Lying in Wait:

Maikeru looked down at his hands. They were stained with a hideous red. And then he looked up red…there was blood stained in the sand. He looked around him. There was death. Everyone was dead. Bodies were mutilated and slaughter. And then he looked into the sky. It was dark. No like the sweet dark blue of the normal night sky, stars endlessly littered across it. But it was pitch black filled with no light, no stars, only and endless void of darkness. But then it turned red. Maikeru twitched. Everything was red.

Maikeru shit his eyes opened from his daze. He touched his face, and felt something attached to it, and looked around him. He was at a Kumo camp and then he realized what he was doing. He was back in his disguise, as for his experiencing Kumogakure. Maikeru was leaned up a tent, and finally he put two and two together. He had dozed off and had a nightmare while on this personal adventure. Maikeru shook his head and held it for a moment, as if it will somehow ease the mental pain on his mind. “Hey. You have a mission.” Maikeru looked up and saw that a man was before him. He stood up straight and made sure no weakness was shown. “It's for an ally independent faction. You are going to go on a battlefield and map out everything. Map out what's happening. Take this paper and pen to write with you. Don't forget to list out all of the things that are happening, key battle positions. Even our own. It's very important. And once you are done you are going to hand this mission into someone at their camp. The location is on the scroll. And don't get noticed You will be working with the same one you worked with last time. Understood?”

Maikeru nodded, and took the scroll. He walked away in a weary state, but eventually he would regain his mind. He left to the entrance of the camp as usual to wait for his companion.

350 WC

Makoto was looking up at the sky and back at his notes, before leaving his book behind at his temporary living area while he was in the current camp he wondered into. He got out a fresh note book and proceeded towards the main meet up point for his next mission as he read the details from the mission scroll.

There near the entrance to the camp Makoto noticed the masked guy from earlier, while he was curious the one thing he really wanted to know about was those techniques that the masked guy used last time. He noticed a strange explosion, it was a normal explosion but he was sure there were no explosive tags or even if they were explosives it was cool as well. Though the priests had muttered nonsense about the great Hastur passing judgement on the bugs and Makoto just did not understand why he bothered to protect these people. Then he remembered for jutsu you need books and for books you need ryo and therefor in order to get ryo he needed to complete missions successfully.

He waved over at the Masked Guy and then proceeded to go to map out the area with him, he then asked something. "Do you have a name?", as he would ask that while not seeming too interested in the answer as he began jotting down in his note book their starting location on the map, it looked very cloudy to him, or at least that was how his mind was processing it as he waited for the masked guy to start moving out as they would make their way around to begin the process of gathering information.

Words = 280

Maikeru made hilariously twisted face behind his mask. It was comical how he was keeping his name so secret. Highly comical. Maikeru looked at Makoto. To the boy it may have seemed like he was staring at him the entire time. But When Maikeru finally calmed himself down, he said “no.” After moving a atleast a mile away from the initial camp, Maikeru had heard of a raid on a Konohagakure Military camp. Maikeru would have helped them, but he really couldn't care enough. He was too busy with his own business. Business like this. Dropped to the sandy ground and pulled Makoto down with him. “A raid is going to happen. A bunch of bandits are coming to ransack this place. Well, attempt at it. Place is pretty heavily armed, and the sorta don’t stand a chance in hell, but still we need to map it.”

Maikeru stayed low and judged the lines accordingly. He took out a journal and a pencil, and carefully drew to the best of his ability. He speculated that the raid wouldn’t begin until another few hours, so he had time to map out the camp itself. He noticed that they were serving food at the far north east of the camp. Not too left of that there were many tents there, quite possibly living quarters. Maikeru drew everything down, until he heard the sound of yelling. From the rear of the camp, there was what was classified as a small army, filled with angry and bloodthirsty men. He took Makoto’s shoulder, and dragged him back in the sand to further conceal their presence from the Ninja and Bandits alike. He wrote down what was happening, and it seemed like the raid was at a lost before it had started. The Konoha Ninja made sure they didn’t even get within fifty meters of the camp, and the number of Bandits easily started dropping like flies. Until came another group from the entrance. Maikeru raised an eyebrow, impressed by this tactic. The initial attack had been a ruse from the beginning. But they still couldn’t break much of the Konoha defensive. Maikeru wrote and drew down the attack strategy, keeping notes for the possible future. But then a squadron, just a small group of ten Bandits, came in, but not nearly as quickly. Something about them gave Maikeru a bad feeling.

