It was again that day when Takashi got lost in Iwagakure. But he had discovered an area no one ever told him about. Bastion Admantine! What a big name for something that was still under construction. Maybe that's the reason none of his friends ever mentioned this place. But still, someone should've said that a giant defensive fortress is being built in Iwagakure. Perhaps, they all took defense for granted? Maybe being a shinobi made them full of themselves and they knew that no threat frowned upon Iwa? Perhaps the preparations in Iwa's shinobi academy were so great that they believed in themselves so much? Did Tsuchikage promise an eternal protection?
Takashi was overthinking, he couldn't really see how big and great this fortress was going to be. Perhaps it was just in the beggining states of construction.

But how did this blind boy came to know of the bastion then?
As he blindly wandered throughout Iwa, focusing on only remembering his way back, he strolled into a guard. This guard had steel armor and immediately attempted to confront Takashi: "What's your business here? Are you here to sabotage the building process?" The poor boy almost jumped out of fear, he never expected to find an Iwa's guard so offensive. "J-just wandering around," with frustation the boy replied. And after the guard had taken a more careful look at the boy, he realized that the Konoha-nin didn't look like a saboteur. The boy was wearing white and orange robe, only with some dirt stains decorating the festive clothing, "Is there a festival going on, I'm not invited to?" the guard asked with a less-serious look on his face and after a few second without hearing a reply, continued, "Okay, you don't look like a saboteur," he admitted and put his weapon away, "There are rogue-nin lurking around. They don't want the great Bastion Adamantine to be built!" a puzzling look took over Takashi's face, and the guard reacted accordingly, "What? You don't know?" the guard laughed at clueless boy and then explained, "this fortress behind me is going to be the most effective defense mechanism in Iwagakure. Hell, I bet it will be the best in the whole world!" and then his triumph settled, "but currently there are some people who don't want us to build this thing. And I suspected you to be one of them. I'm sorry," the guard was now waiting for Takashi to turn around and leave, upon hearing that there's an increased danger here, but Takashi stuck around and just stared at the guard, attempting to determine where his eyes would be, "well, if you're staying around, you can help out. The officials said that they are sending a jounin over to increase the protection and potentiall find the criminals. You can wait for him here and help out, if you are not going back to the festival. I will appreciate that."

It was cloudy and since Takashi was just waiting for someone to show up, he decided that it would be a nice gesture to meet this shinobi with a warm cup of tea. It was Takashi's specialty after all. The boy heard a boiling water near the guard's camp and went near to check if it was actually not just boiling soup. Luckily, there was no scent of onions, potatoes or meat in the air and it was safe to assume that it indeed was just boiling water. Eager, Takashi took out two white cups that were safely tucked away in his robe. From another secret compartment, he reached for some tea leaves. And thus began the process of black tea preparation - put in some leaves in the cup and pour over hot water, to leave just a few centimeters free, so it doesn't splash out. Vigorous stirring robbed the leaves of all the flavor and instead granted the flavor to the water. Then Takashi took out the leaves with his spoon and just threw them down on the ground.
However, there was one more special ingredient he was about to add - liqueur. It was intentional that he added no sugar. A spirit would enhance the tea to be strong and tasty, while not robbing you of your sensed for the black tea raised you awareness.

Then Takashi took a seat on a larger boulder and put one of the tea cups besides him. The other he held himself and ocassionaly sipped it. He would offer the other one to his jounin partner once he arrives.
776

People really need to find some better use of their time…

Raishi thought to himself lazily as he left the village Administration Building. For this mission, he was to fend off possible attackers to the village, as there had been word from the village’s Sensory Division of a party of rogue ninja lurking on the borders, with the Bastion Adamantine their target. He sighed as he moved swiftly like the wind, jumping from rooftop to rooftop towards the all too familiar structure ahead. It was unfortunate that so many people had tried infiltrating, and even harming, the village through the Bastion in the past. Raishi chuckled lightly at the thought of such a paradox. Now that it’s being restructured, our greatest defence is our biggest target…he thought to himself. But in all honesty, it made infiltration detection highly effective, as the Bastion was the only target infiltrators aimed at. Of course, there are other less straightforward methods one could go about infiltrating the village, but it required intellect that those who’d think of infiltrating the village in the first place just do not possess.

Now at the village gates, Raishi paused for a second, to admire how far the restructuring process was going. He thought back, recalling the first time the Bastion had been constructed, and how even then, people had also tried to sabotage it. Oh Zenchi…some things never change he thought to himself, remembering the man who had brought up the idea of the Bastion in the first place. Leaving his wave of reminiscence behind, he then approached the guard on duty. But before he even said anything, the guard began to speak.

