minds young (Halloween Mission, p)

Due to the power of timelining assuring that most ninja fights last mere moments, Pinoch walks back into an absolute fiasco once he's done his internal pep talk. A few moments of positive self-talk for a real boy translates to... what, fifty years in fight time? Where has he been!?

All around the room, where once there had been a regular old ritual setup, are horrible twisted trees, a dark forest out of a fairy tail. The various monsters are scattered about - some skewered on the trees, some roaring and fighting strong, some collapsed with no obvious sign of injury. There's blood and leaves everywhere, and it's absolute chaos.

"Well howdy hey there, Pinoch!"

In a startlingly personable voice, the gigantic cricket appears next to Pinoch from a tangle of gnarled brambles, looking at him with shiny, multifaceted eyes. He twirls an umbrella the size of the boy and leans forward on it, quirking his head eerily. 

"Now, I'd thought you'd done a mighty fine thing just now, turning around. What's brought you on back? You couldn't possibly wanna fight your dear sister, could ya?" the creature's mandibles click reproachfully. "Now, that wouldn't be any good at all, now, would it? Why don't ya just turn around and leave? I'll even come with you as your good old friend, show you how to get on out of this place." 

"Who to blame? Who the one? Who to curse!?" The evil Saya cries, soaring across the room on the head of a thorny Wood Dragon, cackling wildly. With a deafening noise somewhere between a gigantic dog barking and a tree being struck by lightning, the dragon is beheaded, only to be smothered in a mess of vines that flood the center of the room and send several of the monsters stumbling back, cursing, doing their damnedest to catch up to the slippery Murata weaving through but having to deal with all kinds of Mokuton being flung all over the place.

329
TWC 2876/4872

TImelining is one of the most powerful tools known to the ninja universe. While it had only been a minute or so in the real world that Pinochio had taken to gather himself and deal with the realization that he would have to fight an opponent whose power had dwarfed him to the point that he felt anger in his inferiority, Apparently Murata had been going to work. He looked about the scene, twisted trees and blood soaked stone, only to find something that was incredibly off. Why was Saya on a wood dragon?! He knew his student pretty well, and that wasn't in her repertoire for a very specific reason. Unfortunately telling that reason would break the fourth wall in a way that is irreparable, and so i shall leave it solely to the imagination. 

He was so caught up in the rediculousness of what he'd seen that he almost didn't notice the wierd cricket approach, though his head shifted immediately when he heard his name. What was... It was like the great value brand of internal narration standing in front of him, but also gross bug. It became clear pretty quickly that these conjurations had a bit of information on them, but it wasn't close to what Murata had gained on them. 

"Okay. So listen.... I'm all about punching stuff really really hard, and I could not in good conscience allow my teammate to punch things moderate to extremely hard without my help. Also.... Saya isn't my sister. Did you mistake me for Ai?! How does this keep happening?! She's like. Twice my height. And a girl. And a ninjutsu user. And also she looks exactly like saya--not that saya of course, That saya is like a wierd evil abomination that sorta kinda looks like her but has absolutely none of her style or flare--i'm losing my point. Secondly, I may be much older than my team, but I was around when Saya's tutor taught her a very important lesson..." He would take a moment to let his quick spoken rant really sink in before continuing. Drawing a deep breath he would speak the words that should end all of this. 

"STRANGER DANGER STRANGER DANGER STRAAANNGGEEERR DAAANNNGGEEERRR" How is this creepy ass wanna be jiminiy looking jabrony(he would actually pause to remember that one episode of the sopranos to make sure he'd used that correctly. He probably didn't) Gonna tell his three and a half foot tall, literally built like a shipping box because of all his muscles self to follow him off into some random secondary location. 

"Also, I really feel like I should point this out just for the sake of thoroughness, but. I know how to get out of here. See when you enter a building through a doorway that leads into it, you'll find that that door goes both ways. Given I entered a bunch of doors to get this point one would only need to retrace their steps in order to find the way back out. AND SAYA'S WHOLE THING IS NOT BLAMING OR CURSING THINGS!!! WHO FELL ASLEEP AT THE JOB OF PAYING ATTENTION TO PEOPLE IN OUR HISTORY THIS BADLY" He was FUMING. In the same manner as murata before they'd entered, He began swinging the weapon in a quick arc. The uh. The chained ball part not like the Sharp Kama part. WIth pinochio these clarifications have to be made. 

