Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest (STORY ONLY)

[OliWhail]

BEHOLD, I HAVE GLIMPSED BEYOND THE VEIL OF MAYA, WHERE NO MORTAL EYE WAS MEANT TO SEE, NOR MORTAL FOOT TO STEP, NOR MORTAL HAND TO TOUCH. I HAVE BECOME SOMETHING… MORE.

Chapter 94.1: Sealing Recovery​

"--AZOOUUUUUUUUUU!" Kagome was shrieking, held back by Inoue-sensei and the cat-masked ANBU. Everyone else had leapt away, leaving Hazou kneeling alone in the middle of the training ground. "LET GO OF ME YOU STINKERS, WE MIGHT STILL BE ABLE TO SAVE HIM! PLEASE!"

Slowly, very slowly, Hazou put down the un-infused seal, one tiny bit of it smudged to the side by an errant flutter of chakra. "Kai," he murmured under his breath. Nothing changed.

"I think I'm okay!" he called out, and then promptly turned to one side and threw up. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he noted idly that there wasn't any blood mixed in with the bile, so most of his organs were probably still intact.

Suddenly Jiraiya was there. "Look at me," he ordered, one hand on Hazou's shoulder. "You look fine on the outside. Gotta check for mental damage. What's your name?"

"Wha-- Kurosawa Hazou."

"Who's the Mizukage?"

"Yagura."

"What city are you in?"

"Hidden Leaf."

"What month is it?"

"April."

"How many dimensions do sealing failures cascade in?"

"Eleven, or thirteen for three or four linked nodes."

"Okay. Let's have our resident medic check you out. Noburi! Come over here and let's see what Hashimoto and Dr. Yakushi have managed to drill into you."

"GET AWAY FROM HIM YOU STINKING TOAD STINKER! THIS IS YOUR FAULT!"

Jiraiya looked briefly heavenward before apparently deciding to let the paranoid sealmaster keep screaming, as Noburi jogged up and began running medical chakra over Hazou.

"Not feeling any internal damage. Hazou, how are you feeling? Besides nauseous, apparently," the other boy inquired.

"No pain or numbness. Actually…." Hazou bit down on his tongue. "Ow! Yep, can still feel pain. Colors look the same, no other weird sensations. No glaring motor issues," he said, wiggling around.

"I will not calm down!" Kagome insisted, still loudly but much more calmly. Hazou looked over to see Inoue-sensei was looking into his eyes for what was presumably another application of the Sunny Day genjutsu. "This is serious! Hazou was at the middle of a failed infusion!"

"Sensei! Sensei, I'm fine. I don't know how or why, but I'm fine. I saw some weird stuff, but I am okay," Hazou called reassuringly.

There was a small *pop* from off to the side of the group as Keiko reappeared in a puff of smoke, holding several storage seals. She looked over to Kagome and his captors, then to Hazou, then to Noburi's glowing green palms. She raised a questioning eyebrow.

"Very minor infusion failure," Jiraiya explained, standing and starting to walk over to her. "Just doing our due diligence to make sure he's okay. Everything seems fine."

"No such thing as a minor sealing failure, you stupid stinker! Okay, well, technically there can be, but mostly not!"

"Thank you for the lecture, oh wise and learned sealmaster," Jiraiya responded, deadpan.

"Paralytic," Keiko said, waving one of the seals before tucking it into a pocket, "which I assume Inoue-sensei will want to negotiate with you about later, so I'll go ahead and hold onto it for now."

Jiraiya threw his hands into the air dramatically. "Augh! What higher power did I offend that I deserve dealing with the women on this team?!"

Keiko didn't smile. "Notes on experiments with the paralytic, along with Hazou's notes," she continued, handing him one of the remaining tags. "Tower lifter parts," holding up the third. "We'll construct it now, if Kagome is done with the tags?"

Spoiler: Dice

Drawing a seal to replace the one that didn't infuse: No roll, Iron Nerve

Seal Infusion, TN: ?

Hazou, Sealing:
13d100: 646
13d100: 674
13d100: 793
13d100: 604
13d100: 549
13d100: 494
13d100: 581

While Kagome watched him like an overprotective mother horror-gull and the rest of the team took out and assembled the tower lifter, Hazou infused the remaining seals without any issue and handed them off to Jiraiya, who had gotten back to looking like a kid whose mother had just told him he could get an extra-large cinnamon roll.

"We have got to talk more about this later," Jiraiya was saying gleefully, looking over the notes he had pulled from the storage scroll. "Inverting the Yuina matrix and then adding a tertiary node to control the stress distribution? Very elegant. Suffice it to say I'm excited to see what else you and your sensei can come up with, young man."

Hazou was pretty sure he felt himself blushing as Inoue-sensei waved the two of them over.

"Hazou, if you wouldn't mind showing off?" she asked playfully.

"Huh? Oh, um, right. It's all there in the notes, but basically, since the Five-Seal Barrier is volume-limited, and also has distance requirements, you need something long, flexible, and thin if you want to get a set of tags all on the same object. Hence, ninja wire. Akane and Kagome-sensei designed and built the pieces of the frame so they could be disassembled for easy use, and since we needed a way to move the wire as a stable whole. Once it's up--" he nodded for Keiko and Inoue-sensei to raise the frame "-- you can trigger the central seal, and then lower the frame."

Eyes practically shining, Jiraiya reached up and touched a finger to the central tag. The frame was lowered, and the Toad Sage leapt up onto the wire frame. "It works! Sweet kami, it really works! Ha-HA!"

"Sounds like you're pretty happy with your purchases, eh, old man?" Inoue-sensei teased.

"Hush, girl, I will not let your bargain-driving ways ruin this for me. Get another wire in that frame!"

Several minutes later, when Jiraiya had had his fill of looking over the treetops to the other training grounds, he finally clambered down.

"Right, so! I think your note also said something about rewards," he stated with an emphatic clap. "Who wants to go first?" He turned to Inoue-sensei with wiggling eyebrows.

She snorted. "After you short changed us that hard on the seals, I think I'll take round two as a bonus, thanks."

"If I remember right, it'd be more like round--" Jiraiya began, before the remaining ANBU coughed loudly. "Fine, I'll deal with you later. Kids?"

"I'd planned on asking about continued medical training," Noburi said, stepping forward, "but since I'm studying under Yakushi-sensei, I feel the best thing for me to ask for would be water jutsu that Inoue-sensei doesn't already know."

Jiraiya nodded. "Done. I think I know just the tutor to put you in touch with." He turned to Keiko. "Miss Mori?"

"I too have a request for jutsu training, prioritizing Wind techniques that enhance mobility, or alternatively those that enhance the use of ranged bukijutsu," Keiko stated simply.

"Goodness, at this rate you guys are going to get your hands on every technique Leaf has!" Jiraiya chuckled. "Which reminds me. Hazou, when I left you lot in Iron, I told you I would find an Earth teacher. I intend to honor that commitment, so don't worry about requesting continued training, since that's where this seems to be going. What else is on your list?" he finished with a grin.

"Well, sir, I'd like to check if it's okay to talk about what kinds of things are on the table first?"

Jiraiya nodded.

Hazou took a deep breath to steel himself. "Okay," he began, "with the understanding that this is a long shot, and that I don't know anything about how to go about extracting a foreign jounin... I want to see my mom again." He pointedly ignored Yamanaka's sharp inhalation, immediately regretting not having asked to do this more privately. "We have some ideas, the least risky one being to monitor when she would be away from Kiri, then contacting her with a message she would know was from me to organize a future extraction. You're the spymaster - is that possible? If not now, then eventually?"

Jiriaya's eyebrows had risen fractionally. "Getting new assets in place would be tricky, and obviously I can neither confirm nor deny that I already have any such assets. And stealing a jounin related to a missing nin out from under Yagura's nose would almost certainly mean war if he found out. Why should I risk that?"

Hazou frowned, but he was ready for this one. "If it'll mean a war, it's obviously not worth it. I don't want anyone else to have to lose the people they love so I can see mine again. But if it could be done, we're talking about a jounin with extremely compelling reasons to become your asset, and Leaf's by extension. You would be strengthening a team of assets that has already shown itself to be valuable."

Jiraiya let out a small sigh. "Kid, I can understand wanting to see your mother. I can also see the merit in adding what I assume would be a stabilizing influence to your team. But, without getting too far into classified information, the situation right now means I can't make that offer, and honestly I probably wouldn't be willing to under better circumstances just in exchange for the Arikada mission. We might -- might -- be able to get her a VERY discreet message, if your team can propose a solid plan for doing so."

Forcing himself not to grimace, Hazou nodded. "Alright let me think about that. Next question, does any kind of pass to cross Fire borders come packaged with Akane's reinstatement and our continued loyalty?"

"Absolutely not," Jiraiya responded immediately. "Nor would that be a viable reward. Despite your willingness to cooperate, and your teammate's change in status, you are still deniable assets, and if you were captured any such information could be taken from you, enabling major enemy action."

Hazou shrugged. "I figured it couldn't hurt to ask. I have a few more general questions, if that's okay?" He was sure he was imagining the sound of Noburi's eyes rolling.

Jiraiya just nodded. "Go ahead."

"To what extent are seal designs on the table? Either several low-to-medium tier utility seals that you think will contribute most to our effectiveness, or a deeper dive into a particular area, like modified storage seals?"

One of the Toad Sage's bushy eyebrows shot up. "You survive an infusion failure and then immediately ask about doing more sealing? Gutsy. When you say utility seals, what are you thinking of?"

Hazou began counting off on his fingers. "Communication at range. Sensory enhancements like night vision. Alarms. Stealth enhancements, like sound muffling. Something that lets us breathe when there is no clean, breathable air around. Protection from bright lights and loud noise, or extreme temperatures, or skin-contact toxins, or--"

Jiraiya held up a hand. "I'm beginning to see how you might have hit upon the watchtowers and the, ah, macerator," he said wryly. "I think the world's premier sealmaster could reasonably provide you with a selection of seals like that, or with an in-depth study. What else?"

"Will we have the chance to buy new essentials?"

"Of course."

"Are we allowed to access a Leaf bingo book?"

"Sure, I'll have one sent to your quarters. And I won't even count that as part of your favor."

"Thank you, sir, we appreciate it. Another question, if I could: jutsu development. Is training a possibility?"

Jiriaya blinked a couple of times before scratching his head. "Kid, are you trying to acquire as many ways to blow yourself up as possible? I mean, yeah, that's probably doable, particularly since you'll already be working with a jutsu instructor."

"If I can ask, sir, how useful do you think it would be for our team?"

Jiraiya's mouth quirked into a small smile. "Now that, I would count toward your favor."

"Uh. Never mind, then. Last thing, are there missions you have planned for us that you can tell us about before we make our decision? And how long do you anticipate us remaining here?"

"That was two last things, no, and until you've finished the training your favors get you. Leaf administration isn't happy about having deniable assets on-site, and I've had to fight them to let you stay even this long for Ishihara's sake. After that, as far as I'm concerned, our previous deal still stands.

"Now, Hazou, I have a question for you, which I think is fair, after all yours. When we met last time you made a particularly impassioned speech, and I asked you why Fire didn't already look like the world you wanted to build. I'm curious whether you've given that any thought."

"I have," Hazou answered carefully. This was a second chance at getting an incredibly powerful ally on his side, on the side of the world he knew could be a reality, and he was not going to mess it up. "To be frank, the answer to why that hasn't spread to all of Fire was pretty clear in retrospect. You said yourself that none of the major players can trust each other, and that each of them consider only their own people to have any moral weight. What was your phrase? You would 'sleep well' after killing a foreign citizen to save a Leaf one? Not that you would spend so much as a second of thought on how to avoid having to do it again in the future? And you said all your counterparts in other villages feel the same way.

"Everyone being willing to backstab one another the instant there's any advantage to it encourages distrusting and not caring about others, leading to a downward spiral of indifference and hate. Spend long enough trapped in that spiral, and your neighbor's prosperity just looks like a threat. So even if Fire wanted to build itself up into a paradise -- and we've seen that people have used Leaf's surpluses to make life better -- it can't, because you're not as strong as everyone else all at once."

Some of the fire and steel he had felt the last time he stared Jiraiya down was coming back into Hazou's voice now, matching the steel in the Toad Sage's unwavering gaze. "You can't build up, because you would get crushed under the fist of an angry, terrified war god. You can't work with other nations to break out of the status quo, because you won't be trusted, and won't trust them, since you both know that trust would be exploited. So Leaf has to help perpetuate a broken system that's slowly breaking humanity, even if you guys are better about it than others.

"No matter what, we want to help you keep the peace. But in the end, that's just forestalling the inevitable, and something has to change, or everything is going to crumble into dust, and everyone is going to die - everyone in Leaf, every single one of us, and everyone we've ever cared about. A war goes down, everyone loses that much sooner. So we have no choice but to build a world where everyone wins, because we refuse to allow the alternative. Now, one more time, I'm asking you: will you help us?"

Hazou ignored the stares of Team Asuma. Jiraiya was silent for several long seconds. "It sure sounds like if I say no, you're going to try and do it without me," he said finally.

Hazou met the old man's gaze unflinchingly. Just like the last time, he felt like his soul was being laid bare. Eventually Jiraiya snorted, and the spell was broken. "Iron Nerve indeed. Alright, suppose I get on board with this plan. What do you propose to do?"

"We don't know yet, sir," Hazou admitted frankly, deflating a little. "That's part of why we want so badly to have you on our side - you have more experience at this kind of thing than pretty much anyone."

"Ha! Flattery will get you everywhere, kid, keep it up. I maintain what I said last time: Leaf is my absolute number one priority. However, I promise to give what you've said due consideration. I'll admit, it's... nice, to think about living in that kind of world."

For several long seconds Jiraiya stared off pensively into the treeline, before composing himself and putting on a warm smile. "Now, your reward?" he asked invitingly.

---

What do you do now? Voting will end at noon, London time on Wednesday, January 4th.

XP for this plan was awarded last chapter, but as I now have access to nigh-infinite cosmic power, I hereby grant +1 XP for @Cariyaga being the first person I saw to correctly guess that I had been recruited to the QM team.

To clarify what has happened behind the scenes: some time ago I was approached about the possibility of taking on QM duties, especially answering player questions, keeping docs up to date, and covering for times when meatspace issues catch up to either @eaglejarl or @Velorien. At the time, I was even busier than I am now due to school and moving across the country. Many of those RL issues have been resolved, and so we deemed the new year an appropriate time to make the transition. We would have simply made the transition out of character, but an opportunity cropped up in-story that was too good to pass up.

So, I will still be around and in the thread, and will probably still post occasional omake. I want to make it totally clear that until the previous chapter posted, I had no access to additional information. Any posts I have made after that chapter should be regarded with the typical level of scrutiny and skepticism for QM posts.

Now that I have seen the worldbuilding docs, though... oh boy. You guys are in for a ride!

---

Mechanics Announcement:

Yesterday @eaglejarl posted about a proposed mechanic where practice with infusing a seal decreased the difficulty. We've hashed that out in QM chat, and the provisional mechanic is that each successful infusion drops the TN by one, starting at the research TN for that seal. Each failed infusion drops the TN by 5, since you tend to learn more from failure.

Note that you got close enough with that 494 roll that I almost got excited to write another sealing failure scene. That would have been fun!

 

[Velorien]

Chapter 95: Carefully-Chosen Rewards and Carelessly-Chosen Words
by @Velorien​

"So," Jiraiya said as he lounged back in his armchair, "how was working with the old bat?"

"Sir," Sarutobi said uncomfortably, glancing from side to side, "are you sure you want to be saying that out loud? You know the stories."

"Point taken."

Jiraiya raised his voice.

"That was a term of affection!"

"I, uh, it wasn't that bad," Hazō said. "She was patient enough to correct all my mistakes, and she brewed me some tea—very bitter tea—during my break. Actually, I was going to ask: what does 'sheep-swiving' mean? And 'addle-cove'? And 'fumble-fingered jackanapes?'"

"What a woman," Jiraiya sighed wistfully. "If she were sixty years younger…"

"Sir?"

"Ahem. I guess you're not here to talk about the various merits of women. Which is a pity, kid—there's a whole lot I could teach you. You should think about making that your next favour."

Jiraiya lifted a pouch from beside the chair, and fished a few scrolls out of it.

"Here, as promised. Now, I felt like picking you a theme. See, when I was young and foolish, I thought it was acceptable for an elite shinobi to master less than all five basic elements, so I tried to make up for my lack of Wind with air-type seals. And that's what you're getting, complete with a few design notes I managed to scrounge up."

He began to hand Hazō scrolls one by one.

"This first one's the Tunneller's Friend. We happened to coincidentally complete the research on it right after a Hidden Rock infiltration team disappeared in Fire territory. It's got two active modes: absorption and release. The first stores up air from the environment. The second gradually releases it. The more active you are, the faster you use it up. Rock burrowers like to stick it inside airtight masks, but you and I both know restricting it to that is just tunnel vision. What? Don't give me that look. I swear, some of my best material…

"Next up is Usamatsu's Glorious Life-Saving Purifier. Usamatsu was an ass, and he didn't realise until the end of his days that everyone else treated the name as a joke, but when it came to sealing, he really knew his stuff. One end of the seal sucks gas into a storage space in sharp bursts. All gas. In parallel, the other end pumps out air. Just air, no matter what else it sucked in. So if there was poison gas in it, that stays in the storage space forever. Except if the seal is destroyed and all that concentrated poison rushes out at once, which is how Usamatsu got himself killed."

"Can't you just jump out of the poison gas cloud?" Hazō asked.

"Sure you can. And gas users know that. So they'll pin you down first. Or catch you in an enclosed space. Or use gas that instantly sticks to your skin, or melts it. Or whatever. Always assume that the enemy is as smart as you are, kid.

"Next up, this is an alarm seal so basic it doesn't even have a name. Normally I wouldn't bother handing these out, because in Leaf even a beginner in sealcrafting knows a dozen variations of something so primitive."

Kagome-sensei flinched.

"Set it up with your standard trap systems. When the enemy trips it, it wails at moderate shouting volume for two seconds and then shuts off. Twelve-hour duration or until triggered.

"Now, let's move on to something a little more interesting. This one's a toy of my very own creation, back when I had the time to invent seals as a hobby. Check this out!"

He held up a seal.

Hazō and Kagome-sensei both peered at it. To Hazō, it just seemed like another seal, but Kagome-sensei leaned in for a closer look.

"Where's the tertiary nexus?"

Jiraiya grinned. "There isn't one."

"Bullshit," Kagome-sensei spat. "I can see the dispersers from here. You've got to have a tertiary nexus, or the whole thing will blow up as soon as you infuse it."

Jiraiya grinned some more. "Oh, it works. Trust me. I soloed the entire Sōon Clan with a bagful of these. Well, that and a toad the size of the Hokage's Office. Best part? Without a tertiary nexus, there's room for a modulator that lets you set the intensity at creation time."

"That's very impressive," Hazō agreed on general principle, "but what does it do?"

"Sound dampener," Jiraiya said as if it was obvious. "Low-range, but stick a couple of them next to your ears—I used some earmuffs a fangirl from Snow had sent me—and they stop you hearing any sound above the volume you've set. Version B, which you'll find in the bag as well, cuts sound out altogether. You'll be deaf, but that also means immunity to sound-based genjutsu and other fun things."

