>>5883690
You approach the wrecked airship cautiously, sticking to the formation you previously decided on. Sensing no specific threats, Wasabi waves you over to the damaged hull where you spy an opening – seemingly a blown-out window.

“Interesting,” Denki-kun muses, carefully peering inside where the entire airship interior sits at a slightly odd angle. “The designer put the habitable decks at the bottom of the fuselage?”

“I don’t smell anything flammable,” Wasabi reports. “Sensei?”

“I don’t see any immediate threats,” Hanabi-sensei replies with a frown. “There are two main decks, the bottom of which is seemingly for cargo and machinery.”

“What about the bridge?”

She pauses for a moment before gesturing towards the forward end of the airship. “That way. It’s been partly crushed under the rest of the hull.”

>Let’s move along the outside of the airship to get to the bridge.
>We can move through the inside, investigate as we head to the bridge.
>I’m more interested in the cargo spaces right now. Can you tell anything from here?
>Other?

>>5883726
>We can move through the inside, investigate as we head to the bridge.

>>5883726
>>Let’s move along the outside of the airship to get to the bridge.

>>5883726
>>We can move through the inside, investigate as we head to the bridge.

>>5883726
>>I’m more interested in the cargo spaces right now. Can you tell anything from here?

>>5883726
>3d6 best of three

Rolled 1, 2, 1 = 4 (3d6)

>>5885207

Rolled 4, 6, 2 = 12 (3d6)

>>5885207
Like this?

Rolled 3, 3, 6 = 12 (3d6)

>>5885207

>>5885207
“Let’s head inside,” you suggest quietly. “Search the interior on our way to the bridge.”

“Wouldn’t that open us up to ambushes?” Denki-kun asks nervously.

“No,” Sumirin answers curtly. “Not with Sensei and Wasabi here.”

“Not to mention that if the structure has collapsed around the bridge,” Hanabi-sensei muses, “it may only be accessible from the inside.”

…

With Wasabi in the lead, you slowly progress through the corridors of the airship’s main passenger deck, carefully checking rooms as you close in on the bridge and marking above each door in turn with an X carved by the tip of a kunai. The one thing you do notice is that while there are certainly rooms that appear to be designed to be passenger cabins, lounges, and even a formal dining room, there’s no sign of any passengers. No bodies or luggage are anywhere to be seen, and while there’s plenty of broken dishes and stemware scattered about the areas of the kitchen and dining room you don’t see any food or expensive bottles of sake or wine which would also have been shattered in the crash.

Yeah. This whole thing is fishy as hell.

…

When you eventually arrive at the bridge you find that the damage is severe – the structural ribs that hold the whole airship together have buckled where the exposed command bridge would ordinarily be exposed at the keel. Essentially, the spine of the vessel has been snapped at the proverbial neck.

“Seems the bridge is badly crushed,” Hanabi-sensei confirms. “The damage was so severe I couldn’t tell for sure at a distance… too much debris overlapping can make it kinda hard to tell what you’re looking at.”

“Are there any bodies?” you ask Wasabi-kun.

She nods. “Two.”

>Recover the bodies and seal them away. Konoha may be able to identify them later.
>The bodies are irrelevant. The fact that there was a crew means there may be flight logs.
>Leave a few shadow clones to secure the area, proceed to check other areas of the ship.
>Other?

>>5885936
>The bodies are probably booby trapped, use a clone to seal them away.

>>5885936
>>Recover the bodies and seal them away. Konoha may be able to identify them later.

>>5885936
>>The bodies are irrelevant. The fact that there was a crew means there may be flight logs.

>>5885936
>>Recover the bodies and seal them away. Konoha may be able to identify them later.

>>5885936
>1d6 best three of four

Rolled 4 (1d6)

>>5886792

Rolled 6 (1d6)

>>5886792

Rolled 6 (1d6)

>>5886792

Rolled 4 (1d6)

>>5886792

>>5885936
You’re cautious when you seal away the bodies for later identification, even going so far as to use a shadow clone to actually do the sealing itself. When you take a moment to think about the situation it wouldn’t be unusual for the bodies of the crew to have had traps placed on them, which isn’t an uncommon tactic used by shinobi even from the old days of the warring states. A look around what little remains of the bridge confirms that while there aren’t any traps there either, there also isn’t much in the way of materiel to recover for later analysis.

…

“Well,” you muse, seated across from Naruto-san for your debriefing, “it seemed to me like the whole thing was just being used to transport the puppets.”

“I have to concur,” Hanabi-sensei adds. “There was no evidence of passengers or other cargo, and no evidence that any other shinobi tampered with the crash site before we arrived.”

“What few crew were aboard seemed to have scrapped any data recording devices as the airship was going down,” you suggest. “There was no evidence our team could find to indicate the reason for the crash.”

“Then I’ll have the Research bureau look into the design of the puppets you recovered,” Naruto decides wearily, shuffling a few papers on his desk. “I’ll also have Sasuke lead the investigation into the identity of the two crew.”

“Well done. Please be sure to give my compliments to your team, Shiki-kun… it’s good to have the three of you back together.”

