Sealsmith: Antechamber [I/O]

https://www.narutoroleplaygame.com/t48701-the-sealsmith-unlocking-the-antechamber

Keita was currently at his desk in the Mizukage's office, taking care of quite a bit of paperwork that the Mizukage himself did not want to do, but he was fine with it. He was quite content with his job, simply sitting here and doing paperwork, it was fairly calm, but needed a bit of constant attention so that they could all make sure that everything was correct and according to the laws and regulations of the land and village. To most people it would be quite boring, but Keita enjoyed boring, for the most part, because boring meant calm, and calm meant that he did not need to murder anyone, so that was always a nice plus to this sort of work. It was raining fairly heavily outside today, and Keita admired the rain making unique patterns sliding down the window constantly, as well as the calming tip tap of rain as it hit the building and the glass. He did not need music when the rain calmed him down and made it easier to focus on his work, much to the chagrin to the assistants around, as they enjoyed music but were too afraid of Keita to ask him if they could play it most of the time. Keita stretched, but soon a loud knock on the door of his office was heard, and so Keita had to address it somehow. “Come in.” Keita would say softly at the knock, to which a person that seemed a bit winded would hurriedly come in holding a manilla folder. 

Keita looked curiously at the man before pointing to the chair in front of his desk, and the man quickly walked over and handed him a folder. This man seemed to be jounin of the village, but not one of the Anbu, as if it was one of them, the Anbu member would have just weirdly appeared in the area, which made Keita think that he should have practiced the art of sensory. Still, the man showed him the manilla folder and started to detail some sort of incident that happened that was fairly urgent. One of the nobles of the village found a strange antechamber leading to some large structure underneath his house, but it was sealed by a fuuinjutsu seal. This needed a fuuinjutsu user quickly, as there were rumors that some sort of bandits or specialized missing ninja were also en route to try and break in and steal everything in the antechamber. Keita wondered why this seemed urgent enough for a jounin to rush over, but not urgent enough to gain the attention of the other Anbu members. Keita sighed, before pulling the face mask of his armor over his body and placing the Anbu mask he had over his face as well. Keita was unsure who else would be notified, the Kage no doubt, but he wondered if the man would drag himself away from his duties to do this particular task as well. Keita assumed that he would, and started heading out through the window. 

Keita jumped out of the window through the rain, landing on a nearby rooftop, and eventually stopped at the village gates, as he would wait a couple of minutes maximum, seeing if anyone else would join him on this mission, before heading straight to the nearby nobles’ home and seeing what he had found in the strange chamber.
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WC: 568

Next door to his office, in the common room that was connected by double doors, the Mizukage was taking a nap nearby. He didn't have to do nearly as much as he had since Keita was in the office already taking care of the brunt of it. This was good for him since he didn't have much time to himself in recent days nor did he get to enjoy the peace of being able to lounge around. His familiar Ram was not too far, just sitting below the couch he was napping on, with an assortment of fruit in front of him that he was munching away on. The munching had awoken the Mizukage as he sat up, outstretching both of his arms towards the ceiling in order to stretch. Reaching around with his right arm, he began to scratch his hips before getting up. He had to admit, he was amazed that  his familiar hadn't already finished all the fruit he had given him before he awoke. He had always viewed him as a glutton and figured he'd finish. Turning towards a nearby window, the Mizukage had been reminded it was raining fairly heavily today. It was a bit uncanny he had forgotten since the weather was what had caused him to take a nap in the first place. 

He never knew why but he always felt sleepy when it rained. Ah well, he figured he'd use this time to go and fix himself a cup of tea. He got up to do so however, he overheard a commotion in his office. Somebody had come to inform him of something that was on a document of some kind. He couldn't make out too many details since it seems the visitor would be explaining and pointing out something the Mizukage couldn't see personally. In the end, he got the gist of it though. A noble had found some sort of antechamber that was locked by fuinjutsu and a specialist was needed to uncover what he got out of his eavesdropping. After that, there was silence and he assumed both the jounin and Keita had left the area. Fixing himself that cup of tea, he sip it slowly, taking his time and when he finished, he too prepared to take his leave in order to go tail Keita. Not as the Mizukage of course but as the good old Kizmaru Senju, Jounin of Kirigakure. Helping himself out of his Mizukage Robes and Hat, Kizmaru put on his dark red steam armor and petrification in preparation to head out. 