"What's its name?" Kagome-sensei asked as Hazō collected the design notes. "Can't invent an original seal without giving it a name. Disrespectful."

Jiraiya gave a solemn nod. "This is the Banshee Slayer."

He took in the looks from everybody in Teams Inoue and Sarutobi.

"Hey, I was a teenager, OK? I thought it was the coolest name ever. And then it made Tsunade laugh her head off, and after that changing it would have been backing down."

He slumped in his armchair.

"Ah, to hell with all of you. Take the last seal and be done with it."

"What's this one called?" Hazō asked, trying to suppress a smile.

"The Silence Mine," Jiraiya said in a low, listless voice. "And before you ask, no, it is not a mine, and strictly speaking it doesn't silence either. We've all made mistakes in our youth.

"It's a wide-area version of the Banshee Slayer. Turn it on, and it softens sounds—not as effectively, but well enough to make sneaking around easier. Have your stealthiest scout go ahead and put a few of these down, and then your lumbering ox taijutsu expert might not give you away as the rest of the team catches up.

"And then there was this one time Uchiha Satomi infiltrated the mint posing as an inspector, and stuck Silence Mines where nobody would see them. Once night fell, all we had to do was trigger them one by one and the rest of the mission was a cakewalk."

Jiraiya looked into the distance, somewhere far beyond the solid walls of his office. "She was a special woman, was Satomi. She deserved better than what she got."

"Sir?"

Jiraiya's eyes refocused. "That's five excellent seals. More than I normally give out to a team of your standing. Now, Sarutobi and his team know where your ninjutsu instructors are. So you know, the instructors aren't cleared for your identities, so no names, backgrounds or all the other info you guys love to hand out like a new cult with a basket of pamphlets."

Inoue-sensei nodded. "Kids, Kagome and I are going to do some shopping while you're busy. Don't worry, I've got all your requests written down."

She turned to Jiraiya.

"Oh, no hard feelings about yesterday's bargaining, right?"

Jiraiya chuckled, a little of his customary good cheer coming back. "Perish the thought."
​

-o-​

"Welcome, my child," Hazō's teacher smiled beatifically. "My name is Tsuchimikado Nana, but you can call me Mother Nana."

"I, uh, yes," Hazō said uneasily. "Nice to meet you."

Mother Nana (not that he had any intention of calling her that if he could help it) was a brunette of indeterminate age dressed in thick green and brown leather armour, complete with a strategically-slitted long skirt. She never stopped smiling, which in its own way was as disturbing as an aura of killing intent.

"Now, what are you here to learn?"

"I was hoping for a tunnelling technique, or something to let me sense vibrations through the ground."

"Vibrations?" Mother Nana said. "Yes, everyone should learn to sense vibrations. Be happy, my child, for I shall teach you the Living Roots Technique."

"That sounds great. Thank you!" Hazō felt a wave of relief. Something definitely didn't feel right about the woman, but that didn't matter as long as she was prepared to teach him what he needed. He hoped.

"Now," Mother Nana said, "let me demonstrate. First, you breathe in all the love and joy of the universe."

She opened her arms wide, then slowly closed them into seal-making position.

"Next, you mould your chakra and send it through your feet to make deep roots in the earth, and up through your head to receive heavenly wisdom.

"Earth Element: Living Roots Technique…" she said gently as she formed the seals.

"Now, you reach out and feel the profound peace of nature extending all around you. Sense the tremors from the feet of others as they disturb that peace." She smiled serenely. "Extend spikes of rock from the ground and rend the flesh from their bones, turning their viscera into a rain of meat and blood that feeds and nourishes the soil. Oh, but the rock spikes are a separate technique, my child, and I'm only contracted to teach you the one."

She beckoned to Hazō. "Now, you try it with me. Breathe in all the love and joy of the universe…"
​

-o-​

"Hey, there," the young woman, tall and slim with pink highlights in her black hair, waved at Kei. "So you're Master Jiraiya's latest protégée, huh? Wow, you're so young! I'm Aoba Minori, but my friends call me Minorin, and I just know you and I are about to become the best of friends!"

Kei was less convinced.

"Thank you for agreeing to tutor me in Wind mobility ninjutsu," she bowed deeply. "I will endeavour to live up to your expectations."

Aoba-sensei's eyes widened. "Ohmykamikamikamiyouaresoincrediblycute!" she squealed, bouncing on the spot.

Kei looked up in alarm.

"Eek!"

She barely managed to dive out of the way as Aoba-sensei leapt towards her, arms open.

"Hey, where are you going? I just want to give you a great big hug!"

"I would really appreciate it if you stayed away from me!" Kei shrieked with her last shreds of composure as she picked up speed.

Behind her, Aoba-sensei was in hot pursuit.

"Come back, there's no need to be shy!"
​

-o-​

"So you're the latest maggot Jiraiya needs whipping into shape, are you?" Noburi's new teacher barked.

Noburi wasn't sure whether he was facing a human being. Towering over him, at least seven feet tall and with biceps each bigger than Noburi's head, every exposed inch of the man's flesh was covered with scars, some deep enough to surely have been fatal.

"I am Captain Miyamoto. You will address me solely and exclusively as 'Captain Miyamoto'. I will address you as whatever you deserve, which right now is 'maggot'. Anything else, you earn. Am I clear?"

"Yes, sir!"

"That's 'yes, Captain Miyamoto,' maggot! Get it wrong again and you'll be running laps around the Training Grounds for the rest of the day. Am I clear?"

"Yes, Captain Miyamoto!"

"Good," the living mountain of muscle nodded. "Now, what kind of ninjutsu are you here for?"

Noburi had taken some time to think about this. He'd really wanted something flashy, something to make him stand out the way he ought to, but after the Arikada mission…

"Do you have anything that'll let me cover my back? I got hit with a surprise attack last time I fought, and it knocked me out of the battle completely."

"Ha!" Captain Miyamoto barked. "A good shinobi always watches his back. Looks like you're not a good shinobi yet, maggot. But don't worry. By the time I'm done with you, you'll be faster than Hyūga Hiashi, smarter than Hatake Kakashi and tougher than Maito Gai.

"Now, the technique you're looking for is called Hōzuki's Mantle."

He paused.

"Hold that thought. No way would a brat like you have the chakra reserves."

"Oh, I really wouldn't worry about that, Captain Miyamoto," Noburi said. "Say, is that 'Hōzuki' like the Hōzuki Clan?"

"Huh," Captain Miyamoto sounded a little taken aback. "You're not completely empty-headed after all, maggot. That's right. My team was on the eastern front during the war. One of those elite Mist all-clan squads thought they could end us, but we showed the bastards what Leaf training is good for. Oh, we showed them. And then after a little time in T&I, one of them coughed up this little gem. We decided to keep the name, so every time we use the technique, we're spitting in Mist's eye for being too weak to protect their secrets.

"What're you squirming for, maggot? You're not feeling sorry for those Mist scum, are you?"

"N-No, Captain Miyamoto!"

"Good," Captain Miyamoto smirked. "Here, want to hear my favourite joke? How many Mist-nin does it take to refill an oil lamp?"

"I-I don't know, Captain Miyamoto."

"None! They'd rather cower in the dark like the cowards they are than risk facing the Will of Fire! Bwahahahaha!

"Here's another one. Why should you never fuck a Mist-nin?"

It was going to be a very, very long afternoon.
​

-o-​

"Hi, Akane," Hazō staggered into the room, collapsing on the nearest chair.

"Hazō-sensei? Are you all right?"

"I am filled with the love and joy of the universe. Also nausea. How about you?"

"I'm… fine, thanks."

The two looked at each other.

Suddenly, a sense of absolute awkwardness descended on Hazō. He knew, intuitively, without a shadow of a doubt, that whatever he said next would be the wrong thing to say, and would embarrass him in front of her and make her reconsider her feelings. He knew that this would be true irrespective of what he said.

In the back of his mind there was the awareness that Akane was still Akane, and nothing had actually changed between them except the admission of things which had been true all along, but for some reason this didn't help.

Time passed in silence, until at least Akane seemed to screw up her courage.

"I think this is normal, Hazō-sensei. Changing your relationship sort of… resets things. Not literally, just in terms of… what this feels like. It's supposed to get better eventually."

Hazō nodded gratefully.

Akane put a finger to her lip thoughtfully. Akane's lips were another part of her Hazō had never considered. Now he was considering them, and he could feel himself starting to blush again. He wondered if Inoue-sensei knew any techniques for not doing that all the time.

"Is there anything purely factual we can talk about?" Akane asked. "Something where you don't have to wonder if you're saying the right thing?"

Hazō smiled. "Now you mention it, I think I can do one better. I got up extra-early in the morning to do this—which, now I think of it, might help account for the nausea—but here, listen."

He pulled out his flute. Akane gasped softly.

Hazō raised it to his mouth and began to play the Senju and the Uchiha's first meeting. The deep, heavy swings of his glaive served as a counterpoint to the quick, playful stabs of her shortswords, starting out discordant but gradually falling into a perfect steady rhythm.

Akane leaned back against her pillow, rested the back of her head on her hands, and closed her eyes.
​

-o-​

With one last breath, the low tones of the Senju's passion interwove with the sudden, high, agonised joy of the Uchiha. The music pulsed with the Uchiha's final heartbeat, crescendoed as their lips pressed against one another's—and then the song cut off with the finality of death.

Akane wiped the tears away from her eyes.

"That was… that was perfect, Hazō-sensei. How could you learn it so well so quickly?"

Hazō gave a modest shrug. "I told you—I had a lot of opportunity to get good at the flute while I was home alone all those years."

"Any more hidden talents I should know about?" Akane teased.

"Hmm," Hazō feigned intense thought. "Well, I'm not sure I should be admitting this to you this early in our relationship…"

Akane leaned forward attentively.

"… but I happen to be very good at making lists."

Akane burst out laughing. It was a sound he could listen to forever.

"Speaking of keeping things hidden," Hazō said, "do you think we should tell the others about us? I mean, it's fine if you don't, I don't want to be insensitive to your feelings, not that I'm saying it takes sensitivity to accept how you feel, I mean, assuming you don't want to tell them, whereas—"

"Hazō-sensei," Akane interrupted.

"Sorry."

"You should tell them. I do wish I could be there, and see all their faces. But there's no way Dr Yakushi would let us have an all-team meeting here, and I think it would be too long to wait until I'm discharged."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. I think it will make them happy."
​

-o-​

The day was over. Kagome-sensei was gazing at his Akimichi Lore cookbook as if it were his own child, Inoue-sensei was fiddling with her hair, Noburi was in the yard outside performing some very violent taijutsu exercises, and Keiko was practising moulding chakra.

"Noburi, Keiko," Hazō called them over, "could you come in here? There's something I want to talk to everyone about."

Noburi nodded mutely. Now Keiko was coming closer, Hazō could hear that she was muttering something under her breath over and over.

"Keiko, are you OK?"

She gave him a hollow stare. "I must master the Vacuum Step faster. My running speed is insufficient. I must master the Vacuum Step faster. My running speed is insufficient. I must master the Vacuum Step faster. My running speed is insufficient."

Hazō gulped.

"A-After you."

Once everyone was gathered, Hazō began.

"Guys, there's something I would like to tell you all. The truth is, Akane and I… have started dating. I think."

Inoue-sensei beamed. Noburi laughed. Kagome-sensei looked bewildered. And the light returned to Keiko's eyes.

"Before we congratulate you," Keiko said in a level voice, "or commence appropriate celebrations, there are formalities that must be completed. First, which of you confessed your feelings to the other?"

"I did," Hazō said, confused by the sudden serious atmosphere. "Though it was close to simultaneous."

"Second, did any member of the team present you with unsolicited romantic advice?"

"No, they didn't. Why would they?"

"Third, did any member of the team present you with solicited romantic advice which encouraged you to be the one to confess, or proposed a time frame for such confession?"

Did Inoue-sensei's advice count?

"Inoue-sensei didn't say it outright, but I'm pretty sure her advice led me to confess to Akane sooner rather than later."

Inoue-sensei winced as Noburi and Keiko gave her very cold looks. "I regret nothing."

"Finally," Keiko continued, "have you acquired a breeding license from Jiraiya?"

"A what?" Hazō goggled.

"I will interpret that as a 'no'.

"To summarise, Hazō confessed his feelings first, before leaving Leaf. However, Inoue-sensei has been disqualified for cheating, and Pandā's presumption that Hazō would need to acquire a breeding license before confessing has been proven incorrect. In other words, nobody wins the bet.

"How tragic," she added in a deadpan monotone.

"Now, with my role as administrator fulfilled, Hazō, I would like to formally congratulate you on this long-overdue development. It is my hope that the two of you will enjoy a stable and fulfilling relationship."

"What she said," Noburi agreed. "Can't believe you of all people managed to overtake me in the dating game. Teach me your secrets, O 'Hazō-sensei'!"

Hazō laughed.

The inevitable hair-ruffle descended on him while he was distracted.

"Nice going, little Hazō! I knew you wouldn't screw this up! Tonight, Kagome will be making your favourite dish, Mountain-style spiced noodle soup!"

"Inoue-sensei, that's your favourite dish."

"Details, details," Inoue-sensei flicked her hand in the air. "The important thing is that everybody's happy, right, Kagome?"

But Kagome-sensei's mouth was still opening and closing like that of a fish. "Y-You and Akane? Are you serious? How did this happen?"

Hazō's friends' laughter lit up the room better than any lamp.
​

-o-​

After a while, the merriment had quietened down, and Inoue-sensei had subtly nudged Noburi in Keiko's direction. With the two engaged in conversation, and Kagome poring through his supplies in search of spices, Inoue-sensei was on her own. It was a good time to talk.

Hazō studied his target, readied his weapon, took a deep breath and engaged.

"Uh, Inoue-sensei, I just wanted to tell you that your new hair... style looks superb. It, uh, frames your face... accurately, and, well, it draws my eye down your left side, which I assume is the side where you don't keep your weapons, thereby unconsciously making me less likely to notice your weapons. Oh... but maybe your weapons are on this side, because now I am searching your right side for the weapons and don't see them at all! So, that's a great double blind... unless you aren't carrying weapons at all, and this was all to make me spend precious time on looking for weapons when, really, your greatest strength is your genjutsu."

He risked a look at Inoue-sensei's face, on which an unreadable smile was dancing.

"Anyway, is that a good way to do a sincere compliment? Not that I just said that because I want to practice for Akane, although that is an ulterior motive, but it in no way, I assure you, detracts from the fact that your new haircut really is nice. And somehow very puzzling in terms of what it means for you being armed."

Inoue-sensei giggled. "Yep, full points for sincerity. Now you just need to work on every other part of what it means to give a compliment.

"Listen up, Hazō. First off, a compliment needs to be elegant. If you can't fit it in one or two sentences, then it had better be both mindblowing and emotionally context-appropriate, which are both likely to be outside your reach right now. Give me a two-sentence compliment."

"Inoue-sensei, your eyes are very attractive, whatever colour they may be at any given moment. They are vivid and have a nice shape."

"Hmm," Inoue-sensei considered. "Progress. Draw attention to a general feature, then elaborate on what makes it good. Next you need to learn to refine your compliments. Distracting your listener with ambiguity or unnecessary words dilutes the effect.

"Also, what do you mean, whatever colour my eyes may be? People's eyes don't change colour, unless you're an Uchiha or something."

Hazō stopped dead in his tracks. "Inoue-sensei… what colour are your eyes right now?"

Inoue-sensei gave him a disapproving look. "Green. They've always been green, Hazō. I'm a little insulted that you never noticed.

"Now, give me a focused compliment, with no waffling."

"I—I, uh, think you have excellent taste in clothing. It always balances attractiveness and functionality."

"Mmm. Now we're getting somewhere. Give me some more compliments, and let's see if we can't turn you into a proper ladykiller before the hour's out."
​

-o-
​

"And that, Inoue-sensei," Hazō said in his best heartfelt-but-not-trying-too-hard voice, "is why I think the oval of your face provides a perfect frame for features that together rend the heart like a blade of unbearable beauty." Yes, he was internally mortified, but he would see this trial through to its terrible end. It was for Akane.

"H-Hazō?!" Keiko stuttered, coming in at the worst possible moment.

Crap.

For an instant, everything balanced on a knife edge.

"ComplimentpracticewithInoue-senseieverythingisforAkanedidn'treallymeanawordofit!" Hazō explained in his best emergency rapid-fire, praying that Keiko's brain the size of a continent could disentangle the syllables before she ran off.

Keiko relaxed. "Would it have been so complicated to warn me in advance that you were planning to perform training exercises? Ah, not that it is of any personal relevance to me what you two do together. I only ask for the sake of practicality."

"Well, now you know," Inoue-sensei said wearily. "And Hazō, 'didn't really mean a word of it'?"

"I was in a hurry and not thinking straight, Inoue-sensei. Of course those were all sincere compliments. Except insofar as me complimenting you makes Keiko uncomfortable, in which case they were all blatant lies."

Now Keiko was looking as weary as Inoue-sensei. "Thank you for your subtle and sensitively-expressed display of concern for my feelings, Hazō. I am going to go help Kagome with cooking now."

"On a completely unrelated note," Hazō hastily changed the subject as Keiko left, "I wanted to ask you about talking to Jiraiya about Dr Yakushi."

"Oh?"

"Well, while I still think we owe Dr Yakushi for saving Akane's life, so we shouldn't rush to any conclusions, it does seem like he's putting a lot of effort into learning as much as he can about us. And if you're right, he's extremely good at it. I remember what you said about the possibility that he's using Akane as a hostage to ensure our good behaviour, and even if the risk to her is small, that's still unacceptable.

"It's possible that he's following orders from above, in which case we have no recourse. But if he's doing it on his own, then telling Jiraiya might increase scrutiny of Dr Yakushi—which is fine if he's innocent—or otherwise help keep Akane safe. I think we need to make it clear to Jiraiya that Akane is extremely important to us and we won't let her be put in danger. Given she's now a Leaf ninja, I'm sure he'll feel the same way. What do you think?"

"I think it's a good move," Inoue-sensei agreed. Hazō let out a breath he didn't realise he'd been holding in.

"If Yakushi is acting on official orders," she went on, "then Jiraiya might give us the cold shoulder, but that's still information. If Yakushi isn't, then going through the proper channels is the most effective way of dealing with him from our position. Of course, if Jiraiya doesn't take us seriously, that might hurt our standing with him, but at the very least it'll plant the seeds of doubt in his mind.

"Let's go find ourselves an escort."
​

-o-
​

"So as you can see," Inoue-sensei finished her description, "we have every reason to be worried. You know my background, so you can appreciate that I know what I'm talking about when I say that Dr Yakushi is trying to manipulate us, to unknown and possibly hostile ends."

Jiraiya clicked his tongue. "Inoue, did you really drag me away from my long-awaited evening saké for this? 'Help, Big Bad Dr Yakushi is being too nice to us, with his cunning diabolical scheme that I spotted the very first time we talked'?

"Yakushi Kabuto is a trusted Leaf shinobi, vetted at the highest levels. He's got clearance rankings you aren't even allowed to know exist. If he's indulging his academic interests in a way that makes him of more value to Leaf, more power to him.

