stare.

"Excuse me. Hi, hello,” the man started, waving his hand entirely too close to Shiu’s face. "You weren’t planning on taking us through that marsh ahead, were you?”

"I was,” Shiu stated flatly.

"Oh, that’s a bad idea. We shouldn’t do that,” the man said, his face becoming concerned and he shook his head emphatically.

If anything, hearing the source of his headache from the past several hours telling him not to go through only made him want to stubbornly double down on his efforts.

"There’s all manner of yokai haunting that bog,” the man continued. "They say there’s kappa lurking those waters, and trees that’ll suck out your blood, and spiders the size of a house with the face of a woman.”

"How can a tree suck blood?” he sneered, agitation rising in his voice.

"Well, they’re possessed,” he said matter-of-factly. "They wrap you up in their roots then sap everything you got out of you. My cousin said that’s why you hear the trees groaning. You hear things once you get in there. That’s why it’s got the name it does.”

Shiu had enough of these superstitions getting in the way of his duties. First there was his mission in Amegakure, where their paranoid employer charged them with performing a cleansing ritual on the factory she had bought, and now this man, who was somehow impossibly even more annoying, was telling him nonsensical tales of trees eating people. "None of that is real,” he said, whatever small care he might have had for sparing this commoner’s feelings all but gone now. He opened his mouth to say something else, but the straw-hatted man cut him off. By now, the wagon at the front had caught up to them, and now was idling behind the two awaiting direction.

"It’s true, I swear it,” he said, staring at him wide-eyed in his passion. "Those stories don’t come from nowhere, you know. It’s always young men who try to naysay this kind of stuff, but if you were out there by yourself, you’d be singing a different tune.”

As the man bodily impeded the party’s progress with going anywhere, either around or through the swamp, there was the sound of gentle, puffing snorts approaching from the treeline ahead.

coded by pinn @ thq

masshiro

[masshiro]

    There was a lot to keep up with but surprisingly not too hard to do so given the situation at present. Watching around them with mostly passive sensing, while watching the group in front, and keeping a fairly close eye on Shiu. For a brief moment he thought he might need to step out and move up, remembering how bad Shiu's temper was, and not being certain he wouldn't in fact attack one of these civilians if they annoyed him enough. Whether it was true or not was another matter, but they didn't know each other well, and all he could remember was how easily he had prodded him into violence before within no more than thirty seconds. Perhaps it was different attacking someone you knew would fight back, but it didn't make him any less uneasy.

    Moving up the line a bit, he made motions for those with carts to fall back a bit, letting them know it was easier to move behind the group to let him maneuver them through the terrain, and easier on those walking not to follow if the ground sunk. He had traversed this area only a few times, usually because there was no reason not to avoid it, but he knew well enough the terrain itself and how easily a heavy cart could sink even on land that looked perfectly stable. More than a few times Masshiro wanted to step up and lead them down a better path, step in and say it would be safer to go around, but again, he stayed back, letting Shiu learn the hard way. At a point he was physically helping with those at the back, pushing a cart more than once to make sure it didn't get stuck.

    Every time he helped he was distracted for just a moment, immediately becoming alert when he was finished, only to again get that little bit more distracted. His eyes flashed as he saw the quick movement of the man suddenly moving up towards Shiu, wondering if he had missed something as he was trying to direct the cart driver for a moment, immediately moving to the back of the group and looking around. He started to move up just a bit, staying to the right side of the group to make sure he could hear what was being said, but gave a bit of a held back laughing sound as he could clearly hear what the man said.

    He wanted to agree, but again, he had made a point to ask Shiu to take charge of this mission. Unless things were about to take a bad turn for the civilians, he was going to keep watching and take mental notes. Unfortunately the man started going on about monsters and superstitions, and he couldn't blame the most patient of shinobis for rolling their eyes, but he knew full well from what little time he knew him, that Shiu was not the most patient. Though a second time he let out a slight laugh at the idea of a blood sucking tree, given he had a close approximation of one in the shape of a weapon thrown over his shoulder at this very moment, blood red, sickening carving, and could very well be called blood sucking.

    For the sake of entertaining himself a bit, maybe even the other civilians, he spoke up.

"I can't speak to the kappa and spirits, but there are blood-sucking trees. Just not around here."

    Swinging his sheathed weapon a few times, he gave it a pat, making sure everyone could see it clearly.

"This weapon is referred to as Uemori, or The Hungering Forest. It's from a blood stained tree, and despite it's appearance is very much still alive. So maybe the trees here aren't alive, but there are very much alive trees within our borders."

    He suddenly stops talking and made a very clear motion as he jumped up and moved in an instant in front of the entire group to stop them. 

"Please, everyone quiet."

    Immediately he started to look around, using his active sensory abilities to try and feel what was out there, if it was in fact a threat at all. Despite his attempts to let Shiu take control of the mission and the group, he was very much now placing himself at the front of the group and trying to take charge of the situation in the moment. If there was in fact a threat, he wasn't going to take needless chances.