Before he did however, he weaved a single hand seal in order to change his appearance into himself, as a typical jounin. He disguised himself dressed as a typical Jounin in order to go out into the public without being hassled over trivial concerns. His attire consisted of his yellow button down shirt, navy blue pants and black ninja tabi. He also has the appearance of black, leather gloves which were his transformed gauntlets and instead of just a flak jacket, he had flak pants as well. Lastly, he'd have the appearance of a navy blue mouth mask cover most of his face except for his eyes. With that, he was ready to head out to the gates of the village and meet up with Keita, if he happened to still be there. Even if he wasn't, he had a good idea of where the noble in question's house would be due to the vague interpretation he got out of the conversation. Meeting up with him, he decided to greet him and get the information directly from his mouth. 

W.C: 606

Keita sat in the rain for a while, enjoying the refreshing droplets of water hitting his armor and mask before beading off. The armor he was wearing was essentially a full body armor so it did not have any gaps that would allow the water in, so he was still perfectly dry inside. He quite enjoyed the rain, unlike a lot of other people that experienced the same weather over and over again, especially in Kiri because the weather made the sky constantly grey and a bit gloomy, but Keita saw the beauty in it. He really disliked how hot it could become, and did not enjoy his trip to Suna a while ago, and it was not just because the Kage summit was a horrendous waste of everyone’s time. As he was sitting there in the rain, he was also silently counting the time, making sure that he was not going to sit there for too long when time was a bit important. He was still going to wait a bit to see if anyone else, most like just Kizmaru, was going to join him on this mission, and would simply wait for him to leave.

If the man he was waiting for did not show up soon enough, however, he would simply head to the estate out in the borders of the countryside and wait for Kizmaru there instead. Thinking about it, it did not really matter if Keita waited for anyone, as they could simply meet at the estate later for the mission, but he liked to be courteous, and he thought that waiting for someone to show up to the mission was just that. After waiting a couple more minutes and getting ready to leave, he suddenly saw Kizmaru in his jounin disguise heading over to him. The Kage always wore the over the top armor, so he was wondering if he was simply using the transformation technique right now or if he was actually not wearing it when he went out for once. Still, it was a good thing to see his friend, and so Keita waved at him, since this seemed to be a bit informal since he was not coming out here as the lage. Keita did not need to be as formal as to bow to him at this moment.

As they met up, Keita started speaking to him, giving him a concise rundown on the mission they were about to do. Keita would start jogging towards the estate at a fairly brisk pace, as he wanted to get there quickly but there was no need to sprint. “Hello Kiz, I thought you would be late, I almost left you.” Keita would say, ribbing his friend a bit as they started heading to the location. “If you are not aware, the estate we are heading to has a sealed off antechamber that leads to some sort of larger area within the estate that was not on the floor plans. We are going there so I can crack it open and we can see what is inside. It seems like it might be dangerous, and there was also some information about mercenaries being hired to stop us and steal whatever is in the chamber beyond.” Keita would give a quick rundown to Kizmaru as they were jogging in the rain, through the fields towards the forested area surrounding the estate.
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WC: 567

Panting a bit, Kizmaru had greeted Keita as he had hurried here as fast as he could. "Hey Keita, I made it here as fast as I could to see what was going on. I overheard some kind of incident happen again with some nobles and I figured you could use some company as we tackle it together. Of course, it sounded like there was something the shinobi was pointing out on the desk so it didn't make too much sense to me. Care to fill me in on the details," Kizmaru had asked. Not long after that, Keita had responded saying he had almost left him and that made Kizmaru chuckle a bit since he was almost always late. Didn't want to leave while in the middle of brewing his tea so he just finished that up and left for his destination. It was raining, a bit chilly so having hot tea right before going out would keep him warm for the time being. Keita had then begun to jog to their destination to which Kizmaru had also begun to follow closely behind him. He didn't know where exactly they were going so he had to just follow. As they jogged, Keita began to start filling him in on what was going on with whatever incident was reported to him. He knew it involved a noble but he didn't know the exact details of what was going on. According to Keita, they were indeed going to a noble's house to clear up some sort of issue.

