epic of hysterio pt 1 [solo training]

Hysterio walked into the forest. He felt that the next stage of growth he needed, was to get summons. Right now he had none. The most powerful ninjas he had seen all had summons of one form or another, even if they were rarely used, once earned, a summon was a valuable partner. As a result of this line of thinking, Hysterio was now to be found on a pilgrimage. The purpose of this pilgrimage was to firstly help another race of ninjas enough that they would allow him to summon them to his aid in battle. Second, he wanted to earn a little money, though this was hardly as important as the third reason, which was to get stronger, both physically, and mentally. Right now he felt his knowledge of jutsu was rather sub-par, and he had very little experience in real fights. He could not afford to let any of those issues remain since he was a genin now for crying out loud. There would be times when he would be needed to do S ranked missions and frankly, he was not up to scratch. He really needed to improve himself and hopefully the journey would help him with that. He really wanted to become a jounin and get access to the cool armour and all the other stuff they got, most Uchiha he knew were capable of the Anbu status, the surviving ones anyway. He could hardly surpass them as a lowly genin.

The sun was high in the sky as Hysterio walked down the road from his previous base of operations. His next destination: the land of ducks. There were quite a number of reasons for this. Ducks could fly. Many ducks could fish quite easily, and they were able to swim and dive under the water as well. In additions, the land of ducks was the nearest place he had found in his research in the last town, that had summon races. Not that that was the biggest reason he had decided on the ducks to win over for a summoning contract. They had a lot of tactical advantages. Some ducks can hover in place. Others had extremely specialized abilities particularly in the sensory department.

The journey was somewhat eventful. There was not a lot to marvel at, as the scenery was largely the same as what he had seen outside the land of ducks. The land of ducks was rumored to have a ninja village of ducks, many of which had headbands with an image of a very generic duck on their headbands. There was a small group of bandits that Hysterio sent off packing, he certainly did not need a summon for those. However, later on he did see a battle between two vastly powerful ninjas, using techniques powerful beyond his imagination. New canyons formed, rivers diverted at a blow, as the two battled atop their equally powerful summons. Hysterio could barely see in them in the distance, he did not dare move closer, seeing the damage they were wreaking. Eventually the battle ended and Hysterio continued his travelling, but making sure to give a wide berth to the battlefield that had previously transformed the landscape in a short time. He had also taken note of which way the victor headed, making sure that he himself was heading the opposite way in a large semicircular arc. Fortunately, he got away from the place without further incident. After a meal of roasted rabbit, he went to sleeping a tree, leaving a clone as a guard.

In the morning he woke up. Climbing up to the top of a tree, he could not see his previous village anywhere in sight, he apparently had travelled quite a few miles. In the far distance though, he was able to make out the miniscule outline of a village. Awesome! Hysterio began running again and made it into the village of ninja ducks in the evening. Looking around, he was able to find a friendly inkeeper who let him stay the night. It was a long scratchy night as he was not used to sleeping in nests. In the morning, he politely asked, and the inn keeper apologized, being used to ducks he had forgotten to give him a normal bed roll.

Hysterio wandered the town. There was not a lot to do so he spent a while training the water element, as he was waiting for the leaders office to open to visitors. He was on vacation here so he wanted to be helpful, but he wanted to be polite, too. He had some time to kill so he spent it training his water element. At first, he spent his time attempting to create moisture on the chakra paper used to determine elements, without letting it crumble from his dominant element, earth. This took some time, about 15minutes or so. After that, he began the next stage, which was making drops of moisture without the aid of the chakra sensing paper. This also took around fifteen minutes before he was able to fill a cup in a reasonable amount of time. He was thirsty, so it was fortunate that the water tasted pretty pure. It would have been a tragedy otherwise. He might need this skill later, so it was good that he knew of this capability. After that, he began practicing moving water using his chakra, which was fairly easy actually. He already knew the earth element, so in this regard he only had to learn how to move something fluid as opposed to something solid like earth. Otherwise there was actually not very much difference, at all. This part actually only took in the range of 5 minutes, he was not sure, he was not keeping track of all the times it took for him to get stuff done. The last stage he went into, was producing enough water element chakra to make an attack. This took a while, the difficulty being that he had to train his chakra tenketsu thingies to produce water element stuff in great quantity. He decided on rather silly way to train this, that many would not approve of. He first found a clearing that was secluded, in the woods next to the village. He then made a bunch of clones, and used them to help him clear out the brush. Then, for the next step, it was important to take advantage of the fact that humans were afraid of fire. He probably violated a few conventions and laws when he did this but hopefully nobody found out. He made a pile of brush on the ground in a circle, and had a clone stand in the middle. He and the remaining clones lit the pile on fire, and soon the first clone was standing in a ring of fire. The clone panicked and began trying to create water, but not enough. The first clone was dispelled, the dirt serving to put out the fire. The remaining clones and Hysterio all gained the same experience in trying to create significant portions of the water element. The next clone got in the line, and the brush as lighted again. Fortunately, the clearing had been cleared enough that there was no danger at all of a forest fire. It took several tries, and a lot of clones, but Hysterio soon was able to create the water element in large enough quantity to use water jutsu.

