The Visitor [Village Entrance]

The harsh desert winds were definitely not what the apothecary had anticipated. Comparing with the humid climate of the Earth Country and the moderate climate of Tea Country, the Wind Country was true to its name; even the vast ocean of sand wasn't as bothersome as its winds. Cold by night, hot by day, but the winds howled 'round the clock. If not for his backpack with his sake and remedies, the trip might be more casual, but carrying around all this weight through the sands made for a very encumbersome trip. He had a cloak wrapped around his golden mane of hair, covering his face as best as he had managed, with a slit where his eyes could peer into the world.

Underneath the cloak, his green coat and pants, and the wooden sandals he had been so fond of. They were not ideal for this terrain, however did make the scorching sands more bearable. Within himself, the white eye he found in the forest, kept alive, but alas, uselessly so.

After a couple of days of trekking, with the help of nomadic caravans when he could afford their help or pay for it with his services, he started coming across rocky formations, each bigger than the last one he saw before. According to what he knew, he would be getting closer to the fabled Sunagakure, the Village Hidden in the Sands. It had gained quite the reputation with the outlaw ninja population as a place where the hunted were welcomed. Moreover, they appeared to be quite advanced medically. If they had good sake, they would have all the things a young Tau could hope for.

Eventually, he came across the biggest rock formation yet, spanning for miles as far as the eye could see. He had followed the last caravan's instructions to keep moving in the same direction, and sure enough, a cleft in the rock formation indicated the entrance to the village. He approached what he surmised was a guard house. "Aro? Hello? One admission ticket, please!"

The elderly man within the guardhouse was so nice! Not at all the experience Kaworu had with the geriatric tier of the population. It was nice to see the Sunagakure provided their elderly with active participation in the running of the village, which was nice, it was sad for him to see old people discarded in their houses, abandoned by their progeny to see the rest of their days in some old house, only to be visited by Kaworu so he could scalp their last savings on some remedy that was far cheaper than he charged for. The man went into great detail regarding all the info Kaworu needed to remember and answer to in what he could only assume would need to be a short span of time so as to not irate the elder, as elders didn’t have much time left to live and would likely have very little patience to put up with Kaworu’s antics. He started off by pulling the cloak off his luscious golden locks, his piercing crystal blue eyes looking optimistically at the man in front of his as the cloak relaxed to show his face, on long line of stitches running down his right eye to his jaw, a similar one running down his left eye to the jaw, and a third also coming from the eye, but towards the jawline just under his left ear.

“Erm, my name is Kaworu Sanjuro, I don’t have any documents though. I am…” He took a moment to contemplate if he should mention being a ninja, even though he wasn’t a very active one. Except when he murdered all of those guards inside a warehouse. He was pretty ninja back then. So, he continued after the second of contemplation. “I am a missing ninja. I came from the Hidden… erm… what’s the one in Earth Country?” His furrow burrowed in contemplation, as he snapped his fingers once, then twice. “Iwagakure? Yeah, Iwagakure.” Even though Han told him if he was a missing ninja if he didn’t need to tell him the village, Kaworu hadn’t paid that much attention when the man asked him all of that and he just scribbled footnotes along the edges of his perception wherever there was a thought that didn’t related to a nice, hot and refreshing mint tea. “Is there a house that serves mint tea? Or an ophthalmologist?”

The visitation permit was slipped down the tiny slot at the bottom of the mirror. He told Kaworu about the Jasmine Dragon, where likely another old man with a pot belly would welcome him with the best tea in the entirety of Ba Sing S-- I mean, the entirety of Sunagakure. “Thank you, mister! Tell your boss, I told you to tell him that he should give you a raise!” He considered for a moment. “You do get paid for this, right?”

Kaworu pondered for a moment, then took off.


==================
(entering Sunagakure)
(exit)
WC: 828
Claiming 8 Vigor
500 words towards C-Rank Black Threads, already have D-Rank.
328 towards Moving Earth Core