Apparently, it was discovered there was an antechamber discovered in the home of a noble but it was sealed and secured by some sort of fuinjutsu seal of some sort and wanted capable shinobi to come and see if they could unseal it for them. It wasn't in the original estate plans so they had no idea when it was implemented in the blueprints for their estate. On top of that, it seems like they weren't the only ones that were interested in what's inside the antechamber. Other mercenary groups have been dispatched as well in order to find out what's in that chamber, thwart their plans, open the chamber and bring back whatever they could get their hands on. Nothing was ever simple anymore, Kizmaru thought to himself as he continued to follow Keita. Afterwards, Kizmaru seemed to have a decent grasp on the situation in front of them and figured if they had to fend off some mercenaries from getting the contents of the chamber, so be it. "Alright so basically we go to the noble's house, figure out how to open up the chamber, beat up some opposition and then figure out what to do with the contents from there.  "Alright, I guess I'm all caught up now, how long till we make it to this noble's place? Hoping we can get this over with as soon as possible. Despite the country I govern, I still don't like it being caught in the rain like this," Kizmaru had complained. 

W.C: 509

Keita smiled as his friend told him that he made it there as fast as he could, complaining about some of the more mundane parts of the job, and that people did not know how to explain things in simple terms it seemed. Everyone liked to try and be extremely cautious and courteous around the Mizukage, but this often led to them being long winded and over analytical in their explanations of events to the Mizukage, which irritated him. It was better to be short and to the point, and allow the more analytical of the team, like Keita himself, to go over the finer details with a fine toothed comb later. The Mizukage was a bit more of a simple type, and that was no to say that he was stupid, he simply liked things to be less complicated, which was amiable in a lot of cases. The pair started moving towards the estate, through the forests as it was easier to go in a straight line for people like them, even though the road would be more comfortable to most other people, it was really easy for them to dodge and weave through the trees to get to where they needed to go with how fast they were. 

It would really only take them around five minutes of continuous jogging to get where they needed to go, and Kizmaru quickly started complaining anyways about how they needed to get the mission over as quickly as possible, because he did not really like to get caught out in the rain like this. Keita loved the rain, but he could see why people would not like to just stand in it for a while, although their shinobi bodies were a lot more resilient than normal peoples'. It was still pretty uncomfortable if people did not like the cold and being wet. Keita enjoyed the sensation, but he was still going to pick up his speed a bit so that now they were running instead of jogging to their destination. “Sure, we can get there a bit faster if we pick up the pace a bit. I’m just trying to run through some fuuinjutsu in my head to see if I can remember some of the finer things. I don’t really want to be sitting there for hours trying to break the antechamber seal if it turns out to be rather complex.” Keita would say in casual conversation, before they got deeper into the forest. 

Soon, they would reach a large clearing where the estate was, the place unnatural in this forest. The place had been cleared out in several acres to make way for the large estate that seemed more like a castle, and Keita wondered how these people got so much money. Keita himself had enough money to build an estate like this, but it was all saved up from a massive amount of hard work and risking his life a couple of times. He did not really resent the people that had the estate though, at least not for how they got the money to afford one, as it was simply different lifestyles and different avenues of work. No one asked Keita to become a shinobi after all, and with his attention to detail and affinity with numbers, he could have easily gone into business. Still, the estate was large, and Keita did not want to bother with the whole annoyance that was waiting for the guards to let them in, so he simply hopped the fence. The guards there recognized his anbu mask and said nothing as they headed towards the door.
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WC: 605

