The sound of hands striking wood echoed out into the cold morning as the sun attempted to warm the cold front blowing in from the southern sea. The tall skinny blond girl whacking sticks with her hands had her hair pulled back into loose ponytail. Sweat was accumulating quickly beneath the karate gi as she repeated the strikes on the dummy with devastating monotony. The pattern continued to repeat over and over until she moved to strike and felt one of her knuckles getting skinned. Otami quickly broke form and raised the flesh wound up to her lips to suck at it. It was a natural instinct to isolate an injury in the vacuum of one’s mouth in the attempt to cut pain; which of course only kind of helped. The top of her head was smacked with a straight chop. Seemingly without any strength added into the motion yet she could feel the weight of the attack and how much the man behind her was holding back. She squeaked in pain, reaching up to grab the new sore spot when the man who was tutoring, grabbed Otami’s injured finger.
With a noise of disappointment, the older man twisted it, snapping the finger out of socket much to the girl’s pain. She dropped to the ground holding the now far more injured hand to her chest, heaving in the attempt to not barf or cry in front of the cruel instructor. Suddenly she felt his foot touch the tip of her chin and lift her face up to see her glaring nothing but sheer malice.
“Still a beast, I see,” the man spoke in a haughty tone. He stood, smaller than her at only 5’ 6’’, but commanded such prowess in his form that she couldn’t even begin to retaliate. Without knowing, Otami knew he could cut her head right off with that foot. Yet she could not give in. Her Wildling blood boiled, and wanted nothing more than to break the guy’s face, but couldn’t. She lacked the strength to do so, utterly.
Which was sorta how she got here in the first place. Lets rewind.
Two days ago Otami had been out on an E-Rank mission to help build a fence. Simple task. Thing is this said fence was being built between two rivaling farmers, with one side claiming the other was building outside of their own property, and into the other. In order to just fast lane the project, to which the builder of said fence was well within his rights to do, the local ruling government decided to hire out of Konohagakure. Great idea. Three Genin all showed up, and were all of the kind of Genin that took those jobs. Really young and fresh out of the Academy, or like Otami, lazy and unmotivated to move beyond these simple jobs. They were digging post holes when the gang realized that their job was quickly about to escalate beyond E-Rank. The other farmer, guy who didn’t want the fence up for ornery reasons that can only be understood by other yokels, had also gone out of his way to hire some goons. Mercenaries who prided themselves on being “Genin Removers”; and thus remove they did.
Otami got out of the initial blast by the sheer luck of being behind the big stack of fence materials when the paper bomb went off. The other older Genin, a man about five years her senior, was not so lucky as he laid there grabbing his now missing leg, screaming. He was quickly struck down by another kunai. The younger Genin had the right idea and grabbed their boss before moving to Otami’s location. She couldn’t remember a lot of what he was screaming at her. Something about stopping them, holding them off…something. But that kid? He was gonna get help. She got that. He left the farmer in her care and took off faster than she could have predicted of someone three years younger than her. Thank the kami he could.
The band of two men with a third person somewhere in the trees, Otami could smell her, quickly surrounded them. The blond girl drew a kunai from her satchel and prepared for the worst, but she was so incapable of actually defending herself, let alone the man just trying to build a fence. She slashed on her left, holding off one guy as they moved in closer, stabbed at her right and tried to slash left again, but found her elbow being hit with enough force to kick it out of socket. A cry of pain and the kunai flew from her hands to land some distance away. Another fist on her right crashed in on the girl’s temple. The stance held so proudly staggered quickly as a knee buckled under the dizzying vision brought by the blow. Something primal screamed at her core and she raised her arms, calling out to the earth below her to do as she bid. When she had walked the dunes of the Wind Country, the sand often obeyed her commands, though rarely on her whim. She had a gift for tuning earth chakra to a point that her entire system might of well been nothing but that.
Today, however, nothing happened.
Another fist cut deep into her left cheek, a check to the gut that doubled her over, a rising knee to her nose. Someone grabbed her hair and she was barely standing. Someone else was mentioning unsavory things they wanted to do to her. Another kick to the gut forced her knees to buckle but she refused to cry out, beg for mercy, or just simply black out from the pain. Sheer stubborn will kept her composure as she held tight to the invisible wire around her right hand. The person holding her hair pulled Otami’s head back so that they could look her in the eyes, but all they got was a one-eyed glare, and a wolf’s growl as she bared fangs. The guy laughed as the Wildling jerked her body back, making the useless arm pull the wire to send the kunai back in their direction. Wrapped around the handle? You guessed it: an explosive tag she originally hid when it was drawn. The force of the explosion was what finally caused the desert princess to finally reach a state of blissful unconsciousness.