"And if he's trying to be clever about it, well, of course he is. He's a ninja. In case you're forgetting, so are you.

"Now unless you have actual proof that the doctor who saved your comrade's life is out to get you, kindly find something better to do with your time."

Hazō gritted his teeth. This was as far from the response he wanted as it was possible to get. "If you trust Dr Yakushi, sir, then that's fine. Like you say, you've had much more opportunity to test him than we have. But if that trust means you're not even going to check whether what we're saying is right, and Dr Yakushi turns out to be a threat—even if it's only to us, and only in this one case—then you're putting Akane in danger. And you need to understand something. Akane is precious to me—to us—and we are willing to go pretty damn far to keep her safe."

A flicker of something (disappointment?) passed across Jiraiya's face. He made a hand signal over his head.

Six masked ninja appeared around him out of nowhere.

At the edge of Hazō's vision, Inoue-sensei was turning pale.

"Kingfisher," Jiraiya said mildly, "remind me of the ANBU protocol for dealing with a credible threat to a senior Leaf official from an unaffiliated party?"

"Sir! Immediately disable all targets and relocate them to a secure detention facility. If disabling is impractical or risky, eliminate as many as necessary."

Jiraiya nodded as if listening to a report on the weather, then said a single word.

"Proceed."

"Wait!" Inoue-sensei screamed.

Slowly, with her arms out and away from possible weapons, she sank into a dogeza bow. After a second's hesitation, Hazō decided that this was definitely a time to do as Inoue-sensei did.

"Please forgive my absolute idiot of an apprentice, and please forgive me for not teaching him better than this. He and Akane started dating yesterday, and she is his first love, and it is only his adolescent hormones that are driving him to be suicidally protective of her. He doesn't really know what he's saying, and I and the rest of the team would never let him step out of line."

Jiraiya's expression softened a little.

"Proceed," he repeated.

"Lion, Salamander, Hawk: rendezvous with the guards at the guest quarters and retrieve the rest. Be careful with the sealmaster—let his teammates persuade him to come quietly."

A pair of handcuffs clicked into place around Hazō's wrists as he was led away.
​

-o-​

You have restocked on basic supplies.

You have purchased the following books:
​

• Working the Hundred Woods of the Fire Country​
• Why Did It Fall Down Again?!: A Handbook of Architectural Do's and Don'ts​
• Three Akimichi Lore cookbooks (Inoue-sensei didn't have the heart to say no)​
• Common Medicinal Plants and Their Uses​
• Assorted manga volumes​
• Matsumoto's Modern Mathematics​
• Three different Konaya and Tamamono books​
• The Merchant's Gazetteer, which among other things lists the best and worst countries to do business in this year (and why)​
• Yumehara's History of the Elemental Nations​

You have spent 両60,000.

You were unable to find time to socialise with Team Sarutobi or train with Team Gai.

You have begun training in your new ninjutsu, but they are not yet combat-ready.
​

-o-​

Seal details:

Tunneller's Friend
Accumulates up to 300 air points over the course of an hour in Mode A. Releases up to 300 air points in Mode B. One person at rest uses up 1 air point per minute. Light exercise (e.g. walking) uses up 5 air points per minute. Moderate exercise (e.g. hiking) uses up 20. Combat uses up 50.

Usamatsu's Glorious Life-Saving Purifier
Repeatedly absorbs all gas within a 60-degree 3-metre cone in rapid bursts of suction. The gas goes into a storage space. Airlike gas is simultaneously expelled from the storage space via a separate identical cone. Anything not needed to produce the airlike gas (e.g. poison) remains trapped in the space.

Note that this seal merely removes substances from air. It does not add, so if your breathing has converted all the oxygen into CO2, the seal is not going to save you. Note also that Usamatsu had no idea about the proper chemical makeup of air, and just went with something that didn't kill lab animals when they breathed it (in the short-term).

Bog-standard Alarm Seal
When activated, lasts for 12 hours or until triggered. When triggered (separate triggering system required), it produces a high-pitched noise at moderate shouting volume for 2 seconds, then deactivates.

Banshee Slayer
Version A: Select a volume at creation. Any noise above that volume is negated within the seal's area of effect (3 cm radius).

Version B: As above, but negate all noise. This effectively deafens the user, with all attendant advantages and disadvantages.

Silence Mine
Anyone within 10 metres of the seal while it is active gains +3 dice to Stealth rolls as the sound of their movements is dampened. The seal cannot be moved after activation without terminating the effect.
​

-o-
​

Technique details:

Earth Element: Living Roots Technique
This technique requires that the user be in physical contact with the ground. It renders the user able to sense and interpret vibrations, such as those made by walking, allowing the user to make an Awareness roll even where a target is unavailable to conventional senses. The target must also be touching the ground, and must be moving. If successful, the user learns (and can thence keep track of) the target's position.

While motionless, the technique grants a flat bonus to Awareness of (level x 100)/(distance to target in metres/5). While moving, it grants the smaller bonus of (level x 100)/(distance/3).

Note that if you are unaware of a target and it is outside the reach of your conventional senses (e.g. silent and in a different room), you will receive the bonus when rolling to detect it, but not the benefit of your normal Awareness dice.

Chakra cost: 10 CP/5 minutes
Requirements: Wits * 3, Control * 3

Wind Element: Vacuum Step
This technique generates a wave of vacuum a few inches in front of the user, which rapidly moves the user towards a pre-selected destination in an uncontrolled manner, reversing direction as the user approaches the end so as to leave them at the same velocity as when they started. The wave does not bypass obstacles, and if the user encounters an obstacle, they will crash into it at high speed and the technique will terminate.

Vacuum Step has unlimited range and will always bring you to your destination if the path is unobstructed. However, when using the technique the user must make a roll to aim correctly and retain control. The roll uses the technique level against a TN of (horizontal distance travelled in metres + 150) x (vertical distance travelled in metres, min 1). On a failure, the user suffers harm during the journey as they are slammed into the surrounding environment while the vacuum tears the air from their lungs etc., taking damage as if they had failed a combat roll with the same numbers.

Chakra cost: 15 CP
Requirements: Control x 3, Dexterity x 3

Water Element: Hōzuki's Mantle
This technique creates a 270-degree dome of water in a 2-metre radius centred on the user's centre of gravity, with the open section facing directly forwards. The dome has deflecting properties, and tendrils of water lash out from it randomly, making it difficult to attack the user from anywhere but the front. The user reduces enemy multiple combatant bonuses by 1 die per level, and gains +1 die per 3 levels to any close-combat skill.

However, the dome is fully opaque, and the user and anyone on the other side have 0 Awareness with respect to each other. In addition, the dome is slow to move or rotate, imposing a Tactical Movement penalty of 15 – (level x ½) on the user.

Chakra cost: 50 CP/minute

Requirements: Resolve x 3, Stamina x 3, Control x 3
​

-o-
​

You have gained 7 XP.
​

-o-
​

Your team is in a Leaf detention facility, sharing a large cell. You have been stripped of your possessions, but nobody has been harmed or mistreated. The guards claim they have not yet received instructions on what to do with you.

Inoue-sensei isn't talking to you, except to tell you not to make things worse by trying to break out and getting everyone killed.

What do you do?

Voting closes on Saturday 7th​ of January, 9 am New York time.​

 

[eaglejarl]

Chapter 96: Having The Stomach For It​

The sound of the cell door slamming shut behind them had not faded before the entire team turned their backs on Hazō and moved away from him.

Hazō watched helplessly as his closest friends—his only friends—froze him out. Noburi and Keiko moved to the left-hand wall and started talking quietly. Kagome-sensei ran to the right-hand corner farthest from the door and dropped to his knees with his face to the wall, retching violently. Inoue-sensei knelt beside him, rubbing his back and murmuring soothing words, but he waved her off angrily without looking up. She considered him for a moment, then moved away, sitting down with her back to the wall opposite the door. Her head tilted back against the stone; she sighed and allowed her eyes to fall closed.

Hazō watched the byplay for a moment, then moved to join Noburi and Keiko. "Guys," he began awkwardly. "I'm really sorry about this."

Neither genin reacted at all, continuing to talk quietly without acknowledging his presence.

"I quite enjoyed the barbeque with Team Sarutobi," Keiko said. "It was pleasant to have a sense of camaraderie with other ninja again. Which is not to denigrate my feelings for the team—"

"No, it's cool," Noburi said, shaking his head. "I get it. It's nice to see new faces, and even better that they're ninja and we have something in common. Civilians don't really get us, and for this last year the only ninja we've met have been trying to kill us."

"Yes, exactly," Keiko said, brightening.

"Guys—"

"I mean, sure, dealing with some of the civilians have been pretty cool—I really liked doctoring for that lake town—but you can't really talk to them the same way we talk to one another."

"Indeed. There is always—"

"Guys, please, I'm trying to—"

"—a distance between us and them. They cannot understand what drives us and we cannot truly appreciate their lives. Still, I will admit that I have enjoyed our interactions with civilians. If we aren't executed in the morning I think I would find it pleasant to seek out another small town to help."

"Right there with you. With everything I've learned from Doctor Yakushi—"

Hazō moved off, deciding to try his luck elsewhere. With hesitant steps he moved to his fire-haired teacher and crouched down in front of her.

"Inoue-sensei, I—"

"Piss off." She never opened her eyes or moved anything but her lips.

Hazō flinched and backed away, taking a moment to survey his surroundings instead.

The room was large for a cell, perhaps three meters wide and five deep, built of stone so massive it was like being inside a mountain. Dim light came a pair of small candles in sconces on each wall. The only entry was through a pair of heavy doors, the space between them so small that it could only hold one person at a time. Each door was a full thumb-length thick, made of multiple crosswise plies of solid oak, and heavily reinforced with iron; Lady Tsunade herself wasn't going to punch through those. A small window in the innermost door allowed for a jailer to look inside without opening the door. Aside from that the room was completely bare.

The team had been stripped of all their equipment. Their clothes had been taken and replaced with shapeless things made of flimsy cloth. None of it fit and there were no buttons, drawstrings, or other usable parts. It was almost certainly by design that the pants were so baggy everyone had to dedicate one hand to holding them up. There had especially not been anything of a size for a woman as short as Inoue-sensei; she had had no choice but to roll up the sleeves and legs multiple times. She looked like a little girl playing dressup in her mother's clothes.

The flicker of a candle made the light shift across the wall, drawing Hazō's attention to a fine line. He frowned and stepped closer to the wall, fingers reaching out to trace over the designs without quite touching: seals. Walls, floor, ceiling—now that Hazō knew what to look for he could see that every inch of the stone was covered in what were almost certainly explosive seals. This wasn't a jail cell, it was a killbox; presumably there was a switch outside that would allow any jailer to trigger the seals and reduce anyone inside to meatpaste.

With a sigh he settled against the wall opposite Keiko and Noburi, hands dangling hopelessly between drawn-up knees. He banged his head gently against the wall behind him, replaying over and over the careless words that had gotten them all thrown in here. This was worse than Keiko's confession of love; after that the rest of the team had at least been willing to speak to her...well, except for Noburi for a day or so.

Still, maybe that was a hopeful sign? The team had weathered that stumble and restored their dynamic. Presumably they could do the same this time.

"The prisoners will face the walls and kneel with hands behind their backs."

Hazō blinked, looking towards the door. The jailer's voice was muffled but the words were clear.

"The prisoners will face the walls and kneel with hands behind their backs," the voice said again. "Failure to comply will result in death."

Hazō quickly scrambled to his kness, turning to face the wall and putting his hands behind him.

"Prisoner Kagome, you will toss the explosive seals over your shoulder towards the door, then return to kneeling with your hands behind your back."

Hazō heard a sotto voce snarl from the far corner, but a moment later there was a wet thwap on the floor behind Hazō. He risked a glance back to see something that looked like a thin sausage with a long string tied around one end.

Straining his ears, Hazō barely managed to hear a mutter from the other side of the door, although he couldn't make out the words.

"Prisoner Kagome, you will retrieve the other bladder of explosive seals from your stomach and throw them behind you towards the door. You will then resume kneeling, facing the wall, with your hands behind you."

"Stinking cheating godsdamned bullshit stinker eyeballs," Kagome-sensei muttered. Hazō blinked; he'd never actually heard Kagome-sensei swear.

There followed a few more seconds of retching, then another wet thwap behind Hazō.

"Prisoners will not move while the guard is in the room. Failure to comply will result in death."

Hazō waited, silent and immobile, as the inner door swung open. Footsteps came into the room, moving swiftly, and were gone a moment later.

"Prisoners may move freely again," the voice said. Hazō remained motionless anyway until the sound of the outer door opening and closing marked them once again alone.

Inoue-sensei pushed herself to her feet like a woman lifting a massive weight and trudged over to where Kagome-sensei was pressing himself back into the corner like a cornered rat. His eyes were wide, flicking rapidly from side to side, and his lips were locked back in a rictus of anger and fear.

Inoue-sensei's words were too soft for Hazō to hear, but they made Kagome-sensei relax very slightly. She sat down beside him and cuddled into his chest; Hazō watched the sealmaster's arms float helplessly for long, awkward seconds before folding protectively around her. Kagome-sensei stayed perfectly still, except for his right hand which stroked Inoue-sensei's long hair slowly as she dropped off to sleep. The slow rhythm of her breathing slowly soothed the anger and terror from his face, leaving only the fierce protectiveness of a father shielding his daughter from nightmares.

Hazō wasn't about to disturb that scene; he considered making another try at apologizing to Keiko and Noburi but eventually gave it up as a bad job. Instead, he stretched out on the hard stone floor and composed himself for sleep. No matter what happened he'd need to be at the top of his game tomorrow.

o-o-o-o​

Hazō started awake as the inner door swung open. The faint candlelight was drowned out by the humming ball of raiton energy that an unsmiling Jiraiya held in his left hand.

"So," he said calmly, ignoring the way that Inoue-sensei was physically blocking Kagome-sensei from leaping to his feet. "Let's talk." The words dropped to the floor like lead shot, every syllable clattering with threat.

"Sir—" Inoue-sensei began, her voice pleading. "We—"

"Not you," Jiraiya said, his voice imbued with the finality of a headsman's axe. "Kurosawa Hazō: you threatened a senior physician and Leaf ninja. How do you plead?"

---

XP AWARD: 1

Vote time! What to do now?

Voting ends on Wednesday, January 11, 2016, at 12pm London time.

PS: Check it out, I figured out how to type macrons! Jōnin, chūnin, Hazō, Hyūga -- I've got all the best macrons. They're terrific, everybody says so.

 

[Velorien]

Chapter 97: Endings
by @Velorien​

Hazō could feel Jiraiya's killing intent as a physical presence in the room. The massive weight hung over his head, and a single wrong move would bring it down to crush him. It wasn't hurting him—not yet—but it made Hazō feel as if Jiraiya was capable of killing him without doing anything, just by letting his anger break its chains. Hazō had been in mortal danger before, but this time it didn't feel like danger. It felt like certainty.

Hazō took a deep breath, knowing it might be his last.

"My words were ill-considered and rude, and I humbly apologize for them. But they did not convey any underlying ill intentions, because none exist. My poor wording was a result of passion clouding my speech; I did not intend to imply the possible use of force or other hostile actions against Dr Yakushi, nor against yourself or other Leaf personnel."

"Is that so?" Jiraiya asked, that sense of terrible foreboding still there in his voice. "Then how exactly were you planning to go 'pretty damn far' in dealing with Dr Yakushi?"

"That was an appallingly stupid choice of words, sir. I wasn't thinking clearly, and what I believed I was doing was explaining how Akane's health was very important to me, and how high a priority it occupied in my actions. Had I thought before speaking, instead of letting my emotions take over my tongue, that is what I would have tried to express in a polite and rational fashion.

"My 'pretty damn far', if you'll forgive my repeated rudeness, would have described how much of my own effort and resources I was prepared to expend to support Akane in a productive way, such as the goodwill I hope I've accumulated over my stay in Leaf, or favours which I was prepared to owe you and other Leaf citizens.

"At no time did the idea of harming any of those citizens occur to me in any way. That would be a betrayal of my team's relationship with Leaf, as well as of the village I believe to be the closest place in the world to the utopia I wish to someday build. To say nothing of the fact that such a betrayal would be extremely unlikely to improve the situation for either party. It is because I never considered harming Leaf or its people that I was able to say something so foolish and, in retrospect, suicidal, to you in person.

"Sir, I would also like to emphasise that the mistake was my own, and my team would never condone the statement I inadvertently made. Like me, they haven't the slightest intention of doing any harm to Leaf or its personnel."

Jiraiya looked pointedly in Kagome-sensei's direction.

Crap.

Hazō hurriedly bowed, in the hope that the sudden movement would pull back Jiraiya's attention without getting him killed on reflex.

"Sir, I am prepared to accept any punishment you deem appropriate for my failure, but please understand that you will be punishing me for my carelessness and stupidity, not for being a potential threat to your village."

The mass of deadly energy in Jiraiya's hand flickered as if hungry to lash out. He sighed.

"Inoue."

"Yes, sir!"

"The kid still doesn't get what he's done. Explain it to him."

Hazō turned to look at Inoue-sensei, whose face was a featureless mask of ice.

"Jiraiya brought missing-nin into Leaf on his own authority, probably bending Leaf law to breaking point in the process. That already made his life difficult, because Leaf will be full of people who hate missing-nin and want us dead—or worse—for all kinds of reasons. We have no legal rights whatsoever, so our survival depends on trusting Jiraiya to protect us.

"Then you publicly threaten a senior Leaf official. It doesn't matter what you thought you were doing. That's what ANBU, and any other observers with those crazy senses they have, heard you do. You made Jiraiya look like he made a huge error of judgement in trusting you, and like that error put Dr Yakushi in danger.

"Jiraiya may have lost a lot of face in Leaf. To diplomats like us, reputation is more valuable than chakra, and harder to get back. His enemies will be all over this, and his allies will be wondering if they're taking a risk in continuing to support him. Even as a master negotiator and manipulator like Jiraiya, there's only so far you can soften a blow like that.

"And as the cherry on top of the cake, you threatened Dr Yakushi to Jiraiya's face. In other words, you, his subordinate with no formal position or legal standing, publicly disrespected him. Jiraiya may be uniquely open-minded about relating to us as people rather than tools, but even then I only go as far as I do with the back-and-forth because I have a lifetime's experience in seeing the invisible lines I must not cross. If your subordinates don't respect you, you can't trust them. If they insult you in public, you have to be seen to punish them or you look weak.

"So even if he accepts that you meant no harm, Jiraiya still has to weigh whether he needs to kill us to prove that he's strong and decisive, and ready to make up for his mistakes and protect the village, at the cost of having to sacrifice all the value we represent and everything he's already invested in us."

She looked questioningly at Jiraiya.

He nodded.

He slowly raised the orb in his hand, still buzzing with the raw essence of instant death, and seemed to study it contemplatively.

"Please, sir…. may I speak?"

All heads turned to Keiko.

Keiko had backed into the furthest corner from Jiraiya, leaning heavily against the wall. Her breathing was rough, and her eyes were locked on Jiraiya's orb. Gradually, she pulled her gaze up to his face.

"Be brief."

Keiko closed her eyes, then opened them again.

"Sir. Inoue-sensei has enumerated the disadvantages of permitting us to live. Please allow me to do likewise for the advantages."