…

Outside, you sit on a bench near Senju park with your teammates – there’s nothing wrong with eating at a restaurant, but sometimes it’s nice to munch on sushi sitting in the shade on a warm day, with a nice breeze and a faint scent of lavender, with your two closest friends on each side.
>1d6, DC 11
>SP: 4/4

Rolled 3 (1d6)

>>5888823

Rolled 5 (1d6)

>>5888823

Rolled 2 (1d6)

>>5888823

>>5888823
Use 1sp?
>Yes
>No

>>5889541
>No
just to see what happens

>>5889541
>>Yes
Sure

>>5889541
>Yes

>>5889541
>>Yes

>>5889541
>>Yes

>>5889541
Just for a moment it feels like you’ve picked up on something that feels out of place, drawing your attention to a boy perhaps a few years your senior, whose dark hair has been cropped short and bleached at the sides. The ‘punk’ look isn’t exactly rare in Konoha, so it’s not his clothes or his grooming choices that catch your attention. Instead, it’s an ominous feeling you got out of the blue, and which became even stronger (though no clearer in its meaning) when your eyes fell on him. He doesn’t seem to take any notice of you, or in fact anything else for that matter, instead walking swiftly along the path around the perimeter of the park.

“Are you okay?” Sumire asks curiously.

“I’m sorry?”

“You spaced out there a moment,” Wasabi adds. “What’s up?”

“It’s that guy over there with the weird hair,” you observe in a low voice. “Something feels really wrong about him… it’s pure instinct. I don’t know how else to describe it.”

Sumire and Wasabi exchange a worried glance.

“We could do something about it if we knew a little more,” Sumire points out.

>Don’t mind it then. Not every random thought that pops into my head is significant.
>Let’s tail him for a little while. That feeling was… well, REALLY ominous.
>We could report it to Hanabi-sensei. Suspicious person and all that.
>Other?

>>5890994
>We could report it to Hanabi-sensei. Suspicious person and all that.
What shinobi doesn't trust their gut? Let's tail this guy till Hanabi gets here.

>>5890994
>>Let’s tail him for a little while. That feeling was… well, REALLY ominous.

>>5890994
>>Let’s tail him for a little while. That feeling was… well, REALLY ominous.

>>5890994
>>Don’t mind it then. Not every random thought that pops into my head is significant.

>>5890994
>Let’s tail him for a little while. That feeling was… well, REALLY ominous.

It's funny to think of how valid a mention of a "gut instinct" would be on any sort of after action report when involving particularly experienced ninja.

>>5890996
>1d6 DC 11
>SP: 3/4

Rolled 4 (1d6)

>>5891849

Rolled 5 (1d6)

>>5891849

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5891849

>>5891849
Spend 1 sp?
>Yes
>No

>>5892483
yes

>>5892483
>yes

>>5892483
maybe
roll 1d2 to find out

>>5892483
>Yes

>>5892483
>>No

>>5891849
>SP: 2/4
“I’m inclined to trust my gut on this one,” you admit quietly. “It’s not exactly scientific.”

“But it does make sense,” Sumire assures you. “We’ve trained to hone our instincts after all.”

…

It’s always a fine line to walk between following someone, who by the look of him is rather alert, and not being noticed by that person. Typically when someone isn’t actively searching for a problem it’s possible that they could walk right past you without realizing it – particularly with weaker bandits, it’s something that actually happens from time to time. But it seems that for all his alertness, your ‘mark’ lacks even the most basic training as a shinobi that would make it more likely for him to notice that he’s being followed.

You tail him away from the park and into town, where he picks his way through crowds along the main streets. Occasionally he slips into an alleyway and forces you to follow him from above, along the rooftops and awnings, before returning to a main street.

Half an hour later, you sense something else amiss – a second individual who happens to be tailing the same subject. This time it’s a woman, somewhere around Hanabi-sensei’s age by the look of her, with blonde hair, a dark green blouse with shorts, and long white tabi-boots. Most noticeable is her makeup, which is a rather odd choice of yellow eyeshadow and matching lipstick.

[We’ll keep an eye on both of them,] you declare using the wave transmission method to silently communicate with your teammates after noticing the newcomer for the first time. [Is it just me, or is it hard to get a read on this newcomer’s strength?]

[It’s not you,] Wasabi confirms. [Somethin’ about her rubs me the wrong way.]

[Is it her makeup?] Sumire asks flatly. [Whoever told her yellow was an attractive color to put on her face did her no favors.]

[Partly,] Wasabi admits. [It’s like neither of them understands how ‘normal’ people look.]
>1/2

>>5893965
Actually, that’s not as shallow an observation in this case as it might otherwise be – certainly many shinobi have unconventional appearances. One may have unusually-colored hair, another may have patterns in their eyes. One man who worked with your mom when she was younger even looked like a shark. But it also happens that the one who looked like a shark was a member of Akatsuki, which highlights another trend – that often times, the most unconventional-looking shinobi are the ones with unconventional abilities.

If people with dangerous-feeling auras (for lack of a better description) also look like they have no common sense, it could just be because they really don’t think like normal people and so truly lack that common sense. And when great power becomes unmoored from a conventional notions of responsibility and morality, that’s when such power becomes dangerous.

>This is getting out of hand. Report these two as suspicious persons and continue tailing them.
>Continue your observations – try to discern the relationship between these two people, if any.
>Use shadow clones to confront the duo. This will force their intentions out into the open.
>Other?

>>5893968
>This is getting out of hand. Report these two as suspicious persons and continue tailing them.

Red alert, weirdo detected. They fail to pass the vibe check, could be kage-level.

