We're all going to Go Insane in all this Rain! (IO

Li Dian brushed his hands clean of all the dust, dirt, and mud she'd been shifting through the last few hours. Puppets were cool, and oh so useful when the occasion called for it, but for the moment they didn't really prove too useful as far as Excavating a bunch of ruins went. The progress into the city was steady but obnoxiously slow. They were clearing out a road into the center of the city, and to the outer edges of the city. It would go a long way into helping them traverse the ruined Landscape of the Rain village. It would pay off later, but for the moment being it sure didn't seem like it. Clearing out the road was hard dirty look, and didn't have many immediate rewards. Once Li had clapped his hands clean had sat down on a pile of rubble, and brushed his forehead with the back of his hand. He was trying to brush off some sweat but it didn't do much good, with the rain coming down his forehead was wet again in no time at all.

At they pace they were going they may have had the road all cleared out by the end of the week, if not early into next week. But by that time their suppiles at the grocery store would be all used up, and they'd have to start hunting in the jungle. Li Didn't mind that, he'd been on the road many times with his old master. Camping too. He didn't mind having to go out and hunt. But that was just more time consumed doing things that didn't contribute much to reforming the city. It was getting frustrating. Everyone had entered in on the project with such high hopes and and almost a joyus rythm about their project. Now things were starting to get tense and temper's short. No one meant anything they said, but things were being said. It didn't matter who said them or to who, but the point is that they were being said. Li kept his calm and never joined in or let it effect him, but he feared that soon someone was going to be leaving the project. With only four members to their cause it wasn't like they could afford to loose any body. 

Forlornly he lifted his face to the sky. His mouth fell open and he allowed the rain to fall into his open gullet. Not the easiets way to get a drink, but there was nothing better than fresh rain water. At least with all the factories gone he didn't have to worry about there being factory pollutants in it. He brought his hand over his face smearing the water around, before standing to his feet. He still had work to do and couldn't let himself think too much. He just had to loose himself in labor.

Hard work shamed no man! No woman either for that matter. CoRin didn't mind the manual labor no matter how sweaty it got. At least there was always the cooling rains to keep things in balance. What she did mind were the dwindling amounts of food in their fridges. She'd only joined up fro the food.

Okay okay, maybe that's why she joined up, but she was sticking around for different reasons. Li was a pretty great guy, okay? Okay? So she had a crush, big woop. Get off her case. Not that it mattered any way all of this was going to come to an end in a few weeks when the food finally ran out. They'd be forced to leave, and go on their own separate ways.

For now she was happy enough to work on clearing out this road. Though she was sure that they'd never see the end of it, she felt like it was a decent adventure for the time being.

During lunch she'd abandoned the Trio who were smacking on some sandwiches. Off to the side of the road they were clearing there was a collapsed building. There was a strange Aura coming off of the place. It was almost like it was beckoning her. She couldn't help but approach the place.

Still wearing his lab coat, Kozai knew he was nearing the Ame area when the torrent of water from the sky started pouring on his head.As this happened, he was already moving at an easy speed of 90 over the treetops. He sunk beneath the canopy in order to prevent himself from getting too wet.

Even from that distance, however, he knew something was wrong. Where were the skyscrapers and factory buildings? His eyes narrowed as he increased his pace to maximum, at a dashing pace of 110. As he approached the area where the village apparently used to be, he saw what it had been reduced to.

What the hell? As he drew nearer to the edge of the jungle, he focused his chakra senses. There were two of note. One was pretty small, but the other... was almost as large as his own. Maybe these would be able to tell him what had occurred here.

He would seize hold of a long vine which he would swing on, conserving his momentum and launching him into the air, not quite directly over the larger of the two chakra signatures. From this altitude, he could briefly spot the vague form of the other chakra signature as well.

As he landed behind the target, he would note the boy's posture... how aesthetic. Kozai was beginning to appreciate such things, if only for their psychological value. The analytical part of his brain would note that since the rainwater here had been in a previously industrial area, its pH was probably around 5.6 or so, more like coffee than water.

As he stood, he would speak with a voice tinted with genuine concern. "What happened here? Might you be the one in charge of repairs?" He hoped that the boy wouldn't respond violently... Kozai knew several who might have.

