The Final Tempest

Hoping the boy would heed the gatekeeper’s words, Romp let out a bit of a huff as he continued to stand in the way of the boy and the gate. He still wasn’t entirely sure what was right or what was wrong anymore but he knew the one tried and true thing, and that was he was the guard who watches the gate. His general duty was to let citizens and authorized personnel in and out of the village unless he was told otherwise and he was positive he wasn’t told about any diplomat, Romp thought to himself. Either way, it didn’t really matter to him anymore now that the boy had revealed his true intentions and spilled the beans on his plan. Well, either way, he had hoped this would be the end of it and the kid would give up and go back to Konoha or something. Of course, things never turn out the way people would hope. Looking at the boy in front of him, he watched as he began to bite his lower lip as if he was angered by the words that came out of Romp’s mouth. Letting out another huff, Romp deduced this didn’t bode well as tensions seem to be running high between the two of them. As he thought this, the boy would move to the right five meters as if he was positioning himself for something.

Well, being a pit fighter for most of his life, Romp already knew what would potentially follow although, he wasn’t sure what exactly would be coming. Still, he began to anticipate the moves of the small boy, mirroring his movements once more when he attempted to move once more. On another note, it seems somebody else had entered the area awhile ago but he wasn’t really concerned about them since they seemed to have been people that he had previously let through the gates. Well, that wasn’t his concern for the time being as he mentally prepared for what was to come. He still kept his arms folded previously, as if he wasn’t amused by what had transpired or what was next to come. At this point in time, it was clear he had no intention of leaving and going back to his homeland. Now, Romp was always up for a good brawl but he didn’t want to fight with no little kids that seemed like they were fresh out of their diapers but, if this is the way it had to be, so be it. A loud, thundering crash had been heard as if an abrupt storm was beginning to swell before bursting and pouring out. The storm circle had briefly allowed clear weather through as if something detrimental had happened to it beyond his knowledge.

He figured something like that would alert the rest of the village into sending a search team to the borders in order to figure out what was going on. The storm circle had then resumed its primary function of hindering people who forced their way through or did not have permission to be within the territory of Kirigakure itself. Of course since Romp didn’t allow the little ‘diplomat’ in yet or checked to see if his story was valid, he fell under that category. As for Romp, ‘he lived here’ as defined by his earlier statement so he was mostly fine as long as he didn’t try to fly in this kind of weather. Looking at the boy’s eye, it seemed his demeanor had changed a bit. Not by much to effect an experienced man like himself but at least enough to give of the ‘playtime is over’ vibe. Romp thought it was cute in all honesty as if the boy was trying to intimidate him, his wide grin returned to his face. Listening to the boy’s final retort, apparently he claimed they were mistaken about who won the war and it was still ongoing. Romp cocked his left eyebrow in response to this, inhaling as he continued to look at him with his grin. 

Without hesitation, the boy’s eyes became a scarlet color revealing his three tomoe sharingan while he drew his blade in order to prepare an attack. As the boy drew his blade, Romp exhaled, releasing a blood curdling shout from his mouth, locking anything in their tracks that was within ten meters of Romp’s location the shout, simultaneously releasing a six inch, brownish beam-like shock wave had emitted from Romp’s mouth aimed at the boy's chin and upper neck of his unguarded head. Given the situation, Romp was almost certain the boy wouldn’t be able to defend himself from the oncoming attack as he was in range from the scream’s effects. He wasn’t sure if the boy could withstand it or not but he sort of hoped he could. If not, the beam would impact the boy's neck with more than enough force to snap, crush and destroy most of the arteries and spine, killing him instantly. As a fail safe in case his attack didn’t work, Romp adjusted his arms a bit closer to his upper body now keeping them folded across his heart.

