Promising.
(Shimura? Double Shimura?)
Shimura-née-Shimura.
"Not at all," Ruri said. "We were just finishing up. We can discuss the Kei investments at tonight's KEI meeting."
Ami's investments? Have to run, had an appointment with looking at a summoning scroll.
"Of course, Kei," Kei said. "Please give Lady Kei my regards."
"With pleasure, Lady Kei. Good day to you both."
Hah. Kei's nearest neighbor woes.
Nara Kei—a sociable, affectionate Academy student who possesses countless virtues I lacked during my own childhood years and indeed still do.
Too young to be one of our genin, sad face.
"Not that you are blameless yourself, if Akane's reports are to be believed. Are there not already two infant Gōketsu Hazōs at the estate, as well as a Gōketsu Hazuki and a most unfortunate Gōketsu Hazuo?"
Yuno at every baby shower. "You should name him Noburi."
"If you are here to consult Shikamaru, I am afraid he is presently napping, and interrupting a Nara's nap would be an act of naked aggression akin to stealing an Akimichi's food or tearing a Hagoromo's manuscript. If you wish, I can arrange an appointment before you leave."
But the fact is he was napping, napping at my chamber door,
On the morrow
he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before.
Quoth the Nara "Nevermore."
Still, one didn't turn down the opportunity to speak freely without fear of being executed just because one, say, accidentally proposed having Orochimaru overthrow the Hokage.
So many stories to astound the grand kids.
Kei sighed with a familiar expression of disappointment. "Hazō, I am Shikamaru's wife, second-in-command, and confidante. He and I have spent countless nights discussing the ways in which we might use our influence to steer the Hokage towards better long-term decisions and away from tempting but catastrophic ones, as the Nara have for as long as there have been Hokage to steer. If you had asked me, I would have informed you that this was not a card available to us yet this generation. But I suppose by then you had already decided not to trust me."
Very interested in digging into this. Problem of being a good confidante is no way of knowing from the outside. Only Shikamaru could have cut us in on how trusted Kei is or how much of her perspective was integrated in his conclusions.
"Sir, I wish to inform you that the recent phenomenon was caused by a Gōketsu Clan experiment. Unfortunately, the completely unexpected scale and destructiveness of the effect indicate that we were gravely mistaken in believing we understood the mechanisms involved. Having reviewed the data, it is my judgement as Leaf's leading weapons developer and unconventional warfare expert that further research could pose a danger to Leaf, its shinobi, and/or the Fire Country at large. As such, I have officially terminated it and marked all relevant materials classified. I would like to humbly apologise for conducting this experiment without coordination with the Tower, a mistake I will not make again, and I will of course provide whatever compensation you consider necessary for damage to Fire Country territory and its population."
Questing is cruel. Cannot go to Kei for all the answers or where is the challenge? Still better to start consulting her more from now on. Good speech. Earns respect even if Asuma pulls out all the details.
"As a positive effect of this disaster," Kei said to the imaginary Asuma, "we have identified a capability in the hands of a non-Leaf faction which, with sufficient development, could trigger similar effects. We can expect that anyone who decides to research it will meet with equally disastrous results—indeed, worse, since as a sealmaster clan of the Kagome lineage, we pride ourselves on our extreme safety precautions. Thus, I believe it is incumbent on Leaf to ensure this capability does not proliferate, especially as Leaf is now likely to be blamed for any further incidents, with the only people capable of exonerating us bound to have perished during the experiment. The Gōketsu will, of course, provide all the information necessary to identify this capability and its users, and will assist in preventing its proliferation in whatever way the Tower deems appropriate."
Could lead to weaker nonproliferation measures, but buys time to work on necromancy. Carefully prepared speeches like this feel more like hitting a lowered TN than opposing rolls. Blueprint for engaging with higher social opponents.
