Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest
- Thread starter eaglejarl
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- naruto rationalist romance armageddon is looking better and better damn you kishimoto explosions everywhere explosives solve everyone if in doubt surrender to the mercy of zabuza it seemed like a good idea at the time looks like a really bad case of being a jōnin my god. where does the lore end? precommitting is the winning plan screaming in kagome screw the rules i have explosives something bad might still happen sometimes you gotta sociopath stabby zabby subsection c of paragraph 9 should include we can weaponize this so hard
- Location
- The state of Paranoia
My takeaways from this are:
- We probably can't avoid telling Asuma that we met with Akatsuki.
- We can't successfully lie to Asuma about why we met with Akatsuki.
- If we tell Asuma the truth he'll probably do things to us that we would rather avoid. The exact nature of those things is not certain, but start with not letting us contact Akatsuki again and escalate from there.
- We need to get advice from Mari the second we get back in the village. Hopefully she'll be able to tell us which course of action is least likely to get us all killed.
- Location
- Italy
Did...Did everyone forget that Haru is here? With us? And he is not part of Uplift? Seriously, every plan that wants to keep everything silent should start with "What about Haru", and every plan that start with "Telling Asuma" should still start with "What about Haru"? Are we, just gonna ignore everything that happened like we did with Mari? And Akane? And Noburi? And Keiko? If we want Haru as part of Uplift, or even part of Goketsu, is now or never.
We have a pattern of ignoring social problem until they explode, this social problem is going to explode really badly if we ignore it.
We have a pattern of ignoring social problem until they explode, this social problem is going to explode really badly if we ignore it.
- Location
- Europe
It's the Preta path and Hazou should be able to figure out that this is either Preta or Hell because:
a) It is absorbing chakra like canon Pain's body (that's obviously not the part Hazou knows), but it absorbs chakra, which Oro calls life force, which is close enough to "soul", so him thinking that absorbing/eating is the same thing should be possible (The Sage probably got tired of calling it life force absorbing Path and called it Preta Path or something)
b) Preta isn't a japanese word, the japanese name is Gaki and the Path is named 餓鬼道 Gakidō which literally means hungry ghost path
c) Hazou knows Gaki are a thing from Kagome:
So we can probably have Hazou realize that this is one of the paths and leave the information for Itachi and Hidan.
Also, Hazou just walked into an alien world and back? Perfect excuse to send a written report to Asuma because we might be infected!
Why return close to Leaf? Well we just wanted to inform Asuma that we have the scroll and are simply sitting in the woods for a few days.
That also gives Mari an excuse to plan how to deal with this and it's not even a lie.
a) It is absorbing chakra like canon Pain's body (that's obviously not the part Hazou knows), but it absorbs chakra, which Oro calls life force, which is close enough to "soul", so him thinking that absorbing/eating is the same thing should be possible (The Sage probably got tired of calling it life force absorbing Path and called it Preta Path or something)
b) Preta isn't a japanese word, the japanese name is Gaki and the Path is named 餓鬼道 Gakidō which literally means hungry ghost path
c) Hazou knows Gaki are a thing from Kagome:
So we can probably have Hazou realize that this is one of the paths and leave the information for Itachi and Hidan.
Also, Hazou just walked into an alien world and back? Perfect excuse to send a written report to Asuma because we might be infected!
Why return close to Leaf? Well we just wanted to inform Asuma that we have the scroll and are simply sitting in the woods for a few days.
That also gives Mari an excuse to plan how to deal with this and it's not even a lie.
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Raxner
The most dangerous man in an empty room
- Location
- Israel
Credit to you for admitting I was right about my empirical prediction. About my interpretation, it's just an interpretation. It could be wrong, like any interpretation can be wrong. You tell me it is wrong; fine, you can see into your heart, I can't. All I can say is that if Hazo et al. don't have plot armor, they have the best luck anyone ever dreamed of.
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Ah yes, the old "Well, okay, I guess I'll accept your very clear statement except I'm confident that you're still lying" tactic. Well executed.
There has in fact been good luck, for example the fact Noburi and Mari really should have died back in Isan except that the enemy rolled for shit. I did give you one break in that fight; it was something of a coin flip as to whether Kagome's explosives would have shattered the dirt wave and thereby given y'all a round to react. I decided to be generous and say yes, but it was still a case of two equally plausible outcomes. Most of the other instances of the clan's survival that I can think of were down to good planning, with examples being your fight against Bosatsu+friends, the Sunset Racer, your escape from the jōnin that killed Minami, and your domination of the 5th event at the Exams.