>>5893968
>>This is getting out of hand. Report these two as suspicious persons and continue tailing them.

>>5893968
>>This is getting out of hand. Report these two as suspicious persons and continue tailing them.

>>5893968
>>This is getting out of hand. Report these two as suspicious persons and continue tailing them.

>>5893978
Probably not, just being that unusual, not getting a clear read on ability level and Shiki's instincts is enough to report it. If it turns out to be nothing its gonna be embarassing, but its better than the alternatives.

>>5893968
>Continue your observations – try to discern the relationship between these two people, if any.

>>5893968
>1d6 high roll, taking the first three

Rolled 2 (1d6)

>>5894497

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5894497

Rolled 2 (1d6)

>>5894497
lmao high roll

>>5894497
This part is going to be tricky – you have to carefully time your shadow clone technique so that nobody notices you doing it in the crowd, specifically the two targets you’ve been tailing so carefully. However, out of sheer dumb luck, the boy with the goofy haircut just happens to turn around at the exact moment you create your clone, notices you with a shout, and whips his… his arm? Around?

“Shit!” you curse, whipping up a tenrō fūsa barrier to block a powerful attack from the teen.

That shot was delayed by only a second, since he had to transform his arm first before unleashing the wide blast, which the woman in the yellow makeup blocks by transforming her own arm. The blast then heads for you and several people around you, including your team, who you have to protect on the spot.

“That escalated quickly,” Sumire grumbles. “What should we do, help the wounded?”

There have been casualties already among the civilians around you – which leaves you with a sense of boiling rage. Those who can are fleeing on foot, but with the amount of power being thrown around even so far you doubt any of them are going to get far enough away to be safe.

“There’s two enemies,” Wasabi observes. “I say we deal with that first.”

>You two take on the angsty-looking teen. I’ll deal with the woman with the piss-stain makeup.
>Cover for the civilians, help those whom you can. I’ll keep a barrier up to protect you all.
>Help the civilians. I’m going to fight.
>Other?

>>5895878
>Help the civilians. I’m going to fight.
They do healing, we dont, its an easy choice

So I don't watch Boruto, but is the in character assumption that these two are Otsutsuki infiltrators or stooges of some fashion? Is that the type of thing that is worthy of calling in more immediate powerful help to prevent whatever fucked up things they probably have on hand/escape methods, or can Shiki just beat them up?

>>5895878
>>Help the civilians. I’m going to fight.

>>5895927
I don't watch it either, so i can't say but Otsutsuki is nothing more than a suspicion at this point, to much Shiki doesn't know. Its worth calling in back up, but just the blast should be enough to alert every shinobi in the village, so i voted to split between taking care of the injured and keeping these unknowns occupied.

>>5895878
>>Other? Shiki protects the civilians with his barrier, Wasabi and Sumire fight the two enemies.

>>5896049
>>5896052
double vote, delete one or both won't be counted.

>>5895878
>Help the civilians. I’m going to fight.

>>5895878
>3d6, DC 11
>SP: 2/4

Rolled 1, 6, 2 = 9 (3d6)

>>5896925
No I'm just tired and losing my memory.

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5896925
3d6, or 3 people rolling 1d6?

Rolled 1, 4, 6 = 11 (3d6)

>>5896925

Rolled 1, 1, 5 = 7 (3d6)

>>5896925

>>5896925
So yeah, that was my bad. I'll simply consider >>5897091
as a pass for now.

>>5896925
“Help the civilians,” you insist. “Until the Hokage gets here, I’ll fight.”

Wasabi is clearly about to say something, until Sumire puts a hand on her shoulder, shaking her head. So instead, Wasabi says something obviously very different to what she’d wanted.

“… be careful.”

“You too.”

…

“Hey,” you speak up, left hand finding the scabbard unsealed at your waist and gripping so that your hand just barely nudges your sword free to be drawn. “You two mind moving whatever this is somewhere else?”

“Why’s a shitty brat here?” the blonde woman scoffs. “Shouldn’t you just go home like a good boy?”

The punk-looking boy takes the momentary distraction to try running, only for the blonde woman to cut him off with a blindingly fast movement.

“Who said you could leave?”

Before she strikes him, she abruptly finds you in her way with a frown. “Same question.”

“Heeeeh…” the woman half-muses, half-sighs. “You’re pretty quick on your feet.”

The punk boy’s back is up against a proverbial and literal wall, and he clearly knows it. His body is tensed, ready to try and flee again or attack the instant he sees an opening. On the other hand, the blonde woman gives off the air of one who’s completely in control of a situation despite the fact that you’re plainly being underestimated. But that works fine for you, since it’s also clear that she can’t sense senjutsu chakra or else she might be more inclined to deal with you with a little more urgency.

She's fast and strong, and you haven't really seen anything else she might be able to do other than transforming her limbs - but that technique alone is enough to make you wary of this one.

>Keep things under control and don’t show off until Naruto-san gets here. Don’t let either one of them escape.
>If you were to really apply yourself, you might be able to take these two down – but evacuations will have to finish first.
>By using your hiraishin and ryūmei ‘ghost’ together you can probably teleport both these troublemakers out of the village.
>Other?

>>5893968
>Keep things under control and don’t show off until Naruto-san gets here. Don’t let either one of them escape.

