Aegis1650 — Roleplayer Guild

Squad 15, bell test complete, genin victorious.

As the two genin commenced with the assault, Mao-sensei eyed the puppet warily. It would appear that this was far from what he expected out of one of his pupils. He produced a scroll once more, unsealing another device from it. Even in the midst of his attack, Taibushi cocked an eyebrow. This ninja tool was unlike any he’d ever seen. The steel threads now wrapped around his body appeared to have pods on them here and there. Whatever the device’s purpose was, it was unknown to Taibushi. Asuka had adopted a defensive stance before him, ready to repel a counter attack from their mentor. 

“Well then, let’s see what your teamwork can do!” Exclaimed Mao-sensei as he adopted a defensive stance. It would seem he was making the puppet his primary target for the time being. “Asuka-san, it seems Mao-sensei is not reacting to this as I had anticipated, allow me to reveal whatever this device does, pay close attention, you’re going to follow up the assault,” Taibushi said calmly. Asuka responded by picking up a nearby kunai, one the Taibushi had deflected from her previous attack. “What about the remaining traps Taibushi-san? There must be more in the clearing, even if the clone is clearing out the surrounding forest,” Askuka responded. It was a good question, she had already fallen pray to one, it wasn’t something Taibushi took much into consideration for himself. He hadn’t even hardly moved from his location since the test started, his particular style of fighing seldom required it. Askua on the other hand had quite a bit of ground to cover. Her only approaches would have no doubt been noticed by Mao-sensei, and he would be on guard.

“The kunai! Asuka-san, use the kunai as stepping stones,” Taibushi said, a grin forming on his face. “Of coarse, wherever the kunai have landed, there aren’t any traps,” Asuka responded. She adopted a more offensive posture as the puppet finally made it to Mao-sensei. Leaping into the air, the puppet struck from above. The genin watched with anticipation waiting to see what this device Mao-sensei had could do. The puppets arm cocked back as Taibushi’s finger flexed. With a quick flick Taibushi sent the punch rocketing at Mao-sensei. Their mentor stood, calm, ready. As the blow was about to impact, there was a blast of smoke. It wasn’t fully white as one would expect of a smoke screen, it had a light discoloration to it as thought it was tainted with something. A pattering could be heard as the puppets hard wooden body was pelted with shrapnel. Then a crash, the puppets hit landed, but on the ground where Mao-sensei had stood.

Mao-sensei had detonated one of the pods, on his right shoulder. As the pod detonated he leapt back slightly, enough to avoid the blow but remain in the cloud, his breath held to protect against the inhalation poison contained in the pod. Reaching back behind him, he used his free hand to produce a pair of sealing tags. With a  deft movement, slapped both tags on the puppet, one on each shoulder, and leapt back out of the smoke. The genin watched as their mentor shot back out of the smoke, thin wisps of it, trailing after him.  He landed, sliding a little and peered into the smoke. Now that they could both see Mao-sensei, they noticed a pod was missing.

“It’s a deterrent,” said Taibushi, ”when someone gets close he can detonated a pod, the smoke covers him, and the pattering we heard was likely some form of shrapnel, quite ingenious.” He began to manipulate the puppet, but it’s actions seemed sluggish, like there was some form of delay. “Mao-sensei did something to Roza-kun while the inside the smoke screen. I don’t have complete control of her. You’ll have to tackle Mao-sensei, I’ll use Roza-kun to shield you.”

“That won’t be necessary Taibushi-san,” Askua said leaping forward, she planted a foot on the ring of a kunai. Her weight resting on it pushed it further into the ground before leaping from it to the next. As she began to close the distance, Taibushi wondered how exactly it was she intended to get around the defense Mao-sensei now had, but trusted she knew what she was doing. He began the now somewhat arduous task of bringing his puppet to bear again. His gestures became somewhat grander as he tugged harder on the chakra threads to try to compensate for Roza’s reluctance to move. Mao-sensei seemed slightly surprised as the puppet charged out of the smoke at him. He smiled slightly and raised his arms before him to brace for what was about to happen. As the puppet planted its next step, the exploding tag went off. The smoke was a thick black, the bang resonating though the surrounding woods. Taibushi grimaced, it wasn’t that a single exploding tag wound would put Roza out of commission that easily, but she was no doubt damaged, and he was gonna have to put in more than just a few hours fixing her.

The puppet tumbled out of the cloud, it’s momentum carrying it the rest of the way to Mao-sensei. Fortunately for him his already raised arms blocked the puppets charge into him, but the force of it off balance him. He caught a movement out of the corner of his eye. Quickly looking over he saw Asuka charging straight at him. He didn’t want to hurt the kunoichi, but sometimes lessons had to be learned the hard way. He sighed as she got close enough, and detonated the pod. But there was nothing. No scream, no sound if shrapnel impacting flesh, just a puff of smoke. Mao’s eyes went wide. He didn’t know how she did it, he clearly saw her, and she was there. Even with her speed there should be no way she could outrun or evade all the shrapnel. It couldn’t have been any kind of genjutsu, he should be immune to any these two genin could throw at him.

