Borders and Nobles [M: DONE]

[¤ SFS ¤]

---- Border Patrol

Client's Name: Shodaime Tsuchikage Kaguya Kira
Client's Occupation: Shinobi
Mission Rank: C
Payment for completion: 1,000 Ryo + 50 EXP
Mission Subject: We need you troops! The border is only partially covered by the Samurai protectors for now, so we need you to patrol the areas not covered, which should last an entire morning or afternoon depending on when you set out. You will be given enough food and supplies to last you the afternoon, anything more you wish to bring will be your own things and will not come from the village.
Special Requests: Although I would prefer this be done in teams, you may do this solo, if I see you as fit to do so. It's a C-rank so we're not expecting too much trouble.
Notes: Look out for squirrels!

Landing with a thud Sen's chest heaved in and out as he tried to catch his breath. His face was one of stone and solemnness. Like a bull blowing air before charging at the matador. He'd had to scramble to make it out to the rendezvous point on time to get his directions to the part of the border he'd be patrolling. A long week of firsts this would be his first time exploring the border, let alone patrolling it.

The ronin all greeted him warmly enough. It nearly caught him off gaurd. The angry or elitist ways of most of the Iwagakure had made him weary of skilled strangers. As they bowed and introduced themselves he couldn't help but realize that it felt good to be welcomed into a group. It made him wish he was part of a team, and for a moment, it made him bitter and jealous of all the genin of the other villages that were on the road to recovery and had comrades to watch their back, and had no idea what it meant to stand alone in an entire village.

After receiving his directions Sen looked up to the afternoon, the ronin all going their separate ways to begin their rounds. He looked to the skies as if they were looking back, as if they would talk back. He felt in that moment that they were sentient, and he wondered if they knew what he was going to go through in the next six or so hours. There were no definite signs of danger but he was a shinobi on mission. That alone qualified him to wonder if any danger was coming his way.

He wouldn't bother to speculate on it too much, dusting off his shoulders and putting on his jacket as he departed from the meeting place on to his own patrol section. He would simply do his job and handle whatever came his way to the best of his ability. Following the path of stacked and jagged rocks his allowed his body and mind to separate. A ninja should have always been on full alert when on a mission but after a certain point in one's training they could come to perform non-perilous tasks such as carrying bags of blank scrolls or patrolling a countries borders without actually thinking about it. Should an incident arise that would need their full attention their bodies would jar them from whatever it was they were thinking about. It was like going on 'auto-pilot' or 'cruise control'. With the all the ominous quiet Iwa had been seeing lately he just hoped he would have to crash on this mission.

[¤ SFS ¤]

The borders of Earth Country were fairly different than the borders of Iwagakure. The rocky formations were smaller and less frequent. Near the village a majority of walkways and pathways were snug between two canyons of unyielding rock. That, or the pathway was actually a mountain trail. This was probably done on purpose as most likely the founders of Iwagakure wanted the village nestled into the deepest and most jagged rockhole in all of the country. The border had few cliffs as mostly the terrain came to reflect the distance one was getting away from the rocky heart of the country. Time started to roll on slowly, and the genin had to wrestle with ways to keep his mind occupied. There were a few things that sparked his interest. Mostly things of plotting and reflection, he could talk to himself or think in his head while his eyes and body stays attuned to the patrol.

The missions he was doing were making him stronger at a pace he hadn’t expected. Sure, before he graduated he had discovered he had not one but two chakra element affinities. The story itself was very touching. As a child he always identified with fire and in the academy when he’d heard of everyone having one chakra affinity he just knew that his was fire. It had to be, he could feel it. But as time rolled on he was unable to perform any Katon jutsu and he came to find out as a Stone-nin his chakra was inclined to understand, perform and align itself with Doton Jutsu. Of course this was a hard lump to swallow and he refused to believe it. That is, until the day much later in his life when the academy teacher brought in the test strips of chakra paper.

