Mission Roundup

Mission Info:

The sun was just beginning to peek over the treetops of Konohagakure, the song of morning larks filling the air. Jun lay sprawled out on his bed, covers tossed askew with one hand resting on the worn cover of his favorite book - ‘The Tales of Uzumaki Naruto’ - which was laying open against his stomach.

He was dreaming of clobbering some bad guys with the expert use of shadow clone jutsu and a giant rasengan, a cocky, sleepy grin on his face, when his alarm clock rang out a sudden and shrill tone that pierced through his dreams and him sitting bolt right up in bed in an instant, shouting at his empty room.

The ringing continued while he looked around himself with a dazed expression, finally hitting the clock to make it shut up and yawning widely with a long stretch. He had forgotten for a moment that he had several missions lined up for today, and he would need to get an early start if he was gonna have time for training later.

Rubbing his eyes, Jun shuffled to his kitchen to put a kettle on while he fished a cup of miso flavored instant ramen out of his cupboards. Breakfast of champions. After he ate, he splashed his face with cold water and pulled his day clothes on, making a mental note to change his underwear once he got in for the day and showered.

Tying his headband tight around his head, Jun left his apartment and locked up before turning toward the rooftops and smacking his cheeks with an energizing yell. “Alright! Time to get started!” he proclaimed, taking a mighty leap onto the nearest roof and running at full speed toward the park.

His first job would be a piece of cake - all he had to do was bag up a bunch of fallen leaves. He had also heard, however, that there was an overgrown squirrel lurking somewhere in the park, that some higher ups would pay him to capture. ‘For science,’ the missive had read, but Jun wasn’t one to sweat over the details. He would just keep an eye out for it while he was doing cleanup, and hopefully he could rake in the reward as a bonus.

Reaching the park, Jun found the supply shed and pulled out several big bags and a rake, waving to the caretaker before running it over to the closest cluster of trees. There he started raking the leaves up into big piles, running around and around the trunks, gathering as many of the fallen leaves as he could and stuffing them into the bags. Once he had done a few, he took a look around the park, noticing perhaps for the first time just how many trees were in there. He let out a low sigh, seeing how big this task was going to end up being. “Only way is to work fast,” he reasoned, rolling up his sleeves and tightening his headband. “Right. One tree at a time, let’s go!”
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WC: 507 | TWC: 507/2,500

Jun steadily worked his way around the park, dragging his rake across all the leaves he could find and stuffing them into bag after bag. At about the halfway mark, seeing how far he’d come, he slumps against a tree and wipes his brow with a loud sigh. “Maaannn… how big is this park anyway?!” he complained, staring up at the tree tops. “Just for a minute… just gonna sit for a minute,” he told himself, knowing that he still had a lot more to do. While he settled into his break, however, he heard a peculiar rustling from above him. He frowned slightly, his eyes honing in on the branches. Whatever it was sounded bigger and heavier than a bird or a squirrel. Unless…. “It’s that squirrel,” he said to himself, grinning. He was hoping he would run into it, here.

And there it was, sitting high above on a thin branch that bowed dangerously under its weight, busily chomping into a tree nut. “Carefully,” Jun coached himself, using a small amount of chakra in his hands and feet to help him stick to the surface of the tree, climbing as slowly and quietly as he could toward the overgrown squirrel. Half way up the tree, and to his luck the squirrel still hadn’t noticed him. But it was quickly running out of nut to munch, and Jun could feel his window of opportunity slipping away. He scrambled slightly, trying to gain ground faster, but at the moment he stretched out his arm to grab the furry creature, the branch Jun was clinging to creaked and cracked. He saw the squirrel’s head snap over to him, and in an instant it was jumping away, its arms outstretched as it glided over to the next tree.

“A flying squirrel?!” Jun exclaimed incredulously, groaning and leaping after it. Now it was a game of chase, and who would be quicker and more nimble. Jun quickly found out that the squirrel beat him out in that area quite easily, as it scrambled around the tree trunks and leapt away at astonishing speeds, Jun scrambling just to keep up. His clothes kept getting snagged on branches, his skin scratched and scraped up by poky bits of wood as he chased after the rodent. “Come… on!” he shouted at yet another failed attempt to scruff the creature, watching it slip through his grasp. At this rate, he was never going to catch the sucker… he needed a new game plan.

Looking up in the tree, he noticed a few nuts dangling from the branches, and a lightbulb lit up in his brain. “Ya like nuts, huh…?” Jun grinned, chuckling to himself as he reached and grabbed a few handfuls of them, stuffing them into his pockets. Then, hopping down, he crouched by the base of the tree and laid them all out, glancing around before darting behind a nearby trunk. “And now, we wait…” Peeking out slowly, Jun watched the pile of nuts intently for the moment the squirrel would appear.

Sure enough, after a few moments, the chunky squirrel saw the trap Jun had brilliantly laid out and approached it with a cautious sniff. Not seeing Jun lying in wait behind him, it sat and started munching. Jun’s opportunity finally upon him, he dashed out and snatched up the squirrel in his arms, grasping it tightly as it squirmed and struggled against him, scratching at his belly. “Easy, easy! We’re just goin on a trip!” he grunted out, grabbing one of the leaf sacks and dumping the squirrel inside, quickly knotting the top shut.

“Whew!” he exclaimed, laughing at his success. “Time to get this lot delivered…” Hefting the squirrel bag over his shoulder, he trots along and collects all of the other leaf bags he’d filled, piling them up one after another until he was carrying a massive stack of sacks, dropping them off with the caretaker and chuckling triumphantly. “I caught that giant squirrel, too! You can take it down to the scientists for me, right?” The caretaker took one look at him, all dirty and scuffed up, shaking his head a little before depositing a stack of ryo in the boy’s hand. “You’re an interesting one, kid.”

Grinning, Jun took his pay and ran off toward the market, waving over his shoulder. “Thanks, old man!”
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WC: 725 | TWC: 1,232/2,500

Jun huffed as he ran through the village, hopping over street signs and small buildings as he made his way into the market square. He’d gotten a job to clear out some space for more vendors to come and set up shop, nothing too difficult by his standards. The square always seems to be bustling with traders from this land and that, and even some local farmers were known to be seen peddling their produce to passersby. While that normally included healthy stocks of local fruits, vegetables, milk and cheese, today it would seem there was a chicken farmer setting up, as Jun could see the cart behind him stacked high with crates of clucking birds.

‘Wonder what a village shinobi would do with a chicken,’ he wondered idly, imagining a feathery friend running around his apartment and perching on his head to screech at dawn. He quickly shook the thought out of his mind. "No thanks," he muttered to himself, while he found the abandoned stall that he would be working on clearing out.

Whoever it had belonged to had left it in quite a state - there were still crates full of junk, mostly rotted vegetables and other garbage, likely whatever it was they couldn’t sell and saw no value in keeping. “Could have at least cleaned up after yourself,” he grumbled, before finding a sack and starting to shove things inside.

Jun