He lept upwards out of the smoke. He had to reacquire Asuka’s location. From the air he spotted her, once more charging right at him, but this time from the complete opposite direction of the first time. Once more he detonated his pod, but this time, he strained his eyes to see what was happening. And he caught it, the shrapnel went right through her, and she didn’t seem to move the smoke around her. It was an after image of her, and it passed right through him. In the air there wasn’t any real option for him except to fall back to the earth below, into the smoke screen that hadn’t fully dissipated from Asuka’s first use of Grace. 

This was an opportunity that Taibushi had been waiting for. Once more he cocked Roza’s arm back, and as Mao-Sensei fall into the smoke screen he launched the blow. However, without direct line of sight, the attack was blind, hopefully as blind as Mao-sensei would be to defend. The attack landed, but not center of mass like Taibushi had intended, but rather landed square on his right bicep. As Mao-sensei felt the blow land he was twisted off balance, but still landed fine, if ungracefully. He took off out of the smoke screen toward the surrounding woods, the tighter confines would make it harder for the two to coordinate properly. As he darted out of the smoke screen, both his pupils gave chase, Asuka with her kunai at the ready, he other arm simply hanging behind her, and Taibushi manipulating Roza out of the almost dissipated cloud, one leg scorched and cracked, and appearing as though it were limping.

Just on the edge of the woods, Mao-sensei twisted, his free arm grabbing a few smoke pellets from his obi. Before he could throw them to cover his escape into the woods, he heard the crack of a twig. With a glace from the corner of his eye he caught the sight of the Water clone, directly in his path, arms spread to grab hold of him. It was too late to change course, and he wasn’t facing him to counter attack, but then again, that exactly why he had his fancy contraption. He collided with the clone, as he did he detonated two of the pods. However there was one small thing he hadn’t accounted for, the tamping effect of water with explosives. As the charged detonated, the shrapnel was pushed clear through the clone, the water it was composed of trapping the smoke, and forcing the explosive force behind them back into Mao-sensei.

Mao-sensei was thrown back into the clearing by his own explosives, his cloths torn and smoldering slightly around where the pods had been. As he opened his eyes to recover from his unknown blunder, he smacked straight into the chakra threads extending from Taibushi’s fingertips to Roza. The threads seemed to jump to life, Taibushi’s arms flying; he had to be quick, for he may not get another chance to restrain him. The threads coiled around Mao-sensei, who lashed out with his claw severing several, but not all of them. Taibushi yanked his arms back, pulling the threads taunt binding Mao-sensi’s arms to his sides and holding him in place. At once Asuka was there soaring past behind Mao-sensei, the kunai flashed, the cord between the arrow and the bell severed. Asuka caught it and took off, retreating to Taibushi’s location as he wound his chakra threads around the kunai sticking out of the ground around him.

As Asuka finally neared him she spoke, “Taibushi-san, we got the bell! But it seems a little unfair that we would have to work together to get them but one of us still has to be sent back to the academy.” “It’s all right, actually, I think I have a solution to our problem,” Taibushi said as he plucked the small bell out of Asuka’s hand. “Let’s see just how good you are with that sword, think you can hit it?” Asuka looked slightly confused, until the realization dawned on her. She smiled and drew her katana. Her arm still ached, but a single swing outside of combat, she could easily manage. Taibushi tossed the ball straight into the air. It reached its apex and began to descend once more. Not more than a foot above his open palm, he bell split in two, directly in its center. He felt a light gust and eyed Asuka. Even this close he hadn’t seen her swing, but rather, she just seemed to suddenly be sheathing her blade. He handed half the bell to Asuka, thanking her before turning to Mao-Sensei. 

“Sensei, it would appear that we both have the bell. So, do we pass, or do we have to wait out the time limit?” He said. Fortunately for all parties involved, Mao-sensei’s laziness had taken firm hold, he chuckled slightly, “All right, you both pass, honestly I didn’t even want to do this, proctoring a test is boring as far as I’m concerned. Anyway, you mind letting me go? I have your next assignment for you,” he said. Taibushi nodded and retracted the chakra threads. “All right then, we’re going to dinner as a squad to celebrate your success, go ahead and pick up your belongings here, get home and clean up. After that meet up at the sushi bar on Fourth Street, be there by six. I take it you both know where that is,” he said, not even seeming that interested in their response. The both nodded and set about clearing up all the various kunai and shuriken they had used. Mao-sensei on the other hand simply pulled out a storage scroll, and resealed his claw and wire contraption back in it before heading back into the village.

Later that day…

Asuka walked into the sushi bar, alone. It was only five forty-five, so she was early as usual. Taibushi didn’t show up for another ten minutes, and when he did he found a seat next to Asuka. The two started up a light conversation, which Asuka was relieved with, no one wants to be waiting by their self at a restaurant. The conversation was slow and didn’t talk about anything very important, though it did carry on for fifteen minutes while they waited for Mao-sensei, who showed up late. “I must apologize, I laid down to take a nap and overslept,” he said, taking a seat opposite of Taibushi next to Askua.
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