One after another his classmates of slightly younger genin, lined to up find out their affinity. Students were usually put in classes with their own age groups a thirty year old needed to be taught things a little differently than a six year old after all. Learning your natural chakra type was a big step in preparation to becoming a shinobi. Some affinities were built around offense like Katon and Fuuton while some were more aligned with defense like Doton and some were most balanced like Suiton. Knowing your affinity told you what jutsu you could one day learn, what jutsu you could never learn and more importantly it told you what jutsu and styles you were at a disadvantage against. Knowing your affinity allowed you to begin to plan your own battle tactics based on your own strengths and weakness and the strengths and weaknesses of your affinity, which fed back into knowing what part you would play in a team after graduation.

The Chakra Paper Test was like having a foreshadowing of your destiny handed to you. If your desire was to become Suiton user and dominate the opposition with tidal waves and aquatic tactics and that paper got soggy when you poured your chakra into it, it would be one of the best days of your life. On the other hand if the only thing you wanted was to control and command the will of a flame and the paper instead crumbled into dust marking you as a Doton user, you would feel crushed as if under the very rocks you had just learned you could will to your liking.

Crossing out of the more rocky sections of his patrol Sen found himself in a rare area, a place that was still technically Earth Country but had more grasslands than rocks. Digging his world map from one of his pockets he stopped for a moment and made attempt to pinpoint his location on it and record it. The middle of nowhere along the border of his home country wasn’t a priority place to know of but he would need the experience in marking his location on the damned thing and recording it. He had to start somewhere right?

[¤ SFS ¤]

With his location recorded and his current area showing only signs of ‘all clear’ he could press on, his body back on ‘auto-pilot’ and his mind back to reflecting on his humble start in Ninjutsu.

In the weeks that followed his Chakra Paper Test Sen didn’t practice any Doton jutsu he instead learned and performed handseals of various Katon jutsu while flexing what little chakra muscle he had. All too many nights he would grow upset and enraged to tears over the curse of being a Doton user in the bully of a Village Hidden in Stone that he had already grown to hate in childhood. If he couldn’t change where he was from he would least be able to maintain his individuality as a user of something other than Earth style ninjutsu, but it seemed to be hopeless. He mercilessly tried to make himself into a Katon user and overwrite or at least overpower the Doton Chakra he possessed. One day after a few Katon handseals he began to let his chakra flare and a peculiar thing happened, he felt a rumbling underneath his feet. Fearing it to be a Doton reaction of some sort he speed through more handseals of fire forcing out all the chakra he had and then a small bit of lawa spewed from the crack in the earth grazing his right temple and cheek, leaving a scar in its wake.

Unbeknownst to Sen he had used successfully unlocked and used Fushokuzai for the first time. This made him not a Doton, but a Youton user, a shinobi who could will both Earth and Fire to create something new. Initially Doton was all he could use because like most shinobi possessing a Kekkei Touta one affinity always manifested first and as a Stone-nin surrounded by stone and rock there was nothing that could stop the Doton from awakening first. His botched attempts to control Katon instead of Doton jarred the latent ability out of him. Though, he eventually came to learn it would have manifested on its own at a later time if he’d been more patient. The pain and scarring of the incident became his badges of pride. He found new resolve in learning he was a Shinobi who could use three styles which caused him to embrace Doton as well as Katon as both of them were part of his beloved Youton.

Looking back on the whole thing it was a fitting beginning for story as a ninja. He pushed too far and got burned but the payout was worth the pain. As he cleared a section of his patrol he couldn’t help but smile at the memory. His ‘auto-pilot’ was interrupted when he heard scuttling behind the nearby the sprawl of boulders surrounded by only slightly shorter grass. Picking up a small pebble he pitched it against the left side of the boulders and speeded around to flank the right side, coming face to face with a large wolf. It growled at him vicious and snarling and rushed without hesitation breaking it’s own muzzle on the business end of his Youton no Tate.

