Starring:
Masanori, Shuuren (as Tadashi), Yuuka
Date: May 10, 2013
Summary:
Masanori goes on yet another trip to the countries of Wu and Sho. Where he meets his demise.
Poster's note: foul language filtered in obvious places.
"Tar man: The end"
Southern lands
A little bit of a controversial mission… But Kiri is known for those. Yet this one wasn't directly an order from the Kage. It had his stamp of approval on it however, and so it was placed on the job board. Masanori needed assistance in simple mercanary work. It involved torching a village in the southern lands. The pay was far more than royal and the Kage left a note that it would be appreciated if this money would be partially donated to Kiri after completion. Masanori is seated by the gates, the mission wasn't exactly secret, so he was sure more people could tag along. He had no idea however, that there would be another… more unexpected shadow trailing along this one.
He greets whomever assembles at the gate and heads in the direction of the docks. Where he goes on-board the pirate ship he captured, which stinks with blood and gore. Masanori never took proper time to clean it, even after its former use to travel to the southern lands. Masanori doesn't seem to mind nor care, Masanori just pitched up the sails and waits for everybody to board before leaving the dock.
"The countries of Wu and Sho are at war with eachother constantly. I recently decided an important battle between the two counters. Wu one the war. However, Sho has offered a considerable sum to aid their guerilla effort. So we'll be razing down a village."
He walks over the body of the boat while they're headed in the general direction of the countries of Wu and Sho. "Sho has payed for my loyalty. In truth, I come to feed Chi-O-nomu… you're allowed to kill at extreme prejudice. But our main objective is to take out the village and hence an important supply line. My own orders are simple… don't die, and get it done." Yep… simple.
Once arriving in the southern lands in the dock of Si-xao. Masanori leads the way. It seems he's well traversed and known. The dock workers bow for him. "Shinigami-sama." Says one of the dock workers in a broken dialect. Most of them speak foreign tongue. Masanori nods a few times at everyone. Masanori nods down a path and starts walking. "The village is a few hours from here. If you come across soldiers, try to hide. If that doesn't work, we talk.. if all else fails. We kill." He walks down the road, and doesn't seem to make any real effort to hide himself. People around these parts are weary and distrustful.
Masanori shrugs and grabs hold of his scythe. "After that, everything is up to yourself, I recommend fire…." He nods a few times, and lets go of his scythe, who's quiet for a chance. Satisfied with the promised offering of blood.
What interest the man known as Tadashi might have in this mission is questionable. Still, to anyone but the member of the Chitsujyo, he's simply a Sunagakure shinobi who might get sent on a few odd jobs since he IS a Medical Ninja. He stands silent on the ship, simply allowing Masanori to take charge of this mission as intended. In truth, he's probably here more to observe Masanori's strength in his native way of fighting than actually caring about this mission. Once Order is brought to the shinobi world, then he can worry about the rest of it.
The masked man actually remains silent for the duration of the trip, other than maybe introducing himself to any team partner that may not know who he 'is'. He simply follows Masanori off the ship and down the path to where they are going, perhaps already having in his mind how he will deal with anyone who crosses him.
This particular mission wasn't exactly a mission, at least not to the village itself. Perhaps so that Kiri has the option of claiming that they weren't directly associated with this particular mission. Which it isn't. Conveniently. Taking a moment to consider the details listed, Yuuka accepts the mission, arriving fully geared at the gates of Kirigakure with the long length of Kubikiribocho strapped to the curve of her back. Though its a wonder that such a small woman is able to carry such a huge blade to begin with.
The Sevenswordsman smiles softly at Masanori with a subtle dip of her chin in acknowledgement, greeting him. And at the 'pirate' ship, or whatever it really is, Yuuka calmly lifts a pale brow at it for a fraction of a moment before following Masanori aboard. Making a silent note to herself that if any of the ship's crew tried to get fresh with her to just kill them. This ship seemed like the type to have a seedy crew aboard.
Leaning gently against the railing, Yuuka gently crosses her arms loosely against her chest as she listens about the countries, Wu and Sho. Neither of which she's heard of of course, but not surprising. They were simple enough orders. And once the boat begins to steadily move into port and dock, the young woman narrows her gaze lightly as the small group follows Masanori, with a cautious glance given to the scythe. "Anything else we should know?"
Masanori was strolling along the road and threw Yuuka a cross glare. "Not really.." He comments. After about thirty minutes walking the unmistakeable sound of a patrol resonates over the road. "Shoot!" Masanori comments, quickly scurrying off to the side of the road, laying down behind a large rock. There's also trees to hide in and a fallen tree.