“You have finally arrived! We were expecting you about an hour ago.”

Raishi smiled apologetically as he rubbed the back of his head with his right hand. “I apologise, I was only briefed a few moments ago. There had been an issue with the roster allocations since the new Kage got appointed.” The guard shrugged before he began speaking once more.

”Fair enough. Anyway, as you’ve been briefed, there have been a group of 5 suspicious individuals spotted lurking around our borders. This happened just over an hour or so ago, and they haven’t been spotted since. They were robed in black, of various heights, and about 1 or 2 of them had indescribably warm chakra…at least that’s what a sensor said. So we have to stay on guard.”

Interesting… Raishi thought to himself, curious as to what the sensor had meant by warm chakra. Pushing his thoughts to the side, he nodded at the guard, soaking in all the information he had given him before speaking once more. “How many of you are there stationed here? I need to know so we may maximise our defence strategy, assuming these individuals are indeed hostile. Oh and where is your Captain? I need to speak with him concerning our strategy as well.” With that, the guard looked slightly nervous, almost as if he dreaded answering this line of questioning.

“Well….we don’t have any captain right now. Currently, it’s only myself and my colleague, Tenzin, at the top of the wall, that are on duty right now. However, he is unable to participate in any combat right now, as he is primarily primarily a Medic through and through. As I said, we are extremely understaffed.”

Raishi sighed slightly, realising that this was a dire situation indeed. He thought back to the days when his friend Zenchi were still alive, how he had been an extremely effective Captain of the Bastion Guard.How could it get so bad, to this point? It was no wonder there had been a such a scramble for an available Jounin. regardless, the mission remained; to neutralise the potential threats. As he pondered their current position, the guard continued.

“Actually, there is still one more person. Some kid joined us earlier, and he went over to the campsite to have a tea or whatever from what I saw. Perhaps he could be of use”

Whilst hearing this, Raishi raised a curious eyebrow. He hadn’t been informed about any other shinobi assigned to this mission Or perhaps I didn’t hear it he thought to himself. The briefing session was extremely brief, even more so than usual, with Raishi only being told about the urgency of protecting the Bastion from a potential breach. Nodding at the guard, who then jumped up to the top of the wall to start a look out, Raishi advanced to the camp site and finally spotted the boy. As the guard had said, he was drinking tea rather casually, which was interesting considering the situation at hand, and he did not look familiar to Raishi in any way. He approached him regardless, a curious look on his face before he spoke authoritatively.

“Hello there, I’m the Jounin that was sent here to help with defending the reconstruction of the Bastion. Who are you? I presume you’ve been briefed about the situation at hand?”


TWC: 849

Takashi was sitting on the boulder and sipping his tea when he noticed that someone was coming. It was someone new, not the same guard. The guard would have a sword and armor clanging with him. This person was a swift and silent human. Determined and experienced. Most likely the one that guard told Takashi about previously. Takashi turned around and was no longer facing the fireplace. Instead he was now looking towards the direction the person was coming from. The young chuunin was ready to face whoever was about to approach him.
This man introduced himself as a jounin of Iwa. The one that guard spoke of, apparently. However this man confused Takashi with someone else. Why would Takashi be instructed about the situation, if not he isn't even of Iwagakure origin? He was only as instructed as the guard warned him about the possible saboteurs. Thus he answered:"Hi! My name is Takashi, nice to meet you," he then sipped tea and grabbed the other cup with his right hand. "I made a little treat for you while I was waiting," he handed the man his tea cup. The tea now had cooled down and wouldn't warm up anybody really, but it wasn't exactly cold enough to be gross. And then Takashi continued with more truth of his being here, "I'm actually from Konoha," he said to surprise the jounin before him. "But I'm a ninja nevertheless and I'm helping out here out of my own free will!" Takashi then looked around before answering about his knowledge of the situation, "I wasn't told much. Just that there are potential enemies lurking around..." the young shinobi kept looking around anxiouslly, "well, to be honest.." he held an uncomfortable pause, "I'm blind," it had to be said, before this jounin sends Takashi out to look for enemies or examine some clues like footsteps of unknown origin, "But I'm capable! No need to worry about me!" Takashi wanted to gain trust after being so honest. He was rarely this honest with people. He didn't like telling people about his inability. Perhaps it was the only thing holding him back of becoming a great ninja, like the heads of Nekomata clan.