[Sorry for dropping in; Ame's important to me IC and OOC, so I decided to lend ya'll a hand. CoRin can probably confirm my good intentions, so don't freak out just bcs I'm a missing-nin :3]

Li Dian choked for a moment upon hearing a new voice. He cupped his mouth with his hand, as water flew from his nose. As he tried to keep himself from choking he'd reach to where one of his scrolls was stored. He'd unfurrow the scroll like it was from spool wire. He's flick the hand he'd choked onto over to the inked scroll, summoning Summoning Abbadon and Camael. His angels spread their wings out in front of him in defense. He hated fighting more than just about everything. While he was desperately hoping that this was a situation to be resolved by the word, he didn't want to be caught unprepared.

Too late. That stumbling grab for his scrolls had certainly pointed him out as an inexperience fighter. 

Hans and Coco's father (Name him already Coco!) had both stopped their work as well. Li Dian hoped that they'd make a break for it when the opportunity had presented itself, neither of them would be very good in a fight. Not that he was one to speak. He didn't even know where CoRin was at this moment.

"I am." Li announced from behind his wall of puppets. "We're are all that's left of our home. But even a single seed can grow a forest anew. For what reason do you come?" Li kept his face calm, but with a certain amount of war face on to look menacing. His pupil-less blue eyes stared out at the man looking out for... anything! This guy was giving out some seriously strong vibes, and who knew what he was capable of?

CoRin couldn't bring herself to notice the intruder. She was too busy waling in the direction of the calling. Her boots trundled over the rocky piles that had been parted to the side of the road. Only the shell of the store was still standing the rest was just a big pile of collapsed rubble. Much like the rest of the city!

She came to the door frame and was sure that this is were the malignant source was coming from. She could feel the hairs on the back of her neck prickling. She went ahead and stepped over the threshold. An up close view of the ruination that was this destroyed shop didn't do much to shed light upon the nature of what was inside of it. Where ever the counter had been it was buried under a few tons of rock now.

She may have had some strange otherworldly force bringing her towards this shop but that wasn't good enough reason for her to actually do hard labor for it. In fact in all her years CoRin had discovered that there was very little in life worth doing hard work for. Justice, Li Dian who represented Justice, and .... well there wasn't much else it would seem!

She moved further into the shop, stepping gently over the broken glass and rusty nails. That's when she noticed that there was a back room that still looked like it was still intact. Well nothing bad ever came from exploring a back room eh? She took out a fan and used it to wave away the dust that was floating around the moist air.


The doorway was just barley blocked off by a pile of rubble that had destroyed the front counter. She'd have to move a few rocks but not too many. She stepped behind the counter, as best she could. As she did she heard a hollow banging sound as her foot came into contact with a rug that was trapped beneath the piles of rocks. After that she did the classic thing where you bang it several times to make sure you heard it. "Hmmm." She announced throwing up the rug away from the floor and revealing a trap door. "A trap door!" She announced with a yip. Well she had to explore this. Even less bad things happened to people exploring trapped doors. She flung the warped wood open, and jumped on inside heedless of any danger that may have been lurking within. It was only half way down that she began to hope that there were no spikes on the other side.

'Thunk' Nope just a floor. Well that was a relief. She splashed her feet around the floor. There was a good foot of water inside of the small room. CoRin figured it was from the rain draining in. Lucky she found it before the whole thing was drowned out. Well that was to be seen, she didn't actually know what was inside.

Seemed she was in a small Rectangular room, made of concrete. Maybe a bunker? It was half flooded, and smelled weird. Oh! Also there was this Crazy Altar in the middle of the thing! Maybe that should have been mentioned first? There were strange Candles in the shape of snakes twisting around the alter. Their heads were a lit by flames. Which made no since because no one had been here in weeks, obviously. Upon the altar stood a Book, bound in a strange Brown leather that she could smell all the way from here. It was flipped open to a blank page in the middle of the book.

She approached the book. She could feel the pestilential energy coming from it and knew that this was the thing that'd been calling to her earlier. "Well Hello there." She announced stepping reaching out for it. The fact that it was obviously evil only made her want to read it more. As her touched the book's pages, it suddenly slammed shut around her arm. She felt prickling on her skin. "Ouch!" Okay maybe not prickling, maybe stabbing, biting. Oh god! Bleeding for sure. "Ow ow ow! Cannibal Book! Cannibal Book!" She shriek trying to pull her arm away. She couldn't' though, because it's teeth were stunk pretty deeply inside of her. Hmm it seemed she could either loose an arm by ripping it off, or by getting it eaten. Not a decision she liked.

However before that decision had to be made the book released her arms, retracting it's teething and truing back into a inanimate object. Immediately CoRin Withdrew her arms, and held it close to her body armor feeling it throb, and scream. And as she looked down into the pages she found written in her own blood 'CoRin Kura' The worse part? It was in better handwriting than her normal handwriting. "Talk about Insult to Injury!"