The memories from his training merged together as his clones suddenly dissipated, and he woke up in a cold sweat, having collapsed from exhaustion on the ground from training too much, it seemed. It seemed that training for the water element had been a dream. Indeed, when he tried running his elemental chakra without the wind or earth elements, nothing appeared to show up, so he truly did not have the water element at this time, not that it mattered if he was not a ninjutsu user.

There were a number of jutsu he thought he should learn that would be helpful, while he waited. He found that among the jutsus he had heard of, there was one that altered one’s perception of time, allowing them to move faster and perceive things faster than normal, the difference between the speed of the user and that which they were sensing could be bigger than normal apparently. Cool. The jutsu was called “Flicker Movement” or something, so Hysterio spent a while attempting to use his chakra on his mind, speeding up his reactions and vitalizing his muscles. This jutsu was actually fairly easy to learn in fact, he learned it almost right away.

He went and looked at the office for the hours and it seemed the office was indeed about to open. Scurrying forward so that he would be at the front of the resulting line, Hysterio began thinking over a second jutsu in the realm of space and time. This one was more of a utility thing than well, anything. It was used to store items in the user’s own personal dimension. Cool. He brought out a pamphlet and reviewed the contents briefly as he waited for the doors to creak open. Several re-readings of the pamphlet on the jutsu later, the doors opened, and he was the first allowed inside.

Visiting hours were a fun experience for Hysterio, most of the ducks were pretty mellow, and fortunately they spoke the same language as him. It did sound like they had a few quack doctors, and a few quack-pots though among them, ha ha ha ha ha, very funny, but they were menaces nonetheless and the other ducks were too nice to get rid of them. If Hysterio would be so nice as to help the ducks in ridding themselves of their various public menaces, the ducks would be happy to assist Hysterio later should he be in need of some, well, some extra assistance that is.

As he sat and chatted pleasantly with the various ducks during the allotted time, he could not help but notice that one of the ducks did not like him, not at all. This one was a particularly influential duck, as he was in charge of the missions assignments, and this meant that Hysterio could well be given the hardest assignments possible. Little did he know that would be the case, though he would not have put it past this particular duck, he was instead preoccupied with the jutsu he was trying to learn, which occupied the back of his mind like a hornet nest “occupies” one’s back yard, especially when the just mentioned hornet nest is filled with tracker jackers (Hysterio had watched too many movies lately) which were relentless in pursuing anyone who came anywhere near too close to the nest of theirs, also never mind the fact that the hornets might be particular to pig’s blood and pickle sandwiches, which were Hysterio’s favorite, though in this regard he was quite alone. Ending this extremely long train of thought was a mental cue to make sure he had been listening to the ducks pleasantly, and thinking over that jutsu he was trying to learn at the same time. The duck who did not like Hysterio, named The Councelor Dreary Duck, informed Hysterio he would be given an assignment very soon but the ducks needed to convene into a flock to decide which one they should give him, as Hysterio seemed fairly capable in fact, and should be given quite a tough assignment as compensation or as a handicap to keep things fair. Hysterio was ushered into the waiting area again which was about 20 feet away from the duck’s meeting place. He sat there and watched intently, curious to see what they might decide on.