W.C: 860

Jutsu Used
First intent (85 Power/speed, 30 Damage Reduction)

Effects in play:
Oceanic Storm Circle
Interdiction seals

The scarlet-haired teen would watch with his 3-Tomoe Sharingan imbued in his vision to process Romp's movements whilst while drawing his odachi from his hilt with his right hand at maximum speed, a hint of dull regret hitting his chest due to not wanting to fight the gate guard, but fighting against others was all he knew. The Will of Fire, no matter how much Tadashi hated it and wanted to escape the dogma he grew up with, was still present and second-nature for the teen to act upon it. To commit atrocities for the sake of the village, to kill ingeniously for its prosperity, to be treated as a tool which could be discarded at any time if another "tool" was seen as more efficient than another, and to betray your comrades should they turn against the narrow mindedness of the village. All were for the sake of Konoha, the same village that conquered and killed many innocents for the sake of the accursed "Will of Fire." There was no "Will" in it, just a dogma for the false kings that dared to call themselves "Hokages" to control the mindless mass like puppets devoid of emotion. From the day he was born, the Ace of Konoha was forced to become indoctrinated in their teachings, knowing nothing else but to perform any sort of inhumanity for a village that would not even treat him as a human when he needed them the most. Even if he succeeded in breaking away from the ideology that defined his existence, what emotions - what morals was there to abide by? Love? Happiness? Compassion? Society would not allow such rose-tinted emotions to flourish; it was simply how the world worked by know and the ginger should have known that...yet, what was the prevailing regret he felt as he attempted to draw his odachi towards Romp? Empathy? How amusing, a shinobi feeling for another... 

If Tadashi recalled correctly, his transplanted Sharingan could be used to predict the movements of others due to its enhanced vision, therefore the ginger would integrate the knowledge he used from his training back in the Training Grounds into this very battle. The moment the ginger would draw his odachi with his right hand, some of the blade still being drawn out the blue sheath, his Sharingan's enhanced vision would behold Romp's throat tighten for just a moment...an incriminating moment. The sudden tightening of the man's throat resembling that of a frog croaking would leave the ginger in that vital moment to realize that the man was going to scream out something with great force. Considering the circumstances of the battle, the Ace would believe that it was never wrong to be too cautious, as gaining from distance from the man seemed to be a good option. At the moment before the scream erupted from the Romp's mouth, Tadashi would let go of his grip on Jubaku's hilt, letting it slide down into sheath it once rested in. It seemed that the Sacred Spear strategy that he intended to do would spell an early death for him should he be foolish enough to not respond to the sudden stimuli. Then, the scream erupted from the man's mouth, threatening to blow off Tadashi's ears at the sheer intensity of the scream yet not wincing in the slightest, sounding close to an enraged beast than anything else. The ginger would additionally bear witness to a disturbance in air pressure coming from the scream, originating from the man before rushing outwards as lensing of air that would surely shock the boy from head to toe if he was slow enough to get hit by it. Simultaneously, a shockwave of energy began to emerge from the man's mouth that seemed to aim directly at the boy, being another obstacle that Tadashi needed to evade. A wicked grin of pure excitement from the battle would form on the Ace's expression as the man started to scream. The attacks seemed easy enough to evade unless the gate guard had another trick up his sleeve to which the teen would reevaluate his strategy once more before counterattacking.

Using the valuable power of his Sharingan's enhanced vision once more as the beam began to escape from the man's mouth as well as the shockwave of the scream began to travel towards him, the Ace would shift his weight fully left, slightly bending his knees and lowering his shoulder at maximum speed to allow for maximum evasion. A seemingly defensive stance, one that should raise little alarms to the screaming gate guard as the knee bending and minor weight shift could be seen as a pained reaction to the bloodcurdling yell. Nevertheless, Tadashi would waste no time before speeding into a galvanizing dash implicative of a brazen bull, dashing 5 meters straight to his left to evade the rather lackluster speed of brownish beam and shockwave ten-meters in radius hurled towards him, still keeping a close eye on Romp to react accordingly to any additional stimuli coming at him. It would take the ginger about four steps to complete his compact dash and would be a perfect opportunity to counterattack. If not interrupted, as the ginger took his first step, the corner of his right eye staring at the man's upper body, a single Kunai fell from the gaudy sleeves of his Chronos Suit, except that it wasn't a regular Kunai. It was a Specialized Kunai that the ginger made specifically for this occasion, being sharper and more durable than the run of the mill Kunais found at the Ninja Shop that would surely be a threat to most. Immediately after the Specialized Kunai fell from the ginger's sleeve, his right hand would grip the hand with great intensity before flicking it at Romp's direction wherever he was located during that interval, all actions performed in a fluid motion. It was a fluid motion akin to an assassin, definitely not one of a diplomat. The Specialized Kunai was aimed right in the middle of Romp's throat, and would immediately stab and severely puncture his windpipe, incapacitating him should the Kunai hit the intended area. Since the small weapon was aimed at the gate guard's throat, it would not come in contact with the shockwave laser that the man unleashed on the teen.

