Cultivation Planning Session
It was widely understood around the leaf village that the Goketsu clan were weirdos. Not like, creepy weirdos or anything, that wouldn't be allowed on this platform. No, if you were to ask the average ninja on the on-goings of the clan and their specific objectives, the answers you'd get would range from a shrug or a weird luck, all the way down to a diatribe about how they've seen the supposed clan lord painted in green trying to 'train his sneakiness' by camouflaging on a wall on plain sight. In the middle of the day.
The wall wasn't even green for the love of god Hazou would yo-
I digress.
So yeah, the Goketsu and their leader were kinda weird. This time though, things were getting out of control.
Inside the most insidy part of the Goketsu grounds, hidden from the world by several different barriers of seals and other transdimensionally aligned stuff, the highest echelons of the Goketsu Clan came together to hold a meeting. Everyone from the so-called Team Uplift, minus the weirdo-number-one and professional arms-manufacturer. The room was as bare as could be, just a sterile space with white walls, some candles on the walls for a proper atmosphere and a set of chairs with a table.
"And so we give opening to Meeting #4 Category B Rating:F3"1 of Team Uplift." Intoned Keiko from her chair, with all the magnitude and severity in her voice as she was able to direct.
Everyone looked at her for a moment, before Noburi raised his hand. "So…" he started, looking around the room a little. "Why exactly are we meeting? I thought we had already had our sub-sub-sub meeting yesterday about the way we're screwing the Hagoromo? And also, where is Hazou? Is he coming later?"
Mari shrugged. "I'm sure there is an absolutely valid reason for Hazou to not be here. And well, since when have we
ever not gotten in an extra meeting on a good day? Perish the thought we actually do something interesting,"
Kei coughed on her hand. "This meeting is actually about Hazou."
"Yeah, what about him? Does he need help or anything?" Noburi asked. "You can help him with all this planning stuff, I'm not really that good at it."
"It's not that!" Kei grumbled, before sighing. "We have to make an intervention, something is wrong with Hazou lately."
"Kei dear, I'm sorry for saying this, but when isn't there something wrong with Hazou?" Mari said clearly amused.
"Please, don't tell me you haven't seen it." Kei asked imploringly.
From the other side of the table, Kagome tapped the table with his finger. "So you finally see it, huh?"
"Uhm.." Noburi mumbled slightly. "See
what, exactly?"
"The ever changing moods? The ideas that come from nowhere? How he bounces from place to place as if there was something injecting thoughts into his brain?!" Kagome asked, increasing the level of his voice by the second.
Mari just sighed. "Yes, yes, we all know Hazou. I myself have learned how to deal with his…peculiarities, since this whole thing started."
"I find myself somewhat troubled to be saying this, Mari, but haven't you seen it getting worse lately?" Kei said while looking down at the table. "Just last week he was mumbling to himself all day until he went to sleep, something about 'armageddon initiative' and 'narrative tropes'. Shortly afterwards he disappeared for two hours just to come back with a twelve thousand, nine hundred and seventy three pages manifesto on strength maximizing and why increasing combat 'stats' is useless."
"That's just Hazou thought." Noburi argued. "I'm still not seeing your point."
"Noburi, yesterday he was laughing himself hoarse after seeing a green jumpsuit. He then went to a store and screamed about
whales and
eagles." Kei then executed sigh #23-b, also known as 'im-so-done-with-this-bullshit'. "Kagome, please help me here."
"I'm surprised it took you this long, honestly." The sealmaster said simply. "I thought that you would get it when he got into a fight with a ninja from lightning country some months ago over a shiny rock, saying it could create a 'gun of rail'."
Mari looked at him weird. "There is no lightning country in the elemental nations, Kagome."
Kagome shrugged. "Oh there was, it just disappeared one day after someone made a thousand dollar donation to the writer's paypal." Kagome looked around, and grumbled to himself seeing everyone's eyes glaze over. "Fucking stinkers."
"What?" Noburi was clearly confused at this non-sequitur.
"What I meant to say was," Kagome just continued, disappointed at seeing that they were still held by the matrix of narrative conventions. "He has started doing this kind of stuff since the rift got stolen by Orochimaru and we came back."
"The question is why, though?" Mari said, deciding to just follow along. "He has been relatively normal when speaking with me."
"Oh, he somehow becomes twenty percent more talented when doing interesting stuff on fixed two day periods, don't ask me how." Kagome shrugged. "I saw him once practicing, and after he finished harassing an anbu ninja his sealing had an immediate marked improvement."
"This sounds a little outlandish, you know that right?" Noburi was just weirded out at this point. "What, does he get rewards when he…entertains…the au-" Noburi suddenly blanched, his mind screeching at the thought.
Everything stopped.
He tried to continue speaking, but his mouth wouldn't answer.
He tried to protect himself, but his body wouldn't move.
He tried to think of a solution, but his mind wouldn't think.
What was he thinking anyway? Who was he? Why was he here? Oh, that was such a funny wall. A thin funny wall, red, purple, bluegreenyellowgold. Those eyes looked weird. Why was that whale looking at him? It was kinda big. Soooooo cute. The tentacles on the 'whale' were so funny! Hey, don't touch me, that's rood! Wait why does it have eyes? Oh it makes sense. Wait does it make sense? It makes no sense. NoooooOo waititsuredoes. W4it 5very!hing is fine! EEE5Everyth!84ueg fine. Oh look, more eyes! So pretty! OH they're approaching! Hey don't touch my face! Why do you wanna touch my brain? Oh yeah it's alright just go ahead. Where was eye? Oh right.
"-and by that focusing your efforts on the Water Flying Salamander Technique I think you can maximize your Qi usage to get the best out of your affinity while we get better cultivation materials for your next session of meditation." Hazou reasoned from his position on the podium of the Inner Sect's meeting room.
"Huh?" Noburi mumbled into himself, after having lost himself for a moment thinking about something else. Eagle northern tribal leader, what the hell was that?.
"Oh you're back." Kagome said, while vaguely scribbling cultivation notes on his notebook. "You normally take a bit longer to come back after touching that."
Noburi didn't even want to deal with that statement. "Don't you feel that things are getting weird lately?"
Kagome sighed. "The writers sold out and started posting on Royalroad. Sadly the readers over there prefer either cultivation or litrpg, and one fitted this quest better than the other."
Seeing Noburi's eyes get immediately glazed over, Kagome just sighed. "No, everything's fine. Just focus on the session and try to get help visualizing your meridians."
Noburi nodded and looked back at Hazou. Everything was fine.