    

[Kuronmeru Shiu]

♔

Not everyone in the caravan party was paying attention to the conversation near front or was close enough to hear it. For those that were nearby to hear Masshiro’s words, accompanied by the flourish of his weapon, there was a mixture of awe, intrigue and trepidation to be found among their faces. A young pre-teen girl who had been sticking close to the side of one of the ox, in particular, watched the fluid swings of Uemori with a starstruck gaze.

Shiu, however, was not impressed. He looked over his shoulder back at the swordsman, the annoyed quirk of his lips as strong as ever. This man had to have some kind of vendetta against him to enable more of the straw-hatted peasant’s blathering. He found the swordsman’s bravado unbecoming, and not anything near the topic of fascination he seemed to think it was. Shiu had seen that weapon up close. He didn’t care if it was purported to be one of the legendary swords. It was just a glorified stick that might as well have had nails crudely hammered in it, one that in that moment he would have liked to have seen whether he could break it on his knee or not.

Before he or the man in the straw hat could comment any further, though, the swordsman was suddenly standing before them, his stance alert and sensing. Shiu followed the man’s gaze to search out what had grabbed his attention.

Masshiro would have been able to pick out what exactly was making those noises from the treeline well before Shiu could. Ahead of them was a group of twelve bovine, two of which were young calves. Most of them seemed docile in temperament, at least with the distance that was between them and the caravan party at present. There were, however, two among the group that gave cause for concern.

What had first sounded like gentle puffing became more distressed as it went on. It came from one of the smaller adult bovines, presumably a female within the group. She kept her head moving in agitated motions. She would shake her head from side to side, then follow her snorting jerking her head into a tree, horn first, then raking at the bark of the tree by nodding her head up and down, almost as though trying to scratch an itch she couldn’t quite reach. From Shiu’s perspective, all he could see were hints of a glossy black coat, slick with water, and vague erratic movements.

The second cause for concern was the one bovine that came close enough to the treeline for them to get a good look. Shiu recognized from the barrel-chest and wide crescent horns that this must have been a group of water buffalo. The one peeking through the treeline, looking directly at them, was likely a male. The wideset horns eclipsed those of the rest of the herd, nearly tripling the width of his body from one horn to the next. He stared closely at them with calculating eyes, shaking his own head from time to time.

If Shiu had any lingering misconceptions whether it was a good idea to keep trying to broach the marshland, it was gone now. He could not risk trying to cross paths with a herd, and if he continued having to switch directions just to step around a pond or, in this case, a group of wild animals, then he was going to lose his way sooner rather than later.

For a brief, blissful moment, many of the caravans had listened to Masshiro, knowing the gravity of the situation they were in and fallen silent. Even the straw-hatted man was not willing to question whatever had concerned the jounin amongst them.

Shiu kept his body facing forward towards the herd, but gestured with his hand for the wagons to begin turning from the straightforward path he’d been trying to carve out for them, and instead turn to begin heading around the bog, to which they slowly began complying.

coded by pinn @ thq

masshiro

[masshiro]

    His eyes narrowed as he finally got an idea of what the noise was, more importantly where it was coming from and why. His position moved from the front of the caravan to putting himself between what he had seen and the group, but he didn't look quite as worried as he had been for a moment. If the need truly arose, he was confident enough that he could simply kill the animals long before they made a real issue for the group, but he wasn't so cold-hearted and to do so without a real need. This wasn't a matter of opposing shinobi between him and a mission, but wild animals acting as wild animals did. The problem was, it didn't make them any less of a threat in their own way.

"Shiu, move them along, but quietly and slowly."

    With a slow motion of his own, he gripped Uemori in his right hand, letting the sheathe fall to the ground as he pushed the tip of his weapon into the ground he was standing on. In a strange act, it seemed as if the damp grass around his feet was drying out, noticeably in fact, as his weapon took on slight shine. Taking a few steps forward, he wanted the animals to see he had a herd of his own in a sense he was protecting. It was likely they had scared the animals and they were simply being something between protective and territorial, but he wanted to at least take a semi-aggressive stance of his own to show similar. These weren't the smartest breed of animal, but they weren't stupid, and as long as he didn't get much closer than he was they would hopefully let them pass by without incident. 

    He simply stood his ground and kept his attention on the animals, not moving an inch aside from breathing until he was confident the caravan had moved safely away from them, and that they weren't going to suddenly try and become aggressive. 
    

[Kuronmeru Shiu]

♔

Shiu turned his attentive gaze from the herd to glare at the swordsman, putting the arm he’d been using to signal at the caravans down onto his hip. What did that man think he was doing? Waving his arm around just to get a good stretch? He had half a mind to ask him as much, but Shiu held his tongue.

The implication from the swordsman was that while he put down any threat from the herd, he wanted Shiu to focus only on defending the caravans, where he likely wouldn’t get a chance to see any of the combat. The idea grated on him, and felt like an undermining of whatever superficial position of authority that he had allegedly been granted before. He was not bred to take orders from common men. That, and he resented the role he would be playing. Shiu did not go out of his way to pick fights with wild animals. It did not give the same satisfaction as fighting other shinobi, whose minds had been consciously shaped by the artistry of combat, and every time he overpowered another was a demonstration of just how much more equipped he was for combat than any other. He did, however, have a lot of aggression he had pent up over the course of the past several hours, and he loathed to miss an opportunity to flex his strength.