SPOILER: Click to show

Youton no Tate (Shield of Hard Magma)
Rank: (D), C, B, A, S
Type: Offensive / Kekkei Touto
Range: See special!
Special: Size of lava shield depends on the user’s level of 'Fushokuzai'. Blocks attacks of equal rank learned in a 360 degree radius. Shield is always active as long as enough lava is present to be used, and does not require handseals. Judge will determine whether fast enough attacks bypass the shield each time it’s used.
Description: Although appearing to be one of the most basic lava jutsu, Youton no Tate is a technique that soon evolves into the user’s most sacred defensive countermeasure. Always active, the shield that protects the user is formed from a large molten rock presence, and does so under its own will. When needed, the user can also use their own chakra to control the lava so that it can act as a barrier. Because the protection is reliant upon how quickly the user’s lava can respond, it is possible a fast enough ninja can bypass the molten and strike the user.
Domain: Youton. Must know 'Fushokuzai'

Reeling in pain and knowing it wouldn’t win the fight that was about to break out the wolf took off from where it came and Sen moved to get back to work. That is until he came across what it was that brought the wolf to the boulders in the first place. A dead body and an open scroll.

[¤ SFS ¤]

The fanged beast stormed back into the distance, its angry growls equating to something along of the lines of “Next time you won’t be so lucky, brat.” The genin didn’t take the growl at face value. The thing that called all his attention however was the body he found behind the boulder. The face though intact wasn’t one that he recognized a middle aged man. His clothing suggested that he wasn’t a shinobi and searching him didn’t lead Sen to a headband. He had no weapons on his person or items of interest aside from a small scroll in his hands. The scroll turned out to be nothing important. Sen tossed it away before using his tracker to scan the area for any lying in wait to make an ambush. The man wounds and positioning suggested he’d died from loss of blood. The wounds themselves looked to be deep slashed but the number and intensity of them along with how messy and inconsistent they were was more in line with that of a large clawed animal than the blade of a ronin or shinobi.

There was only so much he could do for a dead man, while the living still needed someone to guard and patrol their borders. He would have to come back after his shift and retrieve the body to bury it. With no way to tell the man’s identity it would be risky to take the body into the village so burial someone in Earth Country itself was the only option. He just knew it wasn’t the first choice the dead man would have went with, but it was really all he could do. He just hoped the body would still be there after his shift, nothing like a corpse going missing during a mission to stir up suspicion.

He moved away from the body but once he got to a distance he slowed his pace and went on high alert waiting to hear the movements of anyone who had avoided his tracker to come out of hiding and do something with the body. But when no one made any moves he went on ahead. The air he breathed seemed to become heavier with the thoughts of the mauled dead man on his mind. With a little shinobi training he would have at least stood a chance against that wolf or whatever it was that killed him. Sen’s mind reflected carefully on his future. Who would be the wolf that would come to put him down?

A better question. Would he have enough ninja training to fend off that wolf?

[¤ SFS ¤]

The afternoon sun began its fall into eventual darkness. The orange-ing sky looked down upon him as he held the concept close in mind. With every mission he took his power was growing. After only three missions he felt as though his Chakra reserves were nearly doubled. He hadn’t come across anyone since Otega last week that demanded the use of his best jutsu let alone demonstrating the need for him to learn any new ones. It was a risking thing to do but he was holding off on improving any skills or learning any new ones. This seemed like as good of a time as any to figure out which direction he wanted to extend his skills in. His Youton could use some polishing and expansion but in the rare event that the one he was standing against wasn’t weak against Youton or they were better than him in it, he stood a higher chance of victory by adding some new moves to his repertoire. He would most definitely be making a trip to the Earth Country shop to check out their jutsu stock.

He hit the edge of his patrol area, the ronin in charge of the next section of the patrol was just turning around, about to make his return sweep and then report to the final rendezvous point. He greeted Sen with an relaxed gesture and went back to business. The genin only returned the gesture and spun to do his return sweep. Between the wolf and the body it was shaping up to be an odd but so far, secure mission. With this one coming to a close he had to wonder what mission he was going to pick up next, there was zero chance anyone else would be touching them before he got back anyway. Was it time for the Konoha mission? He couldn’t say he was confident with his skills to make it there and back in one piece but he couldn’t hold off on it forever. The Village needed allies and from a personal standpoint Konoha was a better fit than Kiri. Iwagakure’s primary Kekkei Genkai users, the Airontoku Clan were masters of Youton ; Fire and Earth. Iwa was the Earth and Konoha was the fire. He’d bet his life that they had some particularly useful Katon jutsu exclusive to only their village just as Iwa did. The union of the two would be beneficial to Iwagakure’s primary clan, not to mention himself, a lesser user of the Kekkei Touta.