Her voice was cool, neutral, almost emotionless.

"As you are already aware, our team has three Bloodline Limits you cannot obtain elsewhere, as well as a sealmaster who performs research and has lived to advanced age, and a jōnin with a rare and extensive skillset. In addition, while Akane is not technically a member of our team, her ability to function as a Leaf ninja is strongly connected to us. Most notably, we hold to an ideology which is closely aligned with yours in a way that is not the case for most ninja. The latter gives you strong reason to trust our motivations, and to believe that we will pursue compatible objectives not only at your direction but also with our own time and resources.

"As Hazō has explained, the present situation does not represent an issue of trust, but rather an issue of competence. Our competence will only increase with the passage of time as we gain skill and experience, and if you so desire, you are able to accelerate this process at your discretion by investing in us further. In other words, we are an asset with unlimited growth potential. On the other hand, by… eliminating us, you will receive only a flat… reputational gain, mitigating existing losses instead of… generating new opportunities.

"Finally… I wish to… apologise for my… failure to prevent… this scenario... It is my responsibility… to pre-emptively identify… errors in Hazō's plans… and there was surely… something… I could have done…

"Please don't kill us."

Time passed.

Jiraiya lifted his hand.

The Lightning Element chakra surged…

And blinked out in a flash of light.

"You need to understand," Jiraiya said with an unyielding but no longer terrifying sternness, "that you're out of second chances. If this was anywhere but Leaf, or if you were dealing with anyone but me, you would already be dead. That option is still on the table, and it will stay on the table until you tip your scales back from 'liability' to 'asset'."

He took a step back, out of the cell.

"You have to leave Leaf," he said in a more normal voice. "I'm giving you three days to finish up your ninjutsu training, then you're out, ready or not."

There was a series of soft thuds as various people slumped against walls and the floor in palpable relief.

"Thank you, sir!" Hazō, Inoue-sensei and Noburi said at once.

"I'm choosing to trust that your earlier actions were an honest mistake. But mistakes need to have consequences if you're going to learn from them. That means I'm revoking your guest privileges. I want to see you on the training field or not at all."

"Sir," Hazō said hesitantly.

"Yes?"

"What about Akane? It'll be bad for her if I can't visit, and she shouldn't have to suffer for my mistakes."

Jiraiya moved his head around in a circular gesture of exasperation. "Kid, I get that you care about your girlfriend to the point of temporary insanity. But it hasn't been twenty-four hours since you threatened Dr Yakushi in front of everyone, and now you're asking me to send you to his workplace. I'd like to have a political career left over after this, if you don't mind."

He motioned to the guard. "They're being released under Protocol Hogo-4. Give them their gear and send them back to their quarters, heavy escort."

The team's stares followed Jiraiya's back, then transferred themselves to Hazō. But nobody said a word.
​

-o-
​

The rooms were suddenly claustrophobic, the pink wallpaper garish and inescapable while the windows mocked Hazō with views just out of reach.

He bowed to his friends in deep apology.

"I'm sorry. I put your lives in danger due to my stupidity. Again. Please believe me when I say I appreciate exactly how badly I messed up, and how you have every right to be angry with me."

"I'm ashamed of you, Hazō," Inoue-sensei said bitterly. "I'm ashamed of myself. What kind of fucking awful teacher am I that my genin can make threats in the face of one of the most powerful men in the world by accident?"

"Seriously, Hazō," Noburi added, "what the fuck? I knew you had your doubts about Yakushi-sensei, but how'd you go from 'there might be something not quite right with this guy' to 'rah, rah, he's going to kill my girlfriend, I'd better make an ass of myself in front of Jiraiya until he chucks us all in prison'? Now you've gone and ruined everything. My apprenticeship is over, we won't be allowed to see the Leaf teams again… Keiko's locked herself in the bedroom and won't talk to anyone… Maybe next time you'll think about the rest of us before you go running off to shout conspiracy theories at people who can wipe us out with their little finger. Maybe you'll even talk to us first."

"It's my fault," Inoue-sensei muttered. "He thought checking with me was going to be enough. Turns out it wasn't.

"I should have done all the talking. I shouldn't have assumed that Hazō would learn not to threaten powerful Leaf ninja just because he nearly got us killed in the library."

"I am sorry," Hazō repeated, with a touch of desperation. "I don't know what else I can say or do."

He cast a cautious glance at Kagome-sensei, but Kagome-sensei was twisted up in his armchair, somewhere between sleep and catatonia. He thought it might be Inoue-sensei's doing.

"If you never open your mouth again, I'll be happy forever," Noburi said, but he didn't put as much malice in it as he could have. "Or at least sew it shut until we're out of the Fire Country."

Had Hazō known a way to eat without using his mouth, he might have given it serious consideration.
​

-o-
​

They weren't allowed to leave their quarters except once a day for training. No visitors came, or perhaps the guards turned them away before they got close. Inoue-sensei had gone from furious to melancholy. Noburi hardly spoke to Hazō except to make the occasional scathing comment. Keiko unlocked the bedroom door eventually, but she had withdrawn into herself and no longer spoke to anyone. And Kagome-sensei… in his more lucid moments, Kagome-sensei periodically opened his mouth to say something to Hazō, only to close it again as if unable to find the words.

Then, on the second day, it happened.

Hazō was practising imbibing the transcendent wisdom of the spirit world when he heard a familiar voice.

"Good morning, Mother Nana," Dr Yakushi greeted his instructor. "How is my aura looking today?"

"Crystal clear," Mother Nana beamed. "As always."

"Do you mind if I speak with the young man in private for a minute?"

"Please, feel free."

As Mother Nana retreated, Hazō looked at Dr Yakushi in puzzlement. "Dr Yakushi? I didn't think I was allowed to be anywhere near you."

"Jiraiya can forbid you to see me, but he cannot forbid me to see you. And I needed to know. Why would you threaten my life, Kurosawa?" Dr Yakushi asked mournfully. "Were we not comrades after our own fashion? What could I possibly have done to offend you so?"

Hazō felt a wave of guilt. Looking at Dr Yakushi's expression of hurt innocence, he realised that he and Inoue-sensei had acknowledged how there were multiple possible interpretations of the doctor's behaviour, but then gone ahead and picked the very worst one without hesitation. He'd never meant to make a threat against Dr Yakushi, but he'd still treated him as an enemy before Jiraiya. He'd accused the man who saved Akane's life.

"It was all a misunderstanding!" Hazō said quickly. "I never meant to threaten anybody! I just chose the wrong words, and Jiraiya couldn't take the risk. Please believe me—I never meant you any harm!"

Dr Yakushi gave a soft smile. "I want to believe you, Kurosawa. You never struck me as the kind of young man who would take against others without good reason, much less threaten them. If you say it was all a mistake, then I will take a leap of faith and trust you one more time.

"As things stand, it is not my welfare I need to be concerned about but Ishihara's. If you disappear from her life so abruptly, it will be highly detrimental to her health. I will issue a formal statement of forgiveness, and pull such strings as are available to me, and perhaps I will be able to secure you a visit before you leave.

"Now if you will excuse me, I must find Noburi. I may be unable to serve as his master for the time being, but I can still offer him reassurance, and perhaps some advice for his independent training in the future."
​

-o-
​

"Hazō-sensei! You've been gone so long. Did something happen?" Akane seemed torn between bouncing in her bed and leaning forward with worry.

"I, uh, kind of," Hazō squirmed. "I may have gone to Jiraiya because I was worried about your safety, and accidentally made him think I was threatening Dr Yakushi in order to protect you."

Akane's face turned ashen as she processed the implications.

"You did what?!"

"I didn't mean to," Hazō said plaintively. "I wasn't thinking straight."

"Hazō-sensei, you absolute idiot!" Akane screeched. "How many times are you going to keep risking your life for me? I am not worth dying for!"

She burst into tears.

Hazō stood there, at a complete loss for what to say or do.

"Is it over?" Akane forced out. "Is this you saying goodbye before they execute you?"

"No! No, he already threw us in prison and nearly killed us. But we managed to talk our way out of it. Or possibly he decided to forgive us on his own. Or there was complex political stuff going on and I will never know what really happened. But either way, he let us go."

"Is everyone else all right?"

"Uh. Jiraiya didn't hurt anybody, if that's what you're asking," Hazō hedged.

"Hazō-sensei, you idiot," Akane repeated. "My safety doesn't matter! You not getting killed does. Promise me you'll never do that again!"

"Your safety does matter," Hazō snapped. "Stop saying it doesn't. You are precious to me, and I don't intend to take stupid risks for any reason, but if I have to put my life on the line to protect you in the future, I'll do it without hesitation."

But this only made Akane cry harder.

Hazō mentally kicked himself. Maybe there could have been a better way of phrasing that.

"Akane," he said gently, "I'm sorry. That came out wrong. I don't want to put myself in danger. That's crazy. Nobody wants to put themselves in danger. But some things are important enough that I will do it anyway if I have to, and you are one of those things."

Then he stood and waited awkwardly until Akane's tears slowed down.

"What happens now?" Akane asked. "Is Jiraiya going to punish you? Is he going to exile you from Leaf? Am I going to lose you?"

Hazō shook his head emphatically. "We're being kicked out of Leaf, but he didn't say it was permanent. He gave us three days to finish up our ninjutsu training, but we've been under house arrest apart from that. Luckily, Dr Yakushi spoke up on our behalf, so I got to see you and explain things before we leave tomorrow."

"He really is a sweetheart. How did you manage to threaten someone like that, even by accident?"

"Reasons," Hazō said uneasily. In addition to still feeling guilty for how he'd treated Dr Yakushi, he also felt that the doctor's own hospital was not the best case to air any concerns about him. "Let's talk about that another time."

"But there will be another time, right?" Akane looked into his eyes searchingly.

"Of course there will! Akane, you are the most important person in the world to me—well, setting aside my mother, and I guess I shouldn't downplay the importance of the rest of the team either, but it's you who takes priority, though that's not to say I'm placing special expectations on you, unless you feel that special expectations would be appropriate as a reflection of your importance…"

Akane gave him a look of wry resignation. Hazō had a distinct sense that he was probably saying something wrong.

So for once, Hazō thought about it until he figured out how to say something right.

"Akane, no matter how much I may care about other people, none of them are the world's best apprentice, and never will be. I won't let it end like this. I will earn my way back into Jiraiya and Leaf's good graces, and I will come back to you. No matter what."

Akane gave a bittersweet smile. "Hazō-sensei, will you play me Tears of Red one more time?"
​

-o-
​

It was, though Hazō felt it shouldn't have been, a bright and sunny day. Jiraiya stood facing the team on the other side of the gate. In front of them lay the Village Hidden in the Leaves, abalone shells on the rooftops dancing with sunlight. A place of new beginnings suddenly ended, a chapter in Hazō's life cut short. Behind them lay the thick shadows of the forest, ready to welcome the missing-nin back.

"This is Team Aomori," Jiraiya said, indicating the four Leaf ninja giving Hazō's team cold, suspicious looks. "They will escort you safely to a Fire Country border of your choice. I'll be in touch via the usual means when I have a mission for you. Inoue, use those codes I gave you if you need to reach me in an emergency, and only in an emergency.

"Kids," he gave a weary smile, "contrary to appearances, I really do like you. That's why I get pissed off when you do something that nearly makes me have to kill you. For Sage's sake, think before you act from now on. And be safe out there."
​

-o-
​

You have earned 9 XP.
​

-o-
​

All of your gear has been returned to you, including weapons etc. taken into storage when you first entered Leaf.

You did not have any opportunities to go shopping, or interact with anybody except as described above. However, you were permitted to purchase a week's worth of Leaf military rations to add to your existing food supply for両2000. They are simple, but nevertheless blow Mist military rations out of the water.

Your ninjutsu training regime was utterly brutal. Hazō clung to Mother Nana's every word in order to sift actual practical advice from them, and now feels philosophically disoriented and spiritually unclean. Noburi was perpetually on the edge of chakra exhaustion (though, really, that went for all three), and memorised every Mist-nin joke in Captain Miyamoto's collection in order to make the man shut up and focus on teaching. Keiko's aura of impenetrable gloom only made Aoba-sensei keener to "turn that frown upside down" with displays of physical affection, driving Keiko's escape to new levels of urgency.

As a result, all three are mentally and physically exhausted, and have sworn never to go through that again, but have been able to put 1 XP each into their new ninjutsu.
​

-o-
​

You have the opportunity to offer Jiraiya some last words, or request that he pass on messages for you. How will you use it, if at all?

And where do you go from here?

Voting closes on Saturday 14th​ of January, 9 am New York time.​

 

[eaglejarl]

Chapter 98: New Beginnings​

"Thank you, Aomori," Mari said with a polite bow. "We appreciate the time you've taken to escort us."

Aomori grunted. "Whatever." He looked pointedly at the border. "Dunno when the next patrol is coming by. You sure you don't want to just take the trade road?"

The look Aomori gave Mari, and the dead stare that the grouchy Leaf ninja's teammates gave Team Uplift, made Yū's fingers itch for his ringboxes. Amazingly enough they had been returned to him when Jiraiya kicked the team out of Konoha. It would be so easy to slip them on, raise his hand—

But he didn't. Jiraiya had assigned Aomori to escort them; Yū was pretty sure that the Leaf ninja wasn't really going to attack, no matter what it looked like and no matter how rude he was. He actually felt a small glow of pride for figuring that out—maybe this people stuff wasn't so hard after all!

"We'd prefer to be a little more discreet," Mari said, dimpling. "Your point about the patrols is well-taken, though. We'll get out of your hair. Come on, folks. Time's a-wastin'." She turned her back on the Leaf team (!!) and loped off across the border into Waterfalls, headed for the town of Hiratawa a few miles to the north of the border. The kids followed along silently; Yū glowered at Aomori and his team before trailing after, and he made sure to keep one hand up so that he could see them in the mirror he'd palmed. Sure, they'd been told to let the team go, but that didn't necessarily mean they would.

In the actual event, they did. Five minutes later Fire was a fading memory behind them and there was no sign of pursuit, so Yū tucked the mirror away and gave his full attention to the area around them.

Mari had started bending their course north and east the minute they were out of sight of the Fire team. Going to Hiratawa made sense—it was a good place to resupply, there would be work available, and there would be plenty of informational resources available for anyone who wanted to learn how the rest of the world was acting or plan what their next move would be. That had been the team's consensus during the discussion over the last few days.

Everyone involved had known perfectly well that they weren't going there. Those conversations were purely for the benefit of the stinking watchers that were almost certainly keeping a stinking cheating eye and an ear on the team. And, of course, the watchers probably knew that it was a lie. Yū had wondered how many layers deep Mari would play; would she say she was leading them to Hiratawa in order to throw the watchers off the scent, then lead them somewhere else? Would she say she was leading them to Hiratawa in order to throw the watchers off the scent, then actually go to Hiratawa because the watchers were expecting that be the only place the team wouldn't go? Would she...well, there were a lot of potential levels.

No, she was leading them back to Iron.

Spoiler: Dice, if they were rolled which they might not have been

Chance of a border patrol being in the neighborhood during Fire -> Waterfalls crossing:
TN: ?
Roll: ?

Team Uplift (Stealth 11) vs Border Patrol (if any), Awareness (?): Class ? success

Chance of a border patrol being in the neighborhood during Waterfalls -> Iron crossing:
TN: ?
Roll: ?

Team Uplift (Stealth 11) vs Border Patrol (if any), Awareness (?): Class ? success

The team made it through to Iron undisturbed; perhaps the kami were feeling merciful or perhaps it was a combination of luck, skill, and careful application of Hazō's Border Crossing SOP list. A list that Yū heartily approved of.

Mari was clearly in a hurry to get gone; she drove the team hard, letting them stop only briefly to rest and refill their chakra from Noburi's barrel. They had left the gates of Konoha when the sun was barely above the horizon and they didn't stop until after it got too dark to see.

"Cold camp," she said quietly. "Do your business, eat a ration pack, go to sleep. We've got things to talk about, but I want to be somewhere reasonably safe before we do. Two watches; Kagome, you're first. Wake me at midnight and I'll watch until dawn."

"But—"

"No arguments. I'll be a little short on sleep but I can manage fine for a day or two."

Yū glared at her but he obeyed. Well, mostly. He might have waited until a couple hours after midnight.

o-o-o-o​

Even with nigh-unlimited chakra to keep themselves going, it was a tired and footsore group that broke out of the treeline on the eastern coast of Iron late the following afternoon.

Mari looked around, hands on hips, and nodded. "Seems good to me. Kagome, any objections?"

Yū surveyed the area thoughtfully. The beach was grey sand, but nice and fine; it would be dense and hard to tunnel through for any dirt sharks that might come along. They were at the center of a small, U-shaped cove with reefs farther out, so there shouldn't be too many critters in the water. The terrain was lumpy enough that there were plenty of small dells back in the forest to pitch camp in. Ordinarily that would be an invitation to camping in a puddle, but with Hazō's Multiple Earth Wall to create a dry platform they'd be okay, and they could roof the dell over into an artificial cave like they had before. The underbrush would provide plenty of places to set traps...yes, this was good. Oh, and there was a stream nearby that would make a decent source of drinking water. That was a nice bonus.

"Not awful," he said. He'd been trying to confine himself to the fewest possible words; the team's issues hung suspended over them all like thunderclouds about to burst open and he didn't want to be the one who triggered the storm.

Mari nodded. "Done. Noburi and Hazō, spam clones. Kagome, you and Hazō are going to find us a spot no more than a hundred yards back in the woods; make a cave, then start setting up defenses. The rest of us and the clones will gather up dirt to cover the cave over and see about transplanting a couple of bushes to hide the entrance. Let's move, people." A quick series of handseals later and seven Inoue Maris were traipsing into the woods, carefully scooping a handful of dirt from here and a handful from there into leather bags.

Yū turned back to the woods, his doofus apprentice silently falling into step beside him. They would talk later; for now, there were defenses to create. He smiled slightly as they went, making a mental bet with himself that Mari would work them into the ground and then once again have them make a cold camp and go to bed with no talking.

o-o-o-o​

In the actual event, Yū lost his mental bet: Mari allowed them to have a fire in the purpose-built firepit inside their artificial cave. It was small, but it was cheery and served to make the place feel more like a home than a temporary camp in the wilderness. She did work them into the ground, though, and allowed no talking beyond 'pass the salt.'

o-o-o-o​

Hazō awoke to find sun streaming in the narrow entrance of their new camp. Inoue-sensei was sitting against the wall by the entryway, arms wrapped around tucked-up knees as she stared thoughtfully out past the invisible Force Wall that was angled across the opening at waist height.

He sat up, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes and looking around. It was late for a ninja start to the day; easily ten o'clock by the light. Four hundred miles and a hard day's labor had left him, and probably the rest of the team, tired and sore. Also, starving; he felt like an animal was trying to claw its way out of his belly.

He looked around carefully; aside from himself and Inoue-sensei everyone was still asleep, although Kagome-sensei seemed to be more dozing than sleeping.

Carefully, he opened up the pack that he'd been using as a pillow and rummaged around until he found one of the ration packs that they'd bought in Konoha. He was about to bite in when a quiet hiss from the doorway stopped him. Inoue-sensei was shaking her head and waving him over.

