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Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest

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ContextBot said:
[X] Training Hazou: JUMPING
Chakra Reserves 27 (54 XP)
Mew Hopping (10 XP)
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FTFY. Mew hopping, even when restricted to ground-only MEWs (which might have been unretconned? I'm genuinely confused about that.) is objectively subjectively better.

I know nobody agrees with me but I am right they are wrong and I will fight this to the death :p.
 
Shrooms said:
I don't think Pain actually fought in that battle, he was caught up doing the ritual
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Inferno Vulpix said:
Yeah the QMs have mentioned previously that Pein's as strong as multiple Akatsuki members, and if he were actually fighting in the Battle of the Gods it would've been a lot less balanced of a fight.
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Fair enough.

I still don't love our odds of putting the serious hurt on Orochimaru when the Akatsuki failed to do so, even if they were distracted with a dozen-odd other S-rankers. We're...maybe B-rank, and the man seems to have focused years of S-rank efforts on 'be unkillable'.

I think making him ineffective or preventing him from projecting influence is going to be a more manageable task.
 
FaintlySorcerous said:
Fair enough.

I still don't love our odds of putting the serious hurt on Orochimaru when the Akatsuki failed to do so, even if they were distracted with a dozen-odd other S-rankers. We're...maybe B-rank, and the man seems to have focused years of S-rank efforts on 'be unkillable'.

I think making him ineffective or preventing him from projecting influence is going to be a more manageable task.
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Yeah I think it's safe to say that's out of the question for the near future
 
We couldn't kick Ami, a relatively young, relatively new, social spec jonin out of our compound. How about we hold off on plotting Orochimaru's murder until we've FOOM'd for a bit.

Edit: upon reread, this comes across as needlessly confrontational when that wasn't my intent, sorry!
 
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Killing Orochimaru is not a function of meager things like 'how well can you punch' or 'can you reduce his current form to inert dust'. He clearly has means of survival that extend beyond that, as evidenced by him surviving the BotG.

Instead, killing Orochimaru will be a function of finding out what all his tricks to immortality are and exploiting a chink in his metaphysical armor. If we can target his soul directly, that's a way. If we can mind-wipe him into someone less monstrous, that's another way, etc. This will also probably require being S-Rank, just so we can make seals good enough for the task, but even once we get to that level we'll still have a whole questline ahead of us building up the plan.
 
We could always trigger mass sealing failures and hope those stick.

Like a SIN with a couple thousand primed implosion seals.
 
faflec said:
We could always trigger mass sealing failures and hope those stick.

Like a SIN with a couple thousand primed implosion seals.
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I think see where you're going with this... And then Hazou gets [E*R*A*S*E*D] by the Watchers, causing Akane to shoulder the Uplift Dream with a grim determination that scares everyone in the Elemental Nations... Fast forward 5 years and Akane's conquered the world through Youth, the Power of Friendship, and a mountain of corpses! :D
 
Inferno Vulpix said:
Killing Orochimaru is not a function of meager things like 'how well can you punch' or 'can you reduce his current form to inert dust'. He clearly has means of survival that extend beyond that, as evidenced by him surviving the BotG.

Instead, killing Orochimaru will be a function of finding out what all his tricks to immortality are and exploiting a chink in his metaphysical armor. If we can target his soul directly, that's a way. If we can mind-wipe him into someone less monstrous, that's another way, etc. This will also probably require being S-Rank, just so we can make seals good enough for the task, but even once we get to that level we'll still have a whole questline ahead of us building up the plan.
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FOOMing Ino would probably do the trick.
 
Paperclipped said:
has Hazou earned FP since Chapter 412?
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I'll take a look but probably not.
Paperclipped said:
Earth Dome seals also works, though its seals are on the outside IIRC?
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They are, yes. Earth Dome is intended as a prison while Air Dome is intended as a defense. Hence why one is transparent and one is not.
RandomOTP said:
conquered the world through Youth, the Power of Friendship, and a mountain of corpses! :D
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That took a turn.
 
FaintlySorcerous said:
Given that the combined efforts of the Akatsuki -Pain included - were not up to the task, do you have suggestions?
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He clearly has some sort of philactery (being a thing that can return it from the death via returning his soul to a new bodñdyyor pulling his body and mind from the naraka), my first sugestión is finding out how much he remembers of the battle on nagi (but I don't think we have the stats) that way we can discard backup personality clonation. Next would be localizing the philactery, this is the hardest as we don't know who is entrusted it's location, kabuto may or may not know, heck even orochimaru himself may not know (wipe his own memory after securing whit kagome+ levels of defenses) to prevent yamanaka mind tricks.

