Ill Gotten Artifacts

Mission Details:

Roaming around the streets of Hoshigakure, Kizmaru was hearing rumors of a thief running around and stealing holy artifacts from the religious sites of Hoshigakure. Though it wasn't his place, nor his problem, to deal with this matter, Kizmaru decided to take it upon himself in order to help out as a show of goodwill between the two villages. On top of that, he wanted to know how other villages carried out their mission routine compared to Kiri. He wasn't what he had to do in order to sign up but he figured if since it was mentioned by Hoshigakure shinobi directly, he'd be able to just do it and request compensation for finishing the task later. Travelling with Ram on his back, Kizmaru was transformed into his Jounin attire of a yellow button down shirt, navy blue pants, ninja tabis and black leather gloves. He normally didn't wear them but he needed to disguise his petrification gauntlets as people could probably recognize them from the summit with the appearance of a Flak Jacket over his torso. Well, now that he was prepared to do all of this crazy nonsense, he'd take up the task of looking for this thief alongside Keita and Ram.

First and foremost, they'd need to flush out the thief from whatever hiding spot they might be in. If anything, the thief might be on the move constantly and on the run from the authorities, pilfering more holy artifacts to make a quick buck. You'd think the thief would steal something less recognizable and had more copies of holy artifacts so people wouldn't recognize them but he never really understood the dynamic. Still, his job wasn't to understand them, just to bring them into Hoshigakure custody. With that, Kizmaru instructed Ram to dismount from his back and use his seismic sense to people around the area. Currently, they were in a courtyard of a large shrine where they were safeguarding some holy anklet that would most likely sell for a fortune. It was one of a kind and with the recent happenings of things being swiped, they were hiring any able-bodied shinobi to help out. Seeing as Kizmaru had already taken the liberty of signing them up for the mission as mercenaries, they were already here, searching the perimeter. Having Ram use his sixth sense in order to get a general idea of what his surroundings are.

Though he wouldn't get an accurate idea from the squealing of Ram, at least he'd be able to get the general direction and idea of what was going on. With that, Ram would walk in one direction in order to survey one part of the area while Kizmaru walked in a different direction to survey his part of the area. Kizmaru had the ability to do the same thing with the help of his legendary gauntlets. So he also scouted the area with the equipment's ability activated in order to feel the vibrations of potential living creatures that could be lurking nearby.

W.C: 503

Keita was quite enjoying the hustle and bustle about the fairly prosperous city streets of Hoshi, but it seemed like there was a strange undercurrent within the city walls, which made it seem like there was a large amount of unrest between the native population that were religious and then the native population that were ninja. He saw quite a few people who did not seem to care either way, but most of the people chose to stand by one side or the other, as some people would simply nod to them in passing, but others would give them dirty looks, as if they hated ninja in general, let alone ninja from a foreign nation. The people seemed to mutter under their breaths that they hated that the chuunin exams were held here, because it just made a large amount of ninja that they hated come here, and then he and Kizmaru would get pointed at. Keita was in his disguise that he had come up with earlier, and was strolling around with Kizmaru during this, and it seemed that Kizmaru was paying no heed to the points, as they were just from some random commoners. 

Keita was currently with Kizmaru when Kizmaru suddenly wanted to go and help out some people of this village. Apparently there was a rumor of a thief going around and stealing things from holy sites, and it seemed that the civilians that were religious were blaming this on the ninja. So, it faired to guess that the village would suddenly have a mission to go and apprehend this person, as to quell the unrest and the suspicion that the ninja were the ones responsible. Keita simply followed, as he did not quite have any sensory abilities, the most he could do is put some sort of mark seal onto someone and then use the tracking technique, but if they found the person, he would simply be swiftly captured instead of marked and followed, as it seemed like this was just some sort of petty thief that thought that whatever items he was stealing from the religious people were probably worth a bit of money in some underground auctions, or something of the sort.