With a sigh he rewrapped the food and set it on his bedroll, stealthing to the doorway and crouching down by Inoue-sensei.

"I want us all to eat together, hot breakfast," she murmured. "Go out and gather firewood, set up a fire down on the beach. We'll eat there. You can deactivate the Force Wall."

He made himself nod briskly, carefully keeping the disappointment off his face. He was ravenous, but given how badly he had screwed up back in Konoha this was not the time to do anything other than follow orders efficiently and cheerfully.

He wasn't sure how much firewood they would need so he just kept gathering more and more, wrapping it in a blanket so that he could throw the whole mass into one or another of his storage scrolls. Once he judged he had enough he took it down to the beach and unsealed it all. It turned out he'd gathered more than intended, as he had the better part of a cord of wood. Shrugging, he dug a firepit in the sand, only to find that water filled his hole almost immediately. He raised a MEW platform instead, as well as raising a few more small MEWs around the perimeter to serve as seats. Cycling a log in and out of one of the macerator seals gave him a pile of sawdust and splinters that made good tinder. The fire started with no effort and stayed relatively smokeless as he took pains to feed it with small bits that would burn clean and fast.

"Not bad," Inoue-sensei said, giving him an approving look as she ghosted out of the woods with the rest of the team behind her. Hazō nodded his thanks, but didn't say anything. Sensei was out of ways to stall, which meant The Conversation was about to happen. The one he'd been dreading. The one about just how badly he had fouled up.

He was sure that it wouldn't end up with him dead; that was what would have happened back in Mist, but the rules were different here. Given that Inoue-sensei had allowed him to tag along with the group as they traveled it probably wouldn't mean his banishment either. That still left a wide array of awful possibilites.

Noburi opened his mouth to say something, but Inoue-sensei raised a hand. "Eat first. We'll talk after everyone is full."

Unfortunately, it didn't take long for everyone to stuff themselves full of hot food from Kagome-sensei's storage scrolls. Hazō forced himself to start on the bowl of stew he'd been handed, but set it aside half-empty. As hungry as he had been, his stomach felt like a rope that had been knotted and then soaked in water until it shrank into an impregnable ball. The looks that the rest of the team kept shooting his way just made it worse.

Inoue-sensei looked around the fire to see that everyone had either scraped their bowls clean (Keiko, efficiently; Kagome, wolfishly), or was only poking at the remaining food while glaring sourly at Hazō. With a carefully-masked sigh she kicked it off.

"Hazō: attention to orders," she commanded. The genin snapped to his feet with the reflexive obedience beaten into every Academy recruit, standing with feet shoulder width apart, hands clasped behind his back, and eyes locked on the horizon.

"Back in Leaf you demonstrated critically bad judgement," she said calmly. "For the next two weeks you will be doing all chores around the camp. In addition to cooking and cleanup you make repairs to everyone's clothing and gear. You will ensure that there is always plenty of fresh water and firewood. You will need to do most of that after dark, however, since during the day you will be acting as personal servant to the rest of the team.

"More immediately, however, your teammates are going to take turns explaining your error and their feelings about you. You will make respectful eye contact with whomever is speaking. You will remain silent while they are talking. You will not, I say again not, defend yourself against physical attacks. Are we clear?"

"Clear, sensei!" He had to force the words out through a throat that was suddenly dryer than Suna.

"Good." She turned to the rest of the group. "Hazō's stupid mistake nearly killed us all. He cost us the best situation we could possibly have asked for—assets to Jiraiya and guests of Leaf. We were under the protection of the most powerful village in the world. We had access to their supplies, their books, their jutsu trainers, and so much more. All of that: gone. The friendships we were starting to make with clan hairs and elite jōnin: gone. The medic training that Noburi was receiving from one of the best med-nin in the world: gone. Our access to Akane and the chance to see her get better: gone. All because Hazō threatened a Konoha doctor and disrespected our benefactor—who, by the way, was a Sannin and one of the most powerful ninja alive—to his face.

"All of you have done an excellent job of putting your feelings on hold and focusing on the mission until we could get to safety, but now is your chance to express yourself. Say everything that you want to say, curse as much as you like. Feel free to spit on him or punch him. No maiming, no weapons, no jutsu, but you can put the boot in as much as you want. No time limit, take as long as you like."

Hazō watched, wide-eyed and on the edge of panic as his teacher surveyed the rest of the team before finally nodding to Keiko. "Keiko, you start."

Keiko considered the jōnin for a moment, then rose and moved to stand in front of Hazō, studying him without speaking. Hazō struggled to maintain eye contact as he'd been ordered and forced himself not to shrink away from the utterly expressionless mask that was his teammate's face.

Seconds dragged by as she studied him silently. Ten. Twenty. Thirty. A minute. Finally she spoke.

"For the past two days I have been very angry with you, but Inoue-sensei has said most of what I feel." She paused, considering him again. "However, when I set my emotions aside and examine the situation logically I notice something of importance: I do not believe that you consciously rehearsed those words. I believe that they were said in the heat of the moment when you were stressed and afraid, and that you spoke without thinking. I did the same back in Hot Springs, and then I fled the group for over a week. When I returned, you forgave me immediately and were glad to see me, although I am still not completely certain why. Your mistake had larger consequences than mine; I endangered my own standing in the team and my relationships with the five of you, whereas you came very close to getting all of us killed and, as Inoue-sensei stated, you did cut us off from enormous resources."

Hazō's mouth tried to open and spill out all of the apologies that were backed up in his guts and struggling to get out, but he forced himself to stay silent. Inoue-sensei had been clear that he wasn't to speak until the other person was completely finished.

"A moment ago," Keiko continued, "I said that I was not completely certain why you were so quick to forgive me when I returned from the Summon Realm. I spoke imprecisely. Emotionally I have trouble accepting your forgiveness, but intellectually I know that it was due in large part to the fact that we are teammates and friends.

"I am not accustomed to having friends. I got along with most of the other students in the Academy, but we were not close. I was close with my sister, but friends must be peers and I was never her peer. The members of this team are the first friends I have ever had. You have stood beside me in combat. You have helped me grow as a ninja and as a person. You have forgiven me time and again for my social awkwardness, and you forgave me for my stupidity in Hot Springs. Your lapse in judgement was of epic proportions, but I am not willing to lose you as a friend. I choose to forgive you."

One of the many, many knots in Hazō's stomach untied itself. "Thank you, Keiko."

"I am still angry with you, though."

Hazō blinked and cocked his head, studying her face minutely. Was that a tiny trace of a smile on the corner of her lips? Was she serious, or was she...no...maybe? Was she actually teasing him? No, definitely not. She was definitely serious.

"I can understand that," he said. "Please let me know if there's anything I can do to make things better between us."

"Don't insult any more Sannin." If there had been hint of a smile before it was gone now.

"I won't."

Keiko eyed him for another moment, then turned and sat down again.

"Noburi, your turn," Inoue-sensei said, not looking up from the small branches that she was carefully feeding into the fire.

Noburi stood up, brushing the sand off the seat of his pants and glowering at Hazō.

"Inoue-sensei said it, but I'll say it again: you are an idiot. We had it all—we were becoming friends with important people, I was studying under a doctor who may have been as good as Lady Tsunade herself, we were safe from Mist and random hunters and everything. We were sleeping in warm beds with running water and hot tubs. We had Jiraiya as a patron, you moron! Jiraiya! Of the Sannin! What kind of a stupid, incompetent, ridiculous, thoughtless, idiotic moron screws that up? How stupid do you have to be to threaten a Leaf doctor in front of the Leaf spymaster and a bunch of ANBU? What were you thinking?!"

Hazō flinched away from the anger in his friend's voice. (Were they still friends? Would Noburi forgive him for ruining his apprenticeship?) He forced himself to stay silent; it was obvious that Noburi wasn't done.

Noburi scrubbed both hands across his face as though to drive out the aggravation. He sighed, deflating. "I know you didn't do it deliberately, man, but seriously...do you have any idea just how badly you fucked this up for me? Everything's so fucking easy for you, you've gotten basically everything you wanted since we left the swamp. You convinced us all to get behind this insane plan of yours to make the world bright and happy for all the little boys and girls and butterflies. You talked Kagome into teaching you sealing. You just keep getting better and better at taijutsu with that fucking cheating bloodline of yours. Inoue-sensei lets you do most of the planning for the team, and your plans are usually good. Why did you have to pick this particular time to screw the pooch? My med-nin training is the one thing I have that's really mine and not just because of my bloodline. I got a few dribs and drabs of training from Hashimoto-sensei between rounds of her telling me I was useless and incompetent because I couldn't remember all the alternate names for aconite, or all the symptoms of blood fever. Doctor Yakushi was a better medic and a better teacher. The hospital in Leaf had equipment I didn't even know existed, all the supplies you could want, fresh corpses to dissect, and probably every medical book that's ever been written. Being a medic is the one thing that I really, really want and I had it. It was right there, and you totally screwed me out of it because you couldn't keep your fucking mouth closed, you jackass."

Noburi glared at him, then looked down at the ground and kicked grouchily at the sand.

"You want to know the worst part?" the former medical student said. "I am so unbelievably fucking pissed with you that I cannot even find the words for it, but the worst part is: so what? So what that I'm pissed, what am I going to do about it? We've already lost Akane; we can't afford to lose anyone else, so I'm stuck with you. We're going to be sleeping in the same damn cave and eating around the same damn fire. I'm going to have to look at your stupid face every single day, and every time I do I'm going to remember what you cost me. And I can either stay pissed off and let it poison everything, or I can cope and deal and let it go."

Hazō swallowed nervously, forcing himself to meet Noburi's angry-yet-tired eyes.

Noburi sighed. "And yeah, Inoue-sensei says I can beat on you if I want to, and I know you'll stand there and take it because you're Kurosawa motherfucking Hazō, the great and stoic ninja. What would that accomplish, though? Would it make you not have fucked everything sideways? Nope. That's already happened. Would it make me feel better? ...Probably. The kids in the Academy used to insult me and beat on me just to make themselves feel better, and it seemed to work for them. I hated those kids, though, and I don't want to be one of them." He seemed to see something in Hazō's expression because he hastened to add, "Oh, don't get me wrong—I would just love to smack you a few times. The Leaf anatomy books had colored sections to show the perfect targets for taijutsu or weapon, and when I look at you I keep thinking 'oooh, mandibular condyle, yeah.'"

Hazō took a breath and braced himself.

Noburi rolled his eys. "Oh, relax your sphincter, Mr. MEW. I'm not going to hit you." He sighed. "I mean sure, it's tempting. It wouldn't really do any good, would it? I already know you're sorry and that you recognize what a fucking idiot you were, and that blah blah blah. Punching you might make me feel better for a little while, but then I'd have to remember that I'd actually chosen to be one of those kids and I'm...not quite ready to do that.

"So, yeah. Fine. I forgive you or whatever." He turned and slouched back to his place by the fire, not giving Hazō a chance to reply. He didn't so much 'sit' as 'drop dejectedly to the sand', and immediately grabbed a stick with which to poke the logs just so he could see the shower of sparks go up as he very pointedly ignored Hazō.

"Kagome," Inoue-sensei said, tipping her head towards Hazō.

Kagome didn't move from where he lounged by the fire. Lips pursed in thought, he studied Hazō for even longer than Keiko had. By the time his teacher finally spoke Hazō was bathed in sweat.

"Before I met you, I was pretty happy in the woods," Kagome-sensei said. "Mostly, anyway. Been there fifteen years, hadn't seen any really serious danger in fourteen. Pretty lonely, but no stinking ninja had put me in a cell lined with explosive seals, or threatened to shove a raiton ball through my face. So, yeah. Lonely, but safe." He shrugged one shoulder dismissively. "Then you lot show up." His voice rose into a parody of Hazō's. "'I want to learn sealing, Kagome-sensei.' 'I brought you some mushroom soup and gyoza and chocolate, Kagome-sensei.' 'Show me how to make explosives, Kagome-sensei.' 'The villagers actually like you, Kagome-sensei.'" He snorted. "You even talked me into leaving my nice safe woods. You didn't really know much about how the world works...hadn't even heard of the scorch squads." He paused, lips pursed in sour thought. "When I heard about 'em the thought made me sick. When you heard about 'em, you decided to fix the world."

Hazō kept his eyes on his teacher's as Kagome's unfocused, wandering back into memory for long seconds.

"Not even thirteen, but you were looking out for the team. Making suggestions about where we should go, what people should train that they would like and would be good for the team. Some really stupid ideas, but some good ones. You listen when we tell you that you're being an idiot, and you usually don't do the same stupid thing twice." He sniffed. "Usually. Still can't remember that letting a tertiary node come within three resonance modes of a five-spoke converter with a left-handed—"

Inoue-sensei coughed and the sealmaster cut himself off.

"Um...yeah. I was...um...oh, right. Anyway. You usually don't make the same mistake twice.

"You were the one who brought Akane into the group, too. Good kid, Akane. Best of us. Bright, cheerful, smart. World needs more like her, and she thought you were worth following." His eyes went wide and he shook his head. "Dating, though?! Dating?! How did you even— I mean, that's just—"

Inoue-sensei coughed and the sealmaster cut himself off.

"Right. Anyway. Yeah, Akane. And Leaf. And that stinker Jiraiya."

"Not your fault that the stinker blackmailed us into going after Arikada. Not Akane's fault that she got hit with that worm. After that, what were we going to do, not go to the stinking home of the stinking cheating Leaf stinkers?" He sniffed derisively. "And once we're there, what else did we think was going to happen? Of course they were going to find something to get pissed off about, just so they could put lupchanz in our ears and still keep their squeaky-clean image."

He nodded approvingly to Keiko. "Good job convincing His Stinkiness not to put lupchanz in our ears, or even just kill us," he said. "You always find the right words. Wish I could do that."

Keiko blinked, mouth gaping open in shock. "I don't...what...but...?"

Kagome gave her a shrug. "Alley in Rice, made two separate groups of stinkers back down. Sounded pretty right to me. Jiraiya of the Three Stinkers, made him let us go. Sounds pretty right to me. All that clear communication stuff you do. Can't do that. Never find the right words. You do, though."

Kagome left a gobsmacked Keiko and turned his attention back to Hazō. "So, yeah. Good kid. Kinda young, kinda stupid sometimes. Not most times, just some." His hands rubbing back and forth as he unconsciously fondled the explosive ringboxes that he had apparently donned without anyone, including himself, noticing.

"Real bad time to be stupid. Real bad. Still, the Big Stinker could have decided to let it go, chose not to. Politics, schmolitics; he's strong enough that if anyone stopped liking him he could just squish them. Still a stupid thing to say to him, but I doubt you'll do it again."

He paused long enough that Hazō began to open his mouth to say thank you—although for what he wasn't quite sure, since Kagome-sensei's ramble hadn't seemed to move towards, much less reach, any sort of definitive point.

"So, yeah," Kagome-sensei suddenly resumed. "Pretty much entirely your fault, but also Jiraiya's fault. Really stupid of you. Don't do it again." He paused, clearly thinking, then nodded to himself. "So, s'there any more of that honeybread?" He sat up and swiped his hand around the inside of the stone pot which had earlier contained a small honeyloaf, then leaned back in the sand, happily licking the goopy sweet off his fingers.

Inoue-sensei chuckled. "Relax, Hazō," she said. "I left some tea on my bedroll in the cave; go fetch it and make me some."

"Yeah!" Noburi said, his eyes lighting up. "And hop on one foot the whole way!"

Hazō sighed and hopped off to the cave. It was going to be a long two weeks.

---

XP AWARD: 6

Vote time! What to do now?

Voting ends on Wednesday, January 18, 2017, at 12pm London time.

 

[eaglejarl]

The Great Rebalancing: Why and How

​

When we started Marked for Death we had absolutely no idea how to gauge the skill levels that NPCs should have. We arbitrarily pegged them at "teens for chūnin, twenties for jōnin". After 56 weeks of steady 2-updates-a-week and equally steady XP awards we paused to look at where this got us and realized we had some problems:

• With a skill range that narrow, there wasn't a lot of room for differentiation between people, which meant there wasn't a lot of room to make specialized builds. This made most ninja pretty similar.
• Given the multi-combatant rules we'd set up, the team would have been able to crush senior jōnin, even without Mari's or Kagome's help.
• We'd been generous with the XP and the team was already moving through the arbitrarily-chosen chūnin ranks (crowding into the equally-arbitrarily-chosen jōnin ranks in Keiko's case) after only 1 year in game. Did every ninja progress this quickly? Mari has been a ninja for [mumble, mumble, none of your business how old I am] ...um, a few years now. Surely, if Keiko could make it to Weapons 20 in only 1 year then Mari should have made it quite a bit higher after [I swear I'll hit you if you type that number] a few years?

We looked at various options, like cutting XP awards to basically nothing in order to stem the rush of advancement, but we decided that a better approach was to calculate an actual curve for ninja development and then apply it to everyone. This solved both problems -- we had an actual yardstick that would keep things stable going forward, and there were a lot more XP available to NPCs so that there could be a wider range of skills and more room for specialization.

We understand that this might be disheartening, especially compared to recent experiences in which the genin were fairly badass and able to hold their own against pretty much anyone if they worked together with Mari and Kagome. Unfortunately, it didn't make any sense in the context of rational worldbuilding to declare that in fact Mari managed to grab three once-in-several-generations geniuses from the genin that Yagura allowed to be picked for a risky invasion mission, when any sensible leader would have been keeping such a team at home and nurturing them like the future power-balance-shifting badasses they were shaping up to be.

So that's the Why. Let's talk How.

The ineffable @OliWhail put together not one but many spreadsheets detailing what the power of the ninja population would look like using different assumptions of growth rate distributions, as well as making sample character sheets for Mari, Kagome, Jiraiya, "mook chūnin #14", and his brother "redshirt jōnin #29". Much debate happened, liters of blood were spilled in pointed debate. Mathematics was bent and tortured until it cried. Finally, we chose.

We now have a set of equations that combines raw talent with experience to tell us how many XP a given ninja should be built on. It also gives us a yardstick for estimating how many XP should be given out per update, so that should even things out a bit.

Things you should be aware of:

• Despite the above comments about Yagura not letting super-talented kids out on conquest missions, we decided that since we were hitting you with a heavy nerfbat we were at least going to have the team be well above median in terms of raw talent. (i.e., how many XP they average per month) You aren't the bullshit Itachi "I was ANBU commander by the time I could walk or whatever" Uchiha from canon, but you will crush most of your peers in a fight.
• Just like in the real world, experience dominates over raw talent. Someone who has been ninja-ing longer than you is almost certainly going to have a lot more XP in their build, even if they are lower talent. Walk soft around any ninja with 5 or 10 years on their service record, even if they are a complete klutz by nature.
• The hivemind's choices are becoming even more important. Since we now have an explicit XP-gain curve, it is possible for you to be far above that curve if we feel that your plans are significantly better than what a normal ninja of Hazou's talent, experience, and access to resources would come up with. You have the opportunity to leverage the apparently-superhuman computational power of your collective brains for Hazou's good, and we encourage you to do so.
• We are not going to give out specifics of the equations or their results. In addition, going forward we will only be showing the final result of the skill check formula, not the actual rolls that went into it.
• Sadly, Keiko is no longer special-jōnin level in Weapons. Jiraiya's comment to that effect will be retconned away.
• Also, back in Let the Bodies Hit the Floor, the kids hunting you from the Liberator camp weren't chūnin. This will not affect the Badass Boast that Keiko made back in Rice.

