Getting over it with Eishi Isobe.

[Eishi]

"Ahh, have I ever told you I love the fresh air?" Eishi spoke as he yawned, stretching out his remaining three limbs, probably trying to get over the fatigue of the trip out if I had to guess. We had finally gotten to the base of this large mountain in the spine. It was easily a couple miles higher than we currently were and looked incredibly intimidating if I do say so myself. I just looked around me pretending to see if he was talking to someone else before responding.

"Okay?" I tilted my head, trying to figure out why he was bringing it up. He just looked at me annoyed as if I had missed something obvious. I just stared him down. I had gotten too used to his bullshit to even humoring him when it was just the two of us waiting around. I wasn't going to bother playing along, so I just sniffled at him in indifference, waiting for him to get to the point. He just grumbled at me before finally brushing me off and walked away towards the mountain.

"I'll be up top, laying all of the traps down on the path up. Just keep her going up the way I want by whatever means necessary," Eishi spoke as he left me there and began to make the trek up. I needed to wait here to inform the incoming student about today's labor, so I was stuck around the meeting point until the time came. At least recently I had found my love for sappy romance novels ever since one of my students told me about them. My word had my word view broadened since my discovery. These things were basically as bad as porn and I loved them. At least, they had more substance than all the mags Eishi had collected over the years.

Either way, I was now content until that Kei girl came for another round.

OOC Eishi and Spear-chan

 

[Sato Yuji]

Kei sneezed as she tried to figure out where she was going. The instructed meeting place had been vague especially since it could be hard to figure out what way she was walking with something blocking the sun. She had been warned by some travelers that were going the opposite way that this was “no way for a nice little girl to go.” Kei had found that amusing considering she had been wearing the band that marked her as a member of the shinobi force. In their defence the headband had been wrapped around her neck, not on her forehead, but that was still a lack of situational awareness. Not that she expected much from civilians. Thanking them politely she ignored them and carried on her route.

Before she had left and had gathered that the Spine of the World was simply a large mountain range. That didn’t mean much to her considering her lack of ability to admire them. Kei was just annoyed that it was cold, her body wasn’t meant for the cold. She lacked a lot of natural insulation that older people had. That meant she was cold and uncomfortable. Kei would have been miserable if she hadn’t dressed for the weather. Her heavy parka, gloves, scarf, and boots may had looked funny but at least she was warmish.

Kei as starting to get worried that she was never going to find where she was supposed to be when she stumbled on something that was different. It seemed she had found where she was supposed to be. Whatever was nearby smelled like like metal and tasted the same way. Whatever it was it wasn’t human, humans who tasted like metal tasted slightly different. Smiling she approached the thing. “Hello,” she said cheerfully “Kei thinks she is here to meet you.”
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[303/1500]

 

[Eishi]

"Ah good, you're finally here" I stated, taking my attention away from my book as the young intended shinobi arrived.

"I know this wasn't an easy spot to find, but that's life," I shrugged as I put away my smut and got into 'teacher mode'.

"Your goal today is to climb the mountain behind us. Place this flag into the summit and leave," I concluded handing her a little 'Victory' flag into her hands before grabbing my book back and going back to my reading once more. I just took a relaxed stance against a tree as I waited for her to leave. I was going to end up following her soon enough, but it wasn't like she needed to know that. Regardless, I still had a couple chapters and I was curious where the story was leading. What could I say? I was invested.

As soon as Kei finally did leave. I'd take the chance to disappear into the surrounding forest taking my time to trail her up the mountainside. My job was to keep her on the path and not take a deviation from it too much. I was told to use genjutsu and 'traps' or whatever was necessary to accomplish it, but I had a feeling she'd up to her neck in whatever Eishi had left for her on his way up, any way to put more traps in place for her. That proved to be a correct judgment as she got about a tenth of the way up the mountain. She was about to unwittingly enter into a literal minefield. As soon as she did step over the barrier, she'd soon find numerous explosive notes buried all over the ground for the conceivable path ahead. There was no sign or reason to think any step she took would end up safe, but I was curious to see how she was going to handle herself when she finally did trigger one. I was well off of her position, so it wasn't like I could( or would) save her unless she became incapacitated (or dead), so this was all on her.