"Hey team lead. You ready to finish this all up?! Seems like I've gotta squish an extremely wierd--hold on FOURTH GATE OF PAIN OPEEEENNNNNNNN-- sorry. Squish an extremely wierd bug for making the rediculous assumption that i'm related to my student. " 

(TWC 4550/4872)

"I'm working on it!" Murata shouts. WHAM! - as the faux Jiminy prepares his folksy retort, Samehada SLAMS into his side, the teeth of the great awakened blade digging deep into its side. It crunches like somebody eating lobster with the shell on, and the cricket lets out a horrible squeal as Murata swings the mammoth blade and sends it flying across the room sans half of its buggy torso, Samehada promptly letting out a complaint that it hadn't been allowed to chow down for longer. 

"I'm the real Sayatria, and I just love blaming and cursing people, actually," the false Saya singsongs, incoming on a wave of twisting vines. Murata ducks downwards and then dives through the underside of the vines, several twisting forward to ensnare her, but the Mizukage does a cool slide - and after only slicing one, the entire shambling mass begins to vanish into mist, the evil Saya yelping as she promptly lands in a heap in a pile of brambles. "I blame and curse you for that, especially! Giussepino, er, Pinocchio, whoever, help!"

Murata emerges from the mist and wipes at her forehead, weaving handseals and summoning her armor on to her. Samehada had been the better call when she'd first gotten a moment's relief to get more equipment, but all of these techniques flying around is making her antsy, especially as - oh, yup, that's a giant stick flying at her, she's gotta duck out of the way of that. Thankfully, it nails the werewolf in the face, which had just been getting ready to sneak up on her and presumably make a scary noise of some sort.

272
TWC 3148/4872

"Ok listen. I really thought we had like. A same minds thing going on here but You've shattered the serenity between us. I am no longer a leaf on the wind Murata! First you swap out our signature weapon that we shared and then you take my kill?! I was gonna punch him like... SO hard!!!! Oh. Never mind. Looks like he's still twitching. DIBS!!" Pinoch rushed off. He had missed the bulk of the action because of his decision to run away from the now obviously fake Saya. Now it was clobbering time. 

"Yea. No. So like. There are quite a few issues with this. " From the messenger bag at his side he pulled a set of blue sun glasses, slipping them over his eyes. He would explain the issues with this obviously fake and totally unreal saya to her between weapon swings that crushed bone and sliced though uh. Slicey parts. He isn't as good with the words as Saya. 

"So first, She would never take wood dragon. Something about the effectiveness of the jutsu not being prime because while it covers a large area it isn't as maneuverable as any of her other active techniques? Sounds like mumbo jumbo to me but also I don't really do the whole casty zoom thing. I punch stuff. I punch stuff real hard.  Second, Cursing people is literally her least favorite thing. She would actually break down and cry just at the idea that she was mean to someone unless they absolutely deserved it. Then we have your tone. Too low pitched, a bit breathy. Not passing at all. And the speed of your speech?! You're at like a  quarter of true saya power with the tempo alone, not to mention the cadence. And don't get me started on that outfit. Girl. Please. " The cultists who had been left over, A few left twitching or knocked out only to find themselves making the horible decision to get back into the fight quickly met the blade of his weapon. 

"Secondly. She calls me pinoch. That's literally just Saya one oh one. Now lets try it again. Really get into the character. You love everything and you hide all of the horrors of your childhood behind a mask of puppets. You're so excited to be here that you can't sit still and the volume of energy you have makes zero sense. And go." 

(TWC 4951/4872 my portion complete! )

"I'm so sorry, I thought you had one of these too," Murata calls back from across the battlefield, finishing the werewolf with a shark-sword to the face so Samehada can feast on its chakra for a moment and ease up on draining hers. That sword is an absolute glutton. If fate had guided it into her hands through some manner of lottery and then a choice of weapon by the controller of her fate, she probably should have chosen something more suited to her 'total wimp when it comes to stamina' status. 

She half-considers adding that if he were still a leaf on the wind she'd have to tax him, but that'd be kind of mean spirited - oh, shit, that's a lot of vampires. Did they call reinforcements?

Meanwhile, the false Saya dances backwards ineffectively, flecks of blood and wood flying with every dispassionate slice of Pinoch's kusarigama. Before he can really finish her off, scarlet chakra threads fly from her finger, attaching to one of the vampires assaulting Murata.

"Hey, boss, I nearly got her - WHOA," the vampire cries, swung forward to act as a meat shield between the false Saya and Pinoch. "Ow! That hurts! Dude! Not cool!" he says, trying to parry with a rusty cleaver while fake!Saya forms handseals with her opposite hand and sends branches hurtling towards Pinoch from behind.

"Why did you summon so much wood! This is really inefficient teamwork!" one of the other vampires cries, Murata promptly putting one of the dodged Cutting attacks through her chest with her off-hand, the staked victim promptly turning to dust.