>>5898446
>>Keep things under control and don’t show off until Naruto-san gets here. Don’t let either one of them escape.

>>5898446
>>By using your hiraishin and ryūmei ‘ghost’ together you can probably teleport both these troublemakers out of the village.

>>5898446
>1d6 taking first three
>DC: 11
>SP: 2/4

Rolled 6 (1d6)

>>5899395

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5899395

Rolled 6 (1d6)

>>5899395

>>5899395
As strong as you can tell the woman is, there are two things that definitely work in your favor – your techniques are one of those things, specifically the combination of senjutsu’s expanded sensory range (functionally an ‘early warning system’ for close combat) and the hiraishin (which makes you confoundingly hard to hit). The second thing in your favor is that the hokage is already on his way, meaning that all you really need to do here is drag things out without anyone getting hurt.

“My name is Shiki,” you tell the woman, drawing a pre-marked kunai with a twirl, “and as a jōnin I can’t let you do whatever you want.”

“… you’re serious.”

“Once I draw a blade, always.”

Her expression shifts slightly, from mocking to somewhat more serious. “Delta.”

She launches an immediate attack, ignoring the kunai which flies past her left shoulder as she pumps power and chakra into her right arm. The blow shatters the sidewalk where you were standing, and the punk boy slides back on his feet as you land a powerful kick against his raised forearms.

The woman’s second punch is parried by your blade as you draw it from its saya, though she manages to evade when you shift your left hand up on the hilt to turn and slash at her face.

“I hadn’t forgotten about you,” the woman calling herself Delta insists to the punk before attacking you by modifying her leg to launch a series of rapid-fire front kicks which you manage to parry while drawing out another kunai – you realize quickly that placing a hiraishin mark on her leg doesn’t achieve anything thanks to how her body is transforming every time. The implication is that she must be altering the limb almost at the cellular level, so that the ‘surface’ you mark with the seal no longer exists from moment to moment, like waves washing away characters written in the sand.

“Sit tight while I deal with this, Kawaki,” she instructs over the noise of her strikes being deflected by your blade.

You feel like you’ve done well so far… but you’ll need to stall for just a little more time before Naruto-san can get here. That’s perhaps the only drawback to your position – with as fast as you’ve become, it sometimes makes everything else feel painfully slow by comparison.

>Taunt her about her makeup choices. If she acts hastily she may make an exploitable mistake.
>Confront her over her loyalties – she’s almost certainly a member of ‘Kara’, right?
>Pull a nasty trick or two. She’s definitely the type to waste time complaining about it.
>Other?

>>5901951
>Taunt her about her makeup choices. If she acts hastily she may make an exploitable mistake.

>>5901951
>>Confront her over her loyalties – she’s almost certainly a member of ‘Kara’, right?

>>5901951
>>Pull a nasty trick or two. She’s definitely the type to waste time complaining about it.

>>5901951
>>Taunt her about her makeup choices. If she acts hastily she may make an exploitable mistake.

>>5901951
>Pull a nasty trick or two. She’s definitely the type to waste time complaining about it.
>"That's a nasty technique! What have you done to your body?"

Remind me again if the hiraishin preserves momentum?
I seem to remember it doesn't, which could be really useful with the ryumei/hiraishin combo.

>slash at a target
>teleport behind them, or even above or below
>whether the slash was a hit or a miss, you no longer have to spend time or energy slowing the blade down and reversing course
>it also won't throw off your stance no matter how hard or fast you swing, you can simply cancel the momentum and immediately begin accelerating again

Unless you're using a technique that preserves the momentum of your swings, it should save some time.
So your follow up would not only be from an unpredictable angle, it would also be faster and potentially hit harder than usual. No fear of an over-commit.

>>5901951
>Pull a nasty trick or two. She’s definitely the type to waste time complaining about it.

>>5901951
>1d6 first three
>DC:10
>2/4

Rolled 6 (1d6)

>>5902975

Rolled 3 (1d6)

>>5902975

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5902975

>>5901951
It’s undeniable that at least in terms of raw power this ‘Delta’ woman has a slight edge on you, which you’re certain would be insane if you stopped to think about it. But you don’t actually have that luxury – instead you have to rely on what you assume is [i]your[/i] strength, which is the fact that you’ve spent your whole life studying techniques to seize advantage even from enemies who are stronger than you, by any underhanded means necessary. If you can’t overpower Delta, then you’ll just have to beat her in a way that doesn’t rely on playing that game.

“Well,” she muses with an arrogant smirk, “here I come, please try to amuse me!”

A kunai with chakra flowing through it forces her to sidestep even as she charges, but the perfect timing means that you can use hiraishin to jump to it and attack into her blind spot. Despite having the advantage of position she dodges without looking… only to find that your attack was much wider than she anticipated.

“Senpō: Hibana Mankai.”

It’s strange that she sensed the attack coming but seemed to realize nothing of its actual nature, but you’re mostly just relieved when it hits. Much like the technique it’s based on this attack takes the appearance of a trail of drifting white flower petals released en masse by your sword’s arc, however instead of white flames these petals are even more lethal droplets of blisteringly-hot acid – which, as with your more basic vapor release techniques, also acts as a potent oxidizer.

Translation: they explode when they hit something organic, and melt anything they touch that’s inorganic.