 

[Sato Yuji]

Kei was still trying to figure what exactly the thing in front of her was when it began to speak. Snorting she listened to her mission. She may not be the most emotionally intelligent person but that didn’t mean she was dumb. When the thing was talking about the mountain there had been a spicy undertone to the things taste. It had thrown Kei off, she hadn’t expected something metal to feel anything spicy. Making no move to go up the mountain Kei scrunched up her face, “Kei wants to know what Metal is?” she asked bluntly gesturing at the thing when she said Metal. “And did it do something to the mountain?”

The thing in front of her was obviously not human. Even humans who were not human anymore were more living than the thing in front of her. She had to wonder if there was someone controlling the thing. It seemed to be working independent of any type of control, but they were shinobi so anything could happen.

There was obviously something at work. Things weren't just sent out to tell someone to run up a mountain. That was a lot of effort for something someone could have sent a clone to do. That, coupled with the spicy scent when the thing was talking about the top of the mountain, tipped Kei off that something was up. She would have expanded her senses to see if she could find any more evidence that she was right, but she was focusing on Metal at the moment. Now, Kei was all for running into whatever was set for her, but the not human thing was much more interesting. If it had been any less interesting she would have gone with whatever they had planned. After all, most things were boring life and death was not boring, not boring was something that she strived for.
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[317/620/1500]

 

[Eishi]

I blinked a couple times seeing if the strange girl was going to do what she was told. It seemed she had keener senses than most to notice my nature if a glance or sniff was all it took. I just frowned and refused to speak another word seeing if she was going to leave of her own volition. After what felt like a solid two minutes of silence, I just sighed, put my smutty book away and nodded to her as I began to speak,

"I'm a Tsukumogami, an item spirit. Specifically, I am the spirit of a spear," I clarified as I looked into the girl's eyes, my own unnatural metallic grey pupils probably giving the most sway to my claim than anything I could say as they weren't exactly human-like, to begin with. It was roughly then and there that I noticed her own eyes were consistently closed. I could've just waited for her to open them up, but seeing as she hadn't opened them at all in the last two minutes or so, I guess she just wasn't up to it. I just grimaced at not noticing earlier, but I kept my emotions in check as I spoke once more.

"Now go on young one. If you are planning on getting a passing mark, you best be leaving now," I brushed her off as I did the typical shinobi thing and threw a smoke bomb at my feet. Disappearing into the surrounding forest. I wasn't going to answer her question about Eishi who was already up the mountain. She had a good head on her to put two and two together, but I was curious to see if it would help her avoid the plethora of traps going up the mountain. If nothing else, this was going to be a lot easier than I had expected to get her to go in the right direction with some subtle genjutsus if sight wasn't even a bother.

 

[Sato Yuji]

A tsukumogami now that was interesting. Brother had given Kei a quick rundown of what she might encounter when interacting other shinobi and tsukumogami had been briefly mentioned. From what she could remember, which was honestly not much, they were similar to Small Brother. That was a very interesting piece of information to have, Small Brother didn’t like leaving Brother’s side. Did that mean Metal had someone who was similar to Brother around? If Metal did then that meant there was someone else further up the mountain waiting for her. Kei had to wonder what they had been doing this whole time.

Kei frowned as Spear, Metal was to broad a name so Kei decided to change it, as she felt a thunk on her shoulder. Looked like Spear wasn’t too happy with something. Coughing she waved a hand in front of her face to clear the smoke that the bomb had left behind. That hadn’t been very nice of Spear to do so in retaliation Kei made a nasty face in the direction Spear had gone. Metal was an uncommon smell so it was easy to follow.

Pouting she picked up the flag and began trudging up the mountain. Spear had never answered the question about what it had done to the mountain. Not continuing the class never crossed Kei’s mind, if she failed the class Brother would be disappointed and that was something that had to be avoided at all costs. Instead, she decided to try to see if Spear’s equivalent to Small Brother’s Brother was anywhere nearby. Maybe not everyone was like Small Brother and Brother, but it was better to be safe than to be dead. Kei had to concentrate when she was expanding her range so she stopped her walking and focused internally. It took a few minutes, but she found what she was looking for. Kei’s guess had been right, there was another human on the mountain but they weren’t close by. The smell of cigarettes was quite obvious in a place as pure as the one she was in. Pulling back she began to trudge up again.