While he waited, he began using his chakra to try and open up a portal in space, his chakra reaching into the fabric of space and time, trying to tear it apart. As he attempted this parlor trick, he could see the ducks arguing and gesticulating wildly, at one point the chief slamming his wings down on the table similar to the Raikage of the past, saying “I will not have it. He is still just a genin. We will ONLY give him those missions if he proves himself otherwise FIRST.”

The ducks fell silent, in particular the one who did not like Hysterio, The Councelor Dreary Duck, who looked rather sullen. Unhappy looking, The Councelor Dreary Duck held up a list of what seemed to be missions, written in big letters, and circled one around the middle. He seemed to have been true to his word about trying to give Hysterio a hard mission to do before he would be allowed to get the help of the ducks. Hysterio was only half conscious of this though, as he had discovered that his hand had suddenly stuck through into nothing, the entire body of his hand from the wrist join up having disappeared. What was weird was that he was still able to sense the hand, and feel with it, he could feel that nothing was there, instead of pain. Bewildered, he pulled his hand back, using his chakra still, and he saw a hole where his arm had been. His hand was still attached. It seemed he was still fine, and that his experiment in trying to make another portal was successful after all. The storage displacement jutsu seemed to have been fairly well learned in fact. Hopefully he was able to keep it in good condition and not clutter it with useless items. He took one of the kunai he had in his hand and with the other felt around in the dimension he had opened. It seemed there was a limit to the size of the dimension, as he could feel a floor. Interested, he switched hands and put the kunai had been holding into the dimension, to be checked on later to make sure things were ok with it. The ducks seemed to be finishing their discussion to Hysterio looked up and sharp and began paying attention.

Satisfied with the progress on his current jutsu, Hysterio continued on, thinking about how he might better use the genjutsus he had been trying to learn, namely, the Bringer of Darkness genjutsu, and the Genjutsu: Yuumei Shibari techniques. The Bringer of Darkness genjutsu, while less useful, was a lot easier to learn, though, as the other genjutsu he wanted to learn currently was a combination of both the Bringer of Darkness and the Genjutsu Shibari techniques, requiring the addition of some of his Yuumei to be able to function properly. Speaking of Yuumei, he had not chatted with his Yuumei in some time, hopefully it was doing ok and had not gotten angry at him for not training with it for some time. Perhaps he could fix that later, whatever the issue was. It was then that he heard a rumble from inside, not from his stomach, but from his other inner chakra. The Yuumei apparently had been sleeping and did not want to be disturbed so it could replenish itself faster. Ok, Hysterio would avoid using his Yuumei for a while then, so that it would replenish faster.

The ducks approached Hysterio and gave him a mission, what would be the first of many missions, not that Hysterio knew yet that there would be many more were he to succeed. The ducks began explaining his mission. There was a criminal named Nemean the Lion from the Nekoto clan. Upon seeing Hysterio’s bewildered expression, the Nekoto Clan was explained to be similar to the Inuzuka clan, but worked with cats as their partners instead of dogs, like the Inuzuka who hailed originally from Konoha. This explanation opened up a lot of doors in Hysterio’s mind, and he nodded, fully comprehending now. The ducks explained that the Nemean the Lion guy, the missing ninja, had taken hostages from the civilian population. Ninjas form nearby areas had been sent in to rescue the civilians, to save the people in distress. However, only one had ever returned, spouting horror stories of the missing ninja Nemean the Lion. Apparently Nemean the Lion would feign to be a civilian in distress, jumping the unwary, killing those sent to rescue the civilians, taking DNA from the remains, and sacrificing the bodies to some evil god who favored acts far more evil than Jashin, lord of the un-killable Jashinists. The only reason this particular ninja had survived was because he had strayed from the path his group took and had seen everything that had happened.

Hysterio was nervous. Perhaps his genjutsu would be of some use here, but he had to be careful. The ducks wished him luck and gave him a map that showed approximately where the cave the Nemean the Lion fellow lurked. They had a stake in this too as one of their own had been captured and had never returned. Hysterio left the office, travelling to the land of Flowers, ironically where the Nemean the Lion fellow had been last sighted. As he travelled, he practiced the Genjutsu: Bringer of Darkness technique, slowly becoming able to blind forest animals in a wider and wider radius, for longer and longer. It seemed he was making progress. Hopefully he learned the genjutsu in time to be helpful in the upcoming fight, his VibroBlade would come in handy as well it seemed.