One unsheathed his sword, and jumped over the entire battlefield, landing right in the camp. He began to slaughter them all relentlessly and indiscriminately. Maikeru, of course, wrote this down.


437/782

Makoto was a bit suspicious at the seemingly long and never ending pause as he asked his simple question. Makoto was waiting for an eternity only to get the simplest and most useless answer of all, that answer that could have simply been said with the shake of the head was a really stupid 'no' reply as he began to wonder why the guy did not rather just give him no reply at all.

They were walking for quite some time as Makoto got out his notebook, he noted a few random ruins with two or three refugees in them. There were some small plants here and there as well as a few random shinobi running about ignoring them, as if they either did not notice or had more important things to do as he noted their direction and jotted it down. It was not the main information, but any and all information was important especially since the note book had a lot of space available.

It felt like they had walked for about a mile as he wondered if Maikeru's mask was scaring everyone into hiding or something similar. It seemed that they had walked for days, though in truth it was only around a mile give or take a few feet here and there.

Makoto was still busy jotting some things down as he heard something happening in a certain direction only to feel something pull him down as he panicked slightly, his heart racing like crazy as he realized that he was with Masked Guy who then said to him that a raid was happening and that a bunch of bandits were coming to ransack the place. As much as he had to be scared, he had a mission to do as he shakily wrote down this information in his note book, though the handwriting was less legible then earlier. Makoto did not need to be told twice as he knew he would have to mark this on the map later as he jotted down the general distance and then noticed Masked guy pull out a journal and a pencil. With that he realized doing this mission as two people was reliable as you could compare the notes as well as being a back up in case one was not able to maintain their information increasing the success of the mission.

Makoto looked around and at masked guy as he took note to look for anything dangerous that may approach them. He noticed there was a place with food, or at least he thought it was a food place. His eye sight was fortunately decent, but the rest of his abilities were rather lacking. Makoto began to jot down the number of tents he could see and mentioned a possibility of there being more tents in the tented area.

Makoto heard yelling and while he was startled he remained still trusting in the Masked Explosion Master. He did not know what kind of explosions the masked man used, but he did remember their previous mission had some kind of bang to it. He wanted to gather more information on masked man too, but sadly his notebook had to be used for the mission this time.

Before Makoto could jot down anymore information he felt a hand on his shoulder as he got dragged into the sand as dropped his note book to cover his mouth and nose with both his hands as he nearly sneezed. He also closed his eyes to avoid the sand rushing into them as he wiped his face off and reached out getting his note book back.

Makoto did not fully understand what was going on, but at the very least he picked up on the yelling being a decoy as the main group came from the other end. Then there seemed to be only ten bandits left, but before he could finish jotting it down there was blood spewing from the neck of the one bandit as a bright shining katana blade cut through the neck of the first target it seemed. There was blood all over this crazed man, if it even was a man as the only thing Makoto could make out was the intense sword play as the man dismembered fingers, hands, arms and legs. It was more like this man was preparing a meal to eat then he was trying to kill them. This shinobi must have been bloodthirsty and crazy to be this inefficient, unless the plan was to be as brutal as possible to strike fear into the rest of the bandits making them hesitate as they felt they would face the same brutal ending.

If Makoto had been a bit younger he probably would have wet himself at this point, but he was a bit too old for bed wetting and did not want to give his presence away in the form of a smell. That would be both embarrassing as well as knowing that you died pissing yourself being too much humiliation in Makoto's mind. He looked towards Masked guy out the corner of his eye and then focused on the mad man as he realized he could not keep up with the movements as he even wondered which was stronger between the two of them. Makoto put his notebook inside his shirt and then wondered if his shield would even be useful against that high quality blade.

In the end all Makoto knew is that they may need to escape at this point if they are spotted.

