From Cavern to Sky, What a Wonderful World (Traveling)

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

So a mission was given to him to head off to Shigakure on some kind of envoy mission to bring Shigakure against the Shogun and expand their forces. It seemed like a reasonable thing to do and Arikiko was here... Well he wasn't really sure why, maybe for some back up or maybe to help him get to know his allies. It didn't really matter he decided as he crossed his arms over his chest, looking down at the ground and waiting for Taishoku to show up. He was pretty sure Laxus should've went on this mission but that didn't really matter, he was away on his own business and Taishoku was alright, not quite as bloodthirsty but he was Anti-Shogunate so Arikiko liked him well enough for that. He just wondered where he was now...

Taishoku would sling his gourd on as he made his way out of his clan's home and to where he was meeting Arikiko. A bored expression was on his face as he walked the streets of hakagakure, after a few minutes he made it to the spot and stopped in front of Arikiko."Sigh, you ready?"Taishoku would ask him as he looked down at Arikiko. Taishoku honestly wasn't interested in doing a mission that involved him going to another village, but he had to fulfill his duty as a Hakagakure jonin. Taishoku hadn't really done anything with Arikiko before and wonder how the boy would be on a mission with him, as his back-up. Taishoku only expectation of Arikiko for the mission for him not to do anything stupid or put his mission at risk of failure.

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

"I wouldn't be here if I wasn't ready Taishoku, I do hope you yourself are ready because we are setting off quickly." He murmured out, his voice emotionless and his sanguine eyes moving up to lock with Taishoku's before he nodded. He then turned and walked off, his arms sliding out of their cross and moving his hands into his pockets. The massive axe on his back would be painfully obvious with his walk like this though, red veins of power running over the weapon that was almost twice his own height. "So we are to try and bring Shigakure over to the side of the Anti-Shogunate, quite correct Taishoku?" He asked as he walked, not bothering to look behind him. He respected Taishoku, yes but he didn't show deference to anyone and this case was no different, he would treat the Kurogane as an equal and no more because an equal was all he was and he was lucky to get that much, only his rank gave him such a level from Arikiko.

Taishoku bored expression would fade away, a smile taking it's place, at what Arikiko said. Taishoku would walk beside the boy, his smile still on his face as he looked at the boy's axe and then looked forward."That's what I was told."He would put both his hands in his pockets as he continued to walk."But i am still thinking of a way to have them join us." Taishoku would add. Taishoku has never been to Shigakure and wondered how the people there felt about the Shogun and his rule. If they felt the same as Hakagakure felt they should join us without a problem. "So Arikiko how do you feel about being my backup on this mission?" Taishoku asks the boy, just to make conversation. The two need some thing to talk about so why not that, they would be traveling for awhile. If Arikiko didn't want to answer that question though Taishoku had many more he wanted to ask about the boy.

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

"You simply explain the situation, the fact that we have been oppressed by the Shogun for a long time now, that the villages no longer have their own identity anymore, we are scarcely any different from one another now that the Shogun has just put us under one massive banner. We can't let that continue to happen so we fight against the Shogunate in order to free ourselves from a cruel rule. Or at least that is the way that I see it." Upon that last sentence Arikiko twitched slightly and a lance of pain shot through his head. He clamped one hand over his eye and growled softly before shaking his head and looking up once more. "And your backup? I think we are equal as far as this is concerned, I may not be as smooth with words as others but I can make an impact where needed, as long as certain things don't happen but the chance of such a thing happening is... Miniscule to say the least so I wouldn't worry." He looked around at Taishoku and if he bothered looking he would notice one eye turning slightly purple for some reason...

"That would be a good way to explain thing." Taishoku says, he would have probably thought about saying that if he had to think of something. But that was something a boring person would say to get Shi to join us, but sometimes the boring things are best. As they walked Taishoku would look up at the sky as he listened to what Arikiko had to say about being Taishoku's backup. What Taishoku was going to say first was going to probably offend Arikiko and make him not respect Taishoku anymore, so he decided to say something else."So..." Taishoku had looked down at Arikiko and saw his eye and changed what he was going to say."....What is wrong with your eye Arikiko?" Taishoku expression was a calm one as he waited for Arikiko to tell him, but it kinda freaked him out that the boy's eye was turning slightly purple.

