Marked for Death: A Rational Naruto Quest

[MadScientist]

Here's an idea: Why don't we show Asuma the results of our investigation? Even if we failed to prove the perpetrator, we can pretty conclusively show that it was enemy action, and that Hagoromo and Hyuuga were acting weird right before it all went down.

If nothing else, he might be less annoyed with us if we can persuade him this was deliberately caused by someone else.

 

[Lailoken]

I feel like giving Haru the last word and letting him tease us is probably more of a reward to him than anything he'll end up asking for.

Click to shrink...

Welcome to reality.

 

[FaintlySorcerous]

Here's an idea: Why don't we show Asuma the results of our investigation? Even if we failed to prove the perpetrator, we can pretty conclusively show that it was enemy action, and that Hagoromo and Hyuuga were acting weird right before it all went down.

If nothing else, he might be less annoyed with us if we can persuade him this was deliberately caused by someone else.

Click to shrink...

I think that this is a great idea after we can deliver him a clear, definitive victory.

'Here are our notes; we were unable to demonstrate any wrongdoing on the part of anyone but ourselves. There were some strange activities. They may be useful when it comes time to assemble an economic council. We again humbly apologize.'

Let subtext communicate the actual point, but also be expressly clear that we're just dropping it.

 

[Inferno Vulpix]

Yeah bringing our findings to Asuma is the end of the line, one way or another. Either we have enough evidence to tie this all up, or we admit that we can't find any more evidence and drop it in a way that makes us look good.

Asuma made it clear that he's not interested in half-baked accusations on this topic, so even if we communicate implicitly that we still think it was manufactured we can't afford to officially point fingers without proof.

 

[Lailoken]

"It's a bad winter and there's a sickness going around Leaf."

Haha, hello, biologic warfare, good to see you are still around.

Seeing the gokucoinTM mining process, it seems plausible to catch counterfeiters now that it all is being put together in a single place. All pieces match each other by the wood grain, making up a series of reconstructed tree trunks, which can then be assigned to their extraction sites by size and grain matching to the stumps.

If there are more trunks than stumps, it is proof of counterfeiting and the counterfeiters sourced from a different site, and we can search for it, again, by matching the grain. If there are less trunks than stumps, we wasted a lot of time and effort in a gruelling jigsaw (force wall?) puzzle and have nothing to show for it, because duh of course this section of forest is being cut for reconstruction or whatever, also some of the pieces were burnt down remember?

Also maybe check wood types before all this effort, it could be as simple as that.

Even if we do not have the means to actually detect counterfeits, seals are bullshit. We can pretend to develop a seal to aid in the detection of counterfeits, then set up a slow-going screening of the recollected scripts, and see who shows up to try and burn them.

I personally suspect the hokage of orchestrating this. A way to bind the goketsu and cripple their ability to try stupid shit, and all without bloodshed? Yes please.

So maybe we do not want to really know the culprit. Which was actually us, by the way, by deciding to pay actual money for pieces of lacquered wood.

Click to shrink...

You. I like you.

So since we're poor we should take over all The Yakuza to fund our schemes in the future

Click to shrink...

While appealing, we should remember that we exist in an ecosystem. The Yakuza exist because there is a niche for a relatively neutral third party to handle the civilians for the clans. The last clan which tried to dominate and weaponize them? Well, they're not around anymore and we're kinda squatting on their former estate. Remember what happened last time we tried to form a fifth column.

She pledges to promote the Yoshida Clan's welfare and interests in Leaf, where these are distinct from those of Isan, and likewise protect it from exploitation. She pledges to offer the fullness of her aid to the Yoshida Clan at need, e.g. should the clan's existence be threatened.

Click to shrink...

Danger danger danger. This is a clue about something deeper currently going on.

Wait, when was this? Did I miss a chapter?

Kagome-sensei coughed in embarrassed annoyance. "Right. Yes. So. She sent me those theory notes. The first three pages were fine. Old news, but fine. Pages four through six got mind-numbingly abstruse, repetitive, and boring. Shot full of errors too. I counted three malformed kanji just on page four! Do you have any idea what—" He cut himself off, shaking his head angrily. "Anyway, I nearly threw it all out, but then I noticed that one section was precisely duplicated from earlier. Same two lines of text, same error in the same place. That looked weird, so I went back and checked it over a little more carefully. Turns out, there was a code. When I untangled it, that's what I got." He waved angrily at the paper. "I just finished cracking it. No one else knows about it."