It wasn't foolproof—on being told about Elemental Mastery, Asuma could still say, "Is that how the Gōketsu did it?", and then Hazō would be back on the defensive—but he had to admit that the amount of wriggle room offered by the two parts of Kei and Snowflake's speech in combination was well beyond Hazō's gambit of "For the greater good, please don't ask about this". The question remained: could he have protected Akane if Kei had offered some crude version of this at the time, and then he'd refined it with his own Mari-trained powers of misdirection? Could he have saved the world from Asuma's ambitions?
Solid maybe.
For the honour of the ancestors in the depths, Hazō, use me.
Kei Akane Mari. Use, do not use, yeah right.
"I'm sorry," Hazō repeated. "I promise you I will do better. I know I have major blind spots. I don't check with Asuma before doing things either, I don't take adequate account of my social and political weaknesses or do enough to address them, and the same goes for my level of connection to this village in which I supposedly live. I feel like even Ami has deeper roots here in some ways, with her visible and invisible networks of connections. I know this is a blind spot too, and as my sister and one of the people who's helped me shape Uplift into what it is, you deserve better in ways that those other people and institutions don't. I hope that if there are other blind spots, you will help me find them and fix them."
Heartwarming.
"I shall spare you the itemised list on this occasion."
Post story montage.
"On reflection, perhaps you are owed an apology. While I maintain that my privacy is essential, and may on occasion need to be protected with lethal force, and that your invasion of it at the time was shameless and unjustified, perhaps a more appropriate response in that specific instance would have been a stern lecture rather than immediately resorting to cruel and unusual punishment. You are correct, Hazō—I acted immaturely. I apologise."
A+ character growth.
"Please do not misunderstand," Kei added to break the awkward silence. "Threats of lethal violence are an essential tool for handling recalcitrant younger siblings. This is a truth universally acknowledged in both Mist and Leaf, and I do not intend to deny it simply because I have wielded said tool inappropriately at one or more points in the past. I am simply… admitting that I was at fault in that specific incident, and perhaps making a commitment to be more judicious in my application of intimidation in the future."
Important info to learn 3 years into having an older sister. Points for making it this far blind.
Hazō, the Sage did not grant humanity the gift of universal language
The Sage, eh?
domesticated chakra boars?
Chakra farm?
"Hazō," Kei said, no longer smiling, "if your plan involves committing suicide on anything less than a 100% chance of revival—no, even if it involves committing suicide on a 100% chance of revival, in your judgement which has just proven so stellar in terms of risk assessment—then I hereby veto it absolutely. While I recognise that it is not within my power to actually prevent you from committing suicide should you so desire, be aware as disincentive that if you do, I will impose consequences for you to suffer upon your hypothetical safe return, beginning with laws to eliminate the rights of those declared deceased and continuing to the full extent of Ami's creativity."
Pocket Jiraiya is better than any suicide plan, but if time is running out makes sense to have plans to make the most out of dying. Get the villain monologuing.
"I would ensure you were not forgotten," Kei said dismissively.
She froze.
To see the thoughts that flashed through her mind here.
Claim he wanted to wait until it was verified? No, then he should have gone to her as soon as he decided he wasn't going to get any more information (in other words, once he gave up on trying to replicate the ritual, which was very quickly, since being aura-blasted by Mari over and over sounded like a great way to end up a quivering wreck or comatose).
Hard spot. No way to ask to be taken seriously without conceding the information was important to share. Hard to keep track of who has been told what or what rises to needing a vote to be shared.
"I... I do not understand." Kei's voice trembled. "Did I fail to grieve correctly? Should I have cried as I did when my grandfather passed away? Is the anger I feel at Jiraiya's loss so inhuman that it comes across as apathy?"
Shadow of her parents' upbringing? Sad to have this be her first guess.
"Kei, I really—"
"Go!"
Hazō went.
Impressive she waited so long to kick him out after the tears started. Progress.
Hazō couldn't think, on reflection, why he hadn't shared the information with Akane, Kagome, or Kei.
Worse if Mari has since shared with Akane and Kagome.
Hazō: Alertness 33 + 6 = 39 vs TN 30
Success.
Praise Jashin.