When she came back to reality, painful, painful reality, her arm was back in socket and fixed. The farmer was just fine, if not a bit rattled by the his rival’s actions who had been promptly arrested. A chunnin had come back with the fast boy, apparently just moments after the explosive went off, and took care of all three mercenaries. Their bodies were piled up on a wagon along with the body of the older Genin with a kunai in his head and a missing leg. Otami sat up slowly, unphased by the death but rattled by her injures, the Chunnin moving over to help her up back to her feet. He congratulated her on keeping them preoccupied but something inside of the girl felt the praise was entirely empty. Otami looked up and saw the face and mouth claim he was proud of her, but his eyes were filled with nothing but disgust.
Sure enough, two days later, she had received orders to undergo retraining. It had been finally taken note of by upper management that she had been coasting on E-Rank missions for far too long as a “someone with potential”, whatever that meant. Otami had been brought to this village to protect her from the menace of her father, to with she disagreed with but, accepted that he wasn’t the greatest guy around. Now she had to fulfill her ends. Suna had a reputation of producing strong shinobi by virtue of living in the desert alone and not only had Otami lived in the actual desert since birth, but was also directly related to the reason she was here in the first place. This wasn’t some exchange student thing. They expected much of Otami, and she had originally came wielding a strong control over the element of earth…but, the connection was weak here. It was as if her homelands had a special power that enriched her natural strengths, but here, she would have to learn how to actually use her chakra.
Which brought Otami to this man. His name was Uzumoreru Itten and was the last, (that he was aware of), of an assassin clan that once originated from the same country she had. He had been born away from that clan and life, a native to the Fire Country, but his family still managed to have some ties with them. He had been born with black blood, apparently a big deal in his clan, and thus was naturally gifted in martial arts because of it. He had volunteered to train her, out of his own spare time even, because he wanted to see the fabled strengths of a Suna Warrior, but all he found was this boring girl. She was weak, but not in a way that couldn’t be fixed with basic training. Her glare was the only thing he found interesting about the sun-kissed child despite finding her weak otherwise. She had an iron will that, no matter how much he pushed, could not be broken. She was angry, he could see that, but he also saw the gears in her head turning behind those furious green eyes. The blue flecks around her iris were becoming more vibrant with the more he pushed and he could sense chakra beginning to flow through her body again. Otami’s problem wasn’t anything some hard training couldn’t fix, he surmised.
“Give me your finger,” he commanded. Reluctantly she raised the hand up and with a quick touch he relocated her finger to a loud yelp. “Again.” The fifth time he had said that today but she relented. Taking stance the sound of her hands beating wood began to echo into the morning.
[MFT]
[Topic Entered/Left]
With a noise of disappointment, the older man twisted it, snapping the finger out of socket much to the girl’s pain. She dropped to the ground holding the now far more injured hand to her chest, heaving in the attempt to not barf or cry in front of the cruel instructor. Suddenly she felt his foot touch the tip of her chin and lift her face up to see her glaring nothing but sheer malice.
“Still a beast, I see,” the man spoke in a haughty tone. He stood, smaller than her at only 5’ 6’’, but commanded such prowess in his form that she couldn’t even begin to retaliate. Without knowing, Otami knew he could cut her head right off with that foot. Yet she could not give in. Her Wildling blood boiled, and wanted nothing more than to break the guy’s face, but couldn’t. She lacked the strength to do so, utterly.
Which was sorta how she got here in the first place. Lets rewind.
Two days ago Otami had been out on an E-Rank mission to help build a fence. Simple task. Thing is this said fence was being built between two rivaling farmers, with one side claiming the other was building outside of their own property, and into the other. In order to just fast lane the project, to which the builder of said fence was well within his rights to do, the local ruling government decided to hire out of Konohagakure. Great idea. Three Genin all showed up, and were all of the kind of Genin that took those jobs. Really young and fresh out of the Academy, or like Otami, lazy and unmotivated to move beyond these simple jobs. They were digging post holes when the gang realized that their job was quickly about to escalate beyond E-Rank. The other farmer, guy who didn’t want the fence up for ornery reasons that can only be understood by other yokels, had also gone out of his way to hire some goons. Mercenaries who prided themselves on being “Genin Removers”; and thus remove they did.
Otami got out of the initial blast by the sheer luck of being behind the big stack of fence materials when the paper bomb went off. The other older Genin, a man about five years her senior, was not so lucky as he laid there grabbing his now missing leg, screaming. He was quickly struck down by another kunai. The younger Genin had the right idea and grabbed their boss before moving to Otami’s location. She couldn’t remember a lot of what he was screaming at her. Something about stopping them, holding them off…something. But that kid? He was gonna get help. She got that. He left the farmer in her care and took off faster than she could have predicted of someone three years younger than her. Thank the kami he could.