Click to shrink...

Come on, buddy. Sealmasters don't make casual calligraphy errors. This should not have taken effort. You're better than this.

"Hah! Like I'd go back to that stinking death trap! Murderous hicks from the back of nowhere, with their fancy-schmancy ways and their completely unique seal theory that evolved separately from anyone else's for the last few hundred years! Just because she comes up with one nifty trick for reconvolution, she thinks she's all that? Hah! I could tear her stupid theories to shreds! Shreds! Because they're stupid and she's stupid. That whole stinking idea of secondary harmonic tuning across a filled node? Horsefeathers!"

"Wait, she can tune secondary harmonics across a filled node?"

Click to shrink...

Oh hell, this sounds like exactly what we would need to stabilize the Great Seal.

Hindsight is a bitch. If we go for wood with scrip 2.0, we can think about a curved (rippled?) force wall that we provide to the Tower and no one else. That would also be a good way to keep it civilian-accessible, too; you can feel the texture with a finger.

Shikamaru and his Wood Release are a security concern, but we'll explode that bridge when we get there.

Click to shrink...

Automatic center punch - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

Also, Shikamaru doesn't have wood element any more than Ino has steel element. They were using storage seals and misdirection based on the Kagome maneuver.

...the good news is that starting a farming village on some arrable land is going to be fairly profitable with crops that have a quick turnaround time given the short-term food shortage. Low-income individuals are also probably going to be more interested in leaving the city, especially if we promise them a MEW home and Goketsu protection once they're in the wild.

...that is a bit of a mean thought and I'm a little embarrassed I had it.

Click to shrink...

Mean thoughts? My first was, "yeah, but that would require the thread to actually get around to doing it."

Also, definitely missed a chapter.

I'm trying to think of whether or not we have good sources of game meat. I'm assuming that the ninja in question use storage seals on their kills. If not, then we can increase mobility and their range by offering the use of some seals free-of-charge.

Click to shrink...

Probably worst case scenario is that we can temporarily invert the trade scheme. Humans can probably eat digger ants with the correct preparation. Gee, do we know a cook familiar with their preparation?

Here's an idea: Why don't we show Asuma the results of our investigation? Even if we failed to prove the perpetrator, we can pretty conclusively show that it was enemy action, and that Hagoromo and Hyuuga were acting weird right before it all went down.

If nothing else, he might be less annoyed with us if we can persuade him this was deliberately caused by someone else.

Click to shrink...

He already knows. His problem is that he has to be seen doing something and can't act against royal clans without concrete evidence.

 

[Oneiros]

Since the seal masters in Isan are competent I assume no objections to enlisting them to help solve our problems?

 

[Lailoken]

Found the chapter. Okay, we're already swimming in one kind of debt, so we might as well take on another. Plus, through the loan the Nara have a direct financial interest in solving this, and through them so does Ami.

It's time to put Kagome, Shikamaru, and Ami in a room with a problem to work together to solve and a sheaf of blank requisition stamps.

 

[Rafin]

How did we cost the Amori money? They have scrip that they can't cash right now? That's the only way I can see.

Click to shrink...

I gotta admit that this confused me too. Them being a ninja clan and all I'd have expected Asuma to put them first in line for his buyout.

 

[Lailoken]

Since the seal masters in Isan are competent I assume no objections to enlisting them to help solve our problems?

Click to shrink...

The mere offer of a glance at the sketches of the Great Seal would be a hell of a trade good while simultaneously verifying a large part of the story that we're fighting the universe ending. Their whole village revolves around worship of the 7th Path.

Also, we need a readout on the Amori. Were they the clan we cut a deal for wineland with? Were their competitors?

 

[faflec]

Also, we need a readout on the Amori. Were they the clan we cut a deal for wineland with? Were their competitors?

Click to shrink...

Yes.