Still, feel free to keep thinking I'm lying.
It's a dead cat. Hazō is carrying it around because he why not and because he might find a use for it -- for example, stuffing it full of explosives and then throwing it at the maw of a giant snake in hopes that the snake will willingly swallow it.
You didn't.
Typically if I offer a 'Let EJ write what he wants' option it either means "There's no risk here and y'all are getting too deep into the weeds" or "there is something here that, for OOC reasons, y'all should not have to, so let me handle it."
Thank you! I'm planning to get another chapter out in the next day or two.p.s. Good Dog is so Good, I'm following that story with bated breath as well
Technically it was for suggesting that you should trade with Rock.
Hazō's expectation is that yes, Asuma would have wanted to hear about something as game-changing as a new Summoning Scroll. Also, he gave you tacit permission to steal clan secrets (the koi) from a long-time enemy / current tentative friend, so he would undoubtedly prefer to have a chat about your progress on that.
As I have suggested, Asuma isn't opposed to peace per se, but he isn't going to go out of his way to benefit his enemy in doing so, especially for an arrangement that would seem to benefit his enemy more than he does.
- Location
- uk
See I just thought you wanted to write some punching
The plan was to have Akatsuki 'contact' us and having the Akatsuki contact the leadership.
- Location
- USA
- Pronouns
- He/Him
You got 10 XP and you want a Fate Point too?! You know that Greed is a sin, right?
Are you trying to deceive him, either through omission or commission? If so, it will be handled either narratively, based on the author's best understanding of the relative deception/detection abilities of the participants, or via dice.
Well, yes. That too. :>See I just thought you wanted to write some punching
- Location
- The Void
- Pronouns
- She/Her
There are lots of different opinions being thrown around like facts. Once again none of us know what is an acceptable strategy here. What we should do is go to Mari and tell her everything and discus the strategies we are considering. Then follow that advice. This is the most likely way to choose a correct option. Consult experts and follow there advice
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- Location
- Yes.
Hey @eaglejarl, since you're here does Hazou believe we should be reporting to Leaf right now xor go onwards to Mist? IIRC we have diplomatic papers and everything, and I'm pretty sure Asuma sent a person ahead to let Ren know we would be showing up at some point.
This is assuming we don't report directly to the hokage. We'll need to make decision *before*, not after we reached Leaf.
Luckily, we have the kids, who while non-experts, knows far more about ninja norms than we do.
- Location
- The Void
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Yes and our clan council is outside of leafs walls. We meet up with Mari first and follow her advice. Anything else is incredibly fool hardy and risky.
Hmm. I forgot our clan is outside of the wall. Still feel dubious about the whole thing, but OK.
Here's a protoplan that covers our bases, I think.
This should be something like three scenes, and it's nice and compact as far as plans go.
Personal opinion:
1. We do not want to go into Mist with an uncontracted summoning scroll, so as to avoid shenanigans. Securing a new source of military power for Leaf is of higher importance.
2. The Akatsuki intel, while not at the level of time sensitivity that he has to be notified at the earliest second possible, is still of a high enough value that it does need to hit his desk fairly soon.
Also, I think we spent less time on the scroll hunt than anticipated, so we're ahead of schedule anyway.
- Leave a note for Hidan detailing your observations on the Other Side with the unconscious Daizen.
- Return to Leaf.
- Stop at the clan compound first. Talk to Mari and discuss what happened, and what exactly should be told to the Hokage, how it should be approached, etc. Hazou leans towards full disclosure but wants to make sure he isn't going to get the clan executed for treason or something. Note the letter was mentioned, and Haru was present.
- Report to the Tower, and debrief with Asuma. Follow Mari's advice.
- Ask if Asuma can get information on the Porcupines' culture and attitudes from Enma, so you can determine the best fit for their summoner amongst the Goketsu.
- If Keiko is back, go visit her and see how she's doing and how her mission went. Otherwise, just spend a day with your family, and prepare for your trip to Mist.
This should be something like three scenes, and it's nice and compact as far as plans go.
Personal opinion:
1. We do not want to go into Mist with an uncontracted summoning scroll, so as to avoid shenanigans. Securing a new source of military power for Leaf is of higher importance.