To demonstrate his abilities, Takashi stood up and walked a few meters away. With a poof, he transformed into camellia shrub. It was his favourite plant to transform into - it smelled of fresh tea leaves and served as a perfect disguising technique. Unless someone wanted to check for chakra presence and then came to burn down the shrub.
"A true shinobi, see? Not just some kid," Takashi said after performing this academy-tier technique, which didn't mean he is a skillful ninja yet.

"Anyway, I truly want to help," Takashi now got to the point. He was ready to go on a patrol together with this jounin, or he was ready to split up. Or guard some keypoints. However, he wasn't confident enough to come up with a task for himself. He was expecting the jounin to provide one for him. "What's the plan, sir?" Takashi politely inquired, hoping it would be something easy. He really didn't want to navigate the bastion alone. He could get lost or trip on some loose brick, not even mentioning not noticing saboteurs in plain sight (assuming they would stand in one place and stop breathing to avoid getting detected for Takashi's perception was honed brilliantly.
586

Chakra 185/190:

OOC:

Raishi listened on with slight intrigue as the boy started off by introducing himself as Takashi, and offering Raishi a cup of tea. Of course, he took it out of court at, but just held the cup in his hands as he listened to Takashi. Tea wasn't really his thing. But the thought counts I guess he thought to himself as he watched Takashi go on. As he had guessed, Takashi was not a shinobi is Iwagakure, confirmed by his announced affiliation to Konohagakure. Raishi had never met actually properly conversed with shinobi of other village; there was that one time during the Seven Bells War in the Land of Water, but it was barely a conversation...more of gestures confirming mission objectives and strategy under enemy fire. He always wondered what the other villages were like outside the line of duty; their culture, the atmosphere, the shinobi. And here he had one, performing the transformation technique as some sort of validation of his shinobi status to counterbalance the fact that he was blind. But what does being blind have to do with being a great shinobi? He has a confidence problem... he thought to himself. The fact that he had said "not just some kid" gave it away, because only lower level shinobi would want to seek validation in the midst of perceived 'faults'. If only he knew the story of how Arashi Nekomotze, a former Tsuchikage, died... Raishi thought. He had been killed by a 'disabled' shinobi in a wheel chair who was also blind. Imagine that. In the world of shinobi, the only disability one could have, is a lack of self confidence. and experience is the best way to train confidence he thought to himself.

Just as he was about to welcome Takashi to Iwagakure and instruct him on his role in this mission, there was a loud blast heard from the top of the wall, much like a bomb. Raishi spin round and looked up to see part of the security booth aflame and a security guard trying to fight off 3 hooded figures. Before dashing up the 500m wall with the help of construction ramps, Raishi shouted out to Takashi to stay alive.

As he got closer to the top of the wall, he could tell that part of the guard's arm was burned already, presumably from the bomb. This was the guard from earlier, but Raishi couldn't spot Tenzin, the guard's colleague. As he jumped to the top, the guard was then simultaneously struck in the chest by all three attacker off the wall. Fortunately, Raishi was able to catch him just as he landed on the top platform. Laying him down, he then weilded two kunai and demanded the attackers state who they were and their cause. Since it was now dark, he could see no expression on their hooded faces, but the one in the middle seemed to smile as they all stared at Raishi. Surprisingly, another bomb went off, this time at the ground, and it seemed to  come from closer to where Raishi had left Takashi. Weren't they five? Raishi began thinking, but the 3 in front of him then began to launch their attack. He prepared himself, hoping Takashi could handle the rest.

TWC: 1399

The plan was never discussed. After the big blow Takashi was only ordered to stay alive. Getting up on the bastion probably wasn't even that hard as first anticipated. The jounin took the long path - running up. Takashi could probaby made it in a few jumps thanks to his sprining cat-like legs.
Holding the cup with some leftover tea in his right hand, Takashi dodged any debris that were coming down. The falling did make sound and he could distinguish it and approximate a place where stuff was going to land. It would be a shame if something hit Takashi's head.

The boy was surprised too upon hearing another blow. And not that far away - just some meters behind him. This time his reaction and his insticts were useless for a brick hit his shoulder and it made him spill the remains of tea on the ground. "A shame," Takashi said, looking down as if he could see the stains of tea. He then put the empty cup back in the bulky pockets, as he listened footsteps closing in on him. And it wasn't only footsteps - he heard someone close by say "Cut him down!" though Takashi wasn't going to wait for that. He was ordered to stay alive - thus he had a free reign over the place.