Shiu shifted his glare from the swordsman to the straw-hatted man, who was still standing nearby them. He quietly gawked at the male buffalo, his Adam’s apple looking like a marble tumbling down a flight of stairs as he rolled it back down over the strange ribs of his neck with his spit. Shiu waited a moment for him to move on his own, before he said pointedly, "That means you.”

The straw-hatted man looked at him and seemed as though he was considering saying something, but after a short pause he nodded, then walked back with hurried steps back to his post on the wagon he had abandoned.

While not stepping forward with the same protective posturing that the swordsman had, Shiu did very little to switch his position any closer to the caravans, only walking a few paces to the side to form an uneven line between the two shinobi. It seemed as though the non-aggression pact they had tried to impose between themselves and the water buffalo was working. As the wagons swung their course from south to the east, the male buffalo stood watch at them with attention, and the female’s odd behavior was focused on pushing herself against and rubbing her horns on the trees she still stood nearest.

With so much of his attention on the herd, it had completely slipped Shiu’s mind that among the merchants and workers of the caravan, not all of the quiet murmuring was just curious adults talking amongst themselves about their opinions on whether they agreed with turning around or not. A too-late reminder came to Shiu in the form of breathless panting as the young girl darted in their direction behind him. In an instant that came by too fast for him to stop, the relative quietude of the marshland was broken with a shrill squeal of the girl as one of the two boys, once again, managed to grab hold and pull on one of her pigtails.

In one rough, temperamental burst, Shiu whipped around in time to catch the boys by the scruffs of their necks and plant their faces in the ground. As they yelped in surprise, the boy that had seized the girl’s pigtail gave one final tug, causing her to stumble, before he lost his grip altogether. The girl turned around to look at Shiu in fear, who crouched over the two boys he was pinning down with anger in his eyes. He did not care how bad he may have looked in front of the parents on the caravans, and he was not swayed by the muffled protests of the two boys.

But his intervention had come too late.

A low bellow came from the treeline. After a moment, the female came around a strangler fig, leaning its body heavily against the side of the tree. She shook her head, rubbing her horns up and down with increased agitation as she locked her eyes on the first thing she saw: the second wagon that was passing by, and between the two of them, the pigtailed girl. With a snort and a low bellow, the buffalo charged forward. Her gait was uneven and seemed slower than it should have been, but the power behind it was unmistakable by the sound of her heavy hoof fall. She began to lower her head, aiming to plough into the side of the wagon with the young girl simply being in the way.

coded by pinn @ thq

masshiro

[masshiro]

    For all the glaring and mental pouting Shiu was doing, Masshiro didn't as much as turn to look behind him to notice. His stare was straight ahead, not even having initially noticed Shiu leading the group away as he was watching the herd. He was concerned with the mission, he was concerned with keeping these civilians safe to do so, but he wasn't concerned with a spoiled genin who couldn't take simple directions without his temper flaring. Giving little more than a glance behind him to make sure everyone was moving, he turned back and sighed.

    This wasn't exactly what he had in mind, hoping this was little more than a long walk and a confidence booster for Shiu leading a mission, but the tiniest wrong move here could turn into a potential serious issue. The more he stared, and the longer it went on, the less concerned he became, dropping his shoulders and finally picking Uemori back up to rest over his shoulder. There was suddenly a shrill scream from behind him as he turned, thinking something had somehow came from behind them, only to see kids acting as kids did, but more so parents who given the situation weren't acting as parents should. 

    What he saw next however immediately triggered whatever inside him was well built to keep his patience in check, as the doors were kicked wide open. Turning around he spun his sword and put it to Shiu's throat.

"If you don't want me to embarrass you in front of this group of civilians, you'll get to the front of this line and lead them out. I won't say it again."

    His lip curled as he let out an annoyed noise that wasn't too far from animistic in its own right, and pulled his weapon back as he turned around.

"Damnit..."

    Moving at a quick pace and dashing at the animal he slid to a stop right in front of it to change his angle and pulled back his weapon with both hands. With a quick slash in mid sprint towards the animal he swung as his weapon looked to catch fire, cutting right through the buffalos front feet, immediately dropping it face first into the ground. An arc of fire shot from the weapon, and as he turned a wall of arcing flame shot up, incinerating nearly the entire animal immediately, leaving a burned patch of grass where it was wet and soft just moments before.

    With a growl he turned back towards Shiu, the flames his weapon had created dying out as he grabbed the scruff of his neck much how he had the boys earlier and leaned in close, putting his mouth right next to his ear and whispered.

"I asked specifically for you to lead this mission to give you a boost of confidence, not so you could be an asshole. The next time you lay a hand on anyone in this caravan, I'll leave you in this swamp and complete the mission without you. Is that understood?"