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

Arikiko blinked a few times at Taishoku's question, an actual surprised expression appearing on his face for a few fractions of a second before he snapped his head away. A snarl left his mouth and he covered his eye once more, clenching them shut as he continued to walk forwards. "There's nothing wrong with my eye, just painful is all." He muttered out, his free hand clenching tightly into a fist as he stormed forwards, removing his hand from his face and clenching it as well. Honestly Arikiko himself wasn't sure what was going on but he couldn't focus on it, something continued to cloud his thoughts, make him focus on other things, make him feel pain when he thought of certain things. Arikiko really had no idea what was going on but there was something certainly... Wrong... "So then Taishoku, what is it like being a Kurogane?"

"Then I must have been seeing things." Taishoku says. If the boy didn't wanna talk about it then Taishoku wouldn't bug him about it. "Whats it like being a kurogane you ask?" Taishoku says repeating the question and turning hi attention back on the sky, as he rubbed his chin he began to think of a good answer. Taishoku had asked himself this question many times during training and during intense battles, but that was only to make him boast his confidence to continue during those things. Arikiko was the first person that has ask him this question in a while, maybe about two years or so." I guess I feel like great pride and honor in being a member of one of the greatest clans that has every been. I think all members feel this way also, some more then others." Taishoku would pause as he would think of his little brother for a second."Well being the next in line for clan head those are and should only be my feeling about being in my clan." Taishoku actually was lying as he had many different feeling about being a kurogane and how their clan was run."Why do you ask?" Taishoku asks Arikiko wondering what brought about this question.

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

"Pride for being part of a clan. You talk as though being part of some form of family makes you better than everyone else, or perhaps you are proud of your genes, the fact that you are able to use Blood Release naturally rather than having to steal it like others... A rather interesting thing now that you think about, no?" Arikiko turned his head to look at Taishoku and once more the purple eye would be obvious, however the colour much more noticeable despite the other eye being of its usual red colour. Quickly though the purple went back to red. "I have recently been accepted into the Yaju Clan and I must say that I don't understand why people are proud of being in a clan... It is just a way of getting more power, of learning to harness effects greater than you once knew. I myself have earned a great deal of power despite having been with the Yaju for only a few weeks." He sighed and stroked his chin. Obviously Arikiko was not like most other people his age. "What are your thoughts on such a thing? Would you join a family for the express purpose of taking their secrets to give you more power?"

"Sigh, I guess you could say that." Taishoku says, that statement for everything Arikiko just said. Taishoku glanced over at Arikiko, noticing his eye change color. But Taishoku didn't say anything about the weird thing happening again, he didn't know what to say to him about it. So Taishoku would leave that only, until he had to bring it up. Turing away from Arikiko Taishoku gazed back at the sky and listened to the rest Arikiko had to say." I feel we won't and honestly shouldn't feel the same way about belonging to a clan. My pride comes from the teachings I have been given since birth about my clan and watching how powerful many of my fellow clansman are. But I agree that part of being in a clan is to gain more power then you have had prier." Taishoku would pull his hands out of his pockets and stretch his arms a little before continuing, putting his hands back into his pockets." On joining a new family..well clan..I couldn't do such a thing. Because to me doing that or leaving the my clan would bring shame on me and and more importantly my close family."Taishoku meant his close family as his father mother and brother. "But I would love to gain the secrets and different things other clan posses. No matter how I have to get them." Taishoku was finished and hoped Arikiko thought what he said was a good enough answer.

