Starring:
Date: June 7, 2013
Summary:
Having found a hideout, the order was given to Suterusu to deliver destruction and terror to the rebels fighting Sunagakure. The assassin brought in Meruin to assist with refining the message.
"Struggle With No Reward - Horror"
Rebel Desert Camp
So the order had been given, sow distruction, sow terror. Find the locations within the underground that the rebels consider safe.. and demolish them. With that in mind, the contact in Kirigakure, that could be as much friend as enemy at times, Meruin was contacted. This communication was brief and to the point. The figure, signing the missive as 'stealth' requested Meruin's assistance to end one of the threats to Suna at this location at this time. Thus, the first safe haven of the rebels in the underground was found. About 15 miles away from Sunagakure, it was a small fort buried in the ground, teeming with those whom were trying to cause trouble for the shinobi of the land. The picket line for their sentries was out to one mile away from their own place and the meeting point for the team to gather was two miles out. This wasn't going to be simple.. but then again, Itami had picked the figure specifically for that reason.
2 miles out of the enemy base.
Meruin was present and awaiting, holding the preternatural stillness of the spider that his clan holds in reverence. The Okumo had answered the summons immediately. With it arriving at a time allowing him to slip over to Sunagakure, perform the duty, and run back home to Kirigakure, he chose to simply deliver the message himself. It was the fastest method, and haste was as much his priority as success. Kirigakure's troubles were on the brink of either being eradicated or growing quite a bit. He had to make sure that the balance tipped in their favor. So this assault would be swift and harsh. It would be bloody. It would be terrible. None who walked away from it would sleep cleanly again.
Slipping free of the shadows at that sense of the other being there, the figure would look to Meruin with a silent nod. "Terror." That soft tenor voice would croon. "Innocents are allowed to flee. Those who fight, die. The place must be rubble." That figure pointed ahead of them, into the dark of the underground tunnel. "One mile out is the start of their perameter. My plan was to leave it alone. Make them critically aware that they can't see us coming. Any questions?" He'd look to Meruin after the brief statement and if there was no questions, would focus himself, gathering chakra as those clones would form about him. As one, the 6 of them would scatter, heading for that target, going into hiding as only one who took the very moniker of stealth could do.
"No," spoke Meruin. He had no questions. His turned his head, looking to Suterusu as the mists in his eyes filled with bloody hues, darkness beginning to spread along the paleness of his form. Chitin. A spider's chitin, covering his body. "But I will not follow your plan." Suddenly, the whole of him was covered in that hard shell, even to the tips of every strand of his platinum hair. Eight eyes filled with bloody mists look towards the west where the enemies lie two miles out.. "There will be one sentry left to make the main base. Be swift. I expect him to return to find a slaughter already underway."
Four spider limbs, larger than the Okumo is tall and powerful appearing, thick, suddenly burst from his back, made of pure chitin. They lift the Okumo as he looks to Suterusu. A nod. "Terror."
And then he's gone, his four spider limbs kicking up a cloud of sand as he barrels towards the sentry line. There was a reason Kirigakure's rebels had already been dealt with. It was because they knew how to instill fear in these type of men. To fill them with terror that eats at their resolve. The sentries would eventually see the monster racing along the sands towards them, leaving a small sandstorm in it's wake. And they may try to run and given warning, but they would never reach base. These people wouldn't just learn that they couldn't see them coming.
They would learn that it didn't matter if they did.
The figure nodded in agreement to Meruin. While the surprise of the sentries being useless could be one terror, the other of destroying them so they know how useless it truely is also completely acceptable. While the Okumo was visible in his charge of the sentries, the figure was not. 3 of the clones on the ceiling, the rest went around those on the line who were already dealing with the charging mutant spider with spears and arrows. The terror had begun. As the figure got closer to that fort, he'd focus, judging the location and would have the clones spread out appropriately for that gathering of chakra. The metal forest was going to be massive. That central post would be the middle of the base, the ring around it from above and below shattering buildings, rocks, slashing people, indiscriminately cutting and burning them as it spread those spikes of metal. Have a slaughter underway for the sentry to get there? Yes, absolutely that would be happening when the lone sentry was allowed to get away from Meruin.
Meruin was the predator.
Funny, how the desert was always the place he ended up setting it free. The muscles of his true form bunched as some of the sentries began to flee back to base for reinforcements and warning while others moved to stop him, gathering spears and shooting arrows. The Okumo's pulse quickened at the sight of his prey trying to escape, suddenly going from fast to blazing speeds. In the time it took for him to make the first sentries, one arrow had been crushed against the chitin on his torso, the rest falling far behind him, his speed too much for them to compensate for.
He reached the first line of spears and barrelled through them, two screaming men attached to the spider limbs by black spears piercing their stomachs. Meruin snapped a spear handle in half as more chitin grew over one man and speared through the second. Screams abruptly ended with their deaths, one crushed from pelvis to neck, the other torn in two by the black spikes riddling his body. Satisfactorily covered in blood, Meruin began to reap in full.