Many of the petals do exactly that when they touch Delta’s skin, although she does manage an effective countermeasure by transforming her own body in response. Parts of her skin are clearly burned and bloodied even afterwards, as she raises her hardened, rock-like arm to parry a two-handed cut from your sword.

She pushes you back before you can ‘tag’ her with a hiraishin formula.

“Hiraishin…” she acknowledges, having now seen the technique twice. “And an attack I’ve never heard of before.”

“Yeah,” a voice joins in from a nearby rooftop. “You’ve built yourself a skillset almost as nasty as your mom’s, Shiki-kun.”

“You’re late,” you grumble.

“Ah, sorry, sorry!” Naruto-san apologizes, half-jokingly. “There were some other things I had to see to.”

The punk-looking boy remains rooted to the spot, like a deer staring dumbfounded at an oncoming thunder-train, while Delta laughs.

“Things are getting interesting!” she declares. “First this brat turns out to be way more fun than I was told, and now I get to play with the Hokage himself? How lucky~!”
>1/2

>>5904740
Of course, the nastiest thing you’ve done so far is nothing like what Naori-ue would do. Information is a matter of life and death in the shinobi world – as an objective of countless high-stakes missions, as a source of advantage in combat for those who can obtain it, or as a secret to be preserved until best use of it can be made. Of course any two opponents are going to be constantly gleaning information even in the middle of a pitched battle, always on the lookout for a way to end things in a single decisive instant. And when you think you’ve found such a precious thing it can lead you to act on it immediately to capitalize on the potential advantage.

There’s a risk that goes with that, of course.

A shinobi must always be mindful of the difference between “seeing something” and “being shown something”, because when an enemy shows you something by choice it’s important not to trust that information. In the field or in a battle, a shinobi or a team of shinobi will face dire consequences for failing to make that determination.

In this instance, the disinformation you’ve planted with your first two moves is that your hiraishin requires a marking. Thanks to Ryūzetsu-ue, that’s not true at all.

>Wait for an opportune moment in the fight between Delta and Naruto to strike a decisive blow.
>Use your ghost-clone to capture the punk and remove him from the battlefield.
>Other?

>>5904755
>>Use your ghost-clone to capture the punk and remove him from the battlefield.

>>5904755
>Wait for an opportune moment in the fight between Delta and Naruto to strike a decisive blow.

>>5904755
>>Use your ghost-clone to capture the punk and remove him from the battlefield.

>>5904755
>1d6, taking the first three

Rolled 3 (1d6)

>>5906124

Rolled 2 (1d6)

>>5906124

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5906124

>>5906124
It’s been evident this whole time that Delta is only here because of the punk, so now that Naruto-san is here that clears the way for you to remove any potential obstacles to him beating your mutual opponent like a drum. And right now the most obvious way for Delta to ‘win’ is to simply ignore Naruto-san and do whatever it is she came here to do to the punk.

That’s why after a few moments of setup you hurl a kunai past Delta in a line towards the punk, flying to it in the instant it’s closest to him. While you execute this move two things happen – Delta realizes after it misses her what your plan actually is, and the punk does as well. That’s probably why he does something you didn’t really anticipate and slaps your hand away as you try to grab him.

In that instant Delta turns and fires a beam from her left eye, which grazes your left arm before you can plant your foot in the boy’s gut in an awkward twisting movement. That’s when you can finally leap to a marking in Amegakure, totally ignoring any concept of distance – which probably still isn’t far enough that Delta can’t hear what comes next.

“NICE JOB CAPTAIN UNDERCUT!” you roar angrily, cracking the boy over the head. “DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW BAD THAT FUCKING HURT!?”

“Where…” he begins.

“MY PARENTS’ HOUSE!” you shout at him.

“Do you have to…”

“YES!”

“Shiki,” Ryūzetsu-ue greets you with a frown. “What is this?”

“Sorry,” you grunt, still in pain as you glance at the injury which you can’t help but notice isn’t healing the way it should while you’re in sage mode. “I didn’t have much time to think.”

“It seems you were having some difficulty,” she muses, looking at her unexpected ‘guest’. “Can you heal it on your own?”

You force your chakra to circulate within the wound, using a senjutsu-enhanced first aid technique that would probably kill anyone without senjutsu chakra on the spot. Eventually the wound starts to close, and after a few minutes all that’s left is the scar.

Ryūzetsu-ue lets out a low whistle. “That must have been some attack to leave a scar even after all that.”

“It definitely was,” you confirm, gesturing to introduce the two other people in the room to one another. “Undercut-kun, this is my mother Ryūzetsu-ue. Mom, this is… um…”

“… who are you again?”
>1/2

>>5907151
“I thought you were calling me ‘undercut’ just to insult me,” he shoots back angrily, “but you actually just don’t remember my name?”

“It can be both,” you insist curtly. “Name. Yours. Gimme.”

“It’s Kawaki,” he replies, still clearly frustrated with you. “Try and remember it this time?”

“Oh, I’ll remember alright,” you assure him. “It’s the name of the guy who nearly got my arm blown off by that crazy lady’s eye beams, after all.”

“… I feel like you’re mad about this.”

“… nah.”

>Ryūzetsu-ue, would you mind helping me secure our ‘guest’ here for a little while?
>I’m going to go back to Konoha real quick here, see if there’s any way I can help out.
>Kawaki-kun, who exactly are you and why were you even in Konoha in the first place?
>Other?

