Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest

"The Toad Sage checked in with his clan a short while ago, Summoner Keiko. My understanding is that he intends to do so again at dawn. What message should I pass on?" asked Pandour.

"Hand his contracted messenger this," Keiko said, holding out the glowing Night Light. "Inform him that Hazou -- and by extension the rest of the team -- believes that the thousands of such seals present in the swamp present a significant risk, and that we will be doing what we can to mitigate that risk until an intervention can occur."

Pandour took the wooden disk delicately between his claws. "At your will, Summoner."

Keiko nodded sharply. "Dismissed, Courier."

Haruno let out a low whistle as the pangolin disappeared in the characteristic puff of purple smoke. "That seems like it would come in very handy," she observed.

"Oh, definitely," responded Noburi, pulling his finger from the waterskin he'd been draining her through. "Anyway, that should be little enough that you'll more than recover all of it before you wake up."

She nodded, and stood up to walk over to the girls' corner of the fortress. Yamamoto sat down silently in her place, watching with curiosity as Noburi placed his own finger back in the waterskin.

"Ah, how… interesting," Yamamoto observed. "That is a deeply uncomfortable sensation."

Noburi nodded sympathetically. "The price for getting it over with quickly. Alright, you're done. Get some rest, soldier."

Yamamoto snorted. "Aye aye, captain."


Panashe returned more quickly than expected, leading a somewhat dishevelled Team Gai in from the north just before sunset. Keiko met them at the gate to the fort.

"That one demonstrated the ability to spot me underground, Summoner," Panashe reported, gesturing to Neji. "From the team's forehead armor and your description of the Byakugan eye bloodline, I deduced these were likely to be allies of yours."

"Your assessment was accurate, Panashe. I would request that you continue your search - there are at least two other teams still in the swamp we believe to be eager to ally with us."

"At your will, Summoner," Panashe responded, and immediately began boring her way down through the soft earth.

"The rookies?" inquired Tenten after a moment.

Kei nodded.

"Yosh! A most excellent strategy! Our youthful alliance between the most youthful of Konoha's youthful youth will be unstoppable!" Lee proclaimed.

The other three nin shared a long-suffering look before mutually deciding it was best to just pretend he wasn't there and walking silently into the fort, to the background noise of Lee's boisterous laughter.


Noburi strode across the top of the fort wall, moving to help himself stay warm and alert. It was several hours past nightfall, the fall chill was well and truly setting in. The fort was getting crowded - Panashe had returned about an hour after dark shepherding Team Asuma, before being resummoned and sent out again in search of Team Kurenai. She hadn't yet returned.

They'd had a smattering of foreign teams come by over the course of the night, and traded away some of the Party Tricks Hazou had been making, but nobody seemed especially inclined to believe that the proctors were carrying giant bags of Bad End around with them, and all had subsequently run back out into the night.

Since they'd missed Jiraiya's check-in, their four-team alliance was mostly occupied with resting, waiting, and watching the nighttime fog banks drift over the moon… and the trees... and the ground...

Noburi knew the instant the mist touched him that it wasn't natural. For one thing, it was saturated. For another, it was too dense. Most importantly, he could feel his chakra being pulled out of him immediately.

He spared the briefest moment to pull back some chakra from it, and then leapt backward off the wall.

"Incoming!" he called. "At least ten, all directions! Mist is dangerous!"

The fort roused itself rapidly as the mist crested the walls.

---

XP will be awarded after this confrontation… assuming you survive it.

What does Hazou do, or attempt to convince others to do?

I leave it to @eaglejarl to determine how much time you have for voting on a plan to avoid your doom.

Things in the background:
Unless there's been some contradictory ruling in the past, you were unable to swap out the LBF explosives for nonlethals because disrupting the beam in any way would have set them off.

Hazou ultimately decided that the fewer Night Lights around, the safer everyone would be, and produced Party Tricks for bribery instead.

You've been firing off 2 explosives per hour to signal your location, drawing from new ones Hazou has been making to avoid depleting the supply. On top of this, Hazou has produced 50 more Party Tricks, 5 of which you have traded away for 10 lit Night Lights and 16 of which have been used up keeping the entrance to the fort clearly marked (they have ~15 minutes of light between their repeated activations, and you kept the area illuminated for 4 hours). This leaves you with 29 Party Tricks on hand, plus the 40 in the Summon Realm.