EDIT: There was a Part 2 and Part 3 to this in the main thread.

 

[Velorien]

Interlude: The Backup Heir
by @Velorien​

Mist's Special Envoy had chosen her clothing carefully, just as she chose everything carefully. The lavender kimono, undecorated save for her clan crest, conjured a sense of subtlety and gentleness, while the four ninja behind her (all bearing fine weapons, though only two were weaponmasters) backed it with silent strength. The preposterously expensive hairpins rounded off the effect as a reminder of her station.

She had already judged the impact on the Hot Springs ninja present in the conference chamber. The man seated at the head of the table would be the senior adviser, while the other two were there mainly to listen and offer second opinions later, during private discussion. The senior adviser and the man on the left spoke her visual language well, and were even now trying to guess her game. The man on the right seemed more entranced by her beauty, which was pleasant but irrelevant to the mission. How long had it been since she'd had time for bedroom games?

None of these thoughts showed on her face, of course, which matched the rest of the body language for Attitude Twenty: Humility from a Position of Power. Out of the corner of her eye, the Special Envoy saw the eyes of the third Hot Springs bodyguard narrow fractionally, and over the next few seconds she swapped a few muscles into positions of greater respect. That woman was the real decision-maker, she was sure, and thus her true target.

Bow Fifteen executed, she met the senior adviser's gaze just long enough to convey sincerity. "Thank you for giving up your valuable time to see me. My name is Kurosawa Ren, head of the Kurosawa Clan and Special Diplomatic Envoy of the Village Hidden in the Mist."

"The pleasure is ours," said the adviser, a middle-aged man with streaks of silver in his black hair and his headband at an angle (perhaps to hide a scar?). He gave a deep nod, but did not stand to bow. "I am Mugiwara Ryōichi, Councilman and Personal Adviser to the Lord of the Burning Waters. Please, be seated."

He did not introduce the other two, thereby emphasising his own importance (and further drawing attention away from the observer at the back).

Ren raised her hand in a careful wave to one of her bodyguards. It was one of her own, Modified Beckon Twenty-Three: I am a Small Woman in Command of Towering Giants.

Mitsumori responded to her signal and passed her the rosewood case, which she handed to Mugiwara. Attitude Twenty already had a good set of motions for gift-giving, so she didn't adjust anything and instead focused on the reactions. How wary would they be of receiving an unknown item from a Mist-nin?

"Please accept this gift as my thanks for granting me this audience. It is but a little thing, but I hope that it will please you."

The Mizukage, being the kind of man he was, had suggested offering a weapon. Ren had chosen a pipe. It was a symbol of peace, relaxation and luxury. The gold decorations evoked prosperity, something on the mind of every Hot Springs ninja right now, while the carvings of the Guardian Dragons of the Depths echoed a legend known to every child from Frost to Water. "We defend our own." The juxtaposition would invite curiosity, and sit in the receivers' minds for when the time came for the relevant part of her speech.

It was a thing of perfection, like every tool optimised for its purpose.

"I thank you, Lady Kurosawa. This is a beautiful item." Mugiwara replaced the pipe in its case and set it aside.

"May I ask why you have graced us with your presence?"

Straight to business? Excellent. Ren smirked on the inside, while her face shifted to Expression Sixty-One: Warm but Professional.

"The Mizukage feels that it is time to renew the historic bonds between our two nations, and that the beginning of that renewal must be an apology for the inconvenience we have caused you."

The bodyguard's surprise was barely a flicker. Oh, to play with this woman one-on-one, matching wits without these tiresome intermediaries. But perhaps the time would still come.

"Of what inconvenience do you speak?" Mugiwara asked.

"You have suffered greatly at the hands of the so-called 'Cold Stone Killers', and while you must be aware by now that they are Mist missing-nin, I believe you have the right to hear the full story of how they came to be.

"Some time ago, Mist dispatched a peacekeeping force to the Country of Noodles, seeking to prevent Hidden Leaf's steady erosion of that country's independence by means both indirect and military. As I'm sure you are aware, Noodle's neutrality is a key element in maintaining harmony within our region, and for it to become another of Leaf's puppet states would have been disastrous.

"Unfortunately, we were betrayed. We have no proof of who was responsible for sabotaging our mission to protect Noodle from Leaf, though of course we may guess. This third party subverted one of our best jōnin, an expert in deception and manipulation named Inoue Mari. Inoue placed traitors among the peacekeeping force, then massacred those who remained loyal, and fled to seek shelter in the Fire Country."

Shikigami had been too popular, and besides, who knew how many other traitors he'd left in Mist? Better to leave them thinking they were safe for now. Nor would Kanna, the non-entity, have sufficed. Whereas with Inoue's profile and specialisation, it had been natural for her to take the fall. Not that Ren minded. If it were not for the stupid bitch, her nephew might have been saved. He'd still been young enough for "re-education", and Ren would have made it happen, even if it cost her. If he'd only been allowed to surrender…

"Naturally," Ren continued with Attitude Twenty as her flawless mask, "we were not willing to violate another nation's sovereign borders in our pursuit, and despite our misgivings we elected to cooperate with Leaf authorities in hunting down the missing-nin. Unfortunately, when we tracked them down, Inoue fled with a core of particularly powerful minions while our forces were engaging the main body. Leaf's finest sensory specialists were allegedly unable to detect this group as it escaped through their home ground.

"We continued our hunt, but without success. Inoue's team seemed to have vanished off the face of the earth—until they surfaced here, in Hot Springs, and assassinated an important guest. Again, we cannot say at whose behest they violated the demilitarised zone, though I note that they once again fled into the Fire Country once their treachery was complete. Please rest assured that our finest hunter-nin are constantly on the lookout for these murderers so as to punish them in full for the harm they have done you and us."

Was her mission today going to be the final straw that lead to Hazō's death? Mist and Hot Springs both stood to regain so much face by killing her nephew and his team, and here she was brokering an alliance between them. Would Hana forgive her if she knew? Had Hana ever forgiven her?

Was she still in Resolved Commitment? That should be long enough. Time to shift to Number Sixteen: Patient Alertness, and let them give her the next opening.

"This is all very edifying, Lady Kurosawa, but surely the Mizukage didn't send his Special Envoy merely to speak of past mistakes?"

He was starting to move into a position of dominance. Good. If Hot Springs believed they had the upper hand in negotiations, then the bargaining tomorrow would go much more smoothly.

"Indeed. We of Mist are not unmindful of the impact of the Cold Stone Killers' actions. The elite guests of Hot Springs have gravely overreacted to the incident, and many have withdrawn their patronage out of fear for their safety. I believe it is no exaggeration to say that this country is on the verge of an economic crisis."

The tension in the room was palpable. She was walking on the knife edge of insulting them, but at the same time their attention was totally focused on her. They had to know what their country's weakness meant to Mist.

"I am here to offer aid."

The bodyguard wasn't looking at her anymore. Her gaze was unfocused—calculating, predicting, evaluating—while everybody else was hanging onto Ren's every word. Yes. This was how it should be done.

Ren loosened her shoulders as she selected Attitude Thirty-Four: Confident Magnanimity.

"Rightly or wrongly, the shinobi of Mist have earned a reputation for ruthless efficiency. We wish to place that ruthless efficiency at your service by allowing you to hire our special forces for additional protection of your hot spring resorts. Needless to say, we do not believe that our assistance is truly necessary on a practical level—the Cold Stone Killers incident is a unique blip in an otherwise unquestioned history of secure hospitality—but by adding our reputation to yours, we are confident that we can restore your customers' faith and bring them back to you."

Several seconds of silence.

Mugiwara stirred. "That is a very generous offer, Lady Kurosawa. But what would such unprecedented generosity cost us?"

They didn't reject the offer outright. But then, she knew from the moment she'd walked into the room that they weren't going to. Now the fish was on the hook, and the rest was detail.

"Nothing more than a fixed percentage of your tourist income," Ren said lightly (Diplomat Voice Sixty Modified: This Is Me Trying to Slip Something Past You, So Focus on What I Just Said and Ignore the Real Trap Coming Up). "If our assistance is insufficient to restore your fortunes, then you will only be paying a pittance. Or if wealth is flowing into your coffers anew, we will claim a predictable, reasonable fraction.

"We will also shoulder the full setup costs for this project, including any necessary training, the construction of the logistics and coordination centre, and materiel transportation to the mainland."

The bodyguard's posture turned slightly more hostile. Naturally. But Ren was ready to forestall the objection.

"This is a unique opportunity for us as well. While a less stable nation might balk at inviting allied troops onto its soil, Hot Springs is a demilitarised zone secured by international treaty. Even were we to disregard our long history of common culture and aligned interests, we would be unable to conduct military action against you without inviting immediate, overwhelming retaliation from the rest of the continent. It is this layer of security that enables us to deal as equals.

"I am not here to do battle with you over diplomatic advantages and fine print," she lied. "Only to offer a mutually beneficial arrangement that you will be free to terminate at any time you desire."

If you're prepared to tell your patrons that you are withdrawing the protection they've come to rely on.

Mugiwara stood.

"Thank you very much for your proposal, Lady Kurosawa. Please permit us to retire for the day while we discuss. Our servants shall show you to the guest chambers, and to various traditional entertainments prepared for a person of your stature."

As he rose from his bow, he gave her a roguish wink that came off surprisingly well from a man his age. "I hope you enjoy hot springs, because they make up about three quarters of them."

Ren thought Attitude Fourteen: Relaxed and Uninhibited would be best while she bathed.

How would Hana have handled this mission? Ren's mood sank as the eternal question reminded her of her nephew's fate. She decided to add some motions from Carefree into the mix.​

 

[eaglejarl]

Chapter 99: Risings​

"Good muffins," Gamaheu said. The tattooed Toad was lounging comfortably on a cushion in Panairu's living room, snacking on one of the pangolin's newest batch of banana/watercress baked goods.

The Toad agent paused to look at the muffin and shook his head, croaking a chuckle. "You, baking. Takes me by surprise every time. You've gotten awfully domestic since the war, old friend. What happened to the Scaled Terror that I remember?" He took another bite, eyes rolling back in gustatory delight.

Panairu gave a Gallic shrug. "He got old," he said philosophically. "What, I can't be a fighter and a baker?"

Gamaheu raised a webbed palm in surrender. "Hey, I'm not stopping you. Although, funny you should mention fighters...."

Panairu's massive claws had been busy crumbling a muffin into small enough segments that he could swallow them without choking; at his friend's words they stilled. He looked up, leaning slightly forward so that he could get a clearer look at the tattooed toad. Given that he was the better part of eight feet tall and Gamaheu was only five this left the pangolin more or less looking at the top of his friend's head.

"I'm not going to like this, am I?" he asked, resignation heavy in his tone.

"Probably not. Nine days ago our scouts spotted a squad of Condors trying to sneak by on the southern border. The leader wore green stripes. Three left, two under."

Panairu sighed. "Lovely."

Green was reserved for the Condor military. Three left-facing chevrons signified an Undercommander, leader of a company. Two underbars meant Logistics branch. If the Condor army had grown to the level of needing entire companies of logistics troops...well, you generally didn't need that big a supply train if you were staying home. And if they were sneaking around on the Toads' southern border....

"The scouts followed as far as they could, but you know how it is—they fly, we don't," Gamaheu said with another shrug. He absently tossed the rest of the muffin into his mouth to free his hands so he could rummage around in his beltpouch. "I brought the scout leader's report, though."

"Don't talk with your mouth full," Panairu chided reflexively. It was an old joke between them. "It's disgusting."

Gamaheu gaped his mouth open to reveal the half-chewed muffin mash, bactrian eyes twinkling. Panairu rolled his before taking the proffered scroll and unrolling it. He pulled it almost against his eyes so he could skim through the details, and immediately cursed at what he saw.

"I'll take this straight to the Polemarch," he said, pushing himself to his feet. "Thanks. You must have run your feet off to get this here so fast."

Gamaheu shrugged casually. "Nothing that couldn't be done by any dashingly handsome demigod. Have to admit that I wouldn't mind sitting and having another few muffins before I need to go walking again. Polemarch won't be offended if I don't come, will he? I don't really have anything to add to the report."

Panairu shook his head. "Nah, he'll be fine. Probably want to talk to you tomorrow just as a courtesy, but I doubt he'll begrudge you a night's sleep. There's a tub in the back and more muffins on the counter. Make yourself at home."

Gamaheu smiled. "Thanks. And, if you don't mind me saying it, I really hope you get to stay a baker."

Panairu nodded without speaking as he turned for the door. Personally, he'd rather stay a baker too. Still, if the Condors were gearing up...well, he was old, but his claws were still sharp. The Condors might just need a reminder of what it meant to face the Scaled Terror.

o-o-o-o​

"Reporting for service, Polemarch!"

"Be at peace, Strike Leader," said the Polemarch's massive voice, the faintest hint of amusement hiding somewhere in its depths.

Strike Leader Pankurashun, Senior Combat Instructor for the First Army of the Pangolin Clan, did not do 'at peace', ever. At his Polemarch's command he unbent enough to allow his tail to touch the floor in the 'rest' posture. Even this was an enormous concession.

"The Condors are mobilizing again, Strike Leader." The amusement was gone, granite will grinding it away.

Pankurashun snorted. "After the pounding we gave those beakfaces the last time you'd think they would have learned their lesson."

"Indeed. Which intrigues me. We and the Toads and the Otters monitor their trade closely; their imports have remained constant, so there has been neither famine to make them desperate nor population boom to make them bold. Their neighbors maintain the same operational readiness levels that they have had for decades—nothing to offer fresh provocation or imply weakness."

Not having been asked a question, Pankurashun remained silent.

The amusement was back. "Come, Strike Leader. No speculation?"

"With all respect, Polemarch, I am not paid to speculate on the strategic implications of grain shipments. I am paid to kick ass and shred beak."

The amusement was stronger this time. "Too true, Strike Leader. More recently, however, you are paid to train the next generation. I gather you met with the Summoner recently."

Centuries of military service was all that kept Pankurashun from blinking in confusion. He was a Senior Combat Instructor, not an officer or a High Circle official. He'd been utterly baffled when a Speaker had come running into the training hall and pulled him right out of a class, telling him to report to the Polemarch 'at his earliest convenience.' Which, in the Pangolin army, was the polite way of saying "right the hell now and don't bother stopping to wash off the dirt first."

"Sir, yes, sir," he said, taking refuge in protocol. Was this because he'd taught that human punk the basic training jutsu? If he'd been called in by the Base Commander he would assume he was going to get a reaming and some punishment detail. If he was in front of the Polemarch himself...oh, Pantokrator this could be bad.

"Tell me your impressions, Senior Combat Instructor," the Polemarch said, no trace of reproach in his voice.

Pankurashun did not allow himself to sag in relief, but he did pause for a moment to get himself under control and organize his thoughts. "Sir. Please note that my personal contact with the Summoner is limited to one extensive conversation, a short evaluation on the training field after that conversation, and a brief interaction with her and her squad on the Human Path.

"Physical assessment: Her war skills are above average for a human of her age, above most of our fresh intake. Her strength and endurance are adequate for a human child. Her speed is above average, becoming quite impressive when she uses her 'chakra boost' ability. As with all humans her nose is utterly hopeless but her vision mostly makes up for it. Morale: She lacks confidence in herself, although in her encounter with the Naraka Rollers she was decisive and effective. She—"

"I didn't realize you were friends with the Naraka Rollers, Strike Leader. Such unplumbed depths behind that gruff exterior."

Pankurashun's tongue slapped at the air for just a moment. "I'm not sure they would describe me as a friend, Polemarch. Despite that, they were willing to explain the circumstances of Mori's visit when I asked politely."

"'Politely', hm?" The undercurrent of the Polemarch's voice had moved from 'amused' to 'suppressed laughter'. "I do hope that your polite conversation was not interrupted by the demolition of their headquarters."

"No sir, we were not disturbed, sir. I thank you for your concern, sir." For Pantokrator's sake, you throw one little scrub through a wall and they call it 'demolition'. There was just no justice. If he'd wanted to demolish the place it would have been a proper crater.

"Indeed. I interrupted you—you were saying?"

"Sir, continuing with my report on morale. The Summoner demonstrates admirable loyalty to her squadmates. She had interpersonal difficulties with one of them, Ishihara Akane. The Summoner was self-aware enough to recognize these issues and went far out of her way to mend them. According to my conversations with her liaision, Second Specialist Pandā, the effort was successful and the two of them are more functional.

"Mental: The Summoner is well educated and clearly intelligent, although poorly socialized. Our interaction was brief, but my impression is that she lacks imagination and self-direction. Report ends."

"Hmmm," the Polemarch mused, his far-off tail tapping thoughtfully. "Yes, that makes sense. It would also explain why she has had the contract for four months yet made so few contracts. Tell me, Senior Combat Instructor, what impact would it have on the Summoner were we to bring her here and line up some qualified summons for her?"

"Sir, I believe it would be an error, sir," Pankurashun said, snapping back to full attention. "The Summoner's largest weakness is her lack of self-confidence. It would be better to mark the trail than to show her the log."

"Hm."

Pankurashun waited at rigid attention. There were two kinds of officers; the ones who got angry if you were too direct in your speech and the kind who got angry if you weren't. He'd never before spoken with the Polemarch, or even with anyone who had spoken to the Polemarch, and he sincerely hoped that his ultimate commander was in the 'you should be direct' group.

"Be at rest, Senior Combat Instructor," the Polemarch said, seeming to finally notice Pankurashun's stiff posture. "Tell me, what are your personal feelings towards the Summoner?"

Pankurashun smothered a grimace. Asking a Senior Combat Instructor to express feelings?! That was just unfair. He hoped word of this never got back to the base. Still, orders were orders and anything the Polemarch said was an order.

"Sir, she's a good kid. Young, inexperienced, with all the flaws I mentioned, yet she's trying. Her clan should have their snouts cut off for choosing a Summoner who can't protect herself yet, but she's on the right track. Give her a decade or so and she'll be a Summoner to be proud of. Better than Ui by a mile."

"I see. Tell me, Senior Combat Instructor, what would you say if I told you that she had no clan? That she was, in fact, on her own except for those squadmates you met?"

Pankurashun blanched. On her own? A Summoner that young and she had nothing between herself and the world other than that tiny little squad? How in the name of the Pantokrator's suppurating snout did that happen?

"Sir...if the Condors are moving again and the Summoner is that young and has no clan, she's in a lot of trouble."

"I agree. I believe we shall need to mark that trail quite quickly. See to it, Senior Combat Instructor. You are excused from any duty that would conflict with this tasking. I'll expect a plan on my desk first thing tomorrow."

"Your will, Polemarch." He spun on his heel, tail snapping through the turn with drill-ground precision, and trotted away. This was going to require some thought.

o-o-o-o​

The chores were done, Inoue-sensei had finally gotten tired of Noburi making Hazō sing the 'I Am A Doofy Doofus' song and told him to knock it off, and Hazō was able to sit by the fire and eat in peace.