Words = 280 + 926 = 1206

Maikeru had gotten all of the sides of the camp, with the exception of being need to see the inside of it. Maikeru reached in his bag and took out a bunch of clothing. The bandits has begun to win, so he took out a pair of bandit clothing. He began putting them on after tossing one to Makoto. “Here's what we do. We go in, run around and AVOID FIGHTING AT COSTS. Stay close to me and don't go wandering off. Maikeru ran towards the one of the breaches in the camp, grabbing Makoto by the hand. While running towards the chaotic crowd of bandits, he held him close and jumped over it. “Come on let's go!” Maikeru rant though crowds of sheer violent and barbaric fighting. While doing so, he had his notepad out, and drew complex he saw, carefully mapping out formations and tactics between both sides. A weaker Kumo Nin jumped at the two and Maikeru side kicked him away.

At the bathing area, the water was colored red with blood, and many men fighting inside in an effort to drown each other. Maikeru looked around again and saw another area of the battlefield. It was the camp administration area. Maikeru ran towards it but was caught off gaurd by a Kumo Kunoichi. “Where do you think you're going, bandit scum?” Maikeru didn't have the time nor patience of this. He charged up his fist with Raiton, and unsurprisingly, being a Kumo Ninja, she did the same. Maikeru opened his hand, keeping it straight and pointed. Lighting formed the shape of a sword, and Maikeru swung it at her, decapitation her. Maikeru was shocked. She stood with so much pride that he didn't expect her to be an easy opponent. He looked at her body and then looked around him. It was truly barbaric. He ran towards the administration section, where he was once again stopped. This time it was a Taijutsu master and this time he was formidable. He attempted to get a surprise attack on Maikeru, but he dodged his hit. Maikeru and him traded blows from left to right, one never getting a clear upper hand over the other. Until Maikeru saw an opening in and tripped him over. He reignited his lighting blade and drove it deep into him. Maikeru saw that there were a few more Kumo ninja looking to fight. He tossed the pencil and notepad to Makoto. “You draw I fight.”

418/1200 WC

The Masked Guy got out some really strange looking clothing and passed him some too as he just put them over what he was wearing since he dressed really light already, though the heat of this desert land might make it torture if he had to endure it for too long. That was when the masked guy took charge and told him that they must go in, then run around like mad and avoid all fighting to survive and stick close to nameless masked guy as he considered thinking of this guy as Nanashi, which meant nameless.

Before Makoto could make sense of everything he felt his hand get taken as they ran towards a chaotic crowd of bandits as Makoto's feet hurt a bit trying to keep up as he felt like he was being pulled around. They were like a temporary team as he felt himself getting pulled closer towards masked guy as he noticed the masked guy could do so many things at the same time. Drawing complex maps and formations with tactics included. A random kumo nin jumped in only to be kicked away as if he was nothing.

Along the way they passed a bathing area, however the crimson colored bloody waters had long since taken away the idea of this being a place of cleansing and bathing. Men were fighting and attempting to drown each other instead of just running away as this seemed to be like a small war among men, though some were actually women as well if you looked more carefully as no one cared about gender, whether you were a man or whether you were a woman as a body flew over head as Makoto kept running with masked guy.

Masked guy was strong, masked guy was fast and it seemed that masked guy was smart and experienced too. Was masked guy perhaps a member of the special ops with his mask that he wore, or was masked guy so ugly he could not reveal his face. Makoto had no time to think more on these things as they stopped as some strange Kunoichi attacked calling them bandit scum as Makoto felt like he was being moved out of the way as masked guy charged a lightning fist as the woman did the same only to be cut through her before she could respond as he head flew through the air, all Makoto could do was thinking how beautiful that technique was and if he could do something similar to that.

Makoto wrote down the best description he could for what he saw since the combat strength of anyone they encountered may also be of importance. Then they were on their way again as he stuck as close to masked guy as he could, on occasion he would slip or trip up in the sand though he would reach out and grab hold of whatever assistance masked guy would give him.

They encountered another guy who launched some form of dynamic entry that he managed to avoid and then they proceeded to fight it out with a back and forth flurry of punches and kicks as Makoto wrote this down finally being free as he just looked around them while writing as much as he could. The important information he had taken note of was that it seemed the enemy had lightning ninjutsu and some form of taijutsu skills. Makoto's writing tool was knocked out of his hands by some dust that flew from the battle between masked guy and dynamic entry guy as he got tossed a pencil and told to draw while he fought.