[We started this Topic to Sign a contract XD, so I'm getting that summon no matter what!]

Right, it appeared that the boy had not been entirely conscious of his entrance before he had spoken. Was he not able to sense Kozai's chakra signature? He hadn't bothered to suppress it... It must be either that, or that Kozai had been moving too quickly. The former was not likely, considering the boy's immense chakra signature. Well, perhaps a ... 14% chance of the former option. There were always anomalies in the ninja world, and those were always the most interesting. However, what was even better was the presence of the three puppets before him.Kozai had seen things like these before, used by an insignificant little brat named Volcri.

He knew about puppets, but didn't care to learn how they worked. He could of course, crush these like he had crushed Volcri's, but that went against what he was trying to do here. Now, what was the best way to approach this? Hmph. Something within him told him to speak from his heart, not just from his cold mind. Very well.

"I was originally here to 'take a trip down the memory lane, if you will, and possibly look at some of the hospital tech... however, it seems that I'll be helping you rebuild." Immediately, it occurred to him that what he had just said could be taken as suspicious.

"My own village, too, was destroyed recently..." he would begin softly. At this, he would take the Iwa headband out of his lab coat pocket and toss it to the boy. "So, I do have some reason to assisst you." With this, Kozai would wait for the boy's answer.
(Sorry for the short post, am a little busy)

Having arrived in Ame and still haven't found any useful supplies Sin would head towards the jungle hoping to find some fruit and at best a rabbit to eat. Levi has been outside in the rain for awhile therefore he had developed a cold which was obvious by the sneezing and his nose turning red but it didn't stop him for looking for supplies for his trip nor did it stop him from one of his favorite activities, skating! Yes Levi was skating through the jungle cause why not? It wasn't long until he would stumble upon a few others who he assumed was either travelers or hunters but he went with travelers as he saw that they were trying to clear the road. He would skate slower and step off his skateboard and kicked it up into his hands as he began to walk forward. He would have asked the strangers if they knew where the closest fully stocked store was until he froze in his tracks as a man would come from the sky landing behind the other guy. Levi wasn't sure what was going on for any of that matter but man did the blonde haired guy flinched and clumsily pulled out his scrolls, inexperienced much? Either way he was successful at summoning his fortress of puppetude which was something new to Levi as he had never seen puppets in use before.

Other than the puppet guy and the man from the sky and the other two individuals there was another who Sin saw heading towards a broken down building or in Levi's words, totally wasted. He wpuld then turn his attention back towards the blonde haired guy and the man from the sky as he would catch something he had said. "Rebuild? Destroyed villages? Maybe that's why we had to evacuate. ." He had thought to himself as he would spin the wheels on his skateboard.  Levi wasn't exactly hiding nor was he was all oht in the open like hey look I'm here, but he was probably close enough for the two guys to notice him sitting in the tree. Of course he wouldn't jump down just yet just because of the guy with the armed puppets and feared he might attack him if he would also just come out of nowhere like the man with the lab coat.

Levi didn't exactly want to just interrupt this confrontation between the two but he was kinda just eavesdropping which was rude so sighing he would slowly get down from the tree and calmly walk pass the two with a friendly smile on his face and waving as he walked to a pile of well not exactly trash but it was stuff he thought that might be usable. "Don't mind me just need some supplies, carry on."

Li watched as the light rain beaded up up on the surface of his puppet's bodies and rolled off. He wiggled his fingers slightly causing the indigo chakra thread connecting to his puppets to move. The two puppets flapped their wings slightly flinging off any water that had accumulated. From over his angels he could see the man's face form into a slightly confused grimace. Drat! He was on to Li's secret: He was incompetent!

Oh well no sense dwelling on what you can't help.

He listened to the man's explanation. He was surprised that that another human being had fond memories of Ame. He didn't know much about what happened in his village before he'd returned from his journies with his master, but it seemed that something good had happened to this fellow. Well good! Li had always seen something magical in his rainy village, and it was good that another did as well. Then he mentioned the Hospital, and the man's lab coat suddenly made sense. A medical ninja eh? Right on. 

Just like that? Li loved to believe that everyone had good in their heart and wanted to do good for other people. Recent events however had forced him to become a bit more leery of people's good intentions. Why would an outsider care to rebuild a foreign nation's village? Those most of been some REALLY good memories he had of Ame.

His blue eyes glanced over at the guy who'd been standing up in a tree, as he spoke. 'My we've become popular.'