He was surprised to notice how generally happy he was. Twelve days of chores and hazing had greatly reduced the tension within the team. Inoue-sensei had been careful to ensure that the hazing was kept within strict limits but, in truth, none of the team had really been interested in pushing it even remotely close to what routinely happened during Hell Week at the Academy. It had been more along the lines of "Minion! Fetch me a beverage, minion!" and "You call that polished, minion?! Run fifty laps along the beach shouting 'I am a lazy doofus!'" instead of anything involving bugs or knotted leather. Really, it had only been bad for the first two days. After that even Noburi had mostly gotten it out of his system and was just having fun with it. And the thing with the fruit hat really had been funny.

Of course, there were also downsides to relaxing. Being kept constantly on the run had been nice, in a way, since it left him no time to think. Now that things were settling down he had the chance to really ponder on his mistakes and how bad things could get.

Staring into a fire after dark was a bad habit; it ruined your night vision and left you at a disadvantage if attacked. Still, it was comforting and relaxing on a primal level and if there was one place on earth where he was unlikely to be attacked it was here, in the middle of bloody nowhere with a jōnin sitting next to him and four concentric rings of traps set by a para—extremely thorough explosives expert.

The fire, of course, reminded him of Fire and the mess they'd left behind. Jiraiya hadn't killed them, or cut them off from his network, but it had been a monumental loss of resources. Definitely something to avoid the next time they had to interact with Jiraiya or one of his peers. Which they would have to, eventually; as the Sage had said, "A man may choose to leave the world behind, but the world may choose not to be left." The Elemental Nations weren't that big, and Jiraiya had already demonstrated the ability to summon them through the pangolins. Eventually he'd have another mission for them, another Arikada to deal with, and the team would be at risk again.

One of the logs popped and a shower of sparks whirled up into the night sky like tiny festival lanterns, burning hot and bright for an instant and then fading into blackness.

Hazō snorted softly, an ironic smile tugging at his lips. 'Burning hot and bright, then fading into blackness.' Wasn't that just a perfect metaphor for ninja life? Theoretically, the power to set the world ablaze but in practice far more likely to wink out in moments. Long periods of unrelieved tedium interspersed with moments of pants-wetting terror. Even simple things like traveling—hours and hours of struggling to keep your mind undulled by the pounding rhythm of your feet, occasionally interrupted by a few seconds of life-threatening explosions and flying steel when you ran into a border patrol or a chakra beast.

The chakra beast problem was pretty well solved for the moment; nothing non-sapient was getting through the myriad layers of Kagome-sensei's defenses. No, the real problem was that eventually they were going to need to go back to civilization and interact with other ninja again.

They'd actually been quite lucky with their ninja interactions so far. Things in Isan had been mostly calm...well, with a couple of notable exceptions. Their time in Konoha had been calm, with a couple of notable exceptions. Hot Springs....

Okay, maybe they hadn't been that lucky. Still, they were alive after more than a year on their own and that said something.

Eight years. That was what Akane's teachers had told her was the average lifespan for a ninja. Granted, that average was heavily skewed; on the one end you had people like the Hokage and Jiraiya who made it to advanced age. On the other end you had the massive numbers of genin who died in their first handful of missions. The ones who survived typically spent years being escorted around by jōnin or senior chūnin as the children gained in skill and power so that they could in turn escort the next generation of wet-behind-the-ears puppies.

The team didn't have that advantage. Sure, Inoue-sensei and Kagome-sensei were here to keep them safe, but most village ninja only went on missions every so often and they spent the rest of their time training with a vast array of expert teachers. The team was in the field constantly and although Inoue-sensei and Kagome-sensei were brilliant they could not compare for breadth of skill with the resources of a village. As a simple example, neither of them had an Earth nature so they couldn't teach jutsu that Hazō could use.

He frowned. Actually, what was Kagome-sensei's element? It had never come up.

Shrugging, he waved the issue off and finished polishing off the last of his stir fry while thinking. Where had he been? Right, vulnerabilities. The team lacked the training opportunities that a village could afford them. They lacked the easy access to supplies and weapons. They lacked the free passage through various nations that would be afforded to village ninja. They could build a secure base—certainly Kagome-sensei had done his best—but no static defense could protect against a serious assault by skilled hunter ninja.

He finished the last bite and set his bowl aside, chewing slowly on a piece of candied fruit from one of the Leaf ration packs. (They really did beat Mist's trail food all hollow.) His train of thought should have been depressing, but it actually wasn't. Sure, there were threats and yes, the team's growth was disadvantaged compared to that of village ninja. Still, that wasn't a death sentence, that was a challenge.

Well, challenge motherfucking accepted.

The fire crackled and popped as Hazō turned ideas over in his head for how he would protect his team. His team, who were busy enjoying the moment instead of dwelling on how dark their future could be and how to brighten it up. Keiko and Inoue-sensei were using long green sticks to toast slices of apple over the fire; Keiko held hers in both hands, apple slice down near the embers and a look of careful focus on her face. Inoue-sensei lounged back, arms folded behind her head and stick clasped between her toes as she lazily wafted her apple slice back and forth through the flames, clearly more interested in playing with her food than cooking it. Noburi was lounging against a log to one side, hands folded on his stomach and eyes drifting closed as he gazed sleepily at the stars. Kagome-sensei....

A quiet bang followed by a cackled "Ha!" announced that Kagome-sensei was busy cutting up logs for the fire. Hazō grinned; Sensei had started fiddling with the parameters of his shaped-charge seal lately—or perhaps had finally been comfortable demonstrating years-old variations, Hazō wasn't sure. By forming the angle of the blast into a very narrow 'cone' and cranking the intensity way down he'd created something that was basically a force axe. Chopping firewood was supposed to be Hazō's job but Kagome-sensei enjoyed it so much that no one had the heart to stop him as long as he agreed not to say, "See?! Explosions solve everything!" every time he brought in a new load.

The fire popped again, shooting more sparks into the sky along with several flakes of grey ash. Hazō's eyes automatically tracked them, a smile spreading across his face as the sight reminded him of his long-ago leap to the Mizukage's tower. The heat from Amatetsu's Thousand Yams Furnace had buoyed him up, letting him make the crossing from the ledge to the Tower that had seemed so impossible at the time, yet proven simple in the end. If only border crossings were as ea—

He sat bolt upright, mouth agape, as the answer appeared full-blown in his mind.

---

XP AWARD: 1

Vote time! What to do now?

Voting ends on Wednesday, January 25, 2017, at 12pm London time.

 

[Velorien]

Chapter 100: Alternative Perspectives Part 1
by @Velorien​

It was the most beautiful of all cold, windy, overcast spring days. Today, Hazō's indentured servitude was finally over. No more being forced to give scouting reports in trochaic octameter. No more following people around with a flute as their personal background theme. No more digging latrines, or copying recipes out of Kagome-sensei's book by hand so he didn't have to risk the original while cooking, or polishing Pandā's scales until they gleamed in the firelight—which didn't even make sense as a task, given the effect wouldn't carry over to Pandā's real body. No, today, Hazō was a free man.

"So, Hazō, what are you going to do now?" Inoue-sensei asked coolly. "Apart from grinning like an idiot."

"Um," Hazō stopped grinning. Something about Inoue-sensei had been off for the last couple of weeks. She hadn't been… frustrating? Hyper? A constant threat to his hair? Mischievous. Let's go with mischievous. If anything, she'd been acting a lot like Hazō's old team leader, and it was unnerving.

"Inoue-sensei, are you still upset with me?"

Inoue-sensei paused, then gave a wry smile that had no relationship to humour. "It's complicated and I don't feel like talking about it right now.

"The important thing is that everybody else is calming down. Noburi's studying the notes Dr Yakushi left him instead of staring at them like a dead lover's keepsake, Keiko's steadily approaching her normal level of… Keiko, and it's done Kagome a world of good to be able to secure the perimeter. So as a special reward for your hard work, I'm going to let you do what you've always wanted… and make a list. We're long overdue for an after-action report."

Hazō's grin returned. He fished around in his note-taking pouch, and produced a scroll, which he unfurled with a flourish. "Way ahead of you, Inoue-sensei."

Inoue-sensei just sighed.

-o-
​

"OK, everyone," Hazō began. Today really was a glorious day. Not only was he freed from his torment, but he was about to start fulfilling one of his traditional duties as team sort-of-leader. A few more steps, and hopefully he'd be able to regain the trust he'd lost by nearly getting his team horribly killed. "I think this would be a good time to go over the mistakes we've all made in the recent past, and figure out some ways to do better in the future. Any objections to me taking the lead?"

Noburi shrugged. "Better you than me."

"I would not gainsay your superior expertise in this matter," Keiko agreed.

Neither of the adults commented, though Kagome was only half-listening and half- working on some new piece of carving (either a deer statuette or a backscratcher—Hazō couldn't quite tell).

"Good," Hazō said. "As you can see from this list"—Noburi gave an exaggerated groan—"I've organized the main points by subject, then chronologically. So first things first, OPSEC.

"I think it's fair to say that we've all been terrible at keeping our secrets, especially from Leaf, but we weren't doing so well in Sarubetsu either. Remember when all of us but Inoue-sensei got caught by two ninja patrols at the same time?"

"That wasn't OPSEC," Noburi objected. "That was stealth."

"Yes," Hazō said, "but do you remember the part where we threatened them with all the abilities we actually possess?"

Keiko squirmed.

"Hey," Noburi said, "I think we got out of that one just fine. If anything, muddying the waters with that crazy sealmistress story was a stroke of genius."

"That's one word for it," Inoue-sensei muttered.

"Ahem," Hazō hurried on, "there was also that Irie trader who identified all three of our bloodlines in one conversation."

"That was insane," Noburi agreed. "I don't think any of us could've seen that coming."

"It brings up an important point, though," Inoue-sensei said. "You kids have got to learn how to act like normal people. Take a look at me. Do I look like a badass genjutsu mistress, pro infiltrator and winner of the Mist Women's CQC Tournament three years running?"

Hazō shook his head.

"What do I look like?"

Hazō hesitated. That sounded like a question with a lot of wrong answers, but also an opportunity to score badly-needed points.

He took what he knew was a few seconds too long to find a good formulation, but finally came out with:

"A woman remarkable only for her beauty and poise."

Everyone else was now giving him very odd looks, but Inoue-sensei gave a light smile.

"Eight out of ten. Maybe not all of my training has gone to waste.

"More to the point, ordinary kids don't make a beeline for every seal they see. Ordinary civilian kids aren't even literate, but that time you were being a ninja so it wasn't such a big deal. Ordinary kids also don't move like they're used to wrestling bears in their spare time.

"Ordinary kids don't perform miracles of analysis either. Smart is one thing. Smart and educated is another. Mori-level educated is something completely different, and other smart and educated people will notice.

"Noburi… you're doing good. We just need to figure out how to deal with that barrel."

"Thanks, Inoue-sensei," Hazō said. "On to Leaf. Noburi and I both messed up with Dr Yakushi. If Inoue-sensei's right, then he was being very manipulative, and neither of us noticed."

"It is not so much that I noticed," Keiko added, "as that I am disinclined to trust strangers to begin with, and so his communication style explicitly demanded something I was unwilling to give. It is entirely possible that, had he chosen an approach specifically tailored to my personality, I would have been as vulnerable as anyone else."

Hazō looked questioningly at Kagome-sensei.

"You really think he was being more manipulative than all the other Leaf stinkers?" Kagome-sensei asked. "They were all doing it. Lying bastards, the lot of them. It's just he didn't have extra leverage over us the way the others did, so he had to work harder.

"Oh, wait, he had Akane, didn't he? Never mind."

"Regardless," Hazō said, "we need to get better at noticing manipulation, and that means paying attention to what people might want, and how their actions are helping them get it. We knew Dr Yakushi was interested in our bloodlines, and we should've picked up faster on how all the great things he was offering us were going to get him what he wanted."

Noburi frowned. "I've said it before, but Yakushi-sensei was also acting exactly the way someone in his position would act if he was just a really nice guy. As opposed to an enemy we had to threaten to Jiraiya's face."

"You know I didn't mean to—"Hazō cut himself off. After two weeks of hard work, he was not going to start an argument over this. "It's not that I disagree, Noburi. He saved Akane's life, and I'm ashamed I let myself forget that. But people in our position can't afford to relax just because someone seems trustworthy. I mean, Jiraiya likes us too, and on the whole he's been really good to us, but I don't think at this point any of us doubt that he'd throw us under a rampaging chakra bison if he thought it would advance Leaf's interests.

"Speaking of Jiraiya, we don't need to go over what a disaster that was again, but it wasn't the only one either. I interrupted the Hokage when I asked whether Akane was OK. Luckily, he's apparently very kind as Kage go, so he forgave me, but that whole 'disrespecting Jiraiya' thing really brought home to me how careless I'd been. If that had been the Mizukage, he might have just torn my soul from my body there and then."

"The Mizukage doesn't tear out souls," Inoue-sensei said quietly. "He crushes them. Never look him in the eye."

Hazō shivered.

"Uh, moving on, there's also the Library Incident. Again, that's all me, but I think as an example of what not to do, it's useful for everyone. I blurted out a bunch of secrets and I assaulted Captain Sarutobi. In retrospect, it's amazing we survived that as painlessly as we did.

"The fact is, we need training. We need to be ready so that when we speak with people who could wipe us out by sneezing in our general direction, we've got the proper attitudes and body language ready to go. That goes double for me, since with my bloodline once I learn the perfect poker face, I should be able to use it anytime."

"You're also the one who needs it most if we're going to stay alive," Noburi added helpfully.

"Thank you, Noburi. So. Training. Serious training. Can you help us with that, Inoue-sensei?"

Inoue-sensei gave him an unreadable look. "I can try."

"Good. Now, let's move on to manipulation."

"Weren't we already talking about manipulation?" Noburi interjected.

"Well, technically, yes, but this is where we start talking about manipulation according to my list," Hazō explained, pointing to the relevant sub-heading.

Inoue-sensei gave a forlorn sigh.

"I've been thinking about this a lot while we've been in Iron," Hazō said. "From the moment we entered Leaf, we had the Hokage with his grandfatherly aura. By the way, Inoue-sensei, is that some kind of Kage ability, or does he just have incredible body language?"

"It's a jōnin thing," Inoue-sensei said. "I'll tell you about it another time."

"Right. Then there was Dr Yakushi. He never stopped being… the way he was. Looking back, the last time I saw him it was still impossible to tell whether he was being nice or manipulating me for all he was worth. And again, it was really hard to notice at the time, because he acts so naturally.

"Let's not forget the minders. Jiraiya just happened to assign us people our age, whom we just happened to get on with really well. I think we can all agree that after spending a week with them, we approve of Leaf more than we would have otherwise. Speaking for myself, I really don't like the idea of fighting against Leaf if it would mean fighting Teams Sarutobi or Gai. Uh, not that I would anyway, because Akane is there and because Leaf is incredibly powerful and we're a small group of missing-nin, but you know what I mean.

"It's almost eerie how well things went. Speaking for myself, I successfully befriended Nara, and discovered common interests, as well as getting him potentially interested in our ideals. I, uh, bonded with Lee. Despite my lack of experience, I was able to flirt with Yamanaka. I—"

"Hold up," Noburi said sharply. "You mean you were flirting with her? While your girlfriend was in hospital? It wasn't just my imagination? Or an accident because you're so socially inept?"

"Not an accident, no." Hazō said. Why was this relevant?

"Did Akane know?"

"Eventually. But we weren't dating when it started."

"Uh-huh," Noburi nodded. "But you were planning to, didn't you? You visited her every day. You made her feel special. You confessed your feelings for her. All while going after another girl?"

Hazō looked to Inoue-sensei for support, but there was no help coming from that quarter.

Keiko's face showed only dawning realisation.

Kagome-sensei was focused completely on his carving, almost suspiciously so.

"It wasn't like that," Hazō insisted. "Obviously, Akane would always come first!"

"So you were just leading Yamanaka on, then?" Noburi asked. "It wasn't enough for you to have one girl who worships the ground you tread on, but you had to be the one to get Yamanaka as well? And you weren't even taking it seriously?"

"It wasn't like that," Hazō repeated. "I asked Akane. She said she was OK with sharing. Potentially."

Noburi gave him a look of mixed pity and disgust. "Hazō, Akane was trapped, alone and in danger of losing the boy she loved to another girl. Don't you think she'd say anything if it meant preserving your relationship?"

"Akane wouldn't lie to me," Hazō said uncertainly.

"Never underestimate what a desperate person will do for love," Keiko said in a heavy voice.

"You were unfair to Akane, and you were unfair to Yamanaka," Noburi said bitingly. "I liked Yamanaka. She was cool, and funny, and hot, and I wouldn't have minded getting to know her better. But then you swoop in, and that's that, and now it turns out you were doing it deliberately? As a way of keeping your options open? Dammit, Hazō."

He stood up and walked away.

"You should have spoken to us," Keiko said. "While I may not have been able to offer you helpful romantic advice, I could have at least commented on the implications of attempted seduction by the heir of an information-gathering and mind-reading clan."

Kagome-sensei just shook his head and muttered something about undefined behaviour.
​

-o-
​

Kei lounged back on her favourite tree branch, thinking. Had Hazō truly believed that Yamanaka was interested in him romantically? The heir of a world-famous clan, in a relationship with a missing-nin? Or had he believed that equality of age would somehow justify that kind of interaction? People did not automatically forge bonds of friendship with their peers. If they had, Kei's Academy years would have been very different.

It had been obvious to her from the beginning that the Leaf teams had been placed not only to escort but to extract information in one way or another, and that when Nara and Akimichi's relaxed approach was seen to bear insufficient fruit, the Powers That Be had dispatched Team Gai to provide a sharper, more intense stimulus. All the questions, the games, the tests of ability… And then one girl who asked Kei nothing about herself, but simply understood.

Kei might never see her again.

"Keiko, can I talk to you?"

And there was the culprit. Not that there was any meaning to blaming him. She had, gradually, made her peace. They were all incompetent in their own ways (with the exception of Mari-sensei), and Kei especially so. It would have been hypocritical of her to dwell overlong on Hazō's folly alone.

"What is it, Hazō?"

"I was thinking about you and pangolins," Hazō explained. "More specifically, it has become apparent to me that our team's overall combat potential is still very limited, and that it will take time to rectify this through training and sealcrafting research. I was wondering what you thought of the idea of contracting a pangolin military combat team? Naturally, I want to help you in any way I can, such as by gathering tribute to offer them. Not that I know what pangolins like—ants? Artworks? Weapons? Seals?—but if you tell me, I will figure out some way of finding these things. Likewise, Panchipāma has proven herself as a powerful ally, and making a full pact with her would greatly improve our firepower."

"Thank you, Hazō," Kei hopped down from her branch. "While I believe that making a pact with a combat team would indeed be valuable, more research is necessary as to the viability of such an option. Considerations include chakra limitations, the number of pacts I can maintain at any one time, and the question of whether military combat teams can be hired by a summoner. Bear in mind that pangolin society is permanently on a war footing, and as such they may be reluctant to commit valuable assets that they might need to use in battle at any time. Nevertheless, I will look into the matter, and I am grateful for your offer of assistance.