2. The Akatsuki intel, while not at the level of time sensitivity that he has to be notified at the earliest second possible, is still of a high enough value that it does need to hit his desk fairly soon.
Also, I think we spent less time on the scroll hunt than anticipated, so we're ahead of schedule anyway.
- Location
- The Maple Syrup Mountains
I do agree with this, but I don't think that our actual motivation was much worse than what Byzantine was depicting. Speaking in full honesty about what I personally was feeling about that message, I was thinking that for all we knew Akatsuki was planning to destroy the villages one by one and start over (world peace 'the hard way'), and that there was an outside chance a letter to them containing a desire for cooperation might open them up to less destructive ways of achieving their goals.
It was borne from a position of known weakness and the fact that if Akatsuki wanted Leaf destroyed there was nothing we could do about it, so the best thing we could do is make Akatsuki not want Leaf destroyed. There was no guarantee that Akatsuki was planning such a thing, or that they'd care about our letter, but we also evaluated that there'd be little to no chance of the letter making Leaf's situation any worse, so on balance we decided it was to Leaf's advantage to send it.
That is my full and perfectly honest opinion on why we sent the letter, and I feel like Asuma would ultimately accept the reasoning if Hazou presented it to him. Maybe not super-happy with it, but I don't think your doomsday scenario of a best-case would be likely.
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Raxner
The most dangerous man in an empty room
- Location
- Israel
Nope, I didn't say that I'm confident you're lying. If I'd meant that, I'd have said it. I meant what I said. In the absence of plot armor, their survival till this point requires fantastic good luck. I cannot see into your mind, but you can. If you assure me there's no plot armor, I've got to take your word for it. I apologize for offending you, and specifically for implying that "I'm still confident that you're lying." It was unintentional.
Cariyaga
Handsome Gentleperson
- Location
- United States
Who are you and what have you done with Oneiros?
Itachi just lit a 40ft long crackling bonfire of black unquenchable flames uniquely attributable to him burning for 7 days straight. He almost literally could not have put up a better beacon saying "ITACHI WAS HERE". Granted it's in the forest, but it's still a massive fire.
More importantly it was an entirely unnecessary use of his powers and dramatically increased his risk of being discovered; it seems like it would be a really dumb thing for him to have done if he DIDN'T want to be trackable.
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- Location
- The state of Paranoia
So something along the lines of:
- Go back to the compound, drop off scroll and get advice from Mari on what to tell Asuma.
- Suggest telling him the whole truth, that you contacted Akatsuki in order to convince them away from using Leaf-destroying methods of achieving peace.
- It was possible though far from certain that Akatsuki was planning to destroy all the villages and start over from scratch(peace the hard way)
- We believed there was a higher chance of us being able to convince Akatsuki to not destroy Leaf than there was of us contacting them making Leaf's position worse.
- As it turns out, we came back with a summoning scroll and some information about Akatsuki's current mindset and plans.
- Ask Mari if she thinks it would strengthen our position more to continue on with getting the Koi so we have more to show, or if it would be better to give our report immediately so that Asuma knows we immediately came to him with this information.
- Location
- The Maple Syrup Mountains
Something along those lines, yeah, though off the top of my head it would probably be better to approach the letter issue as a digression from the main report (that of how we encountered Akatsuki at Todoroki and got the Porcupine Scroll) and that getting the Koi on our first trip to Mist is very likely not a viable plan, even if not immediately reporting what happened wouldn't make the thing net-negative overall.
So I'd go with something more like:
- Go back to the compound, drop off scroll and get advice from Mari on what to tell Asuma.
- Suggest telling him the whole truth, that we encountered Akatsuki members Itachi and Hidan at Todoroki and convinced them to let us leave with our lives and the Porcupine Scroll.
- Also suggest coming clean to Asuma about the letter we sent, since it's unlikely we'll be able to keep it a secret under scrutiny.
- We believed that Akatsuki might have been planning to destroy all the villages and start over ('peace the hard way'), and that there was an outside chance that reaching out to them might stay their hand, and that it would be unlikely to make anything any worse.
- By the time Asuma was Hokage, we were suspecting the message was a dud and everyone was so busy it would be... awkward to interrupt Asuma's busy schedule to tell him about a big fat nothing.
- Location
- The state of Paranoia
This looks great. @Jello_Raptor would you be okay with adding this on to the end of your plan? Maybe with an addition of telling Asuma about what we discovered about the afterlife?