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

"True, the teaching from birth can truly shape a person in their later life. However I was not taught like any other, the only influence I have truly had was Morghul and even such..." He jerked his head suddenly, a gasp of pain leaving his mouth before he ground his teeth and brought his head up once more. "No, the only one guiding me was Morghul, teaching me what the world was about and why I should kill and hate..." He furrowed his eyebrows and clenched his fists down by his sides. "I rather like your answer however, a truly bloodthirsty and ambitious one. I believe we could have been friends had the circumstances not been as they are... Age is a barrier, rank and perhaps your overabundance of care for the world around you. This place serves only to fuel our needs and bring us forwards in the world and people need to realise this, as dark as it may seem. Care is a barrier that prevents us from fighting to our fullest extent, a wall that stops us from doing what must be done..." He chuckled quietly and looked around at Taishoku. "Your thoughts?"

Taishoku would look at Arikiko and noticed the things Arikiko did the being wiered out by the jerking of his head the gaps of pain and his clenched fists at his side, but Taishoku wouldn't say anything about it yet."Ha! you say I have a overabundance of care for the world around me? To an extent kinda but really I feel no such thing, friend. I have only one goal and that's to make my clan stronger and by doing that make myself the strongest that has every lived. But as a jonin well..... Plague of Haka I do have to fulfill my duties I am given, no matter what they may be. But my clan is my main priority and thing I kinda only care about" Taishoku would yawn and adjust his gourd, that was sagging off of him a bit, before turning away from Arikiko and to the sky once more. It was a beautiful day for them to be traveling, but how long would that last? They had been walking for some time but nothing was really happening and that bored Taishoku a bit."But, I think everyone should care about something because to me that the only reason you should get stronger or fight with all we got and do what must be done." Taishoku would stop not wanting to say anything else about that subject. Suddenly he would move his gourd from his back and stop. Bones would then sprout from his back blood dripping from them as they grow muscle sinew and blood vessels and then finally flesh. Now Taishoku had some wings and when he extended them to their fullest they would be dragon wings, with a wingspan of fourteen feet. What Taishoku would do no was take flight, but hover above Arikiko and flying with him if he continued to walk." Arikiko enough of talking about caring and those other things! I want grow bored of this! lets make this travel less boring! Lets see how you match up against a jonin, friend!" Taishoku just wanted to see how strong Arikiko and also to see if getting Arikiko active would stop his pain. As he kept his eyes on Arikiko he put his gourd back on his back and waited to see if the boy would accept his little challenge. "Oi and one more thing! This won't be an ordinary fight if you agree on it! But I shall tell you i you agree to it!" Taishoku says finishing everything he had to say, his feeling would be indifferent if Arikiko accepted or declined his little challenge.

Spoiler:

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

Arikiko mulled over what he was going to say after Taishoku had finished the first thing he was saying. The boy reached up and gently stroked the blade of the massive axe attached to his back. As he was about to respond however the Kurogane said something much more interesting and quickly Arikiko snapped his gaze around to look at him, a feral smile arcing his lips up. "A challenge, against a jonin you say?" His voice dripped with bloodlust as his hand grabbed the weapon and swung it away from his back, the edge of the blade carving through the ground and opening a furrow in the earth. He hopped away and stared at Taishoku before rotating his axe around and crouching, letting the gargantuan weapon rest on his shoulder. "I may be hopelessly outclassed in terms of chakra, jutsu diversity and even jutsu numbers... But do not count me out yet, Taishoku. I may be a genin but I am not weak." He chuckled quietly and then narrowed his eyes at the other shinobi, his body preparing itself for battle and adrenaline straight away pumping through his body and getting him ready for the combat that was to come. "So then Kurogane, I accept your challenge and I hope you won't underestimate me..." Arikiko then rolled his shoulder and decided which technique he would use, settling on his tactics already and preparing himself both physically and mentally.