The only way i see us defeating orochimaru if the memory storages is confirmed to be false and his respawn location is imposible to locate or destroy is a death so strange that it bipases his raincarnation method: Get him devoured by the gaki, sealed or send into a crakraless path for example.

I really think orochimaru is gonna be the BBEG of this quest if reality doesn't colapse first. He is an S rank at the level of jiraya, a prodigy with decades of research in biosealing and who knows what else and has already archive regenerative immortality.

He is basically who hazo aspires to be but whit no ethics compation or trusted family. If orochimaru wanted uplift (our version of it at the very least) it would had already happened.
 
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Chapter 416: Drop Below the Fire
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    • A thundering roar shook the grass around them. Moments later came a second, and then a third.

    The team held their collective breath, listening for another sign. Just as Hazō was starting to relax the fourth roar came, this one from much closer.

    "Well," Canabisu said resignedly. "The Feline Clan certainly is a friendly bunch."

    "Earth Element: Elemental Clone Technique."

    The ground rumbled and rose up into a humanoid mannequin. There was a faint crack! and the outside of the mannequin flaked away, leaving a duplicate of Hazō. It stared passively at its creator.

    "Take these," Hazō said, passing over a sheaf of seals and pointing towards where the roars had come from. "When I say 'execute', you are to run that way at top speed. Every ten steps you will shout 'I come in peace!' Every thirty steps, you will activate one of the storage seals and drop it. If anything attacks you, you will activate all of the Youthenizers. Execute."

    The earth clone accepted the seals and followed directions, vanishing immediately into the tall grass that surrounded them.

    "What's a Youthenizer, Uncle Hazō? Huh? Huh?"

    "Quiet," Cangue snapped. The golden-haired dog was looking miserable; her ankle-lenth coat was soaked in mud and dirt, tangled up and snarled unlike the well-groomed beauty it had been when Hazō first met her. She had activated some sort of jutsu that was slowly running an invisible squeegee along her back. In its wake all of the blood was gone and the fur was restored to its usual appearance.

    "Awww."

    "It's a seal that generates a giant fireball," Hazō explained as a box full of strappy mesh cylinders fell out of a seal. "All of you, gather around. We need to get these on you." He held up one of the devices and its purpose was revealed: A muzzle that would slip over a dog's snoot and be secured with a strap over the head.

    Canaut growled. "You are not putting that thing on me."

    "We couldn't fight with those on," Cangue noted.

    "You can get it off easily," Hazō said, impatience throbbing in his tone. "Just scratch behind your ear and the strap will come off."

    "You think—"

    "A moment, if you please," Canabisu said. "Hazō, explain."

    "Those sound like lions. Kanaishu described them as dangerous individually and said they run in packs of dozens. We can't fight that many. The storage seals I gave the clone are full of meat. If the lions become peaceful or back off after getting it, great. Otherwise, I'm going to set this entire area on fire. That's going to suck a lot of the air away and fill what's left with soot and smoke. These masks have seals in them. Usamatsu's Glorious Life-Saving Purifier on the outside to cleanse the air around your eyes and a Tunneler's Friend on the inside that will feed you fresh air. Now stop arguing and come here." He held the first mask up towards Cangue, but the golden dog growled and backed up, head lowered and teeth showing.

    "Cangue," Canabisu said. Authority crackled in his normally calm voice. "He is the chief security officer and his plan is entirely reasonable. I expect you to show the pack loyalty and discipline expected of any member of the Dog Clan. Now, we don't have a lot of time. Hazō, give me mine first so that these two can see there's nothing to be afraid of." He stepped forward and lifted his nose for easy access.

    Hazō gratefully slipped the muzzle over the elder dog's nose and secured it in place. It was a poor fit and rested on his nose but it stayed.

    "Hm. Not the most comfortable thing I've ever worn but not worthy of complaint either. Thank you, Hazō."

    "You're welcome. Okay, I'm going to activate the seals for a moment so that you can see what it feels like. It's going to be weird, but it won't hurt you." He tapped two points and the faint hum and whoosh of the respective seals became audible.

    "Gah!" Canabisu jerked away and shook his head. "Oh, my. That is an exceedingly strange feeling." He pawed at the muzzle, ducking his head as he did. It came loose with just enough effort to settle most of Hazō's nerves about the untested equipment falling off when it shouldn't.

    "What?" / "What did it do?" / "What was it like, Canabisu sir?"

    Canabisu shook his head and snotted. "The seal on the front blows straight up your nose. It's not worse than a strong wind but you can't duck your head away from it either. Hazō, I had no objection to wearing it but perhaps we can wait until it's actually necessary before turning the wind on?"

