Starring:
Date: May 18, 2014
Summary:
Hakumei takes revenge on a traitor, and the village in which he lives.
Poster's note: foul language filtered in obvious places.
"Bury the Traitor"
Komugi Village
Reina had given an order to Hiken and Nanashi, both brief and dark. 'We're dealing with a traitor in Komugi Village. Disguise yourself.' Reina waits outside the village amidst a field of wheat, for which the village was uninspiringly named. Such wheat fields stretch for miles, and surround the village. Neat roads lead up to the well-ordered village, which is ringed by tall, wooden walls with constantly manned outposts. The village is prosperous enough to hire a contingency of mercenaries.
Reina is wearing a black cloak, and an ANBU mask. A fox. Once they get there, Reina says, "A man approached me who knew I was Hakumei. He'd never had contact with any of us, so I persuaded him to tell me who'd revealed my identity." She pauses. "It was a former member of my group, Niro. He'd been allowed to leave. He's been very open about his past involvement, it seems."
She turns and holds up a sketch. "This is him. We'll quietly kill the sentries on those high outposts. I hope you've all learned tree walking, heh." The walls meant nothing to shinobi, after all. "Then, go to every house and kick down the doors until you find Niro. Once you do, kill him. If it's a mercenary and they resist, kill them. But if it's a villager tell them their life will be spared if they remain in their home. Nanashi, stay near the gate and make sure /no one/ escapes." Then she starts gathering her chakra, watching the other two the entire time. Or at least her mask is turned that way.
Arriving, peering at Reina, Hiken is not disguised. He blinks as he hears what Reina has to say and then clears his throat. He then idly shifts, "And what does this Niro look like? I don't know if you recall, but you hired me on all of roughly 2 weeks ago." He nods his head before looking to Nanashi and thengives a slight bow, "I am not aware of htis Niro and I'm pretty sure he's no aware of me unless he was your pocket mouse." He nods his head, "If you give me a description, I'm going to go sans any disguise." He then looks to Nanashi, "As a note, I'm Hiken."
Disguise yourself… Disguise yourself… Really funny. Nanashi's entire identity is just a series of frackin' disguises. Going with shoulder length pink hair and a white sleeveless coat with a black shirt and shorts under it this time, the being appearing just a bit more feminine than normal this time. Since returning from a trip in Kumogakure, Nanashi has seemed to be rather on edge, distracted at times. One paying attention could perhaps spot it gazing at something that's not there. A brief glance is cast at Hiken when he speaks to it, a simple nod given. "… I am no one," it says simply before looking back to Reina. "… Kill Niro and anyone working for him and make sure no one gets out… Anything else?"
"If you insist," Reina says to Hiken. Her tone is flat, and it's impossible to see her expression. The village is several miles from them, up and down slopes of grass and wheat. The skies are alive with stars and the moonlight is strong, but it's still dark in the dead of night. People will be asleep. And so Reina would approach quietly towards their worst blindspot: a rocky outcropping on their west side, which his stone and shadow at night. The torches the sentries keep lit also half blind them, making it hard to see past the light. She circles around to the furthest of the four outposts. And it's then that she creeps up the side of the wall. The sentry up top has to take a moment to register the shadow looming behind him, before Reina places a hand over his mouth and slices his throat. The torchlight is snuffed out.
A blink at Nanashi and then a nod, "Well, I'm gonna call you…Rica." A nod and then he ponders as he looks forward. Hiken somewhat follows Reina's lead though shifting some as he slides over a wall and doesn't even bother with any sentries there, he's just inside. He glances around once inside and starts toward the very first house, taking a look around to start searching for this Niro person…whoever that is seeing as REina didn't give him a description set to suit himself and just went inside.
As the other two move up the walls, Nanashi steps over toward the gates. It spreads its hands out, sending small bits of sand around the edges of the village. It remains silent, glancing toward something once in a while as it spreads the sand to use it to be sure no one tries to escape the village from any side.
After killing that one sentry, there was one less competent warrior to deal with. After that, Reina doesn't seem to value subtlety. She simply walks into the first house. It's not even locked. She supposes they're either especially dumb, or feel safe with walls and one of the sentries she just killed. Goes into a room, sees a man, a woman, and then from the house there's a scream. So much for subtlety. A minute later, Reina is walking out to the next house as the nearest sentry hears the scream, climbs down, and sees Nanashi. Another sentry rounds a corner to see Hiken peering into windows.
The sentry shouts at Nanashi, "Halt!" and then lunges at it with a cudgel. However, the sentry beside Hiken stops to first ask, "Who the soil are you?"
Rushing to peek into a house, Hiken stares for a moment and then looks to the area around. He blinks as he notices the guard pointing him out and then he shakes his head, "I'm Hiken." He nods his head, "And who are you? A dead man? Oh, that's sad." He nods his head, "Here, let me help you with that. You appear to be moving around a lot for a dead man. I'd really hate for you to not fulfil your purpose of being dead." Hiken suddenly opens up a pouch and with a couple of hand seals, a flick of several needles of water go stabbing toward the poor sentry.