Spoiler:

"Great! All you have to do is cut or tear my wings off!"Taishoku would then land on the ground, but it wasn't clear why."If you are able to do that you I will think of you of a equal."Taishoku says that to let Arikiko know that he didn't considered them equals just yet. Instantly Taishoku would have two sets of arms come out of his body, on above his regular one and another set under his regular arms. Adding to that a exoskeleton would also come out of his body and cover everything except his wings. "O and to make it fun don't use your axe to cut the wings off. But besides that anything you do is fine, so please don't hold back on me." Taishoku says from under the exoskeleton that covered his face. After every Taishoku said he would use his mighty wings to move past Arikiko at A-rank speeds,toward their traveling direction. After past him he would move at c-rank speeds. Lets see if Arikiko would catch him and figure a way to take Taishoku's wings off. This little challenge should make their travel less boring, it wasn't that often a kurogane and Yaju faced of.

Spoiler:

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

Tear his wings off, that was all that Arikiko had to do in order to win this challenge of Taishoku's? The yoroi laughed darkly and his eyes narrowed as he spun Morghul around. The axe suddenly changed into a small card, almost looking like a playing card but made of black material covered in glowing red lines. Arikiko then waited until Taishoku moved past him to make his move, the card vanished as he passed it over his chest, murmuring a few soft words, Morghul saying them at the same time.. "Weapon Over." Then a change overtook him. His hair elongated and spiked backwards, like a hedgehog while a black metal band moved over the top of his skull, locking his hair in place. Arikiko's teeth then sharpened and became longer at the same time as a pair of blades burst from his forearms. "Time to begin." Arikiko snarled, a deep metallic thrumming behind his voice before he turned and launched straight at Taishoku at Vacuum Release speeds, his feet leaving a crater in the ground behind him. "I couldn't use my axe, but you didn't say anything about a weapon/zireh hybrid." He screamed as he launched at Taishoku, jumping at his back and swinging both of his forearm blades at A-Rank speeds to try and slice his wings off, a manic, feral look burning in his eyes.

Spoiler:

Once Taishoku was touch several bones pop out all at once, but Taishoku wouldn't use how the technique should be used. He would change the tips of the bones so that they weren't sharp but flat. He didn't want to accidentally send his bones though Arikiko's body, but he needed to get him off. But Arikiko's attack was successful in a way since he was able to completely cut on of the wings off. How this happened is when Taishokui felt contact he withdrew so that it was against his back and not sticking out. But he wasn't skilled enough to move both of them out of harms way. To in order to make sure Arikiko wasn't still on him, and ignored the spikes, Taishoku would create a dome around him, trapping Arikiko inside with Taishoku if he stayed on is back. And the dome wouldn't be big as since Taishoku created this one to just have enough room for him. Nothing would happen offensively if Arikiko got stuck in the skull shaped dome with Taishoku. But he would be pinned to the wall since Taishoku's Dance of the Larch wouldn't allow Arikiko to get close.

Spoiler:

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

A laugh came from Arikiko's mouth as he severed the wing but the bones sliding out of Taishoku's body would be a bit of a problem. So the Yoroi placed a Platform directly under his feet and used it to spin around, his eyes becoming pupiless as he launched a pair of invisible waves at the massive skull, annihilating it from the inside before bouncing off of his platform and landing about five feet away. He turned around and glared at Taishoku, grinning manically. "That was fun... Now let's see how fast you truly are..." He whispered softly and dashed forwards, darting over Taishoku with a jump and rather than launching out an attack, he sent out a pair of Vacuum Release invisible chakra waves down to try and sever the other wing. Of course unless Taishoku had chakra vision he would never be able to see them but the A-Rank damage each they would do... Would not be fun. Upon doing this though Arikiko landed on the other side, switched off Dead Mode and crouched down, slamming his hand into the ground and narrowing his eyes, waiting to see what would happen with Taishoku and whether or not he could dodge the attack...