    "Of course," Hazō said, picking up the muzzle and deactivating the seals before helping Canabisu put it back on. "Now, there's one more thing." He produced a pair of seal-equipped wooden clothespins and slipped them over the strap so they were under Canabisu's ears. "These seals are called Banshee Slayers. They reduce sound in the area immediately around the seal so that you aren't deafened by loud noises."

    "It's a cool idea but it's probably not good against the lions' roar," Canabisu said. "According to Kanaishu that is a sonic attack reinforced with chakra. It will cause physical damage, not merely deafen us."

    "I'm not worried about them," Hazō said grimly. "I've got another couple of seal types, the Banshees and Banshee Fuckers. Banshees are so loud they feel like your head is exploding from the inside. Banshee Fuckers are louder than that. So loud that they will physically harm you if they're set off in contact with your body. People on the Seventh Path seem to have better hearing than humans do, and I'm not okay with being at a disadvantage like that. If those lions attack us I'm going to start throwing Banshees everywhere. I expect the lions will run if we do that, but if you guys don't have your Slayers activated then the Banshees would have the same effect on you. And yes, I'm going to be wearing them too." His wouldn't be active, because he needed to be listening for ambush, but it didn't seem politic to mention that. "Okay, I'm going to turn these on so that you can feel what it's like. I'll keep talking so that you can tell the difference because otherwise it could be a surprise so I'll just keep talking along like this so that you can tell...and now I've turned them off. "

    "Hm...That is actually a major bummer," Canabisu said. "Still, you're the chief security officer and you make valid points. Do they need to be on immediately?"

    "I'm afraid so. I'm not going to have time to activate a seal on each of you once we are actually in the middle of a fight. The others can be done in a few seconds after the fires are set but I need to be able to use the Banshees right away. Okay, let's get everyone else outfitted and get moving." He glanced around at the tall grass and the threats it might enshroud. "I want all of you to stay as close to me as possible. Within my reach. If I can't touch you, you're too far away. Stay tight and do not range out."

    With much protesting and grumbling, the other three dogs accepted their muzzles, Hazō equipped his own mask, and the team started jogging forward.

    o-o-o-o​

    Jogging at ninja speed with the poorly-fitting wooden masks started off uncomfortable and rapidly turned into misery. The rims were padded with fleece but it wasn't thick enough and soon the entire group had blisters wearing into their cheeks. Cantelabra whined, Cangue complained, and Canaut grumbled quietly. All of them fell silent when Canabisu cleared his throat. Granted, they started again ten minutes later.

    The team had been jogging fast for thirty minutes when Canabisu started to flag. He struggled on, doing his best not to slow the group down, but he simply didn't have the physical or chakra reserves necessary to keep up with his younger teammates while moving at speed over long distances. Hazō kept an eye on his team leader but eventually there was no choice but to slow down and stop.

    It was at that moment, when the group was tired and griping with discomfort, when the lions pounced.

    The dogs are all wearing earmuff seals that cut their Alertness (and therefore their initiative) a lot.

    Initiative:
    Young adult lion #1: ?
    Young adult lion #2: ?
    Young adult lion #3: ?
    Young adult lion #4: ?
    Hazō: 33
    Cangue: ?
    Canaut: ?
    Young adult lion #5: ?
    Young adult lion #6: ?
    Canabisu: ?
    Cantelabra: Yeah, he's here too.

    Hazō, Athletics (Block), tag "Ready and Waiting", invoke "(Formerly) Marked for Death", invoke "Lists and Plans" + dice: 55

    Ordinarily Hazō would be moving too slow and this fight would be mostly over before he got to do anything. Sadly (for the lions), Hazō has been maintaining a Block against anything attacking his group and he won the roll. They are now officially having a bad day.


    The lions of the Seventh Path's Feline Clan were larger, faster, and more powerful than any chakra beast that Hazō had ever faced. They had been pacing the group for miles, their innate jutsu allowing them to pass effortlessly through the tall grass without so much as rustling a stalk. They had made only one mistake: They underestimated their opponents.

    The Bloody Jaws Pride were the unquestioned masters of the hundreds of square miles of tall-grass prairie that they claimed as their home. Nothing moved on their land without paying tribute in blood or treasure and a polite request for permission in advance. They had decimated thrice over the massive herds of wildebeest with their mighty horns and crushing hooves. They had driven off the lesser tribes of Cat-kind barring the ones they permitted residence in order to do the work of cleaning up carcasses that the pride was done with and didn't want to have to smell rotting in the sun.