Now that he was finally caught up on the finer details of the mission, Kizmaru figured it was best for him to figure out how they were going to open the antechamber in the first. He was good at Fuinjutsu himself but he was no Uzumaki which is probably why they went to Keita in the first place instead of the Mizukage. That and well, he was the Mizukage and shouldn't be bothered by every trivial thing that comes his way. Although, he had to admit, he wouldn't mind having to deal with the grunt work from time to time or he'd get rusty. It was the whole reason he had to dress like a Jounin, make a fake identification card and forge a new identity. It had its uses he guessed but still, it was a lot of trouble to go through. Continuing onwards to their destination, they found themselves in a forest of Kirigakure. It was a nice change of scenery since he was always cooped up in his office or a large skyscraper of some kind. This is exactly why he needed to get out more as he wasn't aware there were this many scenic areas like this and had assumed it was nothing but beaches that were worth looking at.

He should have taken Ram with him but he'd be too easily recognizable and armadillo wasn't exactly a popular kind of familiar or pet kept in Kirigakure. Well, on one of his days off, he'll probably take Ram for a walk outside of the village and explore more of the surrounding area. Deciding to ponder about that later, Kizmaru continued to keep up with Keita on their way to the Noble's mansion. It seems Keita was being considerate of his complaint as he was just talking about how he wanted to get this over with as quickly as possible. "Well, I'm not entirely serious. I know you can't speed up an important mission like this even if I was a legitimate Jounin, I know better than that but I guess it's better than speeding up and going there without a plan. At least, a well thought out plan. My first thought was to just brute force it. And I don't mean swinging or throwing a bunch of powerful techniques at it, I mean just strengthening my fuinjutsu breaking seal to the threshold of my power and trying it that way. Normally works for me, though most of the time, the contents come out damaged but for something this large, I doubt the contents would break," Kizmaru said aloud.

However, there was one thing Kizmaru had thought about that he didn't plan for. What if the ante chamber itself had some sort of defense mechanism that would proc if it was opened by any kind of force. Pondering on it a bit, Kizmaru figured they'd have to make some contingencies if they went with that plan. Then there was the problem with the opposition they might face while they figure out ways of opening it. 

W.C: 508

They were heading towards the estate, and Keita listed off the things that he was worried about and what he was doing with his overall plan, Kizmaru also shared his ideas and sentiment on the matter, and said that he preferred brute forcing things like that with the basic fuuinjutsu breaking. While usually this would work with things that were hastily placed down on people or items, it did not really work with things that were in buildings and were more stable. With a lot of time and effort available, people would obviously put something in the seal that would prevent it from being destroyed by the normal fuuinjutsu breaking technique, at least when it was used in a brute force method like that. It was similar to normal people trying to crack a safe with some explosive tags. The creator of the safe probably accounted for that somehow, especially the higher end safes, as most safes had a mechanism that would lock you out if damage was done to it, making it even harder to open than normal. Keita would prefer not to fault Kizmaru for his lack of experience in this field, he had learned fuuinjutsu under the pretense of fighting people, so there was really no reason he needed to think about things so hard.

“Well, that might work with other applications of seals, simply breaking it with the fuuinjutsu breaking technique, but most likely not this one. The fuuinjutsu breaking technique is so fundamental to those of us who use fuuinjutsu, that it is fairly easy to develop some sort of contingency against it.” Keita would start to explain to Kizmaru, as they got nearer and nearer to the estate. “As an example, if I had enough time, I could make it to where a fuuinjutsu seal, if attempted to be broken by the fuuinjutsu breaking technique, would simply steal the chakra used to perform that technique and strengthen itself. The problem with the fuuinjutsu breaking technique is that most of us know it, so it is easy to understand its inner workings and come up with ways to counter it.” Keita was always polite and cordial with people, so there was no hostility of any kind in his voice. It was simply the voice he used all the time with Kizmaru, as he did not even put his teacher's voice on for him, although it was a bit of a lesson. Soon after speaking, they had gotten closer to the estate