At the sound and Masanori's rather sticky attempt at hiding, Tadashi smirks slightly beneath his mask and forms a hand seal that creates a new form right beside him as he skillfully leaps into the trees, the shadow clone having the appearance of an old merchant walking with a backpack on his back down the road at a slow pace. If this goes right, and the other two move well, this SHOULD give them time to get going down the way while the guards are distracted with the old man… Once a few moments have passed and the guards are nearing, the old man would begin coughing and hacking, sounding like he's about to send his lungs flying through the air with one hand over his mouth as he continues hobbling down the path.
Masanori's brief glare elicits a small smirk from Yuuka. It was an honest question and he acted as if he ate babies or something. Oh well. The swordsman idly rolls her shoulders to adjust the weight on her back as she turns her attention forward, aquamarine eyes blinking slowly at the road stretched out before them. When Masanori that curses to himself, Yuuka lifts a pale brow at him as he takes off for the side of the road, ducking at the side of the road. "Hm." Tadashi disappears up above her, leaving a clone of a merchant. With a short breath Yuuka bends her knees and takes off in a hard jump, landing in the treetops a few feet from where Tadashi lands as well. With the distraction in place, they have a chance to take off.
Masanori quickly scurried away from the guard when they got distracted. Silently thanking the versatile ally that's coming along. Phew, dodged a bullet there. They pass by safely, also past Yuuka. Regardless, the team quickly finds the road back and continues their stroll landwards. A few hours later and they arrive at a simple wooden village, a large mountain on one side, big fields on the other. The houses are mostly made of wood. There's about ten buildings that look like residences.
Two spear armed guards at the entrance. Things looked simple enough, until the truth came out. There was a guard post in the middle of town, with a good fourty guards, some of them did - not - look like pushovers either. There's also a simple Shinto temple, and something that looks like a town house. Children are playing around… mothers are washing clothing. Fathers are working in the gardens, working leather, or sharpening weapons. It was a regular, peaceful Wu village that happened to be sustaining an important supply line.
Masanori isn't wasting any time. "This is it.." He comments, before taking his scythe off his back. He waits for Yuuka to be ready before suddenly dashing towards the half sleeping guards, hoping to attack them synchronized with Yuuka to take them out before they can even whimper. When they're taken care of Masanori just casually begins strolling through town while women scream and men scurry inside to take up arms.
He does seem to be enjoying the show. He reaches for a put out torch by a building. Pressing it into his own body to cover it in flammeable tar, before running it cross the pavement. The burning torch then gets held by the first building untill it catches fire. He grins… waiting for the guards to wake up and charge them.
While Yuuka and Masanori charge in for the dirty work, Tadashi decides to take a more contained approach. After all, this doesn't need to be linked back to Kirigakure or Sunagakure, else more chaos could come to the shinobi world. Thus, he unravels a scroll, and two forms of him fly out of it and begin running along the borders of the town to start trying to dispatch any guards or men along the borders working.
Approaching the village a few hours later, Yuuka turns her snowy head and glances at Masanori when he confirms that it's they're destination. And already he's preparing as he removes the scythe from his back. Exhaling softly, the young woman reaches up to the collar of her kimono to pull it a bit looser, smoothly slipping her slender arms from the kimono sleeves to allow the fabric to hang from her hips, revealing her chest bound in ivory. And already their customer takes off ahead of them. Her feet dig into the ground subtly a fraction of an instant before Yuuka takes off in a sudden sprint, mirroring Masan as her right hand extends her fingers and the flesh of her palm splits. An ivory blade made of Kaguya bone forming from the bone of her hand just before she slashes at the throat of the second guard.
The screams of the frightened women did tighten her chest as they moved forward, her aquamarine eyes narrowing at the men as they hurry to take up whatever they can in order to defend themselves and their families. Looking to their leader, Yuuka lifts a brow at him as he effectively sets fire to a building. Bones crack under muscle as she rolls her shoulders, bone spikes emerging from her flesh to make the swordsman look even more intimidating. "Women, run with your children and never look beck." she warns. "Anyone that gets in our way will be met by the end of a blade. This is your only warning."
Masanori looks at Yuuka… great, more boners. He had no idea how else to call that clan. He nods while she excuses women and children. Women he didn't care about. Children however, he had developped a weak spot for children. A set of guards run up to to Masanori but meet his scythe, blood splatters across the next building he sets ablaze…
Tadashi isn't lucky. There's a few guards easily dispatched off, though he suddenly meets one carrying a big axe. He isn't an armed guard, rather he looks like a farm-hand. Though by the twist of his axe.. he also looks like a proffesional fighter! He's the only one who managed to block his onslaught, and instead starts one of his own! Tadashi gets attacked by the axe coming at him twice.
Yuuka also gets stormed by two soldiers, though they are easily dispatched of. Suddenly, a large soldier, easily twice her size storms her head on to try and tackle her into a nearby building. Masanori just keeps walking, until a sabre-holding assailant blocks his way. He sighs, readying his scythe.
