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(Flashback Eight Years to Amegakure)

Kiyoshi's heavy boots beat along the rooftops surprisingly quietly as he zipped along the rooftops. He was a ninja who had risen far higher than the average shinobi and after a all his time spent at war in the past years he had earned his ANBU four years ago. With age and experience came caution and patience and Kiyoshi had learned to run silently even in his heavy boots at high speeds. Tiny arms clung to him as his young three year old son clung to his back and he zipped about the city. His wife didn't like him taking him out and running all about the rooftops so Kiyoshi just didn't tell her he did it anymore but whenever he could he would sneak the boy out and take him for a free run.

His son looked up to Kiyoshi and Kiyoshi couldn't help but brag and fuel his drive to become a ninja and travel at high speeds silently like his dad could. He wanted his son to feel the rush and exhilaration and get a taste for being a real ninja even at this young age. Fortunately for him his son loved flying about the city when ever he and his father went anywhere. Kiyoshi came to a stop abruptly though skidding to a halt when he noticed a fellow ninja pursuing him across the rooftops. The boy clung tightly to his father as the sudden stop nearly threw him off.

When he saw that his father had stopped for the masked man tears began to well up in the child's eyes. The ANBU agent gave a silent nod to Kiyoshi whispering silently but with some sarcasm, "Your son's never going to warm up to me is he?" Without anymore words he merely withdrew a scroll and handed it over to Kiyoshi he took it in turn and began to read. As soon as Kiyoshi began reading the ANBU Shunshinned out of sight and away. Orders on the paper from the ANBU. Time to take his son back. He sighed, it was getting a little too late for his son anyway that night...




Back on the same roof four hours later and in the dead of the night Kiyoshi stood in the shadows careful not to be seen. He scaled the side of the building walking down the wall silently as he approached a nearby window from above. Swinging upside down his head hanging upside down hidden behind a porcelain mask in the window looking into one Kekkai Masuyo's room. He spoke quietly knowing full well the boy would hear him and follow, he had to. "You going to sleep all night? Get your ass out of bed Masuyo, Amegakure has plans for you tonight."

Kiyoshi then turned and walked just as quietly back to the roof where he knelt on the ledge waiting. If Masuyo heard him he would follow, if he didn't then he wasn't ready. Even if the boy heard him and chose not to follow a crazy ANBU to the roof just because the ANBU asked, then he wasn't ready either. It was time to see if this Kekkai was ready for the next level.

Kiyoshi found in the scroll a small folded set of instructions just as the letter had said, and quickly unfolded the paper now anxious to see what the brass of Amegakure was up to now. The instructions included a list of names of the genin that were meeting here at his house for their first day of training and preparing to work as part of an actual team. The basic gist of the instructions was to run some sort of team building or training drill and begin to prepare them for actual field work outside of the village. Something small, manageable and simplistic for the young kids to follow but still something that would challenge them. But at the bottom in bold thrice underlined characters read, "TAKE IT SLOW!"

Kiyoshi placed his thumb over the bold print and turned his head to address the first of his ninja team to approach. Goryō Tenzō. Kiyoshi grinned at the corner of his mouth at the young and creepily tall boy. His features are rather apathetic and tired just as his reputation as the heir of the entire tenzo clan, but there is something peculiar. How could a five year old boy be tired and bored being assigned to his first team ever?

Before Kiyoshi can think anymore on the matter however, two more shinobi approach together down the road. Kiyoshi recognizes them from the list as well as two additional Tenzo clan members. The first is a boy in with a long tangled mess of dark hair that partially covers his face and a pair of blue eyes that reflect what they see clearly. The second is a young black girl, or at least Kiyoshi assumes as much from what little of her skin is seen underneath the full body wrapping articles of clothing. The first covers her from the stomach up to her shoulders and arms and stops just below her light blue eyes. The second from the waist down to even her shoe-less but wrapped feet.

The first introduces himself loudly like a small child and more to Kiyoshi's general assumption of anxiety and eagerness, "Hi boss! I'm Terekota and this here is Etsuko! We're ready to get to work! What are we doing? Assassination? Scouting?! SPYING?!?!" Thanks to the timely arrival of Etsuko's palm to the back of Terekota's head both Kiyoshi and Goryō are spared a long and unnecessary list. She then with a slight nod of her head greets Goryō as they all were likely students together in the Academy.

Kiyoshi looks down in his hands once more reviewing the names of the three to ensure that he had the right ninja mumbling their information quietly to himself. Names, ages (Terekota 6, Etsuko 7, Goryō 5), blood types, etc etc. A full team of Tenzo? It was unlikely that such a team just happened by crazy odds and this smelled of favors and strings being pulled to have a full Tenzo team under a Tenzo Jounin. It meant Tenzo kept to Tenzo and their higher standards but also that these children had parents that believed they would do well in this full Tenzo team. Likely parents would check in on the progress of their young protege's. Moving his thumb Kiyoshi glanced back at where the bold text had been written but there was nothing now but a small slowly burned whole through the paper.