Spoiler:

How impressive is what Taishoku thought as he saw Arikiko break through the dome and that cause Taishoku to get an adrenaline rush. When Arikiko had gotten out of the dome Taishoku did three things, one of them was switching his vision to chakra vision. The reason he did that was to try and see what every jutsu Arikiko used to break out of the dome, since he thought he did something that was chakra based. The send thing Taishoku did was us the blood that was still coming out of the severed wing to make a blood clone. Taishoku was able to see Arikiko when he jumped over his dome, and see incoming chakra waves. Taishoku would keep a clam expression as he would punch the ground when he made the dome slipt from the bottom, with on of his hands and fall through the medium sized crater that was made. This wasn't only to make him have some distance, as he would kick the dome with A-rank strength to send it at the incoming attacks. As he would have the blood clone inside to take most of the damage. And when the things collided that gave Taishoku enough time to get on all fours and dart passed Arikiko, at S-rank speeds, his wing still close to his body. Taishoku could feel that their journey was almost over and it would be close on who will win the challenge, but he was confident he would be the victor.

Spoiler:

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

The Ripples would annihilate what was tossed at them... But they were also destroyed in the process so that met an impasse. Arikiko then slammed into the ground and dragged his clawed fingers through the ground, forcing himself to stop before rising up once more, snarling loudly. He narrowed his eyes and watched Taishoku as he started to run towards him, even faster than before and tried to run past him, not that it would help of course. All of a sudden Arikiko's arm lashed out at a ludicrous speed, a huge burst of adrenaline forcing his blade upwards and straight at Taishoku's other wing. Of course the pain of such a speed coursed through Arikiko's body forcing him to grunt but he held on and Taishoku would either need SS-Rank speed or S-Rank speed /and/ S-Rank reaction to actually see this blow and react to it. The actual attack itself would deal S-Rank damage straight to the wing, easily enough to sever it. To think that the Kurogane would get away that quickly, the thought was laughable.

Spoiler:

And with that the challenge was over and the surprisingly calm kurogane stood behind Arikiko. He had stopped when he felt his other wing leave his body, and also he would make his exoskeleton fall apart."Great job!" Taishoku would say turning around to Arikiko, the genin had passed Taishoku's expectations and should be considered a equal in some way."That was a little fun, right?" Asked Taishoku as he walked over to Arikiko and placed his hand on his shoulder, making the parts of the wings that was connected to him go into his body."Well let's keep moving!"Taishoku would say with a smile as he moved his hand from Arikiko's shoulder. As Taishoku waited for Arikiko he realized that the boy could have done some real damage to him if they where fighting seriously. This made Taishoku want to finish the business they had in Shi and return home so he could become stronger.

Posts : 3780 Join date : 2012-05-06

Arikiko was about to lash out at Taishoku again but a voice of reason at the back of his mind forced him to stop, forced him to not slice off the hand that was on his shoulder. He took a deep breath in and let out a soft sigh, his form changing back to normal as the playing card fell out of his sleeve and into his hand. With a flick it suddenly changed into his axe once more and he slammed it into the ground. With a shuddering growl he shook himself out and took his axe back, setting it against his shoulder. "It was fun I guess..." He murmured quietly and tapped his chin before turning and walking with him, his shoulders set and his eyes narrowed as he looked forwards. There was something wrong with the voice that told him to calm down... Why was he to calm down, there was no reason for it, Taishoku was an enemy... No he wasn't, he was a Jonin of Hakagakure and he was an ally. Letting out a sigh, he shook his head and nodded. "So then, how did I fare against you? And don't just say good job... What could I fix?"

I guess he didn't think it was that fun Taishoku thinks to himself as they walked, he had a feeling they were close to their destination." Since you don't want me to say good job. I think you did well against me. And you could become a great shinobi one day if you wanted. But....never mind." Taishoku didn't know what to tell the kid what he thought he should improve on. He seemed good to him and the only thing holding him back was probably his rank as a shinobi. As they continued to walk for sometime their journey would be over. They where now around the are they were supposed to speak with someone that belong to Shigakure. In Taishoku mind this was a pleasant journey but now he had to get serious. He had to get another village to ally with them against the mighty shogun.

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Road Trip

With the first round of classes complete and the students already acclimated to life at the academy. The school has organized a field trip in order to give the students a taste of what …

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