Arriving at their village, the village hidden in a Flower Field, Hysterio after some asking around was led to the leader’s office. It was there he learned that there were a line of sacrifices attempting to gain information on Nemean the Lion. He explained his mission and the leader of the village hidden in the Flower Field agreed to not send any more sacrifices for the time being. Hopefully Hysterio would be successful in his mission as nobody wanted any more losses. Nemean the Lion had taken far too many lives already. He was also informed that the villages would throw a huge party with part of the bounty if he returned alive within one month. If he was assumed to die though, the sacrifices would continue. Not wanting to continue this ludicrous explanation, Hysterio took his leave, while in the back of his mind workout out how he could easily blind people using his chakra during the Dringer of Darkness genjutsu. Perhaps he could target their nervous system and block signals from their eyes, intercepting them before they reached the target’s brain.

Having been informed further as to the whereabouts and specifics of his mission and the planning for the various eventualities that might result, Hysterio took his leave from the village hidden in the Flower Field, whatever it was supposed to be called. He could not remember the name hopefully he could find it on a map though if he got lost. With a little luck though he would not get lost, he was headed straight for the den of the missing ninja Nemean, the Lion. As he passed small animals, he tried to practice the Bringer of Darkness genjutsu on them. Depending on how much he had been concentrating, he might or might not possibly make the genjutsu work, as the animals were sometimes drunk from sake or whatever, and sometimes they did not notice even when he stood straight in front of him. Some of the animals he tried it on had really good hearing or a really good sense of smell though, so they noticed when he approached them, anyway. All this only served to help him realize just how useless genjutsu could be if used incorrectly. People would be able to sense through other means, even if they could not see. This would prove extremely annoying. Hysterio thought for a while while he sat on the side of the road, and decided that the Bringer of Darkness genjutsu would not be good enough to help him were he to get in a serious fight. Blinding the target was certainly helpful, however, it would be nice if he could mess with other senses or paralyze people. In that sense, perhaps he should the Genjusu: Yuumei Shibari. This was a technique that not only blinded the target, but also paralyzed them. It was rather helpful in that regard. He had been practicing blinding creatures already, so combining an attack on the target’s vision with paralysis that he had learned from the Genjutsu: Shibari technique would mostly be a practice in coordination.

He resumed walking, deep in thought, and walked head first into a tree. Stunned, he fell to the ground, his pack cushioning his fall. Unfortunately, the bright colors of his pack served to attract the wasps in the tree, whose nest had fallen. The wasps were not amused. They began chasing Hysterio as he frantically fled through the forest in the general direction of Nemean the Lion. The wasps were hot on his heels and there was no way he was going to worry about anything else until they were gone. He tried to affect them with his Genjutsu: Shibari, but it seemed the wasps were rather persistent, and their simpler nervous systems kept them safer from genjutsu and his attacks mostly were entirely useless. He sincerely wished he could dig through the ground, then he could escape the wasps, unless of course, they were the digging kind. Still, it would have been worth a shot, too bad Mitako was not around. Hysterio decided to try a “stupid” tactic. He waved some hand seals, running through the forest and making sure he did not run into anything. He split off clones of himself whenever possible, each time moving in a random direction. Fortunately the wasps were tracking him by his backpack, which he also cloned, and each time he lost some of them. However, five of the wasps he was not able to shake off.

He eventually found himself stuck in a clearing which was surrounded on all sides by thick vegetation that would take a long time to cut through. The wasps would catch up to him in no time, if he paused to cut through the vegetation. He cloned himself again, spreading out and hoping they were at least momentarily fooled, the clones did not give off a scent or sounds either, while he did with every motion anywhere on his body. He pulled out a spare explosive tag he had found on the ground near the Ninja Shop in Tengakure, and attached it to a twig. The wasps approached, not at all cautious or curious to see what he would do. It seemed they were able to track him through non visual means, or at least not means that would require visibility on the visual light spectrum. They might have chakra vision. They were so tenacious that Hysterio wondered whether they might not make better summons than the Ducks, if he was completely frank. They were rather aggressive, even if they had some gruesome habits, they would make scary partners. It was not for nothing that people avoided them like the plague.