As Keita and Kizmaru had finally gotten to the clearing where the state was and had passed through the guards using the validity of their Anbu masks, they would head straight to the front door of the estate, where two guards could be seen standing there, one of them constantly looking around, as if waiting for something. As the two of them came into view, the guard that seemed to be waiting for them waved his hand to hail them, and so Keita simply assumed that the man was a part of the estate proper, and wanted to make sure that they had some sort of welcome wagon on their way into the estate by the owner. Keita seemed to think it was funny that the man had not met with them himself immediately, and instead wanted to have them be fetched by a servant. Keita chuckled when he thought about what the man would think if he got an ordinary servant to go and fetch the Mizukage, but held his tongue and met with the guard.
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WC: 593

Continuing his travel to the estate, Kizmaru didn't really notice how long it was taking to get to their destination until now. He and Keita had been talking about potential ways to get the antechamber open. They hadn't thought of anything concrete yet but he knew they would figure something out, at least, he knew Keita would figure something out as he was far more skilled in the fuinjutsu department. He then continues his conversation with Keita on the matter of just brute forcing the antechamber open with the normal fuinjutsu breaking. "Yeah, I figured as much. Even though I don't think fuinjutsu breaking is the end of all breaking seals. Maybe after this mission, you could develop some new form of fuinjutsu breaking technique. Up to you really since this is the first time we've come across such a mission. Well, I believe you can do it. Both with breaking into the antechamber to see what's inside and the developing of that concept to counteract most uses of fuinjutsu breaking," Kizmaru had said to his buddy Keita. If all went well, they'd be making some substantial progress in the fuinjutsu area. Kizmaru was looking forward to that as he'd also like some ways to strengthen his own arsenal.

Entering a clearing of some kind, Kizmaru and Keita had made it to some kind of estate ground where their mission would be taking place. Walking towards the guards of the estate, they found no trouble getting around the estate as nobody bothered to stop them other than the guards waving, simply because of the masks they had on them. Security must be very lax around here or they change members out too often. Either way, it would make his job that much easier to complete. It seems they would be escorted by the guards themselves instead of meeting with the client who had sent for them in the first place. This was fine with him as he was used to this sort of thing when pretending to be a jounin but he'd like to address this as quickly as possible. Being led through the estate building itself, Kizmaru and Keita were being led through one of the large dens of the estate where they would be meeting the client themselves. The client was currently below ground in their basement where they had unearthed the entrance to the antechamber and that's where the servant had eventually led the two of them. In front of the two Kirigakure shinobi was a brisk, muscular elderly man that was at least three times their age dressed rather regally.

Despite his age however, the man looked no older than in his late forties which would indicate he took care of himself in one way or the other. He was accompanied by two servants and three of his own personal guard, which were most likely mercenaries under his payroll. When Keita and Kizmaru were both brought before him, the elder man had turned and addressed the two of them. "Ah, you must be the shinobi I've sent for to help me deal with this problem of mine. As you can we, my people have uncovered something known as an antechamber and I would like for the two of you to crack it open by any means necessary without damaging the contents, or my property for that matter. Well, get to it. I've got other matters to attend to, carry on. Whatever is inside, I will offer directly to the Mizukage in hopes he looks favorably on me and my family," the noble had said in a haughty tone of voice. Kizmaru turned his head slightly out of view when the servants, guards and the noble walked by them and gave a barely audible but brief, scornful laugh. That's just what he needed, more work on his plate. 

W.C: 641

Keita was heading towards the estate with Kizmaru, and they were having a fairly good time talking to each other, and currently Kizmaru was explaining that he knew that the normal fuuinjutsu breaking technique was most likely not the end all be all tech that one could use in this situation. He then threw out the idea that Keita might be able to make his own version of the fuuinjutsu breaking technique, but one that was a bit better than normal. Keita thought about this for a moment, before actually considering it. He wondered how useful that would be overall, as there was something that was of importance. He had a limited amount of time in which he could sharpen various skills and practice jutsu. A ninja had to keep going so that they could keep their skills sharp, so they could not just learn everything under the sun, as they would forget certain things. Keita wondered if he was going to be able to use something like that often enough to make it worthwhile. He thought about it a bit more as they were walking over to the estate, as they had now reached it.