Takashi wasn't just going to take beating from some random people, he was going to retreat to the fireplace first, taking his position behind it as if challenging the two invaders to jump through it. And it happened too - however not exactly like Takashi had planned. The furthest guy murmured something and two hands shot up from the ground and grabbed Takashi's feet, locking him into place. It was rather unexpected, but boy's hands were free and that's all what mattered. He searched for a special vial in his pockets. One that he never used for tea. In the other hand he held a kunai to block attacker's inertia. When the footsteps stopped, it meant that the man was jumping through the fire. At this exact moment Takashi threw the vial forward with all his might. It broke hitting the chest of the attacker and spread all over the body. Takashi had no idea what exactly was contained in the vial, but the liquid caught on fire just fine, and set the whole body on fire. "I can smell you," Takashi said with a smile on his lips whilst blocking the sword with his kunai.

A push overpowered the attacker and he fell in the fireplace, burning even more. "Garyuko!" called the furthest man. Takashi's legs were released and a water ball was formed instead - Takashi could tell for the fireplace was extinguished and steam emerged in the air. Takashi still could smell the half-burnt meat and the terrible smelling clothing from his opponent. "Hmm, a sword fighter and ninjutsu specialist?" Takashi evaluated the two attackers. "You wait in the ashes," the Nekomata then said and weaved signs for False Mud Genjutsu trapping the attacker in from of him. It was wiser to deal with the ninjutsu user first.

In order to take care of the furthest invader, Takashi walked a little ahead and opened his mouth as in yawning, while weaving dog and rat signs. After closing his mouth, Takashi just needed to listen for someone vomiting. Direction where someone vomited - that's where he would throw his senbon targeting the head. As the body of his victim feel on ground, Takashi noticed a foul smell in the air. Getting even worse, the further he went. It wasn't hard to realize, that he had to turn back and do a few kicks to hit the enemy. Takashi's speed was dominant even if the enemy was ready to slice Takashi in half and was already in motion to swing his sword. By bending his own body, Takashi dodged the sword and was targeting his kick around the height of his own. Maybe just luck, but the boy actually hit the enemy in head. "What a shame," the boy ended the terrible smelling guy's life with a slice of kunai, once he was on the ground.

"Hey, I'm done here!" Takashi yelled, expecting that the jounin above will also have no problems. The fireplace was distinguished though. The water in the pot was cold due to the water that was poured over it. It truly was a shame - Takashi will not be able to prepare another cup of tea for himself if he stayed here. Thus he went away - in search of a fireplace or at least the festival that guard was talking about.
787
[exit]
Total WC: 2149
B rank mission 1500/1500
Leftovers: 649

OOC and chakra 160/190:

Well, that was...easy...

The three attackers' bodies decorated the platform at the top of the Bastion. Judging from the amount of effort (rather, lack thereof) it had taken Raishi especially to deal with them, he could tell that they were really low level assailants. Probably just some punks looking to garner a name for themselves... he thought to himself casually, slightly bored. Of course, dispatching them was merely a matter of aiming his Enten Shuriken Technique at their legs when he had the opening. Now looking down at the unconscious bodies, he thought back to what had occurred mere seconds ago.

As the group had charged towards him in unison, he'd thrown two kunai knives at the assailants at both ends of the triangular attacking formation, causing them to use their own kunai to uniformly block his projectiles, whilst the middle attacker continued his assault. Despite his basic taijutsu knowledge, he had been fairly confident in his Taijutsu skills against this one less experienced hooligan, and was easily able to parry his kunai slashes and knock him out with a headbutt. After that, the other two launched in the air, once again in uniform, hoping to vertically slice on either side of Raishi's torso with their kunai. So, he'd quickly formed his Enten Shuriken, and aimed at both of their shins whilst they were in the air. Reeling from the pain, they dropped from the air, passing out from the pain before they reached the ground.

He looked on to them, saddened by their wasting youth. They could have joined the village, and been a part of something greater than moronic thrills. But now, they had to face heavy questioning and interrogation and for that he felt sorry for them.

"Hey, I'm done here!"

Raishi looked down at the Konoha-nin he had been speaking to earlier. Of course, he had no worry that the boy would be able to hold his own, but he still couldn't help but be impressed by the kid, as the assailants were nowhere to be found, so he assumed that they were with their maker. He gave him a nod, and watched on as he walked away. He then turned back to the unconsious bodies in front of him, wondering how he'd carry them to the authorities.

290/315:

TWC: 1701