He moved his arm, barely avoiding being stung. He backpedaled frantically, activated the spare explosive tag and threw it, still attached to the twig so that it would move. The explosion managed to take out four of the wasps. The fifth one however, was a large mean guy two inches long and bloody fast. It darted in, and Hysterio had to parry with a hastily drawn kunai, as the stinger was massive. The wasp darted in many times, each time Hysterio barely deflecting it. He turned and ran back out of the clearing soon after he had entered, and found out it was the home of a bear. The wasp charged, while Hysterio ducked under the bear’s swiping paw. The wasp did not stop however, and attacked the bear with renewed ferocity. This did not amuse the bear, which was slightly more able to sense pain due to its more complex nervous system. Hysterio sped past the bear meanwhile, pausing briefly to see the bear swat the wasp, getting stung in the paw in the process, sending the remnants of the wasp smashing into a tree.

Well, he was out of the frying pan and into the fire it seemed. The bear was not happy and seemed to blame Hysterio for its predicament. The bear began running at Hysteiro, moaning in agony. Hysterio turned and fled again, now pursued by one massive enemy instead of many small ones. As he ran he frantically combed through his mind for ways to try to shake the bear off his trail. Unfortunately, the bear proved entirely capable of the same feats Hysterio was able to accomplish, and then some. He was in trouble. It was then that he thought to try using a genjutsu on the bear. He weaved handseals and cast the Genjutsu Shibari technique on the bear, which was frozen. However, despite Hysterio making tracks as fast as possible away from the bear, the bear was able to see him in the distance and took off again. This was bad and it could be worse if the bear caught up. The issue seemed to be that the bear knew which way to go to chase Hysterio. So, that meant he needed to practice the Genjutsu: Yuumei Shibari technique, which paralyzed and blinded the target. However, for that genjutsu to work, the bear needed to catch up, to within 30 meters…. Something Hysterio was not keen on but something necessary nonetheless. He reviewed the steps as the bear slowly gained ground on him, Hysterio practicing on every available animal he came across in his travels. The bear slowly caught up to Hysterio while he was within another clearing, this one sparser as he was getting to the edge of the forest. He turned, facing the bear, and weaved hand signs, attempting to not only paralyze the bear, but to also blind it. The bear, paralyzed mid-step, collapsed to the ground, stunning it. Hysterio approached cautiously, and held a stick in front of the bear’s eyes, about an inch away, but the bear did not react, meaning it was either knocked out, or blinded.

Close enough, Hysterio was glad to not have to fight a bear any more. He ran off back in the direction of Nemean the Lion’s den, having been side tracked a little. Checking his map and approximating his position based on the landscape around him, it seemed he had actually passed the missing ninja’s hideout by quite possibly less than a few hundred feet if his calculations were correct. Making sure to avoid the bear as much as possible, as well as wasp nest which had started this long chase scene, he slowly headed back the way he came, following along with the map. Eventually he found the hideout, and a weird looking guy with a mane that could only be Nemean the Lion, his partner cat said to be deceased, was skinning an animal. Hysterio managed to sneak up to within twenty feet of Nemean the Lion. Then he pulled out a spare katana he had picked up from the skeleton of a deceased unfortunate traveler, though fortunate for Hysterio. He then threw the katana at Nemean the Lion, who did not notice until after it hit him. Hysterio thought he had won already but then Nemean the Lion turned, looked at him, and laughed. The katana fell to the ground, slightly dulled now, Nemean the Lion unharmed completely, where the katana had hit him. Bored, Neman the Lion walked back into his cave, laughing at Hysterio and his weakness. Hysterio thought over this. It seemed Nemean the Lion was extremely tough at least on the outside. It was worth a shot attacking the insides though, and there were many ways to do this. For him though, the only way would be shoving an explosive tag down the missing ninja’s throat. He had to wait until he would be asleep though, as otherwise Nemean the Lion would put a stop to Hysterio Shinkou’s antics. It was that or Hysterio could try that genjutsu again, and maybe he would manage to pull it off again.

