the epic of Hysterio pt 5 (solo training)

Hysterio had brought back the Erymanthian Boar to the consternation of Dreary Duck, counselor to the chief of the Ducks. He was perfectly fine in fact, and had learned a thing or two about using genjutsu. That had been embarrassing when he discovered he had been fleeing with his potential summon from a 3 foot tall pig. Granted, the pig was still pretty tough looking, but it was nowhere near as big as the two of them had thought. The shameful bit was that he had not even thought to use his own eyes, adapted for genjutsu, and for repelling it. His inner Yuumei chakra had began berating him over this, in fact, as he had not even once thought to use it until he came back and was lectured. Then while he tried to sleep at night, the Yuumei chakra inside him had thrown genjutsu layered upon reality upon genjutsu and forced him to practice fighting and trying to break genjutsu cast upon himself.

The next morning he was practicing his jutsu as was his custom, out in one of the tranining grounds. After a while, he headed back for breakfast, and came upon some ducks having an argument. One of the ducks appeared to be alone on his side of the argument, and the others were advancing slowly. The duck on his own was also a lot smaller than the other ducks, and dressed a little weird. Despite being a bird, he had all kinds of bling on his person. Hysterio observed, trying to ascertain the reasons behind the argument. He could not help noticing though, that the bling on this duck probably weighed at least as much as the duck itself did. The duck itself was only about 3 inches tall and miniscule. Perhaps he was an offshoot of the regular ducks. The other ducks accosting him were also dressed, but like normal people, instead of the gangster stereotype Hysterio was willing to bet the smaller duck was attempting to fit himself into. He did not think this was a very fair fight, frankly.

He walked over to the group of ducks, and stuck his hand down on the ground between them all, and activated the Genjutsu: Yuumei Shibari. Immediately all the ducks were paralyzed, and did not flinch when he faked poking them in the eyes. None of them. They must not be able to see then. It seemed they were paralyzed as well, which was good, as he had not really used this genjutsu effectively in any manner before. He would try this again later, perhaps on a live opponent that had a better chance to dodge it, but at least he knew he could pull the genjutsu off. Anyways, now that the ducks were all largely helpless, Hysterio could hear one of the ducks in his mind. Weird.

The duck was cursing and appeared to have noticed the genjutsu being cast, though he was currently unable to do anything about it at the moment. He seemed to notice Hysterio’s mental presence and began querying him as to what the bloody hell he thought he was doing and if he also had a bone to pick with Oshi the Gangsta Duck. Upon hearing the duck’s self proclaimed title and name, Hysterio could not help but burst into a peal of laughter, which rang across the street, to the indignation of all the ducks, who thought he was laughing at them. Eventually his state of continued hilarity subsided and he found himself able to telepathically communicate with the indignant Oshi the Gangsta Duck, that it was very funny, but he could still respect someone who decided to live by their own life choices, to be themselves. Even if said self had a rather funny image in his mind, he was not sure if it was the low hanging shorts, or the bandanna that did it for him btu this guy was entertaining to watch, his manner of dress and attitude a stark contrast to what most people thought of ducks as – fuzzy and cozy, and delicious to eat on steamed buns with leeks between the bits of bread….

In any case, it was pretty obvious what the issue was with the other ducks, they just were more conservative and did not like how Oshi the Gangster Duck carried himself. Hysterio Shinkou could not respect that. He grabbed each of the ducks standing there on the ground, paralyzed physically and perhaps mentally as well. He then took each of them over to a large pond and threw them. While they were all in the air and just entering the water, when they were about a foot of the way under the water’s surface, he released the genjutsu and walked back to the other duck. Oshi the Gangsta Duck seemed a pretty interesting guy actually, and Hysterio said as much. The two of them began hanging out more after that incident, and Hysteiro even managed to fashion a spare shuriken of his such that it fit on Oshi’s hat as a sort of helmet or ornament, with points of course to it.

After a while they were sparring, sort of, in the training ground. Hysterio was sparring with his sword, and attacking his shadow. After a while, Oshi said telepathically to Hysterio that because Hsyterio had helped him out a lot and acted like a real friend, Hysterio could count on Oshi to help if needed in battle. Interesting. Hysterio had been wondering what kinds of abilities this diminutive duck had, and he was interested to find out. Oshi apparently was able to project an illusionary copy of Hysterio onto the ground air or whatever. It was not at all solid, When Hysterio passed his hand through his illusion based double, his hand encountered zero resistance. So it was purely for looks now was it? Not quite. When Hysterio tried casting a genjutsu, the Genjutsu: Yuumei Shibari technique, while the clone was out, the two of them discovered that his clone also appeared to be replicating Hysterio’s current status. Not only was the smudge of mud on the bottom of one shoe present on the other, but when Hysterio tried activating the genjutsu, the same aura appeared to briefly cloak the other, the clone, briefly. Interesting. It did not affect Hysterio as he was the caster and it was his chakra, it also did not seem to affect Oshi the Gangsta Duck, though that was likely because he was eyeing something on the ground instead of watching the clone he had made.