>>5908564
>>Kawaki-kun, who exactly are you and why were you even in Konoha in the first place?

>>5908564
>>Kawaki-kun, who exactly are you and why were you even in Konoha in the first place?

>>5908564
>>Kawaki-kun, who exactly are you and why were you even in Konoha in the first place?

Oh fuck, its this guy. I wonder what will happen with Boruto now ...

>>5908564
“So, Kawaki-kun… would you tell me why you were even in Konohagakure in the first place?” you ask curiously. “I have no idea what’s been going on.”

“Shouldn’t you be more worried about that blonde guy?” Kawaki asks with a glare.

“What, the Hokage?” you barely contain a derisive snort. “I’d be more worried he’d kill that ‘Delta’ woman by accident before he can interrogate her properly.”

“Delta is a complete monster,” Kawaki insists.

“So am I,” you shrug. “So is my sister. So are both of my moms. And as much as it pains me to admit it, Lord Seventh is still stronger than I am… for now. So why don’t you just answer my question?”
>1d6, best three of four

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5912431

Rolled 6 (1d6)

>>5912431

Rolled 4 (1d6)

>>5912431

Rolled 4 (1d6)

>>5912431

>>5912431
Kawaki-kun glares at you.

You smile back.

This seems to unnerve him slightly.

Good.

Eventually, he sighs and gives up. “I wanted as much distance from Delta and her ‘comrades’ as I could get. I figured they’d send some trash like Garō after me, so staying inside a hidden village and keeping my nose clean should’ve been fine.”

“Garō?” a voice repeats that name as Naori-ue slides the door open and joins you, with your sister at her side. “So yeah, why don’t you just tell us a bit more please?”

Kawaki-kun’s body stiffens.

“It’s okay,” Makoto insists with a smile almost the same as yours. “We’re not monsters. We just want you to tell us more about this ‘Garō’ guy, if you can.”

“You know the name?” Kawaki-kun asks curtly.

- About three hours earlier -

You are Uzumaki Makoto, a master of paper ninjutsu, Uzumaki-style fūinjutsu (which now seems to include both the infamous techniques hiraishin and kongō fūsa), storm-release ninjutsu, and senjutsu, as well as the summoner of Ichigo-chan (a giant poisonous salamander) and Uwazi (a shrike from the sage clan to which your mother Naori belongs).

Speaking of mothers, yours is in the process of giving you a mission.

“So yeah,” she concludes. “We know he’s with Kara, so try to capture him if you can. But he’s also clearly not one of their heavy-hitters, so if you accidentally kill him that’s fine too. We probably wouldn’t lose any information that’s worth you getting hurt over.”

“Okay,” you bow your head politely, acknowledging the order. “Understood, ma’am.”

As awkward as it is for you to ‘ma’am’ your mother like that, the formality of the situation sorta demands it – and she knows it too.

>Start by dispersing yourself into paper sheets, scouting ahead, and reforming once you find the target.
>Head out on foot, blending into the rest of the crowd and observing the target when you find him.
>Scatter some paper butterflies, use one to place a hiraishin mark, and detain him in one move.
>Other?

>>5914378
>>Start by dispersing yourself into paper sheets, scouting ahead, and reforming once you find the target.

>>5914378
>>Start by dispersing yourself into paper sheets, scouting ahead, and reforming once you find the target.

We can play the paper demon, hell yeah!

>>5914378
>Start by dispersing yourself into paper sheets, scouting ahead, and reforming once you find the target.
paper is absolutely broken and i love it. also pog for finally getting to play as the other sibling, we focused on shiki for so long i thought it would never happen.

>>5914378
>>Start by dispersing yourself into paper sheets, scouting ahead, and reforming once you find the target.

>>5914378
>1d6
>best three of four

Rolled 2 (1d6)

>>5915603
Come on, bless the next generation of paper based basasses!

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5915603

Rolled 4 (1d6)

>>5915603

Rolled 3 (1d6)

>>5915603

>>5915603
“If you’ll excuse me,” you insist calmly before your body starts to peel apart and flutter out the nearest window like ten thousand butterflies. By spreading the paper out you can sense a wide range as you cross the lake to Amegakure’s old town, searching for chakra that doesn’t belong there. After a few minutes of searching you identify a reasonably strong chakra belonging to a large and deeply suspicious-looking man who more or less matches the very general description you’ve been given.

As you begin to reform he raises his arm, which ends in a large clawed device with three blades that launches a ball of compressed chakra. It doesn’t do anything of course, except it puts a pretty big hole in the side of an abandoned building behind where you were trying to appear.

“That wasn’t very neighborly,” you tell him calmly.

He whips around, only to find your hand blocking his wrist – your head, shoulders, and arms have formed along with two heavenly wings formed from paper, though your body still ends in a jumble of sheets below your waist that floats unbound by the earth below you.

“What the hell is this!?” the man demands.

“Exactly what it looks like,” you insist. “In the world of shinobi strange things like this happen from time to time.”

He realizes too late that you’ve started to use your paper to bind him in place, and he struggles vainly to free himself. But you have far, far more chakra than he does – enough to recreate yourself entirely several times over if need be.

>Finish wrapping him in paper before interrogating him on the spot.
>Cover his mouth and nose. Drive home the point that he’s not in control here.
>Slip your paper into the joints of his shinobi tools, destroy them from inside.
>Other?