They were immediately brought inside by a person that Keita did not recognize, and a person that was definitely not the master of the estate. It was a bit of a slight to not be here personally for someone that was so grossly above your head that their very thought could remove you from existence, but Keita just sort of shrugged it off. As long as this person did not break any laws, Keita would be okay with them. This was of course also hinging on the fact that they were not rude to Kizmaru, as he would also take offense to that. As they were heading towards the antechamber in the estate, Keita marveled at how opulent the place was. This was far too opulent, and it seemed that the excess money they had here was definitely a cause for more taxes on these people. Keita would keep that in mind as the man that was in charge of the estate started speaking. The man was obviously a bit too big for his breeches, but Keita would not really care at this point.

The man was already saying that he would give the whole contents to the Mizukage anyways for some sort of brownie points, but there was no way that Murata would care about what this man said or did. Murata would just take the resources and thank him, and then be on with their day. It would be great to see the look on his face when the big contribution gained him nothing but a thank you, as it was pretty compulsory to give back to the village, it was not some weird extra thing that would give you the status of a hero. Keita brushed him off as he told them to get to it, not really caring about him anymore, and headed in towards the antechamber to start studying it.
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WC: 511

After the haughty noble had left with his little entourage, Kizmaru simply folded his hands and decided to watch the man who was far more experienced in this line of work, well, work. He would attempt to assist where he could but his knowledge was limited so he figured he would only be more of a burden than actual help in this kind of situation. Folding his arms, he'd just watch his buddy at work and attempt to whistle a silly little tune he had heard before a little while ago. Shortly afterwards, he'd begin to pace around a bit before he felt the house shake which made Kizmaru unfold his arms and look up towards the ceiling. He wondered what caused that and decided to check it out. Waving at Keita and telling him to continue, he decided to go alone to see what all of the fuss was about. Walking back up to ground level, he noticed part of the entrance he had just walked through scattered across the floor, some of it burning. It seems like the house was under attack as he saw what looked like bandits attacking anybody that didn't look like they were a part of their gang.  

Letting out a sigh, word of the antechamber may or may not have gotten out and people were coming from all sides to see if it was anything worth their time. Kizmaru figured they weren't very threatening so he figured he'd attempt to dispatch them easily without causing any further damage to the noble man's estate. Speaking of the noble, Kizmaru wondered where the man was since he couldn't see them anywhere in the house. Hopefully, he was somewhere safe because he would really like payment for what he was about to do. He didn't like doing anything for free or the goodness of his heart so he figured it would be best to eliminate as many of the intruders that he could. The bandits seemed to be well organized and tough as they were actually winning against the house guards that patrol the estate. Either they weren't very good muscles or the bandits weren't just ordinary bandits. These must be the mercenaries that were being discussed earlier, now it all made sense to him. Kizmaru had a change in plan and figured he wouldn't go easy on them or even try too. The only thing he could was the owner of the estate was still alive, well and above all, not standing in his way.

As he stood there and thought about it, three of the mercenaries had finished their fights with some guards before rushing in the direction of Kizmaru towards the antechamber that was a floor down below. Since he was already armed with his petrification gauntlets, Kizmaru had raised both of his hands that he was wearing, brandishing them as a means to tell them to back off.  They hesitated for a bit before one of them spoke up to demand the location of what they seek. Kizmaru scoffed and asked the man what would happen if he didn't comply. After that, there was a few seconds of pause before they decided it wasn't worth speaking to each other anymore. The mercenaries and Kizmaru had begun to run towards each other as they prepared to strike each other down. Having a little bit of a skirmish, Kizmaru had gotten into a battle with three experienced mercenaries but was definitely holding his own. Eventually, he had gotten fed up with these close quarters and decided enough was enough. He figured it was best to deal with the three of them before moving onto the next round of enemies.

W.C: 615