This was potentially a great boon to Hysterio as his current and rather short list of genjutsu were both reliant on the opponent seeing him when he cast them, one of them requiring the opponent to be looking specifically at his eyes when he cast it or the genjutsu would not work. Granted, the effect was powerful, but the requirements to cast them were sometimes a little… difficult to accomplish you could say. If this clone proved capable of duplicating the requirements for catching people and putting them into genjutsu for Hysterio, then this could be a huge breakthrough in his tactics. Hysterio feverishly practiced his jutsu and spoke of his idea to Oshi and also his Yuumei Chakra, not wanting to leave a wiser being’s presence out of the loop.

The thre presences waited in a thicket of bushes. Hysterio asked Oshi to make a clone of Hysterio’s body, and walk it out into the open. Oshi did as such, and Hysterio was busy wondering how the test might go when his inner Yuumei kicked him mentally on the shin. Mentally hoppign around in pain, Hysterio realized a badger was approaching the clearing. When it saw the clone of Hysterio it froze, and then slowly crept forward, wary as heck. It sniffed the air and began to look suspicious. Hysterio finished the hand seals at that moment and cast the genjutsu: Yuumei Shibari. Sure enough his clone mirrored the change in his state, briefly mirroring the aura that appeared when the genjutsu was cast. Cool. What was even cooler, was that the badger paused mid sniff. Either the badger knew something was up and was faking, or was truly paralyzed. Hysterio decided to try and find out. He pulled out his trusty Vibroblade, and hid Oshi in his clothing, keeping him safe, though a small bump slightly protruded where his body was, from under Hysterio’s clothing. Oshi would be safe while Hysterio tried an experiment. He took the trusty Vibroblade he always kept with him now a days, and stabbed it into the ground right in front of the badger’s nose. No movement. He had been careful to not even make a gust of wind, so the badger must be blind if he did not react. To check the paralysis, Hysterio grabbed the badger by the scruff of the neck, and lifted the little monster up. It did not move. Not even when he tried shaking it a little side to side. It could not move, and did nothing even when he dropped it. He watched, curious to see how long it would work. After some time the badger got up and definitely was not happy. Hysterio barely deflected the attacks of the badger as he fled all the way back into the underbrush.

The training seemed reasonably effective, so Hysteiro and Oshi decided to cement their new partnership by going out for some bread, gluten free of course. The bread was extremely garlic flavored, and Hysterio was pretty sure he should buy the bread more often to go and vaporize enemies with his strong breath. If his illusions were not strong enough, he was sure the vapors emitted after gulping down the garlic made bread that nobody would be able to stand up to him, much less a vampire. Nothing would be able to stay sane after smelling the garlic bread he was pretty sure.

It took several hours to wash the smell from his mouth and Hysterio noted that there was a reason why that shop seemed frequented by those whose hygiene was not of the greatest regard. The dynamic duo headed out to a local bar to test their skills. Upon being told that he was too young to enter the bar to buy juice, his age obvious to everyone, Hysterio decided to try his genjutsu out again with the help of Oshi, the Gangsta Duck.

Waiting in an alleyway, he used the art of transformation to look like his much younger self, and then asked Oshi telepathically to make the clone of him again. Oshi did as Hysterio had asked and the clone, mirroring Hysterio’s current appearance, looked like it was ready to rumble with nobody in particular. The clone was marched up to the entrance of the bar as Hysterio Shinkou and his partner Oshi the Gangsta Duck watched from a room across the street. When the illusion based clone was confronted as Hysterio had been at the edge of the bar, without stepping foot into the bar, at all, Hysterio weaved hand seals and his illusion based clone was completely unaffected by the bottle that flew right through its head. Vicious people huh. The illusion based clone glowed a darkish purple and the bouncer suddenly froze, unable to move another step. Sweet, so it worked on people as well huh. Hysterio Shinkou would make sure to practice this combination with Oshi the Gangsta Duck more often, it seemed fairly helpful in fact.

It turned out that Oshi the Gangsta was quite skilled in Quack-Fu, a duck equivalent of the human martial arts. Hysterio had to politely decline Oshi’s offer to teach him though, as for one thing Hysteiro Shinkou was devoid of wings and his body shape was much different, never mind the fact that he had no bill save for the ones from restaurants, the grocery store, and the Tengakure Tech Shop. He would see what he could learn from this strange little fellow though.

*****
(total word count: 2007
claiming +10 stats and http://naruto-role-play-rpg.forumotion.com/t26509-oshi-the-gangsta-duck#198284 as a summon

Approved.