They had made their way to a large and beautiful shrine, dedicated to some sort of god that Keita had never heard of before, and within the walls of this place, the people were desperately calling for help from shinobi as to guard this relic, as this was the most likely spot for the thief to strike next. Well, Keita thought, announcing this publicly during the middle of the day is one way to make sure the thief is nowhere near this area, but perhaps the temptation of the holy artifact on the pedestal will be too much for him to simply ignore. The artifact was some sort of holy relic, but to Keita it simply seemed like another piece of jewelry that anyone with a bit of blacksmithing and cosmetic crafting could make, but he was not one to question the validity or the reason behind worshipping said item, so he simply nodded his head when Kizmaru had signed them up for the role of pursuer to take down this thief that was roaming about. 

The pair of Kiri jounin that were wandering around the area did not seem suspicious, as Keita had seen people from the other villages helping out as well. There was probably some sort of monetary compensation for catching the thief, so there was no reason that they could draw suspicion. As for actually capturing the thief, Kizmaru’s pet armadillo Ram would be of utmost value here, as the armadillo’s ability to sense vibrations through its feet was something that neither of them had at the moment. Sensing people and things was quite good. Ram was taken off of the back of Kizmaru and placed on the ground, and he started doing his thing. Keita was curious, as he had seen Ram a couple of times, but never really saw him doing his thing, he just pet Ram when he was on Kizmaru’s back, so there was not really a time when they were in the same place with hostile activities going on around them. 

This particular event could not be considered hostile either, but there was at least the possibility of them having to fight, although Keita was sure that the two of them could take on anyone currently, not just some petty thief. Keita would not be afraid if it turned out the kage himself was the thief, he would just ask for more compensation when they captured him and sent him into custody, if that was even possible. Keita saw that the two were splitting up to cover more ground, and Keita thought he would do the same, but he would go vertical. The other two walking around the building would find most things on the ground, so Keita was going to be a scout for things that might be out of the two’s sensory ranges. Keita quickly activated surface walking and swiftly made his way up the building directly across from the shrine, and would go slowly in a circle onto the roofs of the other buildings in the surrounding area, looking for suspicious activity.
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WC: 883

As Kizmaru left, it seems Keita was left with the task of taking to the rooftop for a better vantage point in order to better survey the surrounding areas. Although it was a good idea, he was a little worried about spooking the thief before they had a chance to catch them if they happened to spot him on the roof like that. Either way, this was fine as they would also be deterring them from stealing whatever holy relic was inside the shrine. Kizmaru kind of wished he knew what it was but even the common citizens of Hoshigakure barely knew what was inside. There was no way, visiting mercenaries from a different village was going to be privy to such information. Maybe it was strong or legendary enough to make Kizmaru want to steal it himself in the future, who knows. He doubted such a thing would happen as he wasn't exactly the thieving type of guy but still wanted to sate his curiosity. letting out a small sigh, Kizmaru would continue to walk around his side of the perimeter, monitoring the area and making sure there was nothing out of the ordinary here from what he could tell.

Deciding to make absolutely sure, Kizmaru decided it would be best to use his sharingan just in case his normal eyes wouldn't be enough. He didn't really need the power of his Mangekyou Sharingan, nor the added blindness that it gave him so he opted to use only the normal three tomoe in order to efficiently look around the place. After looking around a bit with the sharingan, he still couldn't locate anything out of the ordinary. With that, Kizmaru continued his walk around the outside of the shrine, making sure to cover all of his bases. He only circled around his side of the shrine until he could detect the familiar sensation of Ram's vibrations which would be a signal for him to double back around, retracing his steps in order to patrol properly. After a few rotations of this, Kizmaru found himself bored of the routine he had put himself in and decided to go to a point he deemed the center of his perimeter and just laze about. Of course, he kept his petrification gauntlets activated in order to determine who or what may be approaching him at any giving moment. Finding a good place to relax, Kizmaru dusted the spot he wanted to sit down in and relax a little while. 