Now Kei is something of a conditional lucky person, that meant she was very, very lucky only when she was in an unlucky situation. About a tenth of the way to the top she, unlucky, triggered an exploding tag. This tag was, luckily, a small one and Kei had just enough time to jump, luckily, backward to avoid getting blown up. So that was the name of the game. Grinning she walked back a little way and sat down to make snowballs. Once she had a large number of them, all packed with either rocks or ice. Kei began to throw them around the area place she had stepped on the tag. They would, hopefully, trigger the set traps giving her a trap free path up the mountain. She just hoped the taps didn’t cause an avalanche.
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[500/1120/1500]

 

[Eishi]

Kei's plan worked for the most part. There were plenty of small craters on the ground after she had done her due diligence. It didn't mean they were all gone, but throwing them before she took a step was a solid choice. I was at least somewhat impressed. I would've just traveled the treeline myself and avoided the whole thing, but to each there own. If nothing else, doing what she did was just going to be a slow the climb up. The entire path, from what I knew, had been booby-trapped to hell and back and this hadn't been the only nasty surprise in wait. She would encounter quite the number of pitfalls, wire traps, the trees inexplicably falling on her location and even some of her predicted locations as she continued her journey. It was only until she was nearly up the mountain that a new challenge emerged.

I was following her, keeping myself hidden as I went about above the treeline, keeping a gaze on her and maintaining the genjutsu to keep her on the path as she climbed the mountain. Soon enough, she would find herself face to face with the equivalence of a biker gang, just hanging out, inconspicuously, in the middle of the mountain range path. They, of course, weren't actually real, but unless Kei figured that out on her own, she'd likely find that there seemed to always be one more than the number she was expecting attacking her from her 'blind side'.

"Drop all your shit, and get out of our mountain range, girl. I'm not the type to rape and kill small girls, but I don't speak for all of my men, so I won't ask twice!" The biggest brute, the obvious 'leader' of the band of gruff looking men, sneered at Kei as she approached from the distance. There were still plenty of explosive traps and pitfalls under the pathway these men stood on, but unsurprisingly, they weren't triggering any of them as Kei approached. The goal Eishi had this time seemed to be to distracted her long enough via these illusionary fighters for her to stumble upon an explosive note or two. I'd honestly be surprised if this was how it was going to go down after seeing her trek up, but I could still see her getting roughed up a bit. Regardless, I was looking forward to the upcoming show.

 

[Sato Yuji]

Kei was quite happy with her plan. It wasn’t perfect, she had triggered a few traps as she continued on her path but they were more annoying than anything else. Wire traps were easy to get out of, and the pitfalls gave her enough time to jump over them. She was actually thankful when the first tree branch almost fell on her. She had not realized that the trees went all the way up the mountain. An oversight on her part, one she would have to work on correcting. If she got bored of her way of doing things she could always take to the trees. A faster way then what she was doing but right now she was having too much fun.

She knows the thing that had greeted her at the bottom of the mountain was following her. Kei sometimes lost Spear’s scent, but it popped up at regular enough intervals. It had taken a less sharp scent which Kei could only guess was a good thing. As Kei continued up she ran into an interesting situation, somebody else was on the mountain. Somebody was threatening her with a fate she didn’t want to experience, but to Kei, the person didn’t exist. To her senses, there was nothing living in front of her. Deciding to double check her initial findings she did her scan again, this one a much rougher than then her original. Her second scan still only brought up the smell of metal and the taste of cigarettes. Kei’s abilities had never failed her so she simply smiled at the voice in front of her.

“Kei really doesn’t like clones.”

After she spoke she threw a few snowballs laughing as it set off some of the more explosive traps near them. Then she took to the trees. Hopefully, some of the explosions would catch whatever was in front of her. Once in the trees, she began to continue towards the top of the mountain at a much, much quicker rate. As she moved through the trees, she cut off the branches she was near, cutting off her pursuers path. She really didn’t like clones they were hard for her to track because they lacked a signature. That meant she had to rely on her other senses. Kei also wasn’t all the interesting in fighting. Kei continued her run up the mountain, hopefully, the chase would stop when she reached the top and found the clone’s maker.
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[410/1540/1500]

 

[Eishi]

I hadn't expected that, but I guess her logic was sound. I kept on her tail at this point, the clones weren't exactly toast by any stretch of the imagination, but it seemed Eishi was just going to hold them back and play possum until Kei had left the area. Probably was entertained by her answer or something,. They were still metal clones of Eishi, durable enough to take a few explosive notes to the face without much problem, so who knows. I wasn't even going to bother with hiding my presence at this point as I enacted the final stage of the course. I would openly attack her from behind. Materializing my spear form into my hands as I cast [Magnetic Control], imbuing it with an extra degree of pinpoint control as it flew out of my hands, right for the branch she was about to land on. I came in a moment later as I went with unarmed combat. My gauntlets heavied as Imbued them with magnetic chakra. I went in for a few nasty seekers to the chest a few moments later, ready for a rumble.