He noticed at that point the dynamic guy was already dead as he did not even get a chance to view what technique was used, as he looked around the number of enemies was seemingly increasing as he listened to masked guy and drew the area and thinking back he realized that the enemy numbers were increasing. He decided to at least create some clones while masked guy kept them busy as he formed two clones so he could write in peace while the two water clones watched the two areas behind him while he would look to see how masked guy would handle the other kumo shinobi as he wondered why kumo was such a hostile place.

He also took note in his head that if he ever had to go to kumo he would need a bodyguard on the level of at least masked guy. Makoto wondered if he would ever be able to master combat like this, knowing that his level in combat was lacking even for normal academy graduates.

Words = 1206 + 781 = 1987

Chakra 187/250:

Maikeru turned around to see a young man before him. In his hand he held a bandit by the back of the neck, slumped to the ground. Lifeless. He dropped the corpse to the ground. Maikeru and him took a fighting stance, looking at each other in the eyes. Maikeru felt something in the boy. He was blonde and fair skinned. He felt something fire. He rushed at Maikeru with blinding speed, to deliver a kick to the gut. It pushed Maikeru back, but wasn't enough to take him down. The boy was fast. But not too strong. “You bandit scum think you can get away with facing against the might of Kumogakure?! To think such heathens would disgrace the NAME OF HASTUR. I, TKAEYUKI, WILL PUT AN END TO YOUR MISDEEDS!!!”

Maikeru said nothing, keeping everything about himself concealed. He took another fighting stance and rushed at the at Takeyuki. He held his ground, as soon as Maikeru got in range, he Unleashed a flurry of strikes from a directions, keeping Maikeru on the defensive. He held his arms close to his head and chest to avoid a any decisive strikes. “Come on weakling! Show me what you have! Show me your true power!” Maik ignored his taunts and pressed on, waiting for an opening. Eventually Maikeru got frustrated and and broke his guard. While taking hits to the midsection and the face, Maikeru yielded back his fist and made a strike, causing a Landmine Fist explosion. Takeyuki flew backward,and ragdolled in the air, landing and skidding on the ground. He came to his feet, dazed and and slightly burnt. “Nice attack, cretin. Tyr this on for size.” He jumped into the air, and aimed his foot at Maikeru. His legs ignited in fire, and he launched forward. Maikeru rolled away, dodging the kicm
And and charged at him. Soon after more bandits and Kumo Ninja joined the fray around them. Maikeru lunched Takeyuki in the face. I think doing so, a Shinobi tried to get him on his right while attacking him. Maikeru responded with a kick to the midsection, and held out his hands in both of their direction. He Unleashed a cone of lightning towards them, severely giving them many volts of electricity. Takeyuki recovered, and responded with a fist of fire, striking Maikeru and knocking him away. A Bandit grabbed Takeyuki from behind. He foiled him over to the ground, and stomped on his face. And on the second time, his foot turned to fire, and he stomped again. He turned to Maikeru once again, and it was just the two of them. They charged at each other. Maikeru went for a punch to the gut, but this was anticipated, and Takeyuki grabbed the balled hand and threw it to the side. In an attempt at using the stagger to his advantage, he aimed a kick for Maikeru's head. But he ducked underneath, and while he did, he charged forward, bumping his shoulder in to Takeyuki’s midsection and carrying him away. Takeyuki elbowed Maikeru in the back multiple times in an effort to escape, but was hit into a wall instead. The two separated from each other, taking a silently agreed break, both panting. The two simultaneously made hand seals, Takeyuki creating a sword of water and slashing it at Maikeru. But he won the rock, paper, scissors, and created a large Doton fist out of his own, and blocked the swords attacks, yielding it back, and punching him in the gut, lifting him in the air. When he came back down, Maikeru took his fist, and punched him forward, once again throwing him back. Deciding not to waste time he rushed forward, in an attempt to deliver the final blow. Instead, he jumped to his feet and jumped back. Maikeru stopped before he could allow himself to be caught in a counterattack. He looked around him and saw that the entire camp was on fire, and that people were getting slaughtered. It was pretty clear that the bandits were winning, however. Takeyuki looked around himself and saw this too. The look of worry etched on his face, and then a look of disbelief. He turned towards Maikeru once more and raised his hands. “YOU BANDIT SCUM! I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!!” In his hands, conjured two weapons. A fire sword on his right and a water sword on his left. Maikeru nodded and reached into the ground, mixing earth and lighting Chakra in his hand. What he pulled out was a large sword made of stone, cracked and cackling with lighting. Then the two charged at each other, and let their swords Clash. The briefly backed away with Takeyuki making the first move, going for the offensive. Maikeru held his sword strung, and parried the attack, pushing him away. Neither planned on losing.