"On the contrary," she said. "If I have misled you into believing that Jiraiya's fate is not personally meaningful to me, that is no more than a product of my stunted capacity for emotional self-expression. It would be unreasonable to condemn you for placing me in the same category as Kagome when it comes to non-essential information about my stepfather."
Gah.
Gah.
"My analysis is my way to contribute value and delay the inevitable. My bonds with the very few people who are Safe are my morsels of happiness, as are my escapist hobbies. My mortal terror... well, you have been a victim of my emotions running out of control more than any man living."
Great section and all the parts building up to this.
"As I feared," Kei said. "Hazō, while I may be furious with Jiraiya for his betrayal, with a human complexity which I have apparently utterly failed to indicate despite in fact being human, I do not actually believe he belongs in Naraka—the hell reserved for the vilest sinners—as your choice of terminology has implied to Akane. Nor am I convinced by Shikamaru's Will of Fire thesis. Accordingly, I called in a favour from a KEI theologian, who spent some time in discussion with the Hagoromo. According to their allegedly Sage-given lore, the souls of the newly-deceased first travel to the so-called Pure or Purifying Land, a heaven of respite where they are cleansed of the mortal bonds and burdens that cannot follow them on the journey of transmigration. Only once this purification is complete do they move on to their next destination among the Six Paths. If the place beyond the rift is truly the afterlife, and if Jiraiya is truly to be found there with his original appearance and identity—both hypotheses dubious and loosely supported at best—then this Pure Land seems a more plausible candidate."
Need more Pure Land lore. Filter for sources that match what we saw. So far, have thought better to think of the portal as a parasite that has stolen souls from the true afterlife.
"Allow me to first set aside the first and most obvious category of unknown unknowns with which I am less qualified to deal. Let us assume that the rift ever led to the afterlife, and will once more lead to the afterlife when reopened. Let us assume the other side does not contain monsters, powerful chakra beasts, inimical supernatural beings, or other threats of that order which could invade the Human Path. For that matter, we should include alien disease spirits against which we have no protective rituals, invasive plant or animal species that can alter the natural world on which we depend for our survival, and poisons which may spread from the island site by air or sea. Let us assume that the unprecedented act of manually wrenching a closed rift open does not harm the fabric of the Human Path or the afterlife in any way, and nor does forcibly stabilising that rift for an extended period of time—an element central to your research, I trust, since there is no guarantee that if the rift closes again with you on the other side, the same means will be efficacious in opening it a third time. Let us assume, finally, that Jiraiya is there, that it is possible to find him before he moves on despite a total lack of information on his location or the geography of the afterlife, that he is both able and willing to seek return, and that a deceased person will become alive again upon re-entering the Human Path (as opposed to, say, being forcibly returned to the Pure Land or having their soul disintegrate). Finally, let us assume that you encounter him and not, say, Captain Zabuza, or any other force that will compel you to surrender the rift's secrets so they may take control of their own and their allies' resurrection. In short, let us assume that the rift and the other side will function in exact accordance with your wishes and expectations, as matters in life ever do.
Probably will be chakra seeking threats. Afterlife 'immune system.' Rescuing Jiraiya with one reopening is optimistic.
"This granted, allow me to treat the various types of failure mode as independent, although, of course, they will be simultaneous and the second-order effects of their interplay will be complex and staggering. First, for the Gōketsu. Jiraiya would, naturally, take control as clan lord. Your rule has been mixed, shall we say, while he is a veteran statesman with a decades-long record of success. He would not be so irresponsible as to leave his people's welfare in the hands of a junior, much less place his vast power directly under your control. You would naturally lose all the agency to which you have grown accustomed, your role reduced to advisory and executive after the fashion of Noburi or myself, and I may remind you that Jiraiya was not of Uplift. He was coming to express an interest in it, in terms of benefiting Leaf by better leveraging its civilians, but he was ultimately a man in his fifties who had spent his life in a Leaf prospering under the Third's stable, moderate regime. He did not propose or conduct any bold social experiments then, and the KEI is as much his legacy as anyone's, insofar as he did not lift a finger to save his clanless brethren, for all his power and influence. I have power now, Hazō, if complex and qualified, and it leads me to respect Jiraiya less and less as I come to comprehend just how much he could have accomplished with his and did not.
