Akarui sprinted out the gates of Sunagakure proper, kicking up a cloud of dust behind him. He was dressed for combat, the only thing flowing behind him the hood of his sleeveless shirt. The young man's shinobi sandals dug into the cracked dirt and sand with a certain level of eagerness, and even the serious expression on the red head's face could not hide the pride which so enraptured Akarui at the present moment. His first mission assigned on the spot. This was no waiting game, no chore. This was a real mission that needed to be done right at this very second. And he was the one to do it. He was the only one for the job. Well, he assumed that at least. Perhaps there were plenty of others who could have been sent to dispatch of this threat. Indeed, there probably were. But that idea did not really jive with Akarui's mindset as he rushed out to combat. All he could think about was the glory and recognition he would receive for completing this task. Who knew? Perhaps the Kazekage would finally take notice of his skill and determination and promote him from his present position as a genin. All he had to do now was squash a scorpion. Sure, the mission briefing had said it was a giant scorpion. But what did that really mean? Surely the thing was not crushing houses. He hoped not at least. No, it was more likely just a nuisance that needed to be dealt with.

After some time running and patting himself on the back, building up his expectations, Akarui finally arrived at the outlying set of houses the giant scorpion had taken up residence in. As he approached, Akarui did a hard slide across dirt and sand rather than take the two seconds he would have needed to slow down. He thought it would simply have looked cooler that way. The red head's snapped back and forth, scanning the area vaguely for any sign of the creature. Of course there were signs; tipped over garbage cans, torn tarps, there was simply no scorpion amongst them. Even after a few minutes of reconnaissance, he could find nothing. Then, as if out of nowhere, there was a scream.

A woman and her child, jogging helplessly across the sand. Akarui called out to them at first, but his voice cut out halfway through as he saw what was chasing them. The hand he had raised to greet the two now flopped uselessly to his side, the Sunagakure headband which adorned his bicep flashing embarrassingly as he stood there without motion. Giant was indeed the correct word. This scorpion was more than half as tall as Akaruia was, and it was mad. The monster's already large and menacing pincers paled in comparison to its spear-like tail. 'Help' the woman cried out desperately to Akarui once more. Without a second thought now, Akarui retrieved a kunai, and flung it at the main bulk of the creature. "Hey, over here you creep!" The creature turned, but so too had the kunai turned off of the armor of the great beast. Akarui gulped helplessly, slowly unsheathing his katana. "Y-yeah, over here!" The scorpion's mandibles rattled against its armored face in frustration as it slowly began to clatter over towards the young shinobi.

Akarui closed his eyes, doing his best to relax himself. In his right hand he turned around his katana so that he held it in a seemingly useless backwards fashion. In his left he slowly and methodically formed the half hand seals dog and rat, before wind began to whip around the entire side of his body. Opening his eyes, he measured the distance between the two of them. Roughly twenty five meters. Channeling chakra into his weapon now, a burst of wind blasted him forward towards the beast, even as he whipped past it at his top speed, his left hand grabbed at the base of the scorpion's monstrous tail, and he whipped around onto its back. As if in protest the scorpion shook and danced in an attempt to throw off the shinobi, but he held on for dear life, lodging his blade between the carapace of on the creature's back for stability. As the creature switched strategies of shaking and dancing, Akarui removed his hand from its tail. A sly grin crossed the boy's face as he saw a seal successfully places on a piece of carapace connecting the tail to the rest of the creature's body. Looking away he activated the seal.

In an instant a great blast of air pressure emanated from the location of the seal, cracking through the scorpion's carapace and causing the tail to fall limp, hanging on by only the flimsiest of arachnal muscle strands. This did, of course, cause the creature to go into a great fury, and now Akarui was thrown easily from its back, only just grabbing his blade in time to take it with him in his fall. With an oof Akarui landed in the land, sword gripped tightly in his right hand. Within seconds the scorpion was upon him, its tail left lying in the sand behind it as it rushed over to retrieve its blood debt. Before Akarui could react the creature had already grasped his left ankle in its claws, and the red haired shinobi cried out in pain. Eyes filled with hatred and determination, Akarui lifted his blade, channeling chakra along its surface into a fine, wind-based edge. With a fierce growl of anguish, he plunged the tip of the blade two and a half inches into the head of the scorpion through one of its many eyes. The creature's ferocious clattering and hungry mandibles slowly subsided, and the grip on Akarui's leg loosened. In less than a minute, the creature succumbed to its injuries, collapsing onto the sand all at once and kicking up a great dust storm. The creature was defeated.


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