    For the first time since he had met Masshiro, there was emotion in his voice, clear anger, and despite his threat, and the quiet tone he was speaking in, he was very obviously serious. This was a side of Masshiro so few got to see, and one far fewer wanted to. The other face of the "Two-Faced Tactician" was starting to peak from behind the mask.

SPOILER: Click to show

NAME: Kumo-Ryu Kaengiri - [Cloud-Style Flame Beheading]
RANK: C
CHAKRA USAGE: Medium
CLASSIFICATION: Bukijutsu
ELEMENT: Katon
The user imbues their blade with fire before slashing in the direction of the desired enemy, resulting in the creation of large arcs of intense flame that follow the trajectory of the previous swing. A skilled user is capable of surrounding their immediate area with a circular wall of flame, incinerating multiple targets even if they approach from numerous angles simultaneously.

    

[Kuronmeru Shiu]

♔

Shiu curled his own lips when the serrated edges of Uemori touched his neck, a mounting frustration pounding at his temples. This man had pointed his so-called ‘sword’ at him so many times now he had lost count, to the point where it seemed like the man looked for excuses to threaten him with it. This was the closest he had brought it to him though, with the fanged edges of its barbarous shape prodding dangerously at his skin.

Shiu pulled his head back just enough so that the teeth of it would not bite his throat if the swordsman decided to pull his weapon straight back. He did nothing to change his grip on the two runts in spite of the swordsman’s threat, however, anticipating that if he let go of them now, the little runts would recklessly run themselves straight into the herd of buffalo, or otherwise do something to draw their attention again.

The buffalo was charging at them. Before Shiu could figure out how to consolidate the threat of the buffalo with the threat of Uemori and the threat of two childrens’ reckless endangerment, the swordsman took action. In mere seconds, he had crushed the bovine’s legs and enveloped its body in a column of flame, leaving the air to fill with the stench of burnt leather.

The girl that had been standing in the way of the buffalo’s path stood wide-eyed and frozen, the fear that Shiu had been the attention of now being moved onto Masshiro. The male buffalo that had seemed to be weighing whether to join the fray startled at the sight of the inferno Uemori had left. The male bucked and snorted. His horns clumsily knocked into trees as he turned in a hurry and cantered away, drawing the rest of the herd with him as they retreated deeper into the bog. The oxen that had been drawing the wagons nearest to where the attack took place became startled as well. They bellowed in alarm, shaking within their restraints. As stunned as the civilian onlookers were, those who were driving the wagons and a few others did what they could to ease the worries of the oxen workers, saying comforting words and running their hands along their sides in soothing strokes.

With no more need to hold them down, Shiu released the boys, who immediately darted off to find their guardians, one already bubbling with snot and tears. He started to stand up from his crouch, but before he could make any real progress, a hand clamped down on his neck to hold him. The instant he felt the rough skin of the scarred man’s hand touch down on his delicately pampered skin, Shiu tipped over the edge into fury.

Both times in all of their interactions, this man had gotten entirely too comfortable with posturing over him. It was excessive to threaten him twice over some rough handling of some raucous children, or for taking initiative in how he would operate under the circumstances of the wild animals’ threat, or whatever it was that had apparently angered the swordsman. Shiu must have somehow softened on this stranger he thought now, perhaps for the small bit of deference he had shown during their spar and whatever small sliver of respect he must have had for the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, but in this time he must have given the scarred man the impression that he was someone who could be pushed over. This man was nothing more than a fledgling in the swordsman ranks, hardly anyone who anybody could call legendary, and more than any of that, he was not kin. It did not matter to him the objective differential in their power. He had been brutalized time and time again. He was not going to be treated as one of these peasants, who were awestruck by the one fire technique that brought down the bovine.

Unlike the children Shiu had scruffed, Shiu knew how to free himself from holds like these. It was an awkward angle. Usually the defensive techniques were meant to guard against the front of the throat, but the principle of them all seemed the same. Shiu reached his left hand up to slip it between the back of his neck and the man’s hand, pushing past the gut instinct to protect against any casualties for his loose hair. Anchoring the wedge he’d created, he whipped his head forward in order to break out of the grip and attempted to stand. At the same time as he did this, he opened his dominant right hand. There was a crackling sound as moisture crystallized in the form of a long needle in his palm.

The man had commented before that he did not have a full understanding of his abilities, and perhaps for that reason he had felt safe enough to put his filthy peasant mouth to his ear like that.

Using whatever freedom he had managed to grant himself from the scarred man’s hold, Shiu turned on him. He gripped the makeshift senbon in his hand, pinning it beneath his thumb, and angled it to where the man might be able to see it in his periphery and point it threateningly close to tapping the underside of his chin.

"Touch me like that again and I’ll gut you, worm," he said, sneering. "This is my mission. You can leave.”

As he said this, the civilians seemed to succeed in pacifying the wagon-towing oxen, save for one. An ox from the third caravan, the one being driven in part by the straw-hatted man, had only grown more agitated. It rocked itself free from what must have already been a faulty tongue of the wagon. With a lowing sound, it began to run off, heading towards a different segment of the bog.