"Afterlife portal, Gaku!" "Yes sir, now about the finances."
"Speaking of the Hokage... I hope you appreciate that your control of the rift would last only until the first expeditionary team encountered the first human. If the rift is proved as a potential source of 'new' Leaf shinobi, or shinobi willing to be recruited to Leaf's banner, it must be under the Hokage's direct control. If it is a potential source of hostile shinobi, Kage-level at worst, it must certainly be under the Hokage's direct control. If there are other parties with whom Leaf may negotiate for advantage in an unknown world, again, you are not the person to whose judgement such weighty matters should be entrusted. I assume that from that point, any exploration would be conducted by the most trusted, competent, and, of course, discreet shinobi available to the Hokage, while you would be expected to return to your own specialisations, such as research and development.
Depending how fast they purify, could be more people in the Pure Lands than the EN. Protect the secret long enough, no one else has a chance.
"Meanwhile, once the existence of the rift became known to the clan heads, as it would need to be with Jiraiya's return and the regular recruitment of their members for expeditions, there would be a competition of unprecedented ferocity over who should be rescued next—for obviously Leaf's expeditionary resources are limited, and traffic to and from the site needs to be limited also. Every clan head would demand that their fallen take priority, and exert the full extent of their influence to ensure that their parents and siblings, their heroes and their masters capable of expanding the clan's temporal power, come first. Or do you believe you are the only one willing to cross lines and embrace extremes to resurrect a loved one? Needless to say, I intend to participate fully in this competition, for Leaf's clanless deserve a second life no less than anyone else—arguably more, since their first lives would on average have been shorter and worse—while the Gōketsu would be all but irrelevant with no more prominent figures of their own to rescue. The damage to Leaf's unity and stability would be... honestly, beyond my power to estimate.
Fun to imagine bringing back Jiraiya unconscious for OPSEC. Sneak into Tsunade's house and leave him to wake up in her bed with a hangover. No one is on board with closing the portal permanently after fishing out Jiraiya. Difficult decisions ahead.
"Now, let us expand our scope again to consider events in the outside world as Leaf tears itself apart. It would be impractical, realistically unviable, and counter-productive for Leaf to attempt to conceal Jiraiya's return. Much of his value is as a diplomat and as a military deterrent. Nor would it be plausible to pretend he was alive from the beginning, between the survivors' testimonies, his absence during Leaf's recent crises, and the fact that there was no conceivable reason to keep his survival secret even from the Tower's own shinobi.
"As soon as Leaf's capability for resurrection was discovered, even if Leaf itself claimed it could not be replicated, it would be swarmed with spies and with demands for explanation. Every other nation would be terrified of Leaf resurrecting more Hokage, and rightly so, I regret to say. Do you believe the existence of the rift could be concealed for long, considering that Akatsuki were present when it first opened, that it would be the focus of the greatest political struggle in Leaf's history, and that it lies far closer to Mist than to Leaf?
Once it is open, might not be too hard to punch a second rift closer to home. As for Akatsuki, good cover for people we revive. Not unusual for Akatsuki to have internal struggles. Work with Asuma to secretly kill all Akatsuki members, replace them with Leaf's best departed. Hidden second hand controlling AMITY.
"I need not belabour the point from there. The most realistic scenario is that Akatsuki would claim the rift, formally on behalf of AMITY should they desire that fig leaf, and test if Leaf can defend it in the distant land of O'Uzu. They are already aware of it, and we only assume that they have not been researching it themselves. Once it is brought to their attention that it can be used to resurrect Pain, to whom they were fanatically, and, per your speculations, in some cases romantically devoted, no power on this Path will stop them. And if you are capable of finding and retrieving Jiraiya, they are certainly capable of finding and retrieving Pain.