>>5917646
>Cover his mouth and nose. Drive home the point that he’s not in control here.
>Slip your paper into the joints of his shinobi tools, destroy them from inside.

No reason not to do both.

>>5917682
>>5917646
Supporting

>>5917646
>>Slip your paper into the joints of his shinobi tools, destroy them from inside.

>>5917646
The first thing you do, almost entirely for the purpose of establishing dominance, is slip paper into the gaps between all the parts of his weaponized arm. By hardening them you essentially create a dozen sharp blades inside his arm, and use them to shred it from the inside. Next you turn to the mask you see covering his face.

“If I take this mask off,” you muse, “will you die?”

“… no?”

“Good,” you reply cheerfully, before slicing the tubes running into the facepiece and ripping it off. “That will make this easier.”

Then you proceed to cover his face with your paper.

“I have no particular desire to kill you,” you admit, your tone one of complete calm. “However if you force the issue I won’t hesitate either.”

You wait for a few moments before unsealing the man’s mouth.

“Let’s start with your name.”

“Fuck you!”

“Not the name I would have chosen for you,” you counter with a frown. “I’ll let you think about this for a little while longer.”

After uncovering his mouth again, you choose a different question. “Tell me about Kara.”

“You’re just a stupid little girl!” he protests. “As if anyone would be afraid of you!”

>This is a waste of time, and you don’t feel like getting too torture-y. So just finish him off.
>Try choking him again. It’s only a matter of time before he figures out you’re serious.
>You have ways of breaking people’s spirits through words alone. Try using that against him.
>Other?

>>5918879
>>You have ways of breaking people’s spirits through words alone. Try using that against him.

>>5918879
>Papercuts. Lots of papercuts, in very uncomfortable places.

>>5918879
>>You have ways of breaking people’s spirits through words alone. Try using that against him.

>>5918879
>You have ways of breaking people’s spirits through words alone. Try using that against him.

>>5918879
>1d6 best three of four

Rolled 6 (1d6)

>>5919347

Rolled 5 (1d6)

>>5919347

Rolled 2 (1d6)

>>5919347

Rolled 4 (1d6)

>>5919347

>>5919347
“Okay.”

You cover his face again.

“You know, I really don’t go out of my way to kill,” you admit. “It’s not that I’m particularly averse, I was raised as a shinobi after all.”

The man struggles to speak, but you continue.

“It’s just that we live in a different time, you know,” you tell him, feigning affability for just a little longer. “This is a time of peace, broadly speaking. Even most shinobi aren’t exactly lining up to die anymore – killing someone so halfhearted just feels pointless. And I don’t care much for pointless things.”

You sense a protest, but you continue.

“So, why would I kill you now, you may be wondering,” you muse. “Well, ask yourself this – what were you told about Amegakure before you were sent here? Were you warned?”

Silence, so you uncover the man’s nose.

“We may be at peace, and the new city of Amegakure may be more pleasant,” you explain carefully, “but this place is still secured by the same technique which caught even Jiraiya of the Sannin… who you most certainly are not.”

“In other words, you stood no chance,” you continue. “And my suspicion is that Kara knew that from the start… and yet they sent you here anyway.”

A pause.

“That’s right. To them you were considered expendable. Someone without value to the organization. Someone… pointless. And as I already informed you, I don’t care much for pointless things.”

Then you cover his nose again.
>1/2

>>5919950
A guy this big has big lungs, so you’re keenly aware of the fact that you’ve never actually covered his face for long enough that it’s even a viable threat to his health. But the psychological impact of doing it while calmly explaining to him that his life has no value right now is far greater – and based on his worried reactions, you’ve gotten under his skin in a big way. Encountering a monstrously strong person like your parents, or Konan-sensei, or even you and your brother, has an impact on people. The top members of Kara must also be monstrous, because you can see clearly that this man has been traumatized by the experience. Even now, it’s an insecurity you can prey on.

“Of course, if you could answer a few questions,” you muse, “your existence would no longer be pointless to Amegakure.”

You remove the paper from his face again. “So, do you feel like telling this ‘silly little girl’ what she wants to know?”

“… Garō.”

“What is your position in Kara?”

“Outer.”

“Meaning?”

“Not an Inner,” he answers quickly. “The inners run everything.”

“What are their names?”

“I don’t know all of them,” he admits. “I only ever dealt with Delta, Koji, and Ōga – they all worked under Jigen, who’s the boss, until Ōga went missing.”

“One went missing? What happened to them?”

“I have no idea!” he pleads.

“Where are they based?”

“I don’t know.”

“How many of them are there in total?”

“I don’t know.”

“Do the ones you know have any distinguishing features?”

“Delta’s a tall blonde bitch with a weird black mark tattooed on her forehead. Koji’s a silver-haired guy with a beard who always wears a mask. Ōga’s a kinda plainish girl with brown hair, red eyes, and a tattoo on her forehead. Jigen looks like a monk with a weird haircut and a tattoo under one eye.”
>2/3

>>5921179
Well, that isn’t nothing. It’s information you can take back to your mothers, directly from a member of Kara (for what that may be worth). Now it will be on them to interrogate the quality of that information and its source – although it’s unlikely that even if they find Garō credible any of the information he’s given you would actually suggest any particular action.

