Embracing the Shadows (Part 1)

Max would find himself wandering around the town, wondering what to do next. With many of the shinobi gone along with many of the civilians, Kumogakure hadn’t felt quite the same. It just felt as though there was something missing. At least Senshi had still been in the village, but he had likely been busy. There were a lot of duties attached to the rank of Jounin, and Max understood that. So, finding something to do in town would be on his agenda today.
 
Max knew that he was going to need some more stuff, as his “new” white shirt had slowly been getting less and less so and more and more dirty. Well, the best way to get new things was to gather them from those that didn’t need them. So, Max would make his way to where he could always find exactly what he was looking for, the obituary files located in the kage’s offices. There was very rarely a problem with Max looking over this information, mostly because people were too busy with their own work. Besides, such knowledge really couldn’t harm anyone or the village.
 
Quickly scanning over the files, Max found one that stood out. He wasn’t entirely sure why, but Kumorasemasu Nara’s file was the one he decided to go to. Quickly locating the address, Max would return the file and make his way to the location, making sure to jot down the numbers on a piece of paper. The day had been a fairly cool one, Max would note as he headed over to the house of the now deceased Nara. The cool weather only made him recall how he now had no jacket, and as the metal of his limbs chilled there was minor discomfort where it had met flesh. Hopefully he would find a replacement to keep warm until the weather returned to a more favorable condition.
 
Looking down at the slip of paper, Max doesn’t take long to find the place. It wasn’t the largest place, but it was a great deal bigger than his own home had been. To be fair, that really didn’t take much though. The door had been locked, but that really didn’t matter. Max was rather good at getting into these places by now, and so he would use his tools and proceed to pick the lock. See, Max had been very good with his hands and had a strong understanding of mechanisms. This lock was no match for the boy. So he would pick the lock, and after that had been successful he would slip into the large abandoned home. It would have likely been considered a home that was underwhelming to most folks, especially one that had been home to a prominent clan family, but to the poor boy the house seemed like a mansion filled with all types of goodies.
 
Max was in need of some new clothes, and so he would head up to the bedrooms first and foremost. This was likely where he would find all of the stuff that he needed, and so the boy would start there and work his way outwards. As he walked up the creaking stairs, he noted that the place was eerily quiet, the only sounds that could be heard are the scratches of little mouse feet on the walls and ceilings. This place must have been abandoned for some time, but Max wouldn’t think about the details of that.
 
The room would then be on his left, the door still in fairly good condition all things considered. The boy would slide open the door, it also slowly creaking open. The place was in disrepair it had seemed… Maybe they need to oil some hinges?
 
The closets were fairly full of the clothes that the inhabitants weren’t able to take with them when they were… well likely forced out and dealt with accordingly. The boy would first find peruse the items in search of a light jacket, something to keep the chill off at least. He would find only a light vest, a greyish color and fairly worn as well. Max would immediately discard such an item. It didn’t look to be effective at all for protecting one from the elements. No, it seemed more like a fashion statement or and accessory, both of which Max cared little for. Functionality was key, and most of the time everything else was almost irrelevant.
 
As the boy would toss the jacket away, a strange sound peaked his interest. The clang of something hitting the wooden floor hard echoed through the quiet house, the boy shifting his head to the discarded vest. He would search the pockets, wondering what nifty thing he would find within. What hidden gems had awaited him in this treasure trove? He would feel something odd, and pull it out only to realize it was a small scroll case. Now what would that be doing in a place like this? The boy would pop the lid and pull out the scroll within. It had been a rather strange looking scroll, with a handful of jutsu’s on it that seemed to be handwritten in with several notes next to some hastily drawn diagrams. Many of the notations had been a tad difficult to read, but the diagrams looked to show hand seals. This must have been some type of jutsu scroll, but it kept referencing Shadow at various places. Silently flipping through his Jutsu Encyclopedia, he couldn’t find anything referencing these techniques. That meant one of two things: either they are high ranking jutsu that are not listed in the book, or they were jutsu’s that weren’t meant to be in the book. The handwritten notes and such made Max think that it might have been the latter. Maybe that Kumorasemasu guy was working on his own jutsu before he was… removed from his home. The boy would visualize the seals and practice the movements for only a brief moment, as he had other things to do.
 

As cool as the scroll had been, this was not what the boy had come here for, and so he would go back to looking for things he could use. He found a bunch of the traditional shinobi undershirts, along with a few nicer white shirts. He liked the look of himself in a clean white shirt, and since he hadn’t been doing a whole lot of… well gravedigging, he hadn’t stained them with the deathly smell that had been ingrained into his old jacket. 

The boy, once finished here would continue from room to room, pocketing everything that he could that seemed to be of use to him. A few items of clothing here, a few neat trinkets that he thought of neat uses to mechanize into his puppets there. Nothing particularly valuable, though metal objects were prioritized. 

As he was searching through the master bedroom though, he found a bookcase with several interesting tomes upon its shelves. One was titled "A Study of Kekkai Genkai and Their Connection to DNA" which of course caught the boys eye. Ever since learning that differing clans had various minor changes in their genetic coding the boy had been rather intrigued. He would peruse over the book for nearly and hour, jotting down notes on various bloodlines that he was familiar with, along with a few that he wasn't. Once he felt his notes were complete, he would set the book back on the shelf and continue rummaging through the houses clothes. After he felt he gathered enough, he would toss it in a bedsheet and wrap it up hobo style. He would then take another bedsheet and place a bunch of the clothes and such that he didn't want in it. This would be used for fuel for his fireplace, or maybe even fabric to use in a puppet. 


On his way out of the house, the boy would notice one final item that brought an idea to his mind. He would walk over to a bear fur rug that was sitting on their floor gathering dust and pick it up. It was rather large and encumbering, but she would ball it up as best he could and walk out of the house, slowly but surely making his way back home. 


He had a lot of new things to work on, especially that strange scroll he had found.




---Exit---


WC: 1400


Claims:
Figuring out my Nara stuff (1/5)
Bear Fur (for a new puppet I had in mind, not an actual item. Just wanted some reason as to why I had a bear skin)


This book of BL stuff if I can - If not that is fine, but could I claim a bit more IC insight to a handful of clans: Uchiha, Hyuuga, Hozuki, Senju (The only one I wouldn't know about at all IC yet would be Senju)

Approved, since the book would cost 150 words to buy and you had a legit reason as to how you found it in approving that