"As for Panchipāma, I have been considering this. The problem is that we failed to provide her with the entertainment she expected last time, instead involving her into an ordinary battle against a dangerous opponent. I suspect that when I next travel to the Summon Realm, she will also express considerable displeasure at being forced to battle a biomedical sealing specialist head-on, since she may—not unreasonably—be concerned about what damage such an enemy could inflict even upon a summon."

"That's good to know," Hazō said. "Oh, while I'm here, I never thanked you for persuading Jiraiya. Out of all of us, you did the most to save our lives back there."

Kei shook her head. "You are mistaken. I failed. Miserably."

Hazō looked at her in inexplicable confusion. "What are you talking about?"

"I failed," she repeated, as if speaking to a particularly inattentive student. "I failed as a Mori. I used the Frozen Skein in order to achieve the equanimity needed to face Jiraiya. I attempted to speak to him while remaining in the depths of the altered state, and then it broke. My cowardice was profound enough to overwhelm the full power of a Bloodline Limit."

"Keiko, no—"

"Please don't."

She didn't want to hear it. Hazō, who had never truly belonged to a clan, could never understand what it was to draw on the fullness of your training, on the very core of what made you who you were, and find it so lacking that in the moment of your greatest need you were reduced to a helpless, pathetic child.

"Keiko, you were the only one of us who made a difference!"

She froze. Ironically.

Hazō went on. "I failed to understand what Jiraiya wanted from me. Inoue-sensei never found a way to influence him. Noburi didn't do anything. And Kagome-sensei failed to blow anyone up, though that was probably for the best. It was all you! To the extent that Jiraiya hadn't already decided what to do with us, you're the one who saved all our lives."

Kei's brain attempted to process this assertion and returned an error.

"You did better in mortal danger than any of the rest of us," Hazō said again. "Now it's getting dark and I still have a couple of barricades to mend, so I'll see you later."

Still dazed, Kei returned to her branch.
​

-o-
​

This is the first half of the update. The second half will be written by the inimitable @eaglejarl. Since it is he who will decide where the update ends chronologically, he'll be the one to award XP for that time period.​

 

[eaglejarl]

Chapter 100: Alternative Perspectives, Part 2​

Being locked in a killbox had not been good for Kagome-sensei's nerves. It made sense that he would be a little more cautious than usual when doing seal research. Indulging him was the best way to help him relax and get past the trauma. It was fine, really.

Those thoughts became Hazō's mantra, repeated over and over during the days of his punishment detail as Kagome-sensei made him build a veritable Doom Fortress of Five-Seal-Barriered MEW, Force Wall containment barriers, foxholes, kawarimi targets, and traps with which to 'boom, squish' any horrible monstrosities that might come forth from the nether realms to consume the faces of incautious seal researchers.

Eventually, however, even Kagome-sensei was...well, maybe not satisfied, but at least in recognition that lillies could only be gilded so many times.

"So, I was thinking of doing some seal research tomorrow," Hazō said casually, not looking up as he poked at the embers of the fire with a stick.

"And with these words did the End Times begin," Noburi intoned, stretching his feet towards the fire a bit more. He was wearing his slippers, as his shoes had gotten soaked playing ocean tag earlier and were now drying on logs near the flames. "What do you think, Keiko? Is that the most terrifying phrase you've ever heard?"

Keiko frowned, giving the issue serious thought while carefully turning toasting her third chakra-squirrel kebab. "No," she said at last, "I believe 'hey, everyone, watch this' surpasses it."

"Me, I'm going with 'here, hold my drink'," Inoue-sensei said, sipping from a skin of sake she'd produced from somewhere. "You would not believe some of the stupid stuff I've seen jōnin get up to after saying those four words."

"I hate you all," Hazō grumbled.

"You're all wrong," Kagome-sensei said with regal certainty. "None of those are terrifying at all when compared to the true Phrase of Doom."

"Oh?" Inoue-sensei said, looking over in curiosity. The firelight sparkled and danced in her hair, throwing her face into chiaroscuro relief. "What is the Phrase of Doom, then?"

"'What's the worst that could happen?'" Kagome-sensei said calmly.

"Oooooh," said Inoue-sensei, Keiko, and Noburi simultaneosly.

"Yep, you win," Noburi said, tipping an imaginary hat to the sealmaster. "Still, you have to admit that Hazō's is pretty good too."

"You mock me," Hazō said, his voice low and mock-dire. "You all mock me, but I'll show you! I'll show you all! Mwahahaha!" He waved both fists in the air.

Inoue-sensei looked lazily up into the tree canopy above them. "Really just isn't the same without a proper bit of lightning and thunder." She shrugged and took another sip of her sake before waving the skin at him. "Also, the laugh needs work. Try again. Remember, more from the diaphragm...like this. Muahahaha!"

Hazō took a breath and scowled, shaking both fists. "Mwahahaha!"

She waved a hand in casual dismissal. "No, no. That was terrible. No more maniacal laughing over dinner until you can do it properly. Now, you were saying something about research?"

"Yeah," Hazō said. "We've got a lot of seals that we've picked up along the way that we haven't had a chance to research. I'd like to start on them tomorrow, and I was wondering about timing. How long did we plan on staying here?" He carefully didn't look at Noburi.

Inoue-sensei shrugged and shifted slightly so she could plump up the pile of leaves that she'd jammed under her bedroll as a cushion. "I'm not in any hurry to leave." She turned to look over at Noburi. "Noburi, part of the reason I brought us here was because I thought it would be a good place for us all to decompress, but also so that you could continue your training with Hashimoto if that was something you wanted to do. Is it?"

Noburi pondered that one, feeling the insides of his mostly-dry sandals as he did. "Not just yet," he said finally. "She's a total pain in the neck, and she's already done what she promised Jiraiya she would do as far as teaching me. I'm going to need to figure out how to bribe her or charm her before she'll teach me anything else and, to be honest, I just can't bring myself to give a damn right now. I just want to lie on the beach for a while longer before I worry about it."

"I as well," Keiko said, nibbling on her squirrel kebab. "Although I really should go back to the Summon Realm soon; it is well past time for me to seek out Panchipāma and attempt to mend our relationship." She sighed. "I was thinking of going in the morning?"

Inoue-sensei smiled at her. "We won't stop you as long as you promise to come back quickly."

Keiko ducked her head so that her bangs fell forward around her face. "Yes, sensei," she said. The darkness and firelight hid what was almost certainly a blush. "I promise."

A moment's embarrassed silence hung in the air, which Hazō hurried to jump into. "So! How about that seal research? I was hoping you guys might have some suggestions on what to work on first—want to hear what I've got?" He pulled a thick sheaf of paper out of his shirt pocket and held them up hopefully.

Keiko studied the papers thoughtfully. Noburi groaned at the sight of how thick the stack was. Inoue-sensei flopped dramatically backwards, arms out to the sides in a gesture of despair. Kagome snatched the papers from Hazō's hands and tilted them to the firelight so that he could read them as long as he practically shoved his beaky nose against them.

"Macerator version two, of course we do that first," he muttered, casting the first sheet aside and forcing Hazō to scramble for it. "Have to finish what you start. Unknown seals from the casino? Hah!" More pages went flying. "Unknown stuff from those Isan stinkers? Harumph!" Throw, toss, hurl. "Confusion seals? Bah. How are you supposed to squish someone with those? If you're throwing seals at him you should be killing him. Clusterbombs? Hmph." Without looking away from the papers he reached inside his jacket and tossed something to Hazō.

Hazō caught the object carefully. It had come from Kagome-sensei, which probably meant that it exploded, cut people in half, or did some other form of grievous bodily harm if misused. (Or properly used, come to think of it.)

It was about the size of his fist and consisted of a series of small wooden tubes and bits of metal haphazardly stuck together with clay. Inside each was another blob of clay with a small twist of paper sticking out. With a start, Hazō remembered watching his teacher make the pieces back in Isan, what seemed like a lifetime ago but was really only a few months.

"Grapeseed bomb," Kagome-sensei grunted, continuing to look through the papers. "Center tag is small, just enough to throw the rest in all directions. Outer ones are bigger, get the job done." He tapped his finger on Hazō's clusterbomb design. "I like this. Complicated, though. Bigger than a grapeseed bomb, couldn't carry as many. Got a few issues, like the ninja wire. Too strong, means the trajectories of the parts are unpredictable. Use cord, maybe? Something that'll break easily when the blast hits. Maybe just twine. Yeah...." He stared off into the darkness, wearing a smile that fit somewhere in the space between 'dreamy' and 'creepy'.

"So, how about those other ideas?" Hazō said desperately, after it became clear that Kagome was thoroughly lost in his obviously-murderous musings and was not coming back any time soon. "How about the Skyhopper?"

"Huh, what?"

"Skyhopper seal?" Hazō said, gesturing to the array of papers stick clenched tightly in the man's ink-stained fingers. "It should be next on the stack."

"Huh." Kagome leaned a little closer to the fire for better light and gave the paper a furrowed-brow scan. "Huh."

"I am quite certain I will eventually regret this," Inoue-sensei said drily, "but what is a Skyhopper seal?"

"Hrmph," Kagome said, waving the paper around as though it offended him. "Bouncing on air? Really?"

"Pretty sweet, huh?" Hazō said, grinning widely. "Just think—we could be our own air force! If we wanted to get away from people we just bounce up into the sky!"

Kagome frowned, fingers twiddling in the air as he mapped things out to himself. "Good idea. Useful. Wouldn't work, though."

Hazō's face fell. "Why not? I thought the Air Dome was immovable, and strong enough to support us? If it isn't—"

Kagome waved a hand impatiently, flicking the details of the Skyhopper aside in favor of the next sheet. "No, it's plenty strong. Not the issue. Timing, that's the issue. You can jump while you're standing on the dome, but then you have to leave the seal behind you. No way you could reliably jump and deactivate the seals at exactly the right moment to avoid tearing the seals and plunging to your horrible screaming doom."

"Plunging to your horrible screaming doom sounds bad," Inoue-sensei agreed. "Also, jumping on top of an invisible dome and not sliding off sounds risky. Can you use chakra adhesion on air?"

"Sure," Kagome grunted distractedly. "Besides, just put it upside down. Easy to stand on the bottom of a dome. It's flat, after all. Like standing on a log. Except the log is flat, so not really I guess. Can still adhere, though. Have to, in fact. Move too much and you'd disrupt the seal, which would— What kind of stupidheaded insanity is this?!" He turned and waved the next two sheets at Hazō.

"Um," said the novice sealmaster. In the poor light he couldn't tell which sheet Kagome-sensei was waving at him.

"Sky Walking seals?" Kagome-sensei said, shaking the paper clutched in his right hand at Hazō. "You want to modify the Five Seal Barrier to use only one seal? And you want to modify my Lesser Barrier Formation?! Madness! It's obviously madness and craziness and—" He paused, head cocked in thought. "Well...I mean...hm. You could dampen the harmonic on the...no, that wouldn't work. Maybe if you deconvolved the...no, no, no, that might just turn your brain inside out. Ooh, you could...no, that would be stupid. Hm." He pulled a bit of charcoal out of the fire, flipped Hazō's notes over, and started scribbling on the back in complete obliviousness of the genin's horrified look.

The entire group stayed silent, watching with a wary amusement as Kagome scribbled on the paper for several minutes.

"Ha!" he said finally, sounding thoroughly satisfied. "I was right: it's obviously madness. Not going to happen." He waved the sheet at Hazō dramatically. "This? This crazy idea on how you can get rid of four of the seals by decohering the resonances through the fifth and twelfth dimensions? Ridiculous! Absolutely ridiculous! Don't you think people have thought of this? Of course they have, and most of them got turned into goo, or eaten by tentacular horrors from beyond space and time, or both! People have wanted a one-seal variant on the Five Seal Barrier since forever! If it was as simple as decohering the resonance on two dimensions, don't you think someone would have thought of it? It's obviously wrong! Obviously!"

Keiko coughed, interrupting Kagome's tirade and making him glance over at her in surprise. "I will note, sir, that it took you four minutes to determine that this was obvious."

"Hrmph," he said, glaring at her before turning back to Hazō. "Still bonkers. Besides, why do you want to mess around with the Five Seal Barrier for this? Just use the Air Dome. Put that on your shoes, then—"

"Third sheet," Hazō said.

"Huh? What?"

"Third sheet down," Hazō repeated. "Assuming I kept track of where you are in the stack, anyway."

Kagome flipped two sheets aside and skimmed quickly over what was written on the next. "'Put Air Dome seals on shoes, upside down, modified to be activated by chakra adhesion. Activate them in turn while running, using the chakra adhesion to stick to the Dome so the seals do not become misaligned.' Hrmph." He glowered at his student and hrmped again.

For just a moment, every dictionary in the Elemental Nations rewrote itself to say: "smug; adjective. See 'Kurosawa Hazō'".

o-o-o-o​

"Doitagain, doitagain!" Kagome-sensei urged, clapping his hands and staring gleefully at the badly torn up trees downrange.

Shrugging, Hazō scooped up a fist-sized chunk of granite from the ground—the detritus left when sufficient numbers of explosive tags were applied to a MEW—and tossed it into his newest seal. It was absorbed with a noise that was entirely too much like chewing for Hazō's comfort, followed by what was all too clearly a burp.

Carefully, he held the paper up, seal facing away from himself and Kagome-sensei and fingers carefully out of the way. A brief pulse of chakra activated the seal and an instant later pebbles the size of his thumbnail shot out, slamming into the trees and knocking divots of wood flying.

"Yesyesyesyesyes!"

For just a moment, every dictionary in the Elemental Nations rewrote itself to say: "manic: adjective. See 'Kagome'"

o-o-o-o​

"Agggghhh! It's aliiiivvvveeee!"

o-o-o-o​

"Ugh. So close."

"Don't touch it."

"Wasn't planning on it."

o-o-o-o​

KABOOM!

"You're not dead, right?"

"No, sensei."

"You sure?"

"Yes, sensei."

"Really, really sure?"

"Yes, sensei."

"And I'm not dead either, right?"

Sigh. "No, sensei."

"Just checking. Let's go rebuild the testing area."

o-o-o-o​

Mari was lounging on a raft that she'd had Hazō put together during his unendingly amusing punishment period. She was wearing her red swimsuit and had her sunhat pulled low over her eyes. The sun was warm, the waves were rocking her gently, she had a waterskin next to her that had been half-filled with ice before going into the storage seal...life was good.

The light changed suddenly and she pulled the hat back to make sure that it was just a cloud and not a stooping chakra hawk...only to find that it was neither.

"What are you two doing up there?" she asked calmly. Her most promising yet troublesome student stood forty feet above her, his sealmaster teacher standing beside him and both of them wearing insufferable grins.

"Giving us the option to escape from any pursuer ever?" Hazō asked brightly.

"Giving us tactical positioning so we can squish the stinkers!" Kagome said, smacking right fist into left palm.

"Revolutionizing warfare for the next century?"

"Letting us see the sunrise and sunset better?"

One delicate eyebrow rose; that was a substantially more poetic answer than she'd expected from Kagome.

"...so that we have a better angle to spot anyone trying to come at us with the sun behind them!"

Ah, there we go. All was right with the world again.

"Okay, I admit that that is seriously impressive," she said. "But, and I hate to say this, you both look a little ridiculous." Laughter bubbled in her voice; troublesome they might be, but her boys were still adorable. Their respective grand dreams and cheerfully psychotic pragmatism combined to make something greater than the sum of its parts.

And it was true that they looked ridiculous. They stood with feet spread wide as though straddling a barrel, and paper seals covered in bright red and light purple inks had been carefully glued to the bottoms of their sandals. The colors stood out starkly against the otherwise drab shades of a ninja's standard uniform.

"It's a work in progress," Hazō said blithely. "This is just the prototype."

"Uh-huh. Let's see you come down."

Hazō looked uncomfortable for a moment, but he squatted down and reached under his feet so he could touch the seals. Carefully putting all his weight on his left foot he lowered his right a few inches, then shifted his weight and repeated the process on the other side. Very, very slowly he duck-walked down out of the sky, nearly falling over twice when he didn't manage a transition quite right. Eventually, however, he stood only a few feet above the surface of the waves near her raft.

"Okay, there is no way that I'm using those," Mari said, laughing outright. "I refuse to waddle my way to safety."

"It's a prototype," Hazō grumbled.

---

XP AWARD: 44

Vote time! What to do now?

Voting ends on Wednesday, February 1, 2017, at 12pm London time.

---

Things that happened offscreen / general GM notes:

You copied out all the seal-related notes that both you and Kagome-sensei have.

You asked Inoue-sensei if it's at all likely hunter-nin are in Yuni and/or if they're looking for you given your history with Iron. She said that probably not in Yuni since Jiraiya's network will have muddied the waters and yes, there probably are hunter-nin looking for you, but it's doubtful that it's a full-court press.

Because Noburi wasn't planning on going to Hashimoto for training there was no immediate pressure to have the "how to hide your barrel" conversation. Noburi has mostly gotten over his anger but is still a little prickly towards you, so you decided to put the issue off for a while.

You spent 2 days finishing your research on Macerator v2.0. It exerts up to 50 MPa of force, can generate particles as small as 50 micrometers, and can eject them at a speed of up to 20m/s (~45 mph). See @Jello_Raptor's examples for what that means. Thanks, JR!

You spent an additional 7 days researching the basic Air Dome seal.

Kagome researched alongside you and learned both seals. Once he knew them he was able to help you with the research and things went much faster.

Putting the Air Dome on your shoes lets you air-walk, but only very slowly. The basic version is (de)activated with a pulse of chakra that requires too much precision to be emitted from anywhere other than your hands, meaning that you need to squat down and touch the seals with your fingers in order to turn them on and off. You will need to separately research a modified version of Air Dome that activates in the presence of chakra adhesion and deactivates in its absence. I chose to not have you do that in this update because you have about 3 weeks left before Keiko's birthday and I wanted to leave you time to deal with that.

You tried casting MEW underwater. Here are the results:

• Cast on the surface of the water / submerged but not touching the bottom: No. Can only be cast on a solid surface.
• Cast on the bottom of the ocean/river/whatever: Yes. It is real granite.
• Cast on a board that you are holding submerged, either in contact with the bottom or not: Yes. You get a chakra construct. Also, the wall is fixed to the board, so if you are holding it submerged but not in contact with the bottom then the weight will tear it out of your hands. In either case it will almost immediately topple over and very nearly crush you.
• Cast on a rock that you are holding underwater but not in contact with the ground: Yes. You get a chakra construct. See above about not being rooted to anything except the rock and therefore falling over.

Out of character, I didn't deal with the zeppelins in this update because I was tired and short on time. In character, I'm going to justify this with "Hazō decided that the idea was so important that he wanted to do a separate presentation on it, after he had already had a few successes on other things to show to the team."

Note that the XP award for this update is along the lines you should expect for an 11-day update (2 for part 1, 9 for part 2) in which you have a better-than-average plan. (NB: You did not get XP for the 2 weeks of punishment duty, since you were doing nothing useful during that time.) Plans that are "wow, that's amazing!" could earn more, a plan that we feel is merely average will earn slightly less and horrible plans will earn little or nothing.

What made this plan better-than-average: well thought out, clearly sectioned into parts that were easy to write for, there were only 3-4 major scenes in it. (Of which I only had to write one.) Plus, the scene I had to write was something I was excited by. And, frankly, because I'm trying to be charitable in order to compensate for the fact that I'm grouchy right now.