"First of all, it's super rude to imply that my outfit is horrible without even looking at it, I've still got a quantum outift as far as you're concerned," the fake Saya retorts between complaints from her vampire puppet. "And the Yugakure Spirit Halloween popup kind of sucks, okay? I don't have that many options? Why are you being so mean to me? Like, have I ever done anything wrong, even???"

"Ow! That is - yep, that's an artery, I mean, I'm a vampire, so it's fine, but it still kind of hurts, a lot, and ruins my suit,"

"Okay, okay, gimme a second, let me just - hey, it's easier to get into character if you stop attacking me with a scythe, did you consider that! I'm - okay, vampire puppet, I'm hiding my pain behind you, help me out here."

"Mmf!" the puppeted vampire replies weakly, having been relieved of his jaw a couple slashes ago.  

421
TWC 3569 / 4872

"I thought you had one of these too she says. Of course I don't have a wierd shark sword thats three times my body length! Can you imagine me trying to wield something like tha--yanno what. You may be onto something here Murata. What if I just got a weapon that was three times my body length and wielded it like a total boss. Where can i get one of them there fancy shark swords?!" He'd slid the weapon back in the loop at his side at this point. He had his fists for dealing with the cultists, and he knew exactly how to defeat Saya. He just needed to keep talking until he insulted her enough that she gave up and despawned... Or until murata like. Killed her and stuff. 

There is an interesting center point between having vampire minions and using wood style. With just his fists, Pinochio punched the cleaver real hard. It was his signature of course. Ducking down, which was easy given he was perminently basically ducking down(he's very short) He dodged the wood spikes flying at him, watching as a vampire off behind the fake saya who is not real got up to join the fight, only to be impaled and turn to dust. Eficient. 

"Seems pretty good to me vampire boy!!!! Maybe you should sweat more like a sweaty uh. Sweat sweat. Vampires sweat alot!!!" Getting into the swing of things he would throw a torrent of punches that did something. They defintely did something. 

"Woah. Woah .Woah. DId you really just say spirit of haloween?! Saya makes all of her clothes custom. She imports the cloth from like. four countries away and spends thousands per scan. She wouldn't be caught in something off the rack... Your clothing fail is almost as embaracing as your combat fail. Also Puppets aren't even that cool and it shouldn't even be a specialization that exists in the ninja world." Yes. He threw a flurry of punches as he sent this scathing insult to the fake saya. 

"You constantly do things wrong. You never train, you don't care about being a ninja, You didn't even brush your hair and theres crumbs on your shirt, and you're singing isn't that good!!!.... OH sorry man, Artery shots really suck but like. You're tying to kill me and stuff yanno?" Listening to her finally try to focus, he grinned as he continued to push the attack. Like he was going to let her think about this. Saya was a natural act'ture. 


"THe real Saya could do it. In her sleep. Heck even Ai could do it. Imagine being worse than a literal D rank puppet at acting just because theres a little bit of scythe wielding tai master trying to kill you" 

(TWC 5413)

"This one attacked me while I was out in the ocean investigating disappearances, so try that," Murata says breathlessly, staking another vampire. The fight is winding down now, and soon it's only the false Saya and her puppets left. The false Saya has wrangled another vampire to try and keep Murata and Pinoch at bay, pinned in the center of the room with the various trees and constructs crumbling all around. The various monsters seem to almost be melting away into dust, the dream itself beginning to lose cohesion. At this rate, even the fourth wall might totally collapse.

"W-what?" the false Saya says, tears welling up in her eyes as Pinoch insults puppetry. "Puppets are... so cool! They'll be so cool, you'll see! They'll be so cool, just as soon as that update drops..." 

"I've always kind of preferred Genjutsu," the second vampire chimes in as Murata cuts off one of his arms... which is promptly controlled by one of the strings and leaps forward, disembodied, to punch Murata in the face. There's a 'clang!' as arm makes contact with the steel of her armor, and the disembodied arm recoils and waves in the air as it breaks a few fingers. Ouch, that smarts.

"Useless, all of you! Fine! Enough games!" the false Saya says, her first healthbar whittled to zero. The two vampires fall to the ground in useless heaps, and that foul chakra encircles the fake Saya once more, surrounding her in a vortex of terrible vibes. "It's time for you all to see my true form! I was just acting, before, you see - all of you, fooled. All of you... you have no idea... the real update I'm waiting for... is familiars."

Murata squints. What the fuck is he talking about?