He looked up at all of them with a straight serious face, "Come on." Kiyoshi turned on his heel and sprinted down the street fast enough for the young ninja to keep up at a nearly dead sprint racing further into the heart of Amegakure. Running towards the center of Amegakure, he realized that though they were Tenzo there was still a chance either their parents or their teacher had not taught them proper chakra control such as simple wall walking. To test this theory, when the streets became thicker he would run up and along a wall parallel to the road but continuing for the downtown district he glanced back to see whether his team was doing alright so far before continuing on to the very heart of the town, sliding down the wall and coming to a stop on the curbside. He looked up and around him at all the vast silver buildings that towered all around them in splendor before looking back as his students caught up and joined him on the curbside. He could think of no better place to train these students to survive outside the village than at the very heart of it.

SPOILER: Click to show

Terekota ( { [|] } ) Etsuko

In the cloud of smoke and ash that billowed up from the impact of the falling inferno of wood it seemed nothing could've survived. Akane descended through the trees until she was on a branch a mere ten meters above looking down through the smoke and ash. She cursed under her breath for having used so much power but she froze in shock at what she saw next. The trunk splintered and fell apart and standing upright still just finish his hand seals, Kiyoshi stood with crimson eyes reflecting passion and rage.

His bare arms rippled with tendons and muscles that glistened with hot beading sweat as his left hand grabbed hold of his right wrist in an instant directing the righ hand palm up at the girl. He grinned at her shock and confusion and hesitated for a moment by her startled appearance before letting loose with a full on display raw heat blasting form the palm of his hand in an nearly undetectable sphere of looked like nothing more than heat waves. On contact however the thermal energy of the attack exploded causing flames to erupt from the tree where she stood as well as her clothes to catch fire.

Her reaction time was still speedy though as she ducked down from the tree in searing pain caused from the heat of the abrupt attack falling to earth and quickly rolling once or twice along the ground to nullify the flames of the heat based attack. As she tumbled she moved forward towards kiyoshi before springing to her feet and engaging him in melee combat as she twirled a kunai from a thigh holster.

Kiyoshi saw the attack and quickly unsheathed his own kunai from his black under armor vest parrying her jabs, stabs and cuts while at the same time returning blow for blow against her with the kunai. A percussion of metallic singing served as the choir for the dance between these two fire lords. Crimson eyes met crimson eyes as the seemingly endless waltz continued.

SPOILER: Click to show

Encho (Terrible Boiling Heat Wave)
Rank: A (150)
Type: Offensive / Airontoku Kekkei-Genkai / Futton Nintaijutsu
Handseals: Yes
Range: See special!
Chakra: x2 High.
Special: Distance of boiling blast is determined by the clan member's 'Utsuru' rank. Blast is formed at the user's palm, is circular, and is roughly 3 meters thick. For every 6 meters the blast travels, the thickness of the blasts increases by 3 meters. Finally, on impact, a boiling blast is incurred, the explosion spreading the boiling heat everywhere at once. Each time retrained, bonus heat explosion damage is stacked. However, after every second retraining, consumption is raised by one. On impact, the heat explosion covers a range a maximum of ten meters.
Description: One of the stronger Airontoku techniques, the clan member extends one arm, palm open and pointed at their target, while the other hand reinforces it by grasping at its wrist. A blast of boiling heat is produce soon after, a near invisible round explosion coming forth in a straight line towards wherever the users wishes. Upon impact, a large cloud of steam comes forth as the explosion occurs, revealing the true power of the technice.
Domain: Airontoku. Atatameru 'A' (Blinding Heat).

Tier Three - Tempered Steel: With the ability to increase their body temperature exceeding standard traditions (tier one), the user's flesh, of which their clan name is derived, becomes even more durable than before. From this, the user is capable of neutralizing a single s-rank worth of piercing damage to their body, or a single s-rank worth of blunt damage. This mastery can only be used once per thread.[/spoiler}

Kiyoshi took off with a burst of surprise shunsin flickering ten meters and attempting to maneuver around Xin. Xin though was able to witness Kiyoshi's movement as his attention had already been to block his path. He sprinted after Kiyoshi in the hopes of catching close enough to attack and otherwise distract kiyoshi. As he drew close he withdrew a blade from beneath his shawl about to slice from behind when suddenly his ankle became bound by one of two massive twenty meter long inkborn snakes. The sudden halt in his stride tripped him face down into the the water where he crashed under the surface.