814/2014

Makota began writing down the encounter as masked guy and elite guy both had this intense look on their face as if about to engage in awesome combat. The blonde rushed in so fast that Makoto could only write down that the shinobi in this area had speed of around the level of a special jounin or higher. The kick to the gut looked brutal, but it seemed that the boy that he was facing had a lack of strength as Makoto could relate to that to some degree.

The boy began rambling on like those bunch of old priests from earlier and wondered if masked guy was a magnet for these crazy hasturian monsters as he wrote down the information of the strong shinobi being from Kumogakure, as well as the fanaticism that was the cult of Hastur. The opponent was so stupid he even revealed his name and it sounded like some kind of food like takoyaki or something similar which made Makoto feel a bit hungry.

Makoto felt annoyed at this taijutsu style of boxing as masked guy just blocked the incoming blows as if it was natural. Masked guy seemed to be using a turtle style defensive tactic which was not always good for team fights, but it was good enough for one on one when you knew you could defend against a target. Makoto was not sure what just happened, but that punch by masked guy seemed to explode in his opponents face, he was not too sure but was this the explosive fist taijutsu style, or could it be something else entirely as he got an idea for a new jutsu in the future.

Then the opponent lit his leg on fire to launch a kick, as Makoto felt that it seemed interesting but dangerous as the opponent missed as it seemed this fanatic was really short fused. Makoto noticed the cone lightning as he kept taking notes as the people seemed to ignore him hidden in the sand as he kept taking notes. He was keeping low and did not understand why this fight looked so flashy, he began to wonder what masked guy was planning.

Makoto felt interested in that water sword technique as he noted the earth fist was also impressive in its own right. Dual wielding of a flaming sword and a water sword seemed rather interesting as he began to wonder if he could also create a technique like this in the future. However this fight was dragging on a bit much, they seemed rather even so Makoto's one clone threw five shuriken to the side so they would arc towards the target not aimed directly at him, but as a distraction to allow masked guy the initiative to take down his opponent.

Meanwhile the other makoto clone just performed the tori hand seal for insurance in case stray explosions or flames came his way. Meanwhile the real Makoto kept on writing down his surroundings and mentioning the flaming outbreak and the bandits intense counter attack.

Words = 1987 + 508 = 2495

Maikeru continued to wave his giant hammer around, eventually whirling it, spinning like a giant top. When he stopped, the size of the weapon forced Maikeru in a lag, giving Takeyuki an opportunistic attack. But Maikeru took the handle of his weapon just in time to parry the attack. A moment too late, and he would have done for. He blocked attacks from left and right, using the larger surface area to his advantage. Until with one furious duel hit, Takeyuki brought his swords down to shatter the hammer. Maikeru looked in his hands, seeing as if his hands had just had something in them, in then they didn’t.

He created some hand seals, and this time, earth traveled up his arms. Covering his arms and hands in stone, and, like the hammer, they were etched by lightning, cracks with blue static light sparking out of them. Maikeru smashed the fist together, creating a surge. He prefered fight this way anyway. Takeyuki paced back and forth. He looked around him, to see that many of his comrades had been dying. But then he looked away, and only at Maikeru. There was an understanding. That he new he was losing either way, but despite that, all he needed was this victory. This victory against this bandit who wasn’t really a bandit. Maikeru smacked his hands together, sparks flying. It was a taunt. Maikeru was telling him to get at him. And he obliged. He swing his swords, but Maikeru caught them with his rock and lightning covered hands. The Water Sword began to turn to mud, and fall apart within Takeyuki hands. Then there was an onslaught. Using his one handed Jutsu created firesword in a two handed position, he began to throw predictable flurries at Maikeru. Using his hands alone, Maikeru caught each one. But then, he crossed his femurs, one of the other, for the sword to be met with powerful arms moving against it, pushing it back with powerful force, causing Takeyuki to stagger backwards. Maikeru pushed him in the chest to further increase the stagger. And then Maikeru punched in int the face. The man looked up at him, his jaw very broken. He swung his fire sword, but Maikeru grabbed it, and squeeze the chakra out of it, causing it to disperse. “I...I won’t...lose to you….in the name of Hastur...you will fall…”