The band of two men with a third person somewhere in the trees, Otami could smell her, quickly surrounded them. The blond girl drew a kunai from her satchel and prepared for the worst, but she was so incapable of actually defending herself, let alone the man just trying to build a fence. She slashed on her left, holding off one guy as they moved in closer, stabbed at her right and tried to slash left again, but found her elbow being hit with enough force to kick it out of socket. A cry of pain and the kunai flew from her hands to land some distance away. Another fist on her right crashed in on the girl’s temple. The stance held so proudly staggered quickly as a knee buckled under the dizzying vision brought by the blow. Something primal screamed at her core and she raised her arms, calling out to the earth below her to do as she bid. When she had walked the dunes of the Wind Country, the sand often obeyed her commands, though rarely on her whim. She had a gift for tuning earth chakra to a point that her entire system might of well been nothing but that.
Today, however, nothing happened.
Another fist cut deep into her left cheek, a check to the gut that doubled her over, a rising knee to her nose. Someone grabbed her hair and she was barely standing. Someone else was mentioning unsavory things they wanted to do to her. Another kick to the gut forced her knees to buckle but she refused to cry out, beg for mercy, or just simply black out from the pain. Sheer stubborn will kept her composure as she held tight to the invisible wire around her right hand. The person holding her hair pulled Otami’s head back so that they could look her in the eyes, but all they got was a one-eyed glare, and a wolf’s growl as she bared fangs. The guy laughed as the Wildling jerked her body back, making the useless arm pull the wire to send the kunai back in their direction. Wrapped around the handle? You guessed it: an explosive tag she originally hid when it was drawn. The force of the explosion was what finally caused the desert princess to finally reach a state of blissful unconsciousness.
When she came back to reality, painful, painful reality, her arm was back in socket and fixed. The farmer was just fine, if not a bit rattled by the his rival’s actions who had been promptly arrested. A chunnin had come back with the fast boy, apparently just moments after the explosive went off, and took care of all three mercenaries. Their bodies were piled up on a wagon along with the body of the older Genin with a kunai in his head and a missing leg. Otami sat up slowly, unphased by the death but rattled by her injures, the Chunnin moving over to help her up back to her feet. He congratulated her on keeping them preoccupied but something inside of the girl felt the praise was entirely empty. Otami looked up and saw the face and mouth claim he was proud of her, but his eyes were filled with nothing but disgust.
Sure enough, two days later, she had received orders to undergo retraining. It had been finally taken note of by upper management that she had been coasting on E-Rank missions for far too long as a “someone with potential”, whatever that meant. Otami had been brought to this village to protect her from the menace of her father, to with she disagreed with but, accepted that he wasn’t the greatest guy around. Now she had to fulfill her ends. Suna had a reputation of producing strong shinobi by virtue of living in the desert alone and not only had Otami lived in the actual desert since birth, but was also directly related to the reason she was here in the first place. This wasn’t some exchange student thing. They expected much of Otami, and she had originally came wielding a strong control over the element of earth…but, the connection was weak here. It was as if her homelands had a special power that enriched her natural strengths, but here, she would have to learn how to actually use her chakra.
Which brought Otami to this man. His name was Uzumoreru Itten and was the last, (that he was aware of), of an assassin clan that once originated from the same country she had. He had been born away from that clan and life, a native to the Fire Country, but his family still managed to have some ties with them. He had been born with black blood, apparently a big deal in his clan, and thus was naturally gifted in martial arts because of it. He had volunteered to train her, out of his own spare time even, because he wanted to see the fabled strengths of a Suna Warrior, but all he found was this boring girl. She was weak, but not in a way that couldn’t be fixed with basic training. Her glare was the only thing he found interesting about the sun-kissed child despite finding her weak otherwise. She had an iron will that, no matter how much he pushed, could not be broken. She was angry, he could see that, but he also saw the gears in her head turning behind those furious green eyes. The blue flecks around her iris were becoming more vibrant with the more he pushed and he could sense chakra beginning to flow through her body again. Otami’s problem wasn’t anything some hard training couldn’t fix, he surmised.
“Give me your finger,” he commanded. Reluctantly she raised the hand up and with a quick touch he relocated her finger to a loud yelp. “Again.” The fifth time he had said that today but she relented. Taking stance the sound of her hands beating wood began to echo into the morning.
[MFT]
[Topic Entered/Left]