 

[Lailoken]

Since the seal masters in Isan are competent I assume no objections to enlisting them to help solve our problems?

Click to shrink...

Obviously, SCIP-room protocols apply.

Yes.

Click to shrink...

-and one of the first people to turn down the scrip was a wineseller while they are selling off marginal land they no longer need if they can indebt us into clearing more for them. Yay.

 

[FaintlySorcerous]

Come on, buddy. Sealmasters don't make casual calligraphy errors. This should not have taken effort. You're better than this.

Click to shrink...

Good sealmasters don't make casual calligraphy errors. It's possible that there exist living sealmasters who only do everything perfectly when they're scribing seals. Kagome doesn't (didn't?) think much of them as sealmasters to my memory, so having taken a moment to figure it out doesn't seem totally unreasonable.

Plus, he's losing his edge in Leaf, given how comfortable everything is and that nobody's made an earnest effort to kill him in the last week. Having the Spider scroll should sharpen him back up.

[center punch URL]
Also, Shikamaru doesn't have wood element any more than Ino has steel element. They were using storage seals and misdirection based on the Kagome maneuver.

Click to shrink...

Re: Shikamaru, I was memeing, hence the strikethrough. His Wood Element is about as real as our Yellow Flash.

...actually, they've very similar in that they're seal-enabled knock-offs.

I'm curious as to how a centerpunch/finder would strictly prevent counterfeiting. If all it involves is an idea - and one which just requires basic geometry to figure out - then there are probably ten or so other people in Leaf who can figure it out, one or two of whom might not be friendly towards us. I don't like those numbers. Tower-produced lacquer (or thread incorporated into paper) which changes the colour of the light on Hazo's Excellent Anti-Counterfeiting Seal seems more secure. At the very least, it's a state secret which isn't available to anyone with half a brain. (Again, a dozen-odd people in Leaf.)

Mean thoughts? My first was, "yeah, but that would require the thread to actually get around to doing it."

Click to shrink...

'Hey, all you folks whose lives are somehow even worse despite having already been Leaf's poorest, as a direct result of our carelessness: would you like to leave the comfort of the village and go work on a farm? We promise that this time we've been careful enough. Probably.'

I'd feel at least a little bad about that.

Probably worst case scenario is that we can temporarily invert the trade scheme. Humans can probably eat digger ants with the correct preparation. Gee, do we know a cook familiar with their preparation?

Click to shrink...

If you mean Pandaa, then I think that you should add a requirement that said cook must also have a good working knowledge of human physiology, or at least have not maybe-poisoned the only human they've fed.

...has Keiko eaten digger ant, actually? I feel like she might have.

 

[Kiba]

Keiko has eaten some ants and not die. That much is known.

 

[Lailoken]

Good sealmasters don't make casual calligraphy errors. It's possible that there exist living sealmasters who only do everything perfectly when they're scribing seals. Kagome doesn't (didn't?) think much of them as sealmasters to my memory, so having taken a moment to figure it out doesn't seem totally unreasonable.

Plus, he's losing his edge in Leaf, given how comfortable everything is and that nobody's made an earnest effort to kill him in the last week. Having the Spider scroll should sharpen him back up.

Re: Shikamaru, I was memeing, hence the strikethrough. His Wood Element is about as real as our Yellow Flash.

...actually, they've very similar in that they're seal-enabled knock-offs.

I'm curious as to how a centerpunch/finder would strictly prevent counterfeiting. If all it involves is an idea - and one which just requires basic geometry to figure out - then there are probably ten or so other people in Leaf who can figure it out, one or two of whom might not be friendly towards us. I don't like those numbers. Tower-produced lacquer (or thread incorporated into paper) which changes the colour of the light on Hazo's Excellent Anti-Counterfeiting Seal seems more secure. At the very least, it's a state secret which isn't available to anyone with half a brain. (Again, a dozen-odd people in Leaf.)

'Hey, all you folks whose lives are somehow even worse despite having already been Leaf's poorest, as a direct result of our carelessness: would you like to leave the comfort of the village and go work on a farm? We promise that this time we've been careful enough. Probably.'

I'd feel at least a little bad about that.

