It was early morning when Hideyo rose from his slumber. He had gone to bed very early the previous night to make sure he would be well rested when he needed to wake up. Checking the eastern horizon through his hotel room's window he could see that the sun had yet to rise. How much time he had until it did, he did not know, so he quickly got up and headed to his closet. Pulling over a sleeveless, olive drab vest with a white, unbuttoned sleeved shirt over it which he kept the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. For pants, Hideyo slipped on some loose, dark blue ones that stopped just before his ankles. he then headed to the door where his open toe and open heeled sandals were waiting for him. Saddled up, he headed out of the hotel and quickly made a run through the village. Making a quick focus of his chakra energies inward and upon himself to shut down his bloodline for the day. Being stuck in a village filled to the brim with ninja, he didn't want to be drained of energy so quickly, nor have himself discovered so easily.

Now that he was finally dressed and outside, he could see the light on the horizon signaling the coming of the sun. Morning was here and he needed to get into position as quickly as possible. The village was mainly a bunch of mountain platforms jutting out from the mountain faces. Everything was centered around the tallest mountain, or really the tallest building formation that was using two mountain peaks for its foundation. The building rose higher than all the others, and it seemed to have an observation tower at the top. Hideyo realized such a building would most likely be off-limits for most people, especially an outsider like himself, and instead went to one of the more feasible platforms that stood higher than most of the rest.

He leaned against the platform's railing and looked about. His eyes studied each platform, all the signs that stood out to him that he could manage to read, and any positions of the Hidden Cloud's ninja that appeared to be on domestic security patrols. From his position, he mostly noticed that quite a bit of ninja were on the various platforms on the tallest building formation. No doubt, that building was the place of headquarters. As he observed, there were lots of shinobi going in and out from the building's entrances and exits. He also could tell how most of them headed out in similar directions. Most likely there were more gates than the one he had been lead through by that girl ninja who had allowed him entrance to the village.

All in all, the early morning movements of the Hidden Cloud's forces was a sight to behold. Hideyo was highly impressed by it all, feeling assured that this village was still very much active. As the sun would rise, Hideyo would also begin to see the hustle and bustle of the villagers as the shops began to open up around him. He would have to wait and observe a bit more about the village before he could participate in the village life, although his stomach was on the verge of telling him to get a move on.


Post: 561

Chakra 145/150:

It was the chase.

It was always the chase that gave Sourai the adrenaline, and he loved the adrenaline, hence he loved the chase.

Whenever he was pursuing a girl, it wasn’t the date that he wanted. No, it was getting the girl to go on a date with him. On the date, it wasn’t finally taking her home or heading to hers that excited him, but the process of doing so, the exchange of words, the carefully crafted banter on both sides, like a carefully choreographed dance that both participants had to put their all into, or risk tripping and being made a fool of in front of everyone else, and their partner.

Right now, it was also a chase he was in, but a different one. Right now, his chase was more ‘life-or-death’, and was being conducted by the man who had for all his life been the one to hunt down Sourai after the latter got into trouble. And considering the man was now chasing Sourai, it was little surprise to know that Sourai had once again gotten into trouble after doing a little switcheroo at the missions’ desk for a C-ranked mission instead of the D-ranked mission that he had been authorised to take that morning.

Man, villages were downright anal about that.

Either way, Sourai was currently hiding underneath one of the many bridges that spanned the Land of Lightning, connecting the highrise buildings that rose up from the ground and from the mountainsides and mountaintops, so even civilians and the non-ninja staff were able to get around with relative ease. He was currently hiding on one mountainside, hidden from view underneath the bridge, and since the Land of Lightning comprised several layers of workplace, from his vantage point, he could still look down and see festivities going on as well as people going to work in the tourism sector.

It was curious seeing this many people already up and about so early in the morning, but what was one to expect? The festivities were one of many highly appreciated events in the Land of Lightning, and every second not spent celebrating it was another second of your life unnecessarily wasted, in Sourai’s opinion.

Of course, he was running for his life gripping a C-ranked mission scroll, which he tucked into his ninja pouch and out of sight, so he probably was unnecessarily wasting seconds of his life.

On the layer below, he managed to spot a man dressed in white and blue. He seemed to differ from the people around him, with his posture and mannerisms indicating he was a ninja, unlike the people all surrounding him. To Sourai, he stuck out like a sore thumb, and Sourai liked sore thumbs.

This was why Sourai then leapt from his position, landing just a little ways away from the man, startling some of the villagers but ultimately shrugging off their weird looks. Looking at the man from up close, he realised that the man’s white shirt was actually an unbuttoned white shirt, worn over an olive vest, completed by a pair of blue pants. The man himself had particularly interesting hair, curling away from his face at various points while one strand fell straight down it in the middle.

“Well hello there,” Sourai greeted enthusiastically, as he would any other tourist he met. “Is there a reason you’re looking so intently at all the sights we have in Kumo?”

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