A shock wave bursts from the creature's form, nearly knocking the two combatants off their feet. The foul chakra condenses, into layers of... armor? Ears and a snout emerge, and horrible little beady eyes, as the monster takes the form of a gigantic armadillo. It lets out a deafening, nasally roar, and then rolls up into a ball - and with a screech reminiscent of a rapidly-reversing car, it bounds backwards to slam into the surprised Murata and send her slamming against the opposite wall. The terror-armadillo bounces off of her like a bouncy ball, bounding towards Pinoch with an aim to flatten the chatty little guy once and for all.

405
TWC 3974 / 4872

"But i can't really go out swimming in the ocean! My wooden body would swe--I DON'T HAVE A WOODEN BODY ANYMORE!!!! Yanno. Sometimes I forget that i'm a real boy now so I don't have to worry about waterlogging myself. Man this is so convenient. " He would actually take a step back, hands on hips to monologue about how nice it is to no longer be a puppet. THe difference, both in power and in general quality of life was astounding. For instance: who knew that food could taste so good?

"They shouldn't even really exist. Puppets are simultaneously absolutely useless and so over powered that the shinobi world should ban them and erase their existence from the si--i mean world. From the world. " In emphasis, He would motion to the vampire as he commented, before removing this enemies hand at the wrist with a single powerful punch. 


"Uh. Hey Murata? Were you fooled? I don't think I was fooled. Honestly, Like I saw through your fake Saya disguise immediately so.... LIke. I don't think you're as cleaver as you think you are. Another difference between you and Saya. She's actually way more clever than she would ever give herself credit for. Have you tried just punching stuff really hard? Makes it so you don't have to think..." He missed the entirety of her foul chakra pulsing shape change fun times. He was just so committed yanno? THe pulse of energy actually knocked pinochio completely off his feet, sending him flying across the room to a conveniently placed spear shaped sconce on the wall. With horror he braced. This was it. This was where he dies and wakes up in his bed..... Time slowed down as he inched closer to the sharpened metal that would save his life and then..

He hit the wall just beside it. you thought I was going to kill him for comedic effect again didn't you?

THe armadillo rolled about, bouncing this way and that as he tried to squish pinochio, but there was no way for him to get out of the horror. See, His back was turned the moment he realized that the fake saya had changed. Turning around he'd lift up the back of his armor to reveal a large back tatoo

"Check it out!!! it's like my tatoo!!" On his back was a tatoo of Ram, the previous mizukage's faithful familiar wearing the mizukage robes and hat. It was the exact same outfit he'd been seen in for most of these missions. He was very excited to show it off. Unfortunately, This meant he completely missed the attack threatening to crush his tiny body, and as the ball loomed over him it struck heavily, pushing him to the ground right up to the moment when he realized... He's very strong. 

With a heave he would throw the ball with all his force(145 str) aiming at like. Idk a wall or a window. It was hard to see around the ball that dwarfed him so his goal was mostly not where he was standing. 

(TWC 5925)

The armadillo bounces off the wall... and then ping-pongs around the chamber, the entire tower shaking as it smashes apart the ritual chamber. Murata shakes off her daze from being hit by the beast, standing up. Reinvigorated by the power of Pinoch's cool tattoo across the room, she grips Samehada and tees up as the doom armadillo sails towards her, and...

Home run!

With a loud crack, Murata slams Samehada into the armadillo, sending it sailing towards one of the damaged walls. It smashes right through, leaving an armadillo-shaped hole. Directly below, Alex stirs, brushing himself off after being dazed from his fall. It's a miracle that he'd survived - he must be left with only a single hit point after being tossed out that window. If something like a gigantic demonic armadillo were to land on him, he'd be done for sure, but what are the odds of something like that happening?

With that final evil defeated, Murata returns Samehada to its original form and puts the sword at her back. With the door open and their resistance defeated, Goro, Mitsu, and the other sacrifice are free to join them. What had they been up to in the mean time...? It's impossible to say. Perhaps they had been off on their own adventure and made a new friend just offscreen - there are all kinds of other monsters in the temple, after all. Or maybe there aren't anymore. The boundaries of the building are beginning to feel fuzzy, slipping away, until...

The sound of ocean waves fills the air, the group all standing on a white beach. Glassy water laps at the sand as they find themselves in a dream of Island Country, in a sense back home, stars gleaming overhead. The ominous white clothing is gone, replaced with... well, whatever they're all wearing to bed, in Murata's case pajamas. It's a good thing this is a dream, she'd hate to get sand on her pajamas. She sits down on the beach and looks up at the stars. In the distance there are odd ruins that give Murata the strangest sense of Deja Vu. She knows them - they're the ruins of Kirigakure that she'd stepped through months ago in a different dream. She'd been to the real ones, though, drowned underwater, with little resemblance to the half-flooded city in the distance. How curious.