If you mean Pandaa, then I think that you should add a requirement that said cook must also have a good working knowledge of human physiology, or at least have not maybe-poisoned the only human they've fed.

...has Keiko eaten digger ant, actually? I feel like she might have.

Click to shrink...

An elder sealmaster is a good sealmaster, and habits are habits. Plus, there is no way in hell an international missive left her table without being run by a dozen elders before even being submitted for review by the local authorities. His entire job is to be paranoid and we know for a fact that he is better than this.

Also, Kagome is jagged edge.

Reeded edges on coins are ancient defences against defacement, and if we're going to use Caesar cyphers diameters matter. Just run each one through a sequence of edge-cutters offset by prime numbers by a proprietary formula corresponding with its serial number. Make sure the key is large enough to outweigh the volume of currency created and nobody in the entire setting will know how to crack it. They probably won't even realize that the measure is even there.

I mean the large ninjutsu expert turned cook whose name I keep forgetting. He took her for a ride back in Snow.

 

[FaintlySorcerous]

Reeded edges on coins are ancient defences against defacement, and if we're going to use Caesar cyphers diameters matter. Just run each one through a sequence of edge-cutters offset by prime numbers by a proprietary formula corresponding with its serial number. Make sure the key is large enough to outweigh the volume of currency created and nobody in the entire setting will know how to crack it. They probably won't even realize that the measure is even there.

Click to shrink...

As I understand it, reeded edges are defense against clipping the edges for the purposes of keeping extra precious metal, and it makes forgery harder.

However, I don't see how that helps a civilian store-owner tell if the scrip they're getting is good or bad, which is my primary concern. They're going to see weird edges and not much else. If we can get money that an illiterate civilian can verify, clear that hurdle, then we no longer need to worry about forgery, period, and I think that's going to need to be a key feature of scrip: if it isn't abundantly clear that it's trustworthy, then we're going to have a problem. I think that getting away from wooden scrip is going to go a ways to help with that; for the people that will be using it, this was a disaster of epic proportions, and getting them to re-adopt is going to be vital.

I'm reasonably confident that the Nara will come up with some sort of serial number system which we don't need to spend wordcount on in the eventual economics council plan. 'Don't roll your own crypto' is rule one, and 'the Nara took care of this part of the project for the Tower' is a more robust solution for meta reasons (IMO).

 

[Icehawk78]

...I'm not so sure we can't 'ask' for this.

Click to shrink...

My read of that page was that we can't ask for detailed financial records because they don't exist.

Whoever actually did this has to be shitting themselves at least a little bit, though.

Click to shrink...

Not if they don't give a shit about civilians and aren't getting blamed for it.

Here's an idea: Why don't we show Asuma the results of our investigation? Even if we failed to prove the perpetrator, we can pretty conclusively show that it was enemy action, and that Hagoromo and Hyuuga were acting weird right before it all went down.

If nothing else, he might be less annoyed with us if we can persuade him this was deliberately caused by someone else.

Click to shrink...

This sounds like a sure fire way to remind Asuma that we exist in a way that isn't related to saving the world from dragons. That seems like a bad idea.

Plus, there is no way in hell an international missive left her table without being run by a dozen elders before even being submitted for review by the local authorities

Click to shrink...

Head of clan offering a treason to foreigners? Nobody looked at this other than the clan had who sent it. Nobody else even knows it exists and she will assuredly accuse anyone who thinks otherwise of treason themselves.

 

[Lailoken]

As I understand it, reeded edges are defense against clipping the edges for the purposes of keeping extra precious metal, and it makes forgery harder.

However, I don't see how that helps a civilian store-owner tell if the scrip they're getting is good or bad, which is my primary concern. They're going to see weird edges and not much else. If we can get money that an illiterate civilian can verify, clear that hurdle, then we no longer need to worry about forgery, period, and I think that's going to need to be a key feature of scrip: if it isn't abundantly clear that it's trustworthy, then we're going to have a problem. I think that getting away from wooden scrip is going to go a ways to help with that; for the people that will be using it, this was a disaster of epic proportions, and getting them to re-adopt is going to be vital.