As Tadashi reached 5 meters left with the dash, he would relieve himself from that motion and stand there if not interrupted, forming the Ram > Rat > Bird > Boar > Tiger > Seal of Confrontation hand seals with only his left hand to set up the next part of his strategy with the Kunai still flying in the air. He would simultaneously be scanning the battlefield with his Sharingan active to view Romp's movements and act accordingly. Hopefully, the man would not falter as the ginger was only getting started.

WC: 1244
TWC: 5414

Actions + Boring Calcs:

For some reason or the other, the boy had stared at Romp with his scarlet eyes and watched as he fired off his beam towards his unguarded head in response to him drawing his blade. Maybe he was planning his next movements or doing that one thing children do when they think they’re the main hero of a story. This was a particularly odd course of action as he pondered why he wouldn't immediately just move out of the way while continuing to draw his blade, or getting into a stance at the same time of using their upper body. Romp assumed he'd never know. If by some miracle the boy had somehow used his sharingan vision to retroactively see him "tighten his throat" when inhaling after he had started his technique in order to evade it, he'd be quite impressed. Instead the reality of the situation was the boy had indeed reacted to the beam that he saw coming to his head by starting his defensive stance, bending his knees and lowering his shoulders in front of the shockwave beam moving eighty-five meters within the small distance of ten meters. In hindsight, all that did was adjust the beam’s trajectory a bit and instead of hitting the boy’s chin, it would just hit the boy in the nose, incapacitating the boy with the shockwave’s damage as well as the area of effect sound from said jutsu.

For the first time in a long time, Romp began to frown at what he was about to do. Being a child soldier himself at some point of his life, he sort of sympathized with the boy although he didn’t do or try anything on a grand scale such as this. He knew what it was like to fight and survive for a living but, this, this wasn’t the way to do it by sending a lone kid to a large nation and have him play hero. There was no fun or glory to be had. But still, he had a job to do, in the end, all that mattered was the enemy was in front of him breathing and it wouldn’t end unless he made that breathing cease. Walking over to the boy’s unconscious body, Romp kneeled down next to the boy, giving him a hug for a moment. After the moment had passed, Romp placed his right hand under the boy’s chin and his left on top of his head before quickly twisting in a clockwise motion, snapping his neck, killing him. He doesn’t know if this was true or not but, what he did know was at least the boy could die peacefully in his sleep without ever having to worry about the problems of the shinobi world.

Well, he knew that the Mizukage was going to want to know what took place here so he might as well take the corpse back with him to the gate and radio some lower ranked shinobi to bring a medical team. As he looked at the boy’s belongings, he noticed he was carrying a peculiar kunai with a seal marked onto it. He wasn’t sure what it was or what it could do so instead of leaving it alone for evidence, he just made a mental note of it while crushing the kunai with his bare hand. Standing up, Romp picked up the boy’s body and threw it over his shoulder. He didn’t say anything to the other people who had shown up by boat, regardless if they tried to speak to him or not. He just took the kid and began his journey back to the gates. The boy’s body would be taken to the hospital to see if they could get any information out of the corpse or at least figure out what kind of bloodline limit he had. 

W.C: 640

If the ginger expected for his intended actions to bear fruit, reality would soon set in, breaking that deluded illusion at once. Tadashi didn't know whether aged rust flowed through his veins or he simply froze when combating adversity...the final crucible that was supposed to bring his village prosperity and freedom. All of those years of training, patience, and pent-up-anger would soon go to waste, all being immediately crushed by a foe far too strong for the ginger to handle. It was ironic, the Ace of Konoha who barked the loudest about gaining independence, resigning himself to a path of a savior who would save the village from the shackles of Kirigakure, yet when push came to shove, there was no bite. He thought he had already forsaken his apprehensions of doubt back in the gates of Konoha, yet fear came to him, at the worst opportunity possible. He couldn't move, shackled by the panic he swore to abandon as he traveled to the fated village, as the brownish-beam resembling phlegm drew closer to him. The lensing of air from the bloodcurdling scream he witnessed mere moments before the beam came charging at him still expanding like an explosion that wanted to combust so badly once meeting something as solid as a human. Then, like a bullet, and with a sickening SNAP, the blast slammed into the boy's nose, severing the bone in two immediately.