As the guy blocks his hit initially, Tadashi smirks and looks up at him. "Oooh, impressive," his inflectionless voice rings out tauntingly as he appears to just be watching the axe coming at him. However, with a flicker at the last second, he disappears and reappears literally standing on the man's shoulder. "I think it's time for you to take a nap, though," he says before disappearing again to reappear driving a powerful roundhouse into the man's gut, only to disappear again to appear over him to drive another kick to the back of his head, intent on breaking his neck.
Yuuka smoothly slashes through the two soldiers that storm straight at her. "Even with a warning, they do not listen…" she murmurs to herself. It was always the same, unfortunately. She only hopes that what women there were took the children to safety. She exhales a small breath as Yuuka lifts her aquamarine eyes up at the larger soldier, narrowing her gaze at him as he rushes straight at her in an attempt to tackle and disable her. "So slow." she murmurs to herself, sighing. Yuuka takes a slight step in one direction at just the right time to completely avoid being tackled while also causing the large soldier to charge into the wall of the building.
"Now then." her voice growls, lifting her left hand as she begins to release a cloudy mist from her palm. In actuality its particles of bone dust, forming around the huge soldier that had charged at her not even a moment before. The mist suddenly solidifies to form several dozen long kunai made of bone. It wasn't even an instant later that they pierce their target all at once, skewering him thoroughly and perhaps even rattling those nearby.
While the sword armed man focusses on Masanori, Shinigami just grins. The man his initial attack is deflected by the scythe that so smoothly dances around before the blade comes down at the poor man twice… who's believe to be dead. Masanori turns to look at what Yuuka was doing before he groans…. a sword being shoved into his stomach. He looks down at it and steps back, bleeding heavily. But he'll live. He swings the scythe once, the man's head is rolling.
Suddenly, a scream from a house Masanori set on fire. The fire was thorougly spread now, the rest of the village will burn if no one puts this out. "MOOOMMMYYYYYY" Yells a childs voice from one of the burning houses. Masanori looks over his shoulder. Noticing the voice by the child. He makes a split second decision. That house was far too dangerous for anyone to go in. Even a Shinobi. But Masanori does it anyways, stepping through the flames which quickly set his body ablaze, but he doesn't care… he searches through the house and wood… would Tadashi loose his specimen?
*CRACK* Suddenly a part of the roof flies off… a boy no older than six gets thrown out from the new hole created, flying towards Yuuka her person… trust? … Masanori steps out of the house to see where the child has landed… and once the child lands, the burning man of tar looks down at himself, and then the group, before suddenly collapsing, falling onto the dirt… No movements coming from him. His body fully ablaze still…
Just as Masanori falls to the ground, what would appear to be a giant, muscular version of Tadashi would appear from the midst of the flames. This one, however, has a slot in its mouth where the mouth is still visible and eyes that glow white. He moves through a set of handseals before spewing a powerful jet of water over Masanori in an attempt to put out the fire. From above, though, the original Tadashi stands on a top of one of the buildings where the fire has not completely covered the roof yet and lets out a sigh.
"So, in the end, a man who calls himself Death gives his life for the sake of a child," his inflectionless voice rings out as he looks down. Once the fire has been sated enough to be covered, he leaps down down pulls a scroll from his coat to withdraw a blanket from it and completely cover the body while his oddly solid 'clones' continue to move around the borders and tear into guards and others one after another. "It is a pity, but do not fret, my friend. Order will come and end this chaos."
Yuuka instinctively snaps her bright eyes in the direction the child's cry, tensing visibly. But its Masanori that takes off in search of the child first, and a moment or so after he had rushed into a flaming building, the roof explodes outwards and a small boy is thrown from the opening that was created. With a small breath the Swordsman runs the few steps distance to catch the boy smoothly in her arms, with some relief that he's whole and safe. "Here you go…" Yuuka settles him on his feet on the ground, offering a small smile, for all that's worth. "Hurry. And be careful." Looking at where Masanori emerges, she blinks once as a giant version of Tadashi forms and begins shooting water at whatever fire there was on Masan's clothes. With their leader incapacitated, it was up to them to take care of the remaining guards. Or at least discourage them from attacking further. It helped that Tadashi's clones were setting a perimeter.
Masanori remains unmoving even after the fires go out. Later he cause of death can easily be found….. pure dehydration. The fire burned so much tar and fluids, which drained Masanori's chakra and water. Both near empty, along with the found and fires created a fatal cocktail. Right now his body and weapon are in possesion of the doctor.
The village is cleared with relative ease. Most guards were already fleeing. And the village was torched. A job well done, payment would be sent to Kirigakure accordingly. And Masanori will not be missed.