Looking down at him, the desperate man, what was left of the twinge of respect Maikeru had for this person was now gone. Maikeru yielded back his hand, and with his backhand, slapped, causing him to fly several meters back. Takeyuki got up and faced Maikeru, holding his fist weakly and pathetically. He was dazed from the beating. Maikeru grabbed his shirt, and headbutted him in the nose, hearing a loud crack. Takeyuki got to his feet once more. That twinge of respect that had vanished had returned. Maikeru admired resilience. Deep down, Maikeru didn’t want to kill him. Unfortunately he didn’t have much of a choice. Maikeru grabbed him by the head, and twisted it backwards, letting his dead body drop to the ground. Maikeru saw that many bandits were celebrating the ordeal. It was truly a barbaric and gruesome site. Maikeru could agree with Takeyuki on one thing: Bandits were barbaric animals. They were torturing survivors, drinking, fornicating, and playing with pieces of meat, unsure if it belonged to the enemy or their fallen allies. Maikeru didn’t want much part in this. He simply sighed, and went on his way. He looked at Makoto. “We can sneak out of here. No one will notice. Let’s go.”

615/2639 WC

Speed D~2->C 975 WC Needed
Perception D~2->C 975 WC Needed

[EXIT}

Makoto began to think to himself as he watched the battle he realized something he did not notice before. It starts with one thing, he did not know why, it did not even matter how hard he tried. Makoto kept that in mind, he decided to take notes to explain why things went the way they did. He looked on as they went back and forth, watched the blows go south and rise up north. All that he knew as he watched them play, that he wished he could do that too in his own little way. All this time that he wasted, all the time he had debated. All the times he could have trained were all unrelated, as in the end the only feeling he had was of being hated.

Makoto tried so hard to write it all down, but in the end he could not even keep up
He had to fall to the side, to avoid an arrow that seemed to just fly out at random
As he watched the beauty of the masked guy as it started to create its own fandom
Every time he felt bored, he looked and was amazed
At the skill of attacks and the moments of him being grazed.

Makoto put his trust in the mask, wrote as much as he could write
For all this, there's only one thing makoto knew
Makoto had to put his trust in himself
Understand what he had to do at the age of twelve.

Makoto, grew up with his mom and dad
Every time they woke they were always mad
He was a discovery they found some day
They did not care when they threw him away

Makoto believed in himself and in his own jutsu
He wanted to be a master of his own life too
All the times he spent wasting away and wondering when his hair would turn grey
As if the pain would go away as he waste away as he tries to say he wants to play.

Makoto wanted to be a master of all jutsu and the one true master
In order to beat the skills he saw today he would really need to get a whole lot faster
As he would have to rise up and weave jutsu like an epic spellcaster
Forming a web of spells that fuse elements together and shoot like a blaster.

Finally when it was all said and done
It seemed masked guy got to have all the fun

In the end Makoto was not even needed, but he helped in what little way he could as he also mapped up the area better since he could not keep up too much with the fight. His assistance did not seem to go unnoticed as he was told that they should sneak away now that the threat was neutralized, but all that was going through Makoto's mind were what was now lost.

Masked guy had started to make short work of an opponent who seemed to be so evenly matched at the start as he began to wonder if your natural ability could always trump superior jutsu as in his mind he decided he would forge through and revive this lost jutsu so that once again the flames and waters of the elemental weapons would rise up again.

So he followed on and they handed in the completion of their mission with the map that Makoto spent most of his time drawing and taking notes in, as well as his own personal notes in mind as well that he would think on later.

Words = 2495 + 603 = 3098

[exit]

Mission = 1500
Mission Extra Pay = 1200 (300 ryo)
Training Speed E1 - E3 = 150 + 225 = 375
Total 3075

Passive EP = 3098 + 2639(Maikeru's Word Total) = 5737(2 EP)