The pain was disorienting at best and nerve-shattering at worst feeling like the whole world slammed the ginger in the face, and it certainly felt like it internally. The Ace chuckled as he was suspended in the air for a brief moment due to the sheer impact of the beam. His chuckle was dry, slowly coming to accept that he failed his mission; so close to victory that he could taste it, yet so far.  He assumed that he was probably going to die once he fell to the ground, or at least be incapacitated chance for Romp to finish him off, and honestly, Tadashi would not hate him for that. The man was simply following orders, and the ginger would respect and even silently admire the man for a brief moment due to performing his job with such ease and grace that a shinobi could pull off. Then, it dawned on the boy in his last moments: maybe being more diplomatic was not a bad idea. Like the accursed Will of Fire he swore to deviate from, it seemed that just killing others for the sole sake of Konoha was the only thing on the boy's mind once he entered Kirigakure. There were no ideals of "independence" to be seen, just a byproduct of a dogma that encouraged violence and bloodshed. One could never truly escape from their past, and certainly not the teachings that were fundamental to their development. It appeared that in the end, it seemed like there were more similarities between Tadashi and Yensung, their cowardice both reigning supreme when things needed to be done despite striving to be different from the devil in human clothing. Amid the burning pain from his severed nose, still in the air, the ginger sighed for a brief moment, a serene sigh and initiative of accepting the village's burden. If he was going to die, he would at least notify Kinzoku of failing his mission via the Telepathy Seal on his neck. Flowing his last bits of chakra before crashing into the ground with the back of his head first, he'd would use his mind to converse with the cowboy shinobi, "Sorry Kinzoku, it seems like I couldn't fulfill my mission nor place the marked Kunai...Kirigakure is just too powerful..." He communicated telepathically to the Nazar for a brief moment pensively, establishing a link then disconnecting immediately before falling to the ground.

His eyes would shut tightly, the last drifting thoughts in his mind paying his respects and sorrows to all of the people around him. Maybe in the afterlife, he could meet his mother again. Tadashi was at the mercy of the shinobi just standing before him who wanted to kill him, no longer a diplomat, but a martyr. Hopefully, someone strong enough could use his death as a stepping stone for Konohagakure to finally be free, as that was the only thing the ginger could offer him before his untimely passage.

Despite the mystical and fated events that occurred today, one thing was for sure:

There was no such thing as "heroes" in the Ninja World.

(EXIT)

WC: 748
TWC: 6162 

Claiming the death of Tadashi Namikaze, press F to pay respects.

...Also used the effect of Telepathy Seal located on his neck to communicate with Kinzoku shortly before him passing out then dying from Romp snapping his neck.

It was sad when a young person's time and existence is snuffed out.  As Arc saw it this is what happened.  A rash boy arrived in Kiri, the land of blood and pain and violence and mouthed off to the first person he saw.  It happened to be the wrong person.  When he tried to get around the man his way was blocked and the rash boy reached for his sword to challenge the man.  In an instant the man opened his mouth and with incredible power above what most people see in their life times, and on the higher end of techniques of most ninja, executed some kind of beam attack.  Trying to get out of the way led the boy to taking the power of the equivalent of a truck in a 6 inch diameter to the face.  Arc watched as the boy's face was pummeled beyond recognition.  It was not a simple punch to the face but a full on jackhammer to what seemed to be a very defenseless kid.  The force would be enough to break the boy's nose but also his cheek bones and teeth, it would easily crush the boy's forehead and completely destroy his eyeballs.  Arc wasn’t sure why such powerful measures were taken against this boy.  On top of it Romp decided to walk up to the unconscious and most likely dead already boy and break his neck just to be sure.  Arc felt sorry for the boy but at least his suffering was over...at least that is what most people said.  Arc having never died had no idea what the other life was like.  


But Arc survived and he was sure to make sure not to cross paths with Romp again.



[Exits]
WC: 291
TWC: 2034


Arcanis
1017 words
264 words completing Bullseye C rank
750 words completing Bullseye B rank 
3 words toward Bullseye A rank



Rook
1017 words
10 stats toward chakra
450 to finish fire element
567 words towards Fire Release: Great Fire Annihilation

RIP Konoha's Ace.

Approved of claims and exits.

[To avoid confusion, not approving the destruction of Tadashi's eyes which was simply put between brackets]

[you are right permission to remove it?]

Both Kizmaru and Tadashi have agreed to it, so go ahead