Would be super interesting to find Pain in the afterlife to talk to him one 'dead man' to another. But doubt he is in 'normal' circumstances.
"These are the key points which capture my imagination, Hazō. If you desire others, Shikamaru and I have a bulging folder. If I may be frank, your assertion that research is proceeding smoothly terrifies me. Still, you have come to me to seek advice, and therein lies a seed of hope that you will give these issues serious consideration, and refrain from triggering this possible apocalypse until you find solutions that satisfy you and, with my aid, polish them into solutions that satisfy Leaf's finest realists as well."
Nice to have something we can somewhat openly work together with smart people on.
"Not if you wish to retain his respect when he asks about the aforesaid and you have nothing to offer him. If he asks me, I shall inform him that your latest progress report was positive but ambiguous, which it is to a layperson like myself, and that we discussed the matter of consequences and you promised to consider it further, which should be vague enough to satisfy my duty to both parties. Please do not betray my trust in this matter."
More notes for what kind of lying passes under the radar.
Hazō was torn. On the one hand, Mari had never said that, and having Kei believe it would only make things worse. On the other... it wasn't like she'd ever said, "I think X, but you should check with Kei as well in case she disagrees"—at least not in matters that didn't directly affect Kei, and sometimes even then.
On the third hand, Hazō and Kei had just reconciled, and Hazō couldn't bear to ruin that so quickly by reminding her that he was the one who kept neglecting to make her part of the process.
There should be a Nara hand sign for this. *Scholarly disagreement deferred to not ruin the moment?*
"No, it is a reasonable question," Kei said. "I, too, once believed that, as our preposterous love square was clearly the work of kami overdosing on Icha Icha, it would linger without meaningful development for volume after volume until Jira- the author finally recalled its existence and scraped together some unsatisfying resolution so as to create room for a more interesting new plotline. I could not have imagined that... No, forgive me, Hazō. I have embarrassed myself as much as I can bear for one day. I shall narrate that sorry tale another time."
Did Shiori rebound with the Anko polycule?
"Fair enough," Hazō said. "In that case, I think it's time for me to bow out. Enjoy your Kei discussions at the KEI meeting, Lady Kei."
"Enjoy your batrachian briefing, Hazuo."
Hah. Easy GED money. Hazuo, your sacrifice is remembered. So many different kinds of briefing at the Conclave.
Leaf's next rising star of medicine/ninjutsu/summoning looked up from the table over which he was poring over some scrolls by candlelight.
Be careful with the love, Narrator in Noburi's room.
The sizeable axe blade-shaped dent in one of the barrier-grade granite walls was probably unrelated, and Hazō decided he didn't have the energy to poke his nose where it didn't belong.
Yuno takes issue with that.
"Just doing my homework," Noburi said. "Did you know Orochimaru once peeled all the skin off a missing-nin and then glued it back on inside out to see if it would keep its protective properties?"
Wasteful. Orochimaru notes readers not getting a balanced education. "Why do you know what temperature skin melts but not about lunar spleen biles?"
Noburi grinned. "It's what I do. Still, I'd really rather I didn't have to, so try to go easy on the sealing failures, will you? Between this and the Naraka Storm, I'm suddenly a lot less comfortable living in a compound full of sealmasters."
Need a new research set up out of town.
"All right," Noburi said. "So Shima and Fukasaku were really impressed with me for knowing the name 'Pasafutsu', which is kind of funny given I heard it from them to begin with. Apparently, only really old summons know that name, because he gave it up when he became the Pangolin Hierophant."
The most honest kind of impressed. Is Pasafutsu from pacifist? Polemarch comes from war and leader. Hierophant comes from sacred and reveal. Something else to involve Kei in as we learn more.
"And get the info," Noburi agreed. "But a man's got to have priorities in life."
"Gramps, we want to know how you figured out the mystery of the Pangolin War! Why do you keep bringing up how you never ran out of japes for Hyūga?"
Well done. Beautiful writing.