For the moment, Shiu stubbornly refused to take his eyes off the man, intent on seeing his power struggle through.

SPOILER: Click to show

NAME: Sun Tōketsu [Snap Freeze]
RANK: C
CHAKRA USAGE: Low
CLASSIFICATION: Ninjutsu [General]
ELEMENT: Hyōton
HANDSEALS: 0
REQUIREMENTS: Yuki Clan (Kiri or Yuki Branch)
DESCRIPTION:
Without needing a hand-seal, the user will create a single senbon ice needle in the palm of their hand and send it flying towards their opponent. When the ice comes in contact with a person or object, it will snap freeze whatever it touches in a half a meter radius. For example, if it comes in contact with an arm or leg, it will freeze the limb, same goes with a sword of Ninja tools.

coded by pinn @ thq

masshiro

[masshiro]

    The grip he had wasn't so tight that it would have stopped Shiu from simply pushing his arm away, but the way in which he tried to get free worked all the same. His eyes shifted as he looked down, them glowing far brighter than they had previously when he had made a point of showing them, as his open hand turned into a tightening fist. He knew well enough if he wanted to it would have been an easy task to bat the arm away and driving a strike right into Shiu's gut, but he gave him just a moment, not a second longer than he cared to, to let him speak.

    Turning his head away, despite the stare Shiu kept, Masshiro made a simple hand movement as the animal would have immediately stopped in its tracks. It wasn't something he made a habit of doing, but the animal was now experiencing something very similar to what Shiu had when they first met. As far as the animal was aware, it couldn't move, it was stuck in place, likely incredibly unhappy about it, but stopped all the same. His head very slowly turned back to stare Shiu in the eyes.

"This is a test is what this is. I personally asked for this mission, and to go on this mission with you and let you act as a leader to see how you'd deal with it. That was your first misunderstanding, the second; When I said I'd leave you here, I meant face down in the swamp. Don't push your luck, this attitude of yours has lost its charm, and I don't have near the patience to deal with it that your squad leader does."

    Stepping back he turned around to see if everyone was okay, but didn't directly go to or question anyone, simply looking over the group. Looking over to who had previously had a hold of the animal that started to sprint, his voice returned to a mostly even state before speaking, though his tone still held far more emotion than his usual speaking voice.

"He's unfortunately in a genjutsu at the moment, you'll need to secure him before I release it. He won't be running further in the meantime. If you need my assistance, please ask. Apologies for the situation, otherwise. It's unfortunately gotten out of hand, but we'll be leaving again shortly, right Shiu?"

    Turning back he tilted his head to the side as he stared forward at the genin, his eyes still glowing, making it clear he was waiting for a response. Whatever side of Masshiro had shown itself before was not entirely gone, but this was a different type of cold stare, of someone who wasn't looking at him as a lower ranked shinobi from his village, but something he likely wouldn't hold back on for now. Whether Masshiro might think differently once he was in a different mind set was one thing, but for now he wasn't likely to act as calm as usual.

SPOILER: Click to show

NAME: Magen: Jubaku Satsu [Demonic Illusion: Tree Binding Death]

no burgers this time

    

[Kuronmeru Shiu]

♔

As he waited for some sort of response, or for the swordsman to step away, Shiu made certain he never wavered his heated gaze, nor did he lower the ice senbon that he so desperately wanted to drive through the man’s skull. A part of him knew the threat he made was empty. Jounin tended to give him the slip in any assault he ever made against their person, and Shiu had yet to master being able to break from the genjutsu the swordsman had put him under during their training, so it was a simple matter of the jounin putting him under one again to render him completely useless. It did not matter though. The weakness the swordsman thought he’d found in him was unacceptable, and Shiu intended to stamp it out without mercy.

He did not flinch at the intense aura of the scarred man’s gaze, and he kept his needle still and pointed when he looked away to deal with the ox. Shiu kept track of what happened as much as he could of the ox in his periphery. He saw movement still, and he heard the distressed, yet robust, bellowing of the bovine before too much time had passed. Good. He would not have to regret the stance he’d taken against the swordsman.

He stayed silent as the swordsman confirmed what he felt he already knew—that the arrangement for this mission had been set up by the swordsman, so that he could continue in his personal conquest to stalk him. As unsurprised as he was to hear this, it was not something he was happy about. Still, in spite of the angry tone and the elaboration on his threat from earlier, the swordsman got in his final word without making any other attempt to lay a hand on him, and that was victory enough for Shiu.

He pressed his thumb down on the senbon, snapping it in two, before releasing the chakra he’d infused to hold its form. The broken halves melted in his palm, and he flicked the water leftover from it off to the side away from the swordsman. It was the closest he would come to a gesture of truce he would make between them for now.

Not once taking his eyes off of the scarred man, he announced to the merchants and the workers with as much authority as his undeveloped vocal cords would allow, "We’ll resume our trek as soon as that cow has been secured.”

— ♚ —

Shiu had moved ahead to take point in the line once again. If he ever had been in the mood to sully his hands with the work of farm animals, then had not been the time. Instead, he watched the progress expectantly, and with impatience, from afar.