With the other two on the job, he figured maybe he could cut corners a bit, slack off and rest up. Squatting down into a sitting position, Kizmaru place his hands behind his hat and began to lay down and look up at the clouds above. It was a pretty quiet day and hopefully it stayed that way. He was too interested in catching the thief anymore and all he wanted was this request to end as he laid there. At first, he figured he wanted some kind of excitement while in Hoshi but after doing what was essentially guard duty, all he wanted to do now was just, be lazy. He figured he could do so since they weren't actually being supervised by some official commanding officer. Feeling a yawn build up, Kizmaru opened his mouth to let it out, falling asleep faster than he had realized. On the other side of the perimeter where Ram was walking, the creature didn't really detect much that was out of the ordinary, not that he knew what was considered ordinary or not. Ram had only made one rotation himself before he was distracted by something else.

Some wild fruit had been growing nearby in a tree that he hadn't seen before in Kiri, located in some peculiar, tall bushes. Walking over to them, Ram decided to go foraging in order to eat the large rainbow colored fruit it had been craving. Picking the first one, Ram began to sniff it for a couple of moments to see if he could pick up anything that might be poisonous to itself on possibly humans. It had planned to take two extra fruits back for his friends. Taking a bite, Ram found the fruit delicious before it began to chow down on it. Finishing it Ram reached for a second one. However the thing he reached for wasn't a fruit at all. It was also round but smaller, a lot smaller. Upon further inspection, Ram noticed its color was grey and was attracted not to a bush but to another human figure. Since the human wasn't moving, Ram never really detected him on the compound meaning he's been here before they even showed up scouting the area. The man had spotted Ram while he was walking over and saw him as just another random animal looking for food. Shinobi having animal companions must not be common in Hoshigakure as the man just tried to 'shoo' Ram away instead of dispatching him.

Instead, Ram just picked three more fruits and walked away to go find Keita or Kizmaru in order to alarm them of what  he found. He had found Kizmaru first and began to squeal in his presence to wake him up. Kizmaru woke up briefly and began to morph into various forms to the best of his abilities in order to tell the story of what he saw. Kizmaru stared at Ram briefly but he was still quite sleepy, patting the head of Ram and turning over to go back to taking a nap. This made Ram squeal angrily like a cat briefly before climbing the side of the shrine in order to go and find Keita. When he made it to the top, he spotted Keita and began pulling the side of his robes. If Ram got his attention, Ram would then squeal and whimper a bit at Keita, slightingly morphing his body in order to tell his story in hopes Keita might understand. After all was said and done, he'd climb the back of Keita and point into the direction where he saw the sketchy person. Ram also then handed Keita one of the rainbow fruits he had picked.

W.C: 1,034

Keita was wandering around on top of the buildings, once in a while jumping from one roof top to another, and then staying there for a bit to scout out the surrounding area, attempting to find any suspicious individual around the ground level where the robbery took place. Keita did not really see anyone suspicious, or doing anything that would be considered illegal, although he was unsure of all of the laws that Hoshi had, he assumed that the basics were covered, such as no stealing, attacking people, murder, those types of things came to Keita's mind when he was contemplating things and looking around for the thief. Soon, he felt some sort of presence behind him and heard some sort of tapping on the roof behind him, so he turned around, readying an attack should it be someone that he did not know, but as he turned around, he had to look down, and saw the little Ram had gotten up on the roof somehow. Keita wondered what he was up to, and started whimpering at him, so Keita walked up to him and pat him. "What do you need Ram, what's wrong?" It seemed that Ram was concerned a bit, and attempted to climb onto Keita's back, and so he let him, helping him up onto his back so that the armadillo was comfortable and would not fall off. He was a bit heavy for Keita, as Keita was not quite strong, he was simply slightly more fit than the average person, but he was still fairly spindly compared to other ninja. As the armadillo got comfortable, it started whimpering and pointing towards a certain direction, which Keita turned his vision towards, but saw not a whole lot. 