As Kiyoshi ran forward stilll trying to catch up to Akane something brought him to a sliding halt on the water. The lake before him suddenly split apart leaving a gaping chasm filled with vines that were en-wrapping around each other to form arms and hands. The hands soared upwards out of the gaping maw reaching forward at Kiyoshi. Snapping his hands together he quickly countered the obvious genjutsu using a standard Kai and shattering the illusion. The crevice vanished and again there was merely a lake before him. And further ahead Akane had a large advantage now.

"You can't be serious right now Kiyoshi! She's getting away!" Chen called while he controlled his two snakes at the same time drawing more designs upon his scroll awaiting the enemy to try some sort of counter attack. For now his first snake had not only tripped Xin but having caught onto his ankle it dragged him up out of the water and with a flick of his long slender body sent him skipping back across the lake in the opposite direction of Akane, Kiyoshi, and the Lemur. The second snake had bore down on the hood girl but not in time to stop her from casting the genjutsu on Kiyoshi. Now she was using the the flats of two kunai against the jaws of the massive ink snake.

Chen looked to his sensei curiously as though slightly bored, "You really expect this to let us get to know them? It's not fair to them, sensei!" But he merely looked back with a knowing smile and a twinkle in his eye. He started chuckling softly at first before all out laughing. His students were good, but there were certainly underestimating this young genin troupe.

Light shone through the shutters of Kiyoshi's small rundown excuse for a house for some time before it made it's way across the room to strike his eyes. Disturbed from his rest his eye opened in a careful glare against the light before rolling over onto his side away from the bed. He then worked into a sitting position hunched over the edge of the bed, knees touching elbows and face cradled by his hands. "If slept this late in..." he grumbled his eyes shut tight still in protest to the light, "then I'm late."

What had he been up so late doing? He glanced around the room before he noticed the notebook resting on the night side table. He pried his eyes from the book powerfully and stood to his feet. The veteran quickly crossed the room grabbing the book almost absentmindedly without even a glance at it as he repeated angrily with himself, "Then I'm late!" Quickly grabbing up his cloak he looked down at his weapons he had found rare use for in his recent past. He hesitated before reaching down and grabbing hold of the lengthy chain that held two skull sized steel spheres and wasting no more time bolting from his house.

Once outside he kicked off the ground soaring to the nearest low roof and turning to face towards the training field taking a deep breath before launching into a dead on sprint leaping and bounding from roof to roof using shunshin no jutsu to flicker across larger gaps between the buildings before returning to a racing sprint across the village. Once close enough he closed the remaining distance to the grounds in a chain of three more shunshins.

Flickering onto the edge of the of the grounds he broke into a calm but quick walk, shouldering his meteor hammer onto his shoulder as he approached the rest of the team. It took no effort to recognize who among the three was the team leader. As he drew closer he muttered audibly, "Apologies sir," accompanied with a slight bow of the head.

"Oi, boys!" The pair turned sharply to the familiar call of their old Jounin instructor who had been leading the team of young shinobi in their drills. He smiled from the shore of the lake walking backwards out onto the water and waving them to come in closer. The two glanced at each other with a grin before they rose to their feet and walked to the shore while Chen tucked his painting supplies away into the folds of his baggy robe.

They stepped out onto the lake joining their veteran as the team of three continued to battle it out further out on the lake. The Jounin smiled as they approached, "If it isn't a pair of hooligans I wish I hadn't been the one to train, what are the pair of you doing out here today? Shouldn't you be off saving the world or preventing some sort of catastrophe on its way to the village or are you too good for the grunt work of being heroes?"

"Well there's that," Kiyoshi laughed, "and then of course we're just being lazy on this beautiful day." he glanced back at Chen for confirmation who merely nodded with a smile. "Of course we have you to blame for that though don't we? You were the one who taught us everything we know so-"

"So like every other maladjusted behavior you two manifest, I'll be blamed for it." The old man laughed heartily, "How do our superiors see it that way still? Yet every time you guys do good it's always about how good you two are as stand alone ninja and I never get any credit. Shunned like a Eunuch in a brothel house."

Chen sighed crossing his arms across his chest and hugging his art supplies to his chest. Slowly shaking his head he began, "You always had such an elegant way with words, sensei." Metal on metal rang out as a particularly vicious slash was parried by the team causing the three to look across at the team as they continued their exercise with gusto. "You're team seems to be shaping up a bit... what are they all? Genin?"

"Yeah, but they'll be going into the chunnin exams this year." the Jounin said quietly in contemplation before continuing, "Truth be told boys that's actually the reason I called you two over here. I need to ask a favor from you-" he cut himself off and with a sharp and piercing whistle called the exercise to a stop as he waved in the young ninja for some debriefing.