He approached the cave, and threw a rock inside. It sounded like Nemean the Lion had some sensitive places just like every other male. That was encouraging but not too helpful. Nemean the Lion rushed outside as Hysterio was finishing his handseals. Hysterio activated the genjutsu and Nemean the Lion was looking at Hysterio, hands outstretched when the genjutsu took effect. Nemean the Lion toppled to the ground, unable to move it seemed, or doing a very good impression of such. The other ninja did not even flinch or budge when Hysterio paused just a millimeter before stabbing at one eye. That or he was supremely confident. Hysterio picked up two rocks, his plan in process. He he took one rock, and, using the Rock Section Cane jutsu, extended the rock into a full blown cane, which he would need shortly. Pulling out the spare explosive tag, the other one, the one that had been dropped on the library floor, he wrapped it around the stone. This would be the moment of truth.

He looked at the opponent, who still appeared incapacitated by the genjutsu Hysterio had attempted earlier. Good. Hysterio wrapped the second rock in the paper tag, activating it, and dropped the bundle into the oponent’s mouth. He then used the stick he had made to poke it down the other’s throat quickly, before withdrawing the stick and fleeing to a safe distance before setting it off. The resulting explosion was rather quiet. Hopefully the other ninja was still incapacitated. Hysterio re-did the hand seals for the genjutsu and held the last one, as he approached. Nemean the Lion seemed to have been shredded in his own iron skin or such, blood was everywhere, and his chakra signature was not visible anywhere when Hysteiro activated his Meigan dojutsu. Relieved that he had won, he sat down for a moment and took a deep breath. Now to find the village hostages. Bones were all that greeted him, a short time later, after he had opened up the cave and done a little exploring, many possessions were found that presumably belonged to various villagers. Stuffing all of the items into his dimension, the one that he had learned to use previously, he picked up the body of the missing ninja, and carried it all the way back.

There was awe when he returned to the village, it seemed the ducks were not the only bird-brained people. The counselor Dreary Duck was rather frightened in fact. Hysterio Shinkou was banned from the offices of said counselor, who started speaking to Hysterio by way of a telephone, or messenger. Word had it that Counselor Duck even had a bronze cage made so he could hide from Hysterio Shinkou if need be, though why this might ever have to be the case was not clear. It seemed to have something to do with losing credibility or such. Hysterio was then warned by Dreary Duck that the tasks he would be given would become increasingly difficult.

Hysterio got a brief reprieve from his staycation or rather, work study to get the ducks to help him as his summons. It seemed the next enemy he would be able to research quite well. It was a nine headed hydra, the Learnean Hydra, which apparently was raised in a pasture, ate grass, and was bred specifically to kill ducks, by some group of earthworms who decided they wanted some change. This Hydra would be a little troublesome, as it was bred to kill ducks as was just previously stated. It had nine heads, each of which would regenerate if cut off. While it would be obvious to attack other parts of the body if the heads regenerated, it seemed the Hydra would grow a new head from anywhere, not just the neck stumps, growing extra heads each time, two if a neck was severed. The key word here being time. It seemed it was also able to emit large amounts of fumes, which stemmed from its internal gasses. This last factor could be handled with a gas mask of sorts, which Hysterio needed to obtain quickly. However gas masks were not something commonly found in the land of Ducks., which was unfortunate. Hopefully he would find one somewhere else. Hysterio continued reading. It seemed the Learnean Hydra had a partiality, in other words, liked, chocolate chip brownies. Weird. It also ate chili on a regular basis, which had to be made from ducks. It seemed it was just supposed to survive on ducks for the most part unfortunately.

*****
(ttl wc: 5479
claiming: 3479 towardshttp://naruto-role-play-rpg.forumotion.com/t25974-genjutsu-yuumei-shibari
1000 towards http://naruto-role-play-rpg.forumotion.com/t25856-storage-displacement
1000 towards http://naruto-role-play-rpg.forumotion.com/t25855-flicker-movement
Also 28 stats

that should be 27 stats, i had to hurry before my computer left me... lol