    The lack of challenge had only one drawback: It made it difficult to train the next generation. There were no major threats remaining on whom young lions could realistically practice their stalking and killing. The elders of the pride had felt that a tiny group of outClan so stupid that they didn't reach out before entering the territory would make a good training exercise for obstreperous young teenagers who were a little too full of themselves. They were wrong.

    The grass had barely parted and the lions didn't have all four feet in the air before Hazō tapped the Banshee Slayer seal clipped to his hair and triggered the Banshee Fucker that he'd been carrying in his left hand for the last three miles. He tossed the seal to the ground in front of himself and flicked through handseals.

    "Earth Element: Tunnel Excavation Technique!"

    Every time any of the dogs had moved more than an arm's length from Hazō he had called them back. As such, they were all within the area of the jutsu when the hole opened under their feet and dropped them into the ground with a trio of surprised yelps and one excited "Wheeeee!"

    The Banshee Fucker went off when the lions were in mid-air. They shrieked in pain and all six landed in disarray, falling to the ground and thrashing back and forth as the sound physically pummeled them until blood flowed from their ears.

    "Fire above the hole! Earth Element: Multiple Earth Wall Technique!"

    A seal arced up out of the vertical tunnel into which Hazō had dropped the team. It hadn't reached the apex of its arc when a granite wall sprung across the hole, sealing it shut before the world above became fire.

    Hazō tapped a Jiraiya's Awesome Daybright Lantern Seal and light bloomed in the tunnel.

    "Could everyone please get off of me?" Canabisu grunted from the bottom of the pile of dogs. "Cangue, there was a time when I would have adored the idea of having such a lovely lady atop me, but I'm rather past that."

    "Earth Element: Tunnel Excavation Technique." A horizontal shaft branched off from the hole, opening up space for everyone to sort themselves out.

    "That was cool! Can we do it again? Please please pretty please with fish guts on top?"

    "Hush, pup," Canaut grunted, moving into the new tunnel so that he could get away from the others. He moved a little farther down to make room for Cangue. Hazō couldn't help but notice that Canaut was trying to conceal the fact that he was keeping his weight off his right front paw.

    "You were right about how loud that is," Canabisu said. All of the dogs had already swiped their muzzles off and Canabisu had his head cocked. "How thick is that stone?"

    Hazō glanced up reflexively. "About eight inches."

    Canabisu winced. "That has to hurt."

    "By now they should be bleeding from their ears. If they don't get away from the seal they'll be deaf in a minute. Give it a couple more minutes and their brains might liquefy."

    Heads cocked in surprise.

    "I thought it was just to deafen them?" Canaut said.

    "It may damage our ability to..." Canabisu trailed off.

    Hazō raised an eyebrow. "They attacked us. They can get fucked." He snorted. "Besides, I don't think the noise is their problem. The Youthenizer that I tossed up there just went off. The lions are currently burning to death and a few minutes from now so will everything within half a mile. In five minutes you're all going to put your masks back on and we're going to go up there and follow the perimeter of the fire as it spreads across the plains. I'm periodically going to throw more of those things around until everything within fifty miles is a howling inferno. We tried to play nice. We didn't start anything with the lynxes, but we finished it. The lions came for us, I sent them a tribute of meat and a declaration of peace. They attacked anyway.

    "We tried to do peace, they wanted war. Fine. Now they get to learn how Team Uplift rolls."




    This update covered a couple hours, tops.

    XP AWARD: 2

    Brevity XP: 1

    "GM had fun" XP: 2

    It is now about 1pm.

    Vote time! What to do now?

    Voting ends on Wednesday, March 3, 2021, at 12pm London time.


    EDIT: Chakra usage in this update.

    Hazō starts at 120 CP as a result of all the summoning he's had to do to keep Cannai in touch with all of Dog territory. He then spends:

    Earth Clone: 15 CP
    Tunnel Excavation x2: 48 CP
    MEW: 33

    Total used: 96 CP
    Remaining: 24 CP
     
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  • Threadmarks
    • Ah yes, associating the name "Uplift" with massive weaponized wildfires. Keeping to the WDM theme, everyone!
    Well, it's only a WDM if the cats don't already have an easy counter... I'm a little anxious to see how the next chapter goes, honestly.

    On another note, I reread some old chapters and came across one where our natural chakra reserves were so low that we struggled to keep our Jutsu active for more than a few passes in combat. We were getting GM hints that maybe being so reliant on Noburi might be a bad thing. Thankfully since then we've had shadow clones which have pushed us to pump chakra reserves a bit. I can't imagine how bad things would be right now otherwise! We're already rather tight on CR even after all that XP expense!

    Edit: That paragraph about the great strength of the local pride is worrying.
    On the other hand, the puppy going "Wheee!" is very cute. Puppies are great.
     
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