He vanished, reappearing behind the gawking group with a pair of heads in his hands, bellowing his supremacy and glorying in the carnage to come. Three of the four remaining wild eyed sentries rushed him in a panic, the final attempting to flee. Meruin dashed past the ones attacking him, ropes of spider silk bursting from his back and enfolding the necks of them. As they were pulled off of their feet and dragged behind the Okumo, he dashed towards the fleeing sentry…
And sped past him. There were others ahead, those who went for reinforcements initially. They had a mile to travel. They would never make it before the Okumo reached them, and it was so. The death of the others had taken so little time, they hadn't even moved out of hearing distance.
Visions of the predator flickered into view as it swiftly gained on it's prey, flashes of a night terror relived in wakefulness. He reached the first one, one of the choking men dragged behind him being pulled up into his grasp by the spider silk. With a grunt and a wet pop, the Okumo tore off an arm and cut off their scream with a quick snap of the neck. Body facing the fleeing man even as the spider limbs propelled him along a parallel path, he swung the disembodied arm at his fleeing prey's head. There was a loud crack as contact was made. Whether it was from the snapping arm or the man's neck, none would ever know, as spider silk swept the man into Meruin's free hand before the Kirigakure Jounin stabbed the man in the heart with the jagged bone that'd sprouted from the arm on contact. He dropped the body, leaving it in the sand with the limb still sticking out of it and continued.
Vanish. Vanish. Vanish. He grabbed another sentry by the throat and tossed him up, a thick spire of chitin shooting from his back to lance through him. The bleeding, breathless corpse served as a flag to follow as the Okumo continued. Flicker. Flicker. Flicker. The last one who went to get reinforcements screamed as he suddenly found himself on the ground, the Okumo over him, a flurry of black blades slicing into the helpless man, rending him into so many pieces. The man held from the black spike above Meruin began to let out a scream of his own. It steadily grew in pitch as that spire began to separate, to spread apart.
Just as it reached it's crescendo and the body was torn in half, there was a sudden explosion of metal in the near distance. The sound of destruction rang out as a small forest of steel trees burst into abrupt existence, growing with a swiftness. Steam and smoke mingle in the air around and above it, lifted from the scorched bodies and rubble that falls from the many limbed spires. Suterusu had done his job. And more swiftly than the Okumo had anticipated. Still.
As he turned to look towards the lone sentry that he'd passed by, covered in the gore of his predations, he decided that the job was still being satisfactorily completed. This man would deliver the message well. After releasing a low growl the sentry would never hear, the Okumo vanished, streaking towards the metal forest none but the Murasame Assassin could produce. There were other atrocities to commit and others to serve as messengers.
That figure was hard at work.
While the initial forest had been massive, the figures in black was everywhere. Indeed, with 5 copies of him, plus the main figure himself, it would seem like he was everywhere. Any time any group of them tried to gather, to try to fight, one of that figure would show up there, a reaping death as the daiklave, extended to look akin to a reaper blade than just the normal weapon, would slash. Hands, feet, legs, arms, they got claimed by that wicked blade, scattering the men screaming as they fled the dark figure.
Just as the chaos almost resolved, those clones would change their locations. A wider spread, the metal forest was sent out again, launching more structures, wrecking further damage on that fort, claiming more lives. It turned the whole thing into a full route as most of the people would give up trying to form groups to fight and start fleeing.
Chaos. A cacophany of screams and mutilation.
By the time Meruin made the main base, there was little more than this. The forest had at least doubled in size, many of it's metal trees bearing bleeding, searing forbidden fruit on one branch or another. Now all that was elft were the pockets of people fleeing, attempting escape. With the desert holding so few things to take cover under, the each of them were visible. Their only hope was that they would not be the ones targetted.
Now, Meruin could never been seen for more than a few moments at a time, flickering around, spraying concentrated bursts of an invisible poisonous gas, his bellows propelling the toxin. Men dropped from the pain of their flesh dying on contact, eroding away to leave a multitude of sores on their body even as they started coughing. Soon, blood would begin filling their lungs and they would drown in the desert, their own lifeblood the only liquid necessary. Some of those he managed to assault would rise, however, and some of those would survive the trip to the next outpost. He made sure of it.
As the last remaining people fled, that figure gave a muted nod to himself, one to another of the clones. They would gather in the now desolate camp, trashed beyond recognition. Looking around at the work done, the damage dealt was carefully studied, to verify it's extent and ability. Afterall, one doesn't get better unless they grow from what they do. Finally, the figure would turn, seeking out Meruin with a nod towards him in satisfaction. "Your assistance is appreciated. I would call this first mission complete." That soft tenor would croon his way, the clones vanishing as he spoke. "I will not keep you further from your Kirigakure duties. If I need your assistance again, I will contact you."
Meruin was standing where one of the metal trees rose from the ground previously covering the underground camp, the spider limbs adorning his back vanished now that the necessary actions had been performed. The mists in his eyes had already returned to deep blues and greens, and they dropped to the chunks of flesh and the few body parts that riddled the ground around him, dropped from the chitinous spikes that had previously adorned him.
And then Suterusu spoke and the Okumo listened. The mission was official designated as complete, and would likely prove to be successful. Meruin nods and looks to the Murasame assassin. "Very well. I do hope that this has cemented your forgiveness for my past transgression, as well as improved our standing with the village itself. Should you require further assistance, send another missive. If I am able, you will have my aid." And with that, the Okumo crouched slightly, sand rolling away from his feet as wind chakra pushes under them. A push off with a foot and he's speeding overtop of the sands, en route back to Kirigakure.