"You're less than a kilometer from the top, get there before I stop you," I instructed before my spear form came from under her and slashed up. I was going to continue to beat and harassing her until she planted her flag as was my job. I was definitely rooting for her at this point, but I still had to make sure I went by the book. The closer she got, the harder I went. I needed to get her stressed out and beat up enough to really want that victory.

Once she had finally done the deed and planted the flag, assuming that she makes it, Eishi would appear next to me with some of those little pocky stick biscuits in his mouth as he looked Kei over. God did I love those little things. It seemed Eishi noticed as he tossed me his pack as he began walked over to the student. I just caught it casually and put them into one of my pockets as I followed along. I'd probably just have some when the student was gone.

"Pass," Eishi thumbed up at Kei before going through the motions of healing most of the damage she had endured in the last kilometer. Enough to close and wounds and heal and broken bones, but not enough to dull the aches. Eishi was always a strong believer in not completely healing mistakes. The pain was always a good reminder in his opinion from what he has told me. I decided to just go up to the blind girl and handed her some protein and a waterskin.

"Good job, Feel free to stay and rest for a minute if you want to accompany us back," I commented as I took a seat on a metal bench, took out some Pocky sticks, and offered a seat next to me by patting it. Eishi had the fun job of cleaning up his mess down the mountain, so I was free to enjoy the air for the next half an hour to an hour.

 

[Sato Yuji]

Kei sighed heavily as she realized the clones were still following her. It did seem that they had backed off some but that didn't fill her with confidence. Her suspicions proved right as she tasted blood and steel before her next jump. It seemed the being that had been following her had decided to play its hand. The taste had more steel then blood so Kei assumed it wasn't actually trying to kill her, jut stop her from running. That meant it would go for something she was using and then maybe her. Right before her next jump, she felt the taste sharpen and Kei responded appropriately. She kicked up off of the trunk of the tree onto a bench that was above the one she had been originally aiming for. The one that the spear had now destroyed. Tasting more blood Kei simply stopped jumping forward, an act that plummeted her through a layer of, back to the one she had been in before her avoidance of the spear. Now, this hadn't been a pleasant action, she received her first scrapes from breaking through the branches, but it did enable her to avoid whatever Spear had been about to do.

Before Spear had spoken Kei had already decided to run. It wasn't as if Kei couldn't fight, some may even have called her competent, it was simply that she did not necessarily want to. Especially not with someone who was potentially stronger then she and with her movements severely restricted. Kei sighed again, this time louder, before imbuing her legs with chakra and pulling out her knives. When she couldn't dodge the attacks she simply defected them. It was not an easy task, Kei's knives were made more for throwing than for deflecting, but it was still successful. It just hurt her arms and shoulders. Kei was finding this task very, very tedious by the time she had reached the top of the mountain. She had been hit a few times, but nothing major, just a few scraps, and bruised bones. Nothing she couldn't heal once she had a few moments rest.

Finally reaching the top of the mountain she let out a breath as she planted the flag into the ground. Shaking out her hands she made a face at the person who appeared next to her. "You taste bad." Was the only thing she said to the new presence. She was not surprised that the other appeared, but that didn't mean she had to like it. Kei really hated the taste of cigarettes. Kei hopped up and down a few times before sheathing her weapons and repeating the jumps moving away from the bad tasting person.

She stopped jumping as the other human approached her and smiled as she felt healing chakra wash over her. That was nice but completely unnecessary, not that she would complain when someone else was wasting their chakra. She made a face at him when he didn't completely heal her. "Kei believes that if you are going to do something you should do it completely." That was a pointed statement at his healing job. "Also since Kei passed Cigs should give her food." She didn't feel hungry, but Brother had said she had to eat after she did any type of fighting or running. She had made a mistake of not eating once and Brother wouldn't let her live it down. She smiled brightly as Spear gave passed her, taking a sip.

"Thank you." She said taking a seat next to the being and passing the water skin back. Kei relaxed slightly as she clenched as relaxed her hands. Adrenaline really messed her up.
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[605/2145/1500]
[5/5]