Time to hunt a Vampire. (Zyxis,Natsume)

Natsume seemed quite enraptured by Hoshi's story, her eyes wide and head nodding every other sentence or so. It had been so long since somebody had told her a 'story'—storytelling had died when her mother had. When the story came to an end, she clapped alongside Zyxis, though a little more enthusiastically. Her father and mother had never told her such horror stories as a child. Perhaps they'd never cared for those kind of things.

She scratched her cheek as Zyxis called on her to lead the team. "I'm..." She bit her loop and shook her head slightly. "I'm sorry, Zyxis-senpai, but I do not believe I am qualified yet for that. Especially not on a mission with an active hostile." She smiled awkwardly at him. "It'd be best for me to start leading on a simpler mission, perhaps an E-rank one, or D-rank, at most." She bowed her head at him. "I'll be in your care, leader."

She tilted her head and focused on the mission posted on the wall, her lips twisted into a slight frown. It sounded, quite frankly, a bit... dramatic. Still, villagers were going missing and dying, and as a ninja, she had a duty to protect them.

"Do we know where any of these bodies are? Perhaps we can find clues on the bodies." Even though she wouldn't be leading, she was sure Zyxis wouldn't mind if she suggested a few things once in a while.

Natsume wasn't sure when or how it had happened, but at some point, she'd gotten separated from both boys. Hoshi had been acceptable to lose track of—he'd run off with a laugh and left them with little to follow. She shook her head as she recalled it; she'd not expected such unprofessionalism from him. "I should talk to him about that next time," she reminded herself. Regardless of her position as 'newer' than him, even she could see what he'd done had been rude and unbefitting of a proper ninja. She looked up and around her as if he could hear her thoughts, but was quickly reminded that she was still alone. Or at least, without the boys, as she'd also lost Zyxis at some point. That had been a more subtle thing. One moment she'd been right behind him, keeping an eye out on their surroundings, and then Zyxis must've turned a corner and Natsume had lost sight of him. She'd backtracked, but he was gone.

So here she was now, atop a rooftop, trying to spot anything unusual on the streets below her. Being Spooktober, people were dressed oddly, like animals or zombies or other creatures less than human, but she did her best to ignore that and focus on what she knew. Villagers, taken at night and drained of blood. A seemingly unknown hunting pattern. Their bodies, found in the morning, so perhaps disposed of somewhere that would be otherwise obscure during the dark cover of the night. "Perhaps an alleyway?" With that thought in mind, she paid more attention to the alleyways she was passing, often slowing down as she neared one to try and thoroughly inspect them from above.

One such alley proved fruitful. She spotted a body.

She hissed through clenched teeth and hopped down from the rooftop, landing in a crouch near the body. Immediately, she searched for a pulse. There was none—"I was too late,"—and the body was cold. Or well, parts of it were cold. She pressed her fingers to the marks on the victim's neck, where it was warmest, as if all the heat-circulating blood had been drawn to that one spot and then extracted. From the heat still lingering there, she would guess the body's disposal was relatively recent—a few minutes, maybe half an hour at most? "They might be nearby still." Knowing that, how could she stay still? She pushed off from the ground and climbed back up to the rooftops, this time scanning the streets thoroughly for any bloodied figure.

About a block away from the body, she noticed a tall, pale man. He was relatively lean and slinking through the shadows, and his front was covered in blood. Perhaps it was a costume. Or perhaps, the killer. Natsume dropped to the streets and followed him, trying to keep the smallest distance possible that still would avoid his detection. She followed him down a couple of streets, passively noting that the crowd was thinning out more and more. "Where's he going?" He turned a corner. She hurried forward and carefully peeked around the corner. She saw the edge of his tailcoat around the next corner. She would not let him disappear from sight, not like with the boys. She rushed after him and went to turn on to the next street—

An arm flashed, hand grabbing her shoulder and slamming her back into the alley wall. "Didn't your mother ever tell you not to follow strangers into dark alleyways, little one?" he said, practically purring. His killing intent was intense, raising goosebumps along her arms.

She would not let herself be stunned into submission! She threw one hand up to the sky, and clamped down on his wrist with the other. Her lips pulled into a snarl. "My mother's dead." Electricity crackled and buzzed in her hand, quickly travelling through her and into the man [Raiton: Hiraishin -20 AP | POWER: 25 + 5, SPEED: 25 + 5]. He spasmed as the electricity rammed through his body, and Natsume used the opportunity to duck under his arm and put some space between them, so she wasn't literally trapped between a killer and a wall.

She pulled out a kunai and held it in her tight fist. Hopefully backup would arrive soon. "We should've never split up!"