The positioning of the sun told him his shift was almost over, the time he’d taken with that body had thrown off his timing. He didn’t have time to patrol the area as slowly as he had the first time. There was too much space to clear so he did the only logical thing he could do, and burst into full sprint clearing every large obstruction he could along the way. Rocks, boulders, huts, this far out from Iwagakure there even a few trees. The Shunshin jutsu would have made this a breeze and he would have liked to have been able to obtain it, but there were more pressing things he had to acquire first. His shield of hard manga was a heaven send and it worked charms against everyday objects but it was less useful against more or less any ninja jutsu. The craggy and angry route back to the rendezvous point seemed different now that he was speeding through it. He jumped from rock to rock in a narrow pathway climbing upwards, he would need the altitude to launch himself into the distance. There was less than one hour for him to report back with his tracker in hand he would do what he could to clear the area without losing too much time.

[¤ SFS ¤]

Using his tracker on the fly took a steady hand and sharp eyes. Fortunately, Sen had no lack in either. It was a shame he hadn’t come across too many animals during this patrol. His first time wandering Earth Country without a specific destination should have yielded more sightings of the plants and wildlife, though with even the top of the Earth Country’s food chain, ninja, dying out it made sense that were no plants or wildlife. He’d seen a bear earlier in the patrol but the damned thing looked so bored and out its mind with hunger it didn’t even move to engage him. That of course made no sense to him. Landing on the hard stoned floor of the smallest mountain along the path of his returning sweep he took the less complicated way of an eagle’s view to clear the areas he had left. He would check them all from this one spot and make the dash back to the rendezvous point so the ronin or ninja for the next shift could relieve him. Having to rush life this wasn’t his style, nor was it a good reflection on his performance and reliability but it couldn’t be helped. He could only take the good with the bad and vow to do better next time.

He scanned in all remaining directions and locations. It would only be another hour or so before the next guy was out here and although a genin like himself could get a lot done with an hour the chances of someone waiting in the distance for him to go away so that they could do some sinister thing way out here was slim to none. His tracker was sure as hell earning its keep amongst his tools. He peered northwest looking for the set of boulders where he’d encountered the wolf and saw something upsetting. The man was gone, he might have thrown the whole mission out the window to investigate had he not seen a pack of wolves further north with his body parts in their mouths. He’d wanted to do right and bury the man but it looked like that wasn’t going to happen. If nothing else he was feeding the circle of life that they all had to follow. Sen however hoped that when it was his time to go he didn’t have to do so at the hands of a mangy mutt looking for something to bite into. On top of that if he did have go that way he hoped the dick that found his body could bury him before the wolf came back to turn him into shit, literally.

What a waste.

With that the genin took another few minutes to do a once over through the main points of his route. With the body taken care of he would have no more stops to make. Each area was just as he’d encountered it the first time so without another second of delay he took off for the area the ronin would all meet before calling it a day. Dusk was settling in fast and Sen didn’t know his way around good enough to make it through to the mission’s end point without losing a bit of time. At his fullest and most paranoid speed everything around him was a blur. Miles became yards, yards became feet, feet became inches and by nightfall Sen was back where he started. Greeting the ronin with the same gestures they’d greeted him with before. They expressed gratitude that he was able to assist them and he returned their gratitude, happy they were going through such trouble to protect and guard a country that was not their own. In the end Sen was tired and drenched in sweat. The mission had been so mind consuming that he hadn’t even eaten the food provided for him. It was just was well though it meant he could pig out a little bit after collecting his pay. Even with a little mishap and misfortune along the way, there was nothing like a job well done.

[END]

[Icarus]

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