"I don't think we're going to remember much of that, and that's probably for the best," Murata laughs. "You know, Pinoch, I wouldn't know, but I think you'll make a really great impression on the Mizukage when you meet them."

Then Murata wakes up.

---

The Mizkuage steps out onto the balcony of her estate with a glass of water, looking out onto Kirigakure. Lights gleam like islands above an ocean of fog in the pre-dawn hours. Groggy, Murata adapts once more to the thought that this village is her responsibility now. Many that have taken this role in the past would argue that she owns all of it, though such a notion is ridiculous to her. 

"Prrp?"

Princess, Murata's cat, rubs against her legs and looks up at her curiously. Murata gathers the cat into her arms and hefts her up to rest against her shoulder, the cat purring from the attention. 

"It's early, but I suppose I might as well get some work done anyway," she murmurs to the fluffy calico held against her chest. "How does that sound to you? Do you mind an early breakfast?"

"Mrow," Princess replies unhelpfully, although the feelings she communicates through Murata's Ninshu indicate that she is pretty much always down to eat breakfast. Murata sets her down and walks back into estate to feed her, make breakfast, and get dressed.

Twenty minutes later, Murata steps into her office, now quite tidy. She sits down at her desk, glances at the calendar... and then does a double take.

"Already?" she says aloud, voice still heavy with sleep. Already, indeed. Later that day she will be departing her village for the first time since being designated its leader so she may head to the Land of Tea and prepare for her meetings with three other Kage. 

Though she suspects that violence would not be in the interests of any of the other leaders, it still fills her with worry. Surely she couldn't match any of them in combat, as much as she must project an air of strength and confidence. Will she be able to match any of them in a duel of words, either? Aloide seemed much more confident in the former than the latter, given how the Summit had gone. Murata is more comfortable with the latter, though she still doubts herself, especially given the impression she will have to give to bring her village victory.

Princess jumps up on Murata's desk and settles by her papers, vying for attention. Idly, Murata scratches at the cat's ears with one hand, going over again what she knows of Sunagakure, Konohagakure, and Kumogakure. The tides of fate have swept her into this position, but the decisions she makes now are only her own, and that scares her.

"It'll all be alright, won't it?" Murata asks the cat, putting on a self-assured grin before taking a sip of her coffee. Princess has no verbal response for her, simply enjoying the early morning ear scratches. "It's only the fate of three villages, nothing to be stressed about at all."


905
TWC 4879 / 4872

The 4872 total WC figure for me and Saya to complete the arc was calculated based on the other team members' contributions up to halfway through the second mission (then we did the third totally on our own).

Claiming:
28,500 ryo
143 AP converted to ryo due to max trained AP, totaling 7150 additional ryo
30 tickets
1 Golden ticket

Goro, Pinoch, and Mitsu's chakra signatures (with their permission, since they're in the same village and I interact with them IC all the time anyway)

will do WC claims later

Outside, pinochio was cool as a cucumber, even as he was doing loop de loops at the suggestion of the mizukage apreciating his work internally. "I think he'll be very satisfied with my work. My student Saya sets the bar very low for the three of us, which gives me the opportunity to really shine." He glanced about their destruction, grinning with the word they'd done. Now they just needed to get out and figure out how to get home. He formed a single seal, preparing the jutsu he'd been working on. Hopefully he had figured out the subtle nuance, ensuring it would work properly. It would be embaracing to screw up in front of such a powerful weapon user. 

He picked his target location, a small sound catching his ears right before he activated his body flicker. The noise caused him to glance backwards, snapping his head to and fro, and then he was off. 

Good news: body flicker worked perfectly. 

Bad news: his glance backwards set the stopping point of the technique a bit wierd. Instead of flickering out the door, he flickered directly into the door frame, back down the stairs, into the back wall where he heard a sound, and then into the far wall of the castle, which killed him instantly. 

Waking back up he shook his head. 

"That... Could have been better." 

(TWC 6153

Truth 1-3 complete with wc to spare! 

claiming 6100 ryo, 30 ap, 8 tickets, 10100 ryo, 50 ap, and 10 tickets, and finally 12600 ryo, 63 ap, 12 tickets, and 1 golden ticket

Total: 28800 ryo, 143 ap, 30 tickets, 1 golden ticket

6153 wc: putting 300 towards kachu tenshin amaguriken(2850/2850)previous training 2500 towards earth shaker(wep)(2500.2500)1500 towards reckless art amplifier (1500/1500) hundred fists of fury (1750/1750) dropping the last 100 and 122 more ap exit topic closed! )