"CoRin Keep an eye on that guy." He announced keeping his eyes on Lab Coat. "CoRin? CoRin?" He sighed, he didn't dare take his eyes away from the conversation "Dammit girl." Probably ran for the hills the moment this guy appeared. 

That's when Li snatched the man's head band out of the air. He examined it's metal surface, and traced his thumb along the emblem in the center. He looked up at the man. This time Li's face wasn't quite as suspicious. "I see." He announced suddenly feeling the weight of the apparel in his hand. So they were brothers. They'd both seen and shared in the destruction of their homes. Yet somehow Li couldn't help but feel that This man's journey had been somewhat more tragic. He'd lost his home, and went to Ame. Hoping that it would offer him some solace. Damn, that was sad. The place he'd come to get away from his tragedy had a tragedy of it's own. 

Then the boy who'd been standing off in a tree climbed down, and approached the group. Or rather the pile of salvage that The Rain Ninjas had collected over their hour of work. "A friend of yours?" Li would ask cocking his head over to the Skater. 

"Well Friend. Just the extra bodies would go a long way to helping rebuild Ame. However...." He paused gave blushed with shame. He didn't much like asking things of others. "I hear that Iwa had a technique that Could adjust the weight of rocks. We'd be done by the end of the night with something like that. I don't suppose you have such knowledge do you?"

(Light Weight Rock Tech Even if ya don't have Earth Release I still think he'd have knowledge of one of his Village's Signature Jutsu!)

"For what felt like an eternity I sat in that damp half flooded bunker of an altar room. The stench of burlap and mildew filled my nose to such and extent that even the thought of another scent was impossible. It seemed to flow up from the tome like a great plum of invisible smoke, keen on choking the life from me.

I flipped mindlessly through the aged pages of the tome. My right hand still half eaten and bleeding. Like a woman possessed almost I stood there turning page after page as if in search of some great answer. I felt heedless to the bleeding of my arm, nor the throbbing of my muscles. I was only dimly aware of the raising water in the altar room. With the trap door now removed the outside water pouring in like it felt a great need to seek shelter inside the dark hole.

As I flipped through those thick soggy pages I could almost feel the pages pulse between my fingers. Like the had a life of their own. Perhaps they did. At time it almost felt like the thing was the one making my hand flip the pages and not myself. It was almost the pulsing you get by putting your finger above a vein and pressing down. Only you know... on a book. Still despite my disgust, distrust, and generally uneasiness I couldn't help but keep on turning an turning.

The pages were inked in a sickly black substance, that even proper ink would have called dark. Each pulsing page was covered in strange script. Not a single space on the page was left unsoiled by the ink. Each open space had been capitalized by the writer, being used as a space for a picture, or even a foot note. Though not ones I could easily understand. You see the writing was done in a strange script that my mind had no way of comprehending. Yet as my eyes skirted over the text I couldn't' help but come away from it feeling like I'd gained a little bit of understanding. On what I can not say, it was only a feeling, but as I read. And I do you the word 'read' Lightly I found I was able to gain a feeling from the book. Like I understood the meaning rather than the words. And the meaning was dark and terrible. As I waded through the pages of words and symbol that meant nothing at all, the feeling I was getting was that there was something terrible indeed about this book. Nothing new to me at all. It did try to eat me after all. But it was less that the book itself was terrible, but more of what it could unleash. That was the true terror. But what could that mean?

Well I soon learned. The pictures which decorated the pages as well as a dead body decorated a room, showed me the way. At first they were just as meaning less as the words which I could only understand, but not comprehend. Impossible shapes were drawn often. Often with annotations of some sort that possibly explained their purpose. They were the type of shapes that could only be drawn on paper. Stairways to no where and what not. Yes as I ventured further into the book, or as it felt: As the book ventured further in me the shapes began to give way to drawings. Sketches. Not mere doodles. Detailed and artistic drawing of creatures and places I had never dreamed of seeing before. It was almost like a stat page for a sports star the way it was set up. With a picture and then several lines of intelligible writing underneath it.

That is until I came to the page I was meant to come to. As if the book had knew what I need, or what needed me. At last I came to a page that I could actually read. Not just understand, but read. Like the cow says mooooo. It was a page describing a demonic green fire I could summon into the world. An outer God Known at Tzulcha The Green Flame. Cool!"

-Corin, My Name Is CoRin and I've Seen Things

[Channeling my inner Lovecraft]

(Due to some interesting irl issues, my post will be delayed until Friday night.)