I'm reasonably confident that the Nara will come up with some sort of serial number system which we don't need to spend wordcount on in the eventual economics council plan. 'Don't roll your own crypto' is rule one, and 'the Nara took care of this part of the project for the Tower' is a more robust solution for meta reasons (IMO).

Click to shrink...

It won't help during circulation, but it will make it easy to check for authenticity when it's cashed in for ryo at the central issuer. In fact, if we wanted to create confidence we could make the details of every time it happens transparently available to everyone who wants them and offer a standing bounty of, say, 10% of the counterfeited value to anybody who provides enough evidence of the culprit to satisfy the authorities (Tower, Merchant Council, some new independent institution we hold enormous sway over because we designed it from day one?)

The Yaks would love it. Now we've got civilians going to the Tower to take missions.

Head of clan offering a treason to foreigners? Nobody looked at this other than the clan had who sent it. Nobody else even knows it exists and she will assuredly accuse anyone who thinks otherwise of treason themselves.

Click to shrink...

Good point, but he still should have automatically thought to check any international communication for a secret message.

-Hell, this was a test. She wanted to check his skills before committing. As long as we reply in the same cypher, even just "message received, under consideration" will win enormous points with them.

 

[eaglejarl]

This is a wonderful title.

Click to shrink...

Oh, good! I was hoping someone out there would be the right subtype of nerd to spot it.

How large was scrip? I'd pictured pebbles or small stones.

Click to shrink...

Pebble sized, but they still burn.

How did we cost the Amori money? They have scrip that they can't cash right now? That's the only way I can see.

Click to shrink...

They were handed a whole bunch of wooden nickels which for a little while were worth nothing, hence them losing money. It eventually got sorted because the Tower effectively guaranteed the value.

 

[Orisha91]

I just realized hot-tub seals solve a bunch of problems.

I'm pretty sure having hot-water on hand would help the med-nin a little bit with the sickness going around.
Also, might be good to have hot water around so food supplies can be stretched by using more soups.

There would be less need to stock up on fire-wood or burn calories acquiring it.

Sorry, Mari. Gonna have to distribute this out. I think Haru would like this.

 

[Heleor]

Oh, good! I was hoping someone out there would be the right subtype of nerd to spot it.

Click to shrink...

I dunno, auth failures are probably 403, not 435. You're a few chapters too late for the joke.

 

[eaglejarl]

I dunno, auth failures are probably 403, not 435. You're a few chapters too late for the joke.

Click to shrink...

435 Unable to authenticate at present.

It's an email error code, not an HTTP error code. I had thought it was part of the SMTP standard, but it looks like it might be unique to Exim. TIL. Anyway, it's got 'present' (current time / gift), 'authenticate' (demonstrate knowledge of or identity with something), uncertainty, and it all seemed cute in my head.

 

[Heleor]

435 Unable to authenticate at present.

It's an email error code, not an HTTP error code. I had thought it was part of the SMTP standard, but it looks like it might be unique to Exim. TIL. Anyway, it's got 'present' (current time / gift), 'authenticate' (demonstrate knowledge of or identity with something), uncertainty, and it all seemed cute in my head.

Click to shrink...

That's an even deeper cut than I was expecting! Very nice!

 

[Lailoken]

Screw that, by the time we're done there will be plenty of dragon giblets to go around.

Hey, since there is already a sealmaster on site, y'know who would make a better arachnid summoner?

That ninjutsu hacker. Conditional on her joining the clan, of course.

 

[Lailoken]

Potentially interesting thought: what if part of reconciliation with Naruto was an offer to trade? Hazou takes on the bijuuship and he gets to be free and even be a summoner like his father figures?

 

[ContextBot]

"All right. Going back to the original topic, you said that the Hagoromo are spreading rumors about us. Are the Hyūga?"

Click to shrink...

They don't have to spread any rumors, the Hyuuga are funding the Church of Youth and if Neji gets additional food from the Turtle Clan than they look like the good guys.

Meanwhile the Hagoromo tell everyone that we are to blame for crashing the economy. And sadly one of the few things we really have going for us was the trust of the civilian population.

No wonder @Lailoken thinks Hinata is evil.