Keita was confused, but trusted Ram's senses, so Keita immediately slipped off of the building from the back of the building, before circling around, being extra cautious and hiding from the vision of where Ram pointed. As Keita got close, he decided to use his chakra sensory ability, sending his chakra into a relatively small area around himself, which covered the area that Ram had pointed to. Keita told Ram to shush, as Keita 's chakra sensory picked up a foreign chakra signature hiding in the bush. Keita then got close enough, before suddenly, two chains of solidified chakra jutted out of Keita's body, swimming through the air and suddenly wrapping around the bush. There seemed to be a muffled grunt coming from the bush, before the chakra chains were wiggled a bit, and leaves and twigs of the bush getting crushed and shaken off, falling to the floor, revealing a man. The man was around five feet, seven inches tall, and had some sort of goatee as well as dark blue clothing. One of the chains that were wrapping around the man had covered his mouth, and soon Keita unwrapped the man's mouth, before calmly talking to him. "So, hiding in a bush and observing us, care to explain?" The man looked incredibly angry, but mostly at the armadillo, thinking that it was just another harmless animal was a huge mistake, and he regret not doing anything to the armadillo earlier to prevent it from squealing or something, giving away his position so easily to the shinobi that were sent to capture him. 

He decided that he was going to attempt to play it off, although the artifact that he had stolen was in his pocket, if he was assertive enough, there would be no cause for the ninja to capture him, as long as he made enough commotion to the more religious people that were around here, they might just accost the ninja, as they were very prejudiced against them. "Help! This foreign ninja is trying to kill me!" The man yelled, attracting the attention of a bunch of people in the area, some of them being the religious type that were worshipping at the temple here, and were already in a bad move because of the larceny of the religious artifact earlier. A crowd started to gather, as Keita looked the man up and down, checking out the now scrunched together clothing that the chains squeezing him did. He saw a discrepancy in the outfit he was wearing, and so Keita knew how to perfectly diffuse the situation, when the religious people came over and started to yell things at Keita. There were people saying that foreign ninja were not welcome here, and to leave, as well as them trampling the sacred grounds and accosting a normal worshipper. It seemed that the crowd was getting quite rowdy, but before it got too bad, Keita suddenly flipped the man upside down, loosened his chains round his midsection, and started shaking him up and down. At first, the crowd was angry, seeing the ninja blatantly disregard their cries and start shaking the man, but that all changed when a golden bangle fell from the man's clothing, and into Keita's hand, before Keita started to explain. The crowd went completely silent, as Keita started speaking. "My partner and I decided to join the hunt for the person that stole the holy relic from the temple, and here he is. Is there anyone from the temple that is here and has the authority to call this mission complete?" Keita said, this time in a deep, slightly annoyed voice, as he was still in his disguise.

Soon, a member of the clergy showed up, and showed Keita the signed and stamped piece of paper that he could bring to the mission area to claim the rewards, and asked for the bangle back, which Keita happily gave to him. At this time, Kizmaru should have been alerted and came over, so Keita would just hand him the slip and then they would get out of there. Ram was still on Keita's back, and he wondered if the little armadillo would be mad at Kizmaru for not coming over when he gave the former the distress call, as Keita couldn't imagine that the armadillo would come to him first.
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EXIT 
WC: 1015
TWC: 1898/1500
Claiming 6000 ryo from mission
Using 1898 words on Four Symbols Seal - 4000 with 25% discount =1898/3000

Waking up from his nap, Kizmaru had been interrupted by the sounds of skirmish going on from the surrounding area. He figured it was just Keita dealing with whatever Ram had to report and just got back up. Walking around the area for a little while, he managed to meet up with Keita and Ram that was currently on his back. Kizmaru smiled groggily as they went to confirm the mission was completed. Keita was already in the process of this and Kizmaru just stood idly nearby letting him finish his business. When all was said and done, they started to leave the area and Kizmaru attempted to call Ram to his own back. Unfortunately, Ram simply ignored his calls, expanding a little bit to show he was pouting and angry. Kizmaru had no idea what he did wrong recently but it was fine since he was riding on the back of somebody familiar. Still, he never thought he'd feel a sense of jealousy from his animal companion riding Keita's back instead of his own.

[Exit.]

W.C: 175
T.W.C: 1,712

Loot Claims
Claiming 6,000 Ryo.

Ability Claims (Applying 25% Word Discount)
Using 1,700 into S-Rank Copycat

Approved