The ox had eventually calmed, or perhaps accepted its fate, allowing the straw-hatted man responsible for it to reattach it to his wagon and for the group to continue on their journey. Chatter eventually resumed, though never quite as jovial as it had been before. The merchants and workers were well aware of the tension between the two shinobi guarding them now, and there was also an air of apprehension that there would not yet be another incident to be violently contained caused by the young genin’s misguidance. Even the straw-hatted man had fallen into a relative silence, focusing more on making sure the neck yoke of his ox stayed attached to the wagon’s tongue.

The group distanced themselves from the outskirts of the bog as they took the long route around it. It was far enough away that there were no more instances of wagons getting stuck in the mud, and they were far enough away from any paved road to attract the attention of any nearby bandits that preyed on parties such as these. Shiu had elected to take the weighted risk to keep pressing the group forward for one more hour after nightfall. It was in part on the intuition that the civilization they were trying to reach could not be too much farther, as well as knowing the civilians would be much less vulnerable to attack in an inn than by a campfire in the open, but the truth was that much of his motivation was because he doubted he would be lucky enough to have the civilians be as quiet as they had been today once they got some rest.

So the caravans lit their candles to hang on the sides of the wagon, granting them the little bit of light they needed to keep pressing onward. Just before Shiu decided to call it, the village he’d been seeking out came into view.

It was a tiny thing. No doubt a village with an insignificant history and an even more forgettable name, it was built into the river’s belly. There were few houses, and any amount of shopping to be done seemed to be centralized to one general store, which was closed, and the inn that had been built on top of the river. There were a few boardwalks that stretched over the river, likely meant to be perches for anyone trying to fish, and an open stable to keep the oxen overnight, but that was it. It was a wonder that the last of the merchants they were to collect to take to the archipelago would be staying here at all. They were there as promised, though, adding one more caravan for them to add to their travels.

The inn was packed with more people than the owner was likely used to seeing. Rather than resting immediately, the merchants indulged in sake, rising to a volume that seemed to reverberate off the plank walls of the cramped building. Shiu stayed in a corner facing the entrance, wrinkling his nose at the sight of it. Alcohol was a vice within his clan, less because of the way it addled the mind, and more that it was not good for the blood. His brother, Inei, freely partook in the noxious beverages, but he was an exception, and one Shiu found as an embarrassment to his kin.

He was not used to the loose-lipped nature of a room full of drunk people.

As the men and women of the inn slurred their words and pressed too close together, Shiu picked off the too-small portion of his meal. He could afford the expense of eating more, but he only ordered anything at all out of the necessity for the human body to eat. The singular himono and wedge of bread on his plate may have been acceptable to the raucous crowd he would be bedding with. He found, though, that the handmade loaf had hardened outside and become gummy and dry inside, while the mackerel had burnt too much on the edge and was undersalted. He imagined the taste was not unlike if he stuck a lump of charcoal on his tongue.

Tired as he was, both in mind and body, Shiu waited for the noise of the inn to die down, whether by the grownups of the caravan party to turn themselves in for the night or pass out on the tables. He knew he would have to talk to the swordsman again to decide who amongst them was going to sleep when, but he was not looking forward to it, so he put it off.

coded by pinn @ thq

masshiro

[masshiro]

    For all that he hated the way Shiu had handled himself earlier, despite his own outbursts, he was more than glad the group was a bit less energetic. It certainly made it easier to keep an eye on them and to focus on their surroundings without people being loud and distracting. For all that it was likely boring for them, this was how he liked it; quiet and without incident. Quiet was certainly the best way to describe things comparitively speaking, even Masshiro and Shiu had done little else than exchanged side glances despite their earlier not so friendly interactions. 

    The first decision Shiu had made thus far he was on board with was his idea of pushing on further, as if he had it his way they would have pushed on even further still. It was clear that the animals were getting tired, the civilians they were escorting were getting tired, and he didn't quite fancy the idea of pushing this many people through the dark. Once they had reached the town they were aiming for, he simply stayed back and watched, following them as needed, making sure no one strayed too far until they were all congregated at the inn.

    As Shiu stayed off in the corner, he kept to himself near the entrance, looking back at the genin now and then. While one of them watched the door, he felt more comfortable being physically near it to be able to immediately react. Much like Shiu, he wasn't a fan of alcohol or drinking, not for any moral reason, simply not liking the idea of being anything but sharp if he was awake, plus he didn't frankly like the smell or the taste. He didn't partake in eating at the moment either, not liking to do so in front of others as one of his many eccentricities. Once everyone was asleep or he was alone somewhere, he'd eat and do so quickly.

    By the time everyone was more than a little drunk, and even Shiu looked openly tired, he pushed off the wall and leaned over to the man who was taking orders and spoke quietly to ask for food, then walked directly towards Shiu.

"I'll keep watch first. Go rest, I'll wake you and rest later."

    He wasn't coming to discuss but more to direct, turning around and walking off before getting a response. He was starting to get a bit hungry, but he was waiting till the room emptied before he'd take his food and likely go outside to keep watch.
    