As the sentry lunges at Nanashi, the cudgel that strikes the being's shoulder sinks into it. Extending its hand forward, it grabs the man's hand, a wave of sand extending out from its body to wrap around him and bind him past moving. "… You really shouldn't go about swinging your stick at strangers," it says calmly, though its eyes tell a tale of horrific rage momentarily despite its calmness just briefly before the sand would violently compress the man's body with intent on killing him instantly.
The sentry looks confused at what Hiken is saying. But it does register eventually, and then the sentry raises his cudgel. He shouts as her charges Hiken, or more precisely charges right into a chestful of water needles. He drops, clutching his chest and bleeding rather noisily. The noise brings about four people bursting out from their house, still in their pajamas. A grown and three kids, but the man is holding…a cudgel. Seems everyone seems to have one to hand. Ironically, he shouts the last words of the dying guard. "Who are you? You'd better not hurt my kids!" He swings for Hiken.
Nanashi's victim dies too. He is screaming just before he's crushed. Then all hell breaks loose. Two sentries come around, see the dead sentry. One raises his cudgel to leap forward and swing it at Nanashi, while the other actually starts making hand seals and sends a gout of fire at Nanashi to roast him.
Reina is busting into houses, simply not waking some, and cowing others into submission. One who doesn't cooperate is burned alive, and soon one of the houses is roaring with flame. Now villagers are popping out of their houses, in confusion.
As the man comes at him with the cudgel, a quick handseal sends a barrier of earth up between himself and the attacking man, causing the cudgel to simply crash against the barrier before Hiken steps around it and smiles slightly, "Now kids, we're going to learn a lesson today. It's the lesson on how to go from being a breathing living indvidual to the walking dead." He gestures, "Your father has transformed, before your very eyes." He makes a few more hand seals and more needles whip toward that man as well, "Ta da. And now you see how the transformation happens. I do hope you learn that it isn't a fun thing to do."
As the strike and flames come at it, Nanashi only looks annoyed, its body almost instantly recovering from any damage done without a sign of damage leftover. Each hand points at one of the men, firing off a powerful orb of sand at each of their faces. "One man can create a village full of idiots it seems," it mumbles, eyes darting around to look for more guards.
"Don't h—" the man begins, but then he dies. All three children look down at his corpse. Daddy's dead. Two immediately flee back into the house. But the eldest, a boy of six, screams, "I'll kill you!" He reaches out for the cudgel, to pry it out from under his father's corpse. And tug and tug. Seems his father is literally dead weight. Just wait, Hiken! The next sentry is smarter than the first howeever, as he sneaks up quietly behind Hiken to stab at him with a kunai.
Both of the men are killed almost instantly by the shots. And plenty of villagers see it as they run screaming for the only exit, the village gate which is being opened by two panicked but determined villagers.
Reina kicks down another door, to be faced with Niro, only to have a face-ful of senbon thrown at her.
"Oh silly child, that's not at all how you stay alive." Hiken chuckles and hten blinks as he slams his hands into the ground and a dome of earth raises up over him, covering him completely before he hmms and steps up as it falls away, "Strange…" He states, "Did I not demonstrate how to stay alive?" He hmms and idly flips needles of water flipped up and around into the poor man, "We find that Niro shovel yet or we going to have to kill everyone here?" He hmms.
COMBAT: Hiken attacks target 1 with WATER-NEEDLE-TECHNIQUE with a roll of: 24
COMBAT: Hiken attacks target 1 with WATER-NEEDLE-TECHNIQUE with a roll of: 23
As more and more people start to pour out of the buildings to try to run, whatever's stressing Nanashi out seems to start to come to a head. "Get back… get back… get back…. get back," it says, clutching its head until a wall of sand suddenly comes up in front of the gates. "So… loud…. so… loud… so LOUD!" As it looks up, one of its eyes has taken on the yellow form of Shukaku's eyes. "CAN YOU HEAR THEM?!" it calls out before slamming its palms on the ground, sending a massive tsunami of sand up from the wall to come down on the village and crush everything in sight, only sparing Hiken and Reina from its wrath purposely.
The man had the good sense to do a sneak attack, because he's hardly a warrior. He falls down next to his father. The child's courage fails him and he runs sobbing back into the house. By now they're learning that the claim of ten sentries was a boast…even the ones at hand aren't especially strong. Yet another sentry runs around the corner to face Hiken, only to see the dead bodies on the ground. He seems to have learned Hiken's lesson, because he drops his cudgel and backs around the corner, only to driven under by a torrent of sand. Sand is bursting out everywhere, crushing people beneath its weight. Even the houses are crushed.
Reina looks back in to Niro who is shouting, "I didn't mean to do it. I just…just mentioned Hakumei once. Really!" And standing there is his family, a wife and his son. Reina smiles. "You didn't just 'mention' it. You knew what would happen. I'm melt your faces off. Your wife and son. Then your village is going to roast. Alive, with these very walls, everyone who—hmm?" Reina looks at the sand pouring down, rushing around to crush houses and people alike. Reina shrugs. "Same result. Different method. My friend is so kind, to asphyxiate and crush this village, rather than burn them alive." Then he slams the door shut a second before it's buried.