That leaves you with a decision of your own. You can definitely use hiraishin to return a restrained Garō to be interrogated further, which would probably involve genjutsu-based interrogation. It’s only something you’ve heard about, but Konohagakure apparently used to have a dedicated torture and interrogation bureau that was incredibly effective at taking information from uncooperative suspects. That bureau’s methods have been somewhat toned-down in the present era, and you’re aware that your own village never quite had that level of sophistication.

There’s another option, which is to release Garō with a tracking mark placed on him – which is something that your own mother has tried in the past without much success. But since it wasn’t Naori-ue who captured Garō you might get away with it.

Finally… it may actually be merciful to simply kill him on the spot quickly and painlessly. You doubt that interrogation will be pleasant, and you’re not sure what might happen at the end when he has reached the limits of his usefulness. You also doubt that if Garō returned to Kara that his life would be either long or peaceful. No matter what happens, Garō’s remaining life seems bleak.

>Return him to Shin-Ame for a more thorough interrogation.
>Mark him and release him, see if that tactic works this time.
>Put him out of his own and everyone else’s misery.
>Other?

>>5922050
>Have mom take him into the supermax ninja prison for now, and interrogate him later

>>5922050
>>Mark him and release him, see if that tactic works this time.

>>5922050
>>Mark him and release him, see if that tactic works this time.

>>5922050
>1d6, high roll
>considering the first three

Rolled 1 (1d6)

>>5923152

Rolled 5 (1d6)

>>5923152

Rolled 5 (1d6)

>>5923152

>>5923152
You place a hiraishin marking in a place you don’t think anyone will see until it’s far too late – with the understanding that this guy is much too stupid to have built his mechanical arms for himself, you have to assume that he’ll be trying to find whoever it was that did build them. So by placing a marking underneath the wrecked metal, right against one of the stumps, you can basically guarantee nobody will see the marking until he gets to that target.

And when he does, Naori-ue can teleport there from anywhere in the world in an instant.

After placing the marking you release him.

He seems confused at first, but then starts to run as though his life depends on it. He makes it a pretty good distance too before his brains end up splattered across the nearest wall.

Despite the shock you spread your paper sheets widely across the old town, searching for some evidence of the possible assailant while you reassemble near the body: you have no problem considering it ‘the body’ because generally speaking when you see brains outside the skull that means the person they belonged to is already dead.

Closer inspection reveals that you were right to assume the man is dead, based on the fist-sized hole that’s been opened up on the right side of his skull. But you also see something unusual, which is the fact that there’s no entry wound on the opposite side of the skull… that means his brains were blown out from the inside, probably a small explosive charge placed in the fluid layer between the brain and the inner surface of the cranium.

Whoever Kara has working for them is meticulous.

…

After wrapping up the body you place several seals over it, and instead of bringing it back into the village you send a paper clone to the new village to inform your parents.

…

You partially-reform in Naori-ue’s office, having fluttered in through an open window.

“Someone blew his brains out remotely,” you explain. “But the good news is I have some information for you…”

- A Few Hours Later -

“And that’s how it happened,” you conclude your explanation - mostly for Shiki’s benefit, but also for this stranger who he brought into your home unexpectedly.

“Let me get this straight,” the newcomer frowns. “You’re telling me you not only beat Garō single-handedly…”

“Yes.”

“… you toyed with him the whole time…”

“Correct.”
>1/2

>>5923785
“… by turning your whole body into sheets of paper…”

“She just said that,” Shiki grumbles impatiently. “Repeating her story doesn’t add anything to it.”

“So let’s skip to the point where you tell us everything you know about the man I just fought,” you move the conversation along, “and confirm whether or not what he said to me about the rest of Kara is accurate.”

“Garō was an Outer, like you said,” Kawaki confirms, still bristling slightly at the situation he finds himself in. “He worked directly for Jigen, the leader. Delta, Kasshin Koji, and Ōga are all Inners who also report to Jigen.”

“So what is the difference?”

“Inners are actually a part of Kara and get told more,” Kawaki clarifies. “Outers are just collaborators – some aren’t strong enough, some aren’t smart enough, others just have limited usefulness.”

“Like well-placed spies,” Ryūzetsu-ue muses.

Kawaki nods silently.

“So what was Garō’s responsibility?”

“He was my handler, back when I was a brat,” Kawaki tells you. “You know how his face was all messed up?”

“You did it?”

He nods with a little satisfied smirk. “Yeah, and it probably ate at him right up till he died.”

You get the feeling that any further interrogations will be overseen by Naori-ue, and that while she’s no doubt willing to keep you in the loop about whatever she learns regarding Kara from Kawaki in the next few days and weeks, you probably only have one more chance to ask him a question of your own interest. That’s just how things work in most hidden villages – this sort of situation simply isn’t in the purview of a jōnin who isn’t a specialist in such matters, even if you have earned a profound degree of trust from your village head.

>Please clarify what you mean by “handler”. Who exactly are you?
>What else can you tell us, specifically, about Kara as an organization?
>Do you know anything about the disappearance of this ‘Ōga’ person?
>Other?

>>5924709
>Please clarify what you mean by “handler”. Who exactly are you?

>>5924709
>>Please clarify what you mean by “handler”. Who exactly are you?

>>5924709
>1d6 high roll taking the first three

Rolled 6 (1d6)

>>5925692

Rolled 5 (1d6)

>>5925692

Rolled 2 (1d6)

>>5925692

>>5928248
New thread