[Kuronmeru Shiu]

♔

Even between the ebb and flow of the remaining stumbling bodies, Shiu noticed immediately when the swordsman pushed himself off of the doorframe. Shiu watched his approach with narrowed eyes and a moody frown but waited for the man to speak.

What was to be said—or rather, how it was said—did nothing to lighten his mood. He knew it came from no gentle suggestion for him to take care of himself first, not that he would have wanted that from this man anyway, but rather just by some annoying sense of practicality that told him that the young genin was no longer fit for the duties of watch. Shiu may have protested it too, because if there was one thing he was looking forward to on this mission, it was kicking the scarred man in the ribs to wake up, but he was, admittedly, beginning to feel a little foggy.

He glared at the swordsman’s retreating back, stewing over how the man found it acceptable to simply order around then walk away from a prince like him, but still he said nothing, and with less reluctance than he would have liked to have shown, he complied. Shiu delicately peeled one last shred of the himono to eat before setting his chopsticks down on the plate and leaving the dining hall.

The room he was given was small and sparsely decorated, with no more than a mirror and a vase holding some sort of reed plant on the dresser. Shiu slid the screen door shut behind him and stepped on the heel of each of his sandals to remove them. The moment he sunk his bare foot onto the wooden floor beneath him, his nose wrinkled. A thin film of dust had settled and not been swept from the floor, and now it was on his feet. It was enough to make him debate putting his sandals back on, but in the end he decided the dust was there to stay, and with the ever-present chatter of the peasants outside, he didn’t need the extra discomfort of trying to sleep with shoes on.

He undid his belt, setting his katana down so that it rested against the wall and set his medical kit and back pouch by it. Everything else he kept on his person as he went to wash up as best as he could with these mediocre accommodations, then as he settled down to rest in the mediocre futon that was provided. Shiu covered himself in the thin, starchy sheets and closed his eyes, lulled only under the light veil of sleep by his own exhaustion.

coded by pinn @ thq

masshiro

[masshiro]

 One by one, two by two, but all the same slowly, those under his and Shiu's care made their way to bed, eyeing Masshiro as they passed. Only a few bothered to give him a wave or make an attempt to say goodnight, still unsure what to make of him and not wanting to get to know him any more than they already did. It was for the best as his food was getting cold and he was getting tired of babysitting them the hungrier he got. By the time they finally all found their beds he made his way outside, sitting down on the ground just outside the door and making a relaxed groaning sound. He hadn't properly sat down for hours, either walking or standing for the large part of a day, and it was nice to get off his feet for a bit.

    The food didn't last long, leaving him to relegate himself to looking out at the town, up at the sky, and finally back to his feet. Despite the late hour he could feel people still moving around now and then, and hear them walking past, but there didn't seem to be even as much as a third shinobi close enough that he could passively sense. His walking took him a full lap around the building, then a second, and finally a third. The hours were passing and the chill of the night had set in as solidly as the darkened sky, and each pass he felt less movement as even the night owls were either moved on or settled somewhere.

    After his third pass around the building he made his way over to the stables to check on the animals, looking over the carts, and specifically milling around the poor animal he had to put under a genjutsu earlier. It wasn't happy to see him, but it didn't move much, the only one still awake, just barely. Back at the Inn, there was movement, and Masshiro was just out of range to passively sense it with no reason to be actively keeping track, or so he thought. It seemed a few patrons had slipped in as the civilians they were traveling with were drinking and eating, getting the poor idea to take what little the caravan travelers had, not realizing Shiu and Masshiro were shinobi, despite the headbands they didn't bother trying to hide. Being drunk, desperate, and greedy tended to make it easy to overlook important details it seemed.

    By this point everyone but Masshiro in their group was a sleep, and from outside one of the rooms a window was being pried open with a knife that was more a blunt piece of metal with a leather wrapped handle. It was surprisingly quiet, as if they had done this more than a few dozen times, and perhaps if this was one of the drunk civilians this would have been a simple matter of breaking in and grabbing what they wanted. The window they had pried open made a slight squeak, and if the dust had been any indication, this window wasn't taken care of any better than the rest of the room. Again the window squeaked as it was pushed open enough for the man to slip himself inside, not realizing the body asleep, or at least assumed to be asleep in the room, was Shiu. The dust covering the floor helped to a degree to muffle their feet touching the wood, but the slightest of noises weren't masked completely. 

    Little things most might not notice could have been more obvious such as a draft that wasn't present before, the sound of wind from the open window, the barely audible sound of fabric slipping against the pant legs of the intruder, and the leather stretching under the tightening grip of the makeshift weapons handle. Depending on they were noticed or not, they were headed right for the pouch and the katana they saw leaning up against the wall, eyes wide at such a fine weapon. Something like that would certainly get him a few coins, and who knew what was inside that pouch.
    

[Kuronmeru Shiu]

♔

Shiu’s eyes fluttered behind closed lids at the first tell that someone was entering his room. At first, in the haze of him just having woken up, Shiu forgot about the inn, the caravans, the civilians, the riverside town. He was in his home, where a deep sleep was a dangerous thing. The Kuronmeru household made a practice of attacking each other while the rest of the world slept, and Shiu was no exception. It was why the twins never went to bed without a weapon at hand. At the small cost of a chronic state of slight unrest, it ensured they would keep a mindset of paranoia, allowing them to be prepared for a fight under any given circumstances. Circumstances such as these.

As the window squeaked again and there was the soft, muffled thump of a heavy body landing on their feet, Shiu’s consciousness began to stir, and with it the awareness that this was not his home, and this intruder would not be his kin. The sheet that he had pulled over him was the incorrect weight, and it was stiff and unpleasantly rough against his skin. The padding of the futon beneath him, too, did not do enough to separate him from the wooden floor below, and it left a dull soreness spreading down his spine. A small, barely perceptible smile lifted the corners of his lips.

Shiu waited in silence, listening to the swish of fabric approaching him. He waited to see if the intruder was going to stop above his still form. In his head, he telegraphed himself rolling over fast and slashing at the stranger’s Achilles tendon, eager to see if that would topple the body over.

They did not stop by him, though, and instead continued past his left side. Shiu timed the swish of the pants fabric with the time that he rolled his head over and opened his eyes, any noise he may have made by this simple act overlapping with the small noises this stranger couldn’t help but make. He waited for his eyes to adjust. With only the moonlight passing through the open window, it was difficult to make out any distinguishing features on this stranger. Shadows cast over the back that was turned to him and fog had crept into the room from where the window was left open. By appearances alone, it was difficult to tell whether this was someone who had been traveling with them on one of the wagons, but then again, Shiu did not make a habit of committing the faces of peasants to memory. Ultimately, he decided that it didn’t matter who this stranger was. They were not the long-haired swordsman coming to wake him, and they were not someone simply passing by on their way to the bathroom. This was someone who had intruded in his room, and he would put them down.

As the stranger stopped to bend over the things Shiu had left propped up by the door, Shiu rose to his feet. The intruder paused at the sound of bed sheets falling away, but it was too late for them. Shiu stepped quickly behind and clamped his left hand on the stranger’s shoulder to hold them in place. He flexed his wrist, unsheathing the blade of his fumei ha. He pulled on the shoulder, and with that little bit of added momentum, he thrust his arm forward, plunging his fumei ha through the back of their neck. Immediately, the relative silence of the room was broken by the sounds of the stranger choking on his steel, and the clang of the stranger dropping their makeshift knife. Shiu’s small smile grew into a dark, twisted smirk. He allowed the blood of the stranger seep into the leather of his fumei ha, and he jiggled the blade a little without withdrawing it from their neck, just to see if he could make the strangled chokes of the intruder hitch.

He wanted to keep toying with this person in their final moments, but he restrained himself, knowing he needed to prioritize his duties of ensuring that no harm befell the merchants and workers. Roughly, Shiu heaved the body to the side and off of his blade, letting the heavy body thump against the hardwood floor before sheathing his fumei ha’s blade. Shiu decided he didn’t have time to tie his belt around his waist again, so he left his katana and pouch where they were as he exited the room.

Shiu looked down the corridor to the dining hall. He saw no immediate trouble there. No weapons being brandished, nor fights breaking out. He moved onto the next part of his inspection—checking each of the rooms for any more intruders. He stepped quickly on soft, graceful feet to the room left of his. As he did so, he opened the palm of his left hand, crystallizing an ice senbon in his hand, then slid back the door of the first room he would check.

SPOILER: Click to show

NAME: Fumei Ha [Hidden Blade] [x]
RANK: C
CLASSIFICATION: Offensive, Supplementary
ELEMENT: N/A
DESCRIPTION:
As its name implies, the Hidden Blade is a concealable weapon that is composed of a narrow blade set into a channel on the underside of a bracer. Controlled by spring-loaded mechanism, the blade can spontaneously extend and retract from its position after pressing a switch that activates the mechanism by flexing the wrist. The blade has the same durability of a standard kunai.
ABILITIES:
Spring Loaded Mechanism - By flexing the user's wrist, an mechanism is activated which springs forth a narrow hidden blade from the bracer, the blade while no more different in composition from a Kunai, provides an element of surprise and another avenue of attack either in a stab or a slash. The same mechanism makes the blade to retract to its hidden position.

NAME: Sun Tōketsu [Snap Freeze]
RANK: C
CHAKRA USAGE: Low
CLASSIFICATION: Ninjutsu [General]
ELEMENT: Hyōton
HANDSEALS: 0
REQUIREMENTS: Yuki Clan (Kiri or Yuki Branch)
DESCRIPTION:
Without needing a hand-seal, the user will create a single senbon ice needle in the palm of their hand and send it flying towards their opponent. When the ice comes in contact with a person or object, it will snap freeze whatever it touches in a half a meter radius. For example, if it comes in contact with an arm or leg, it will freeze the limb, same goes with a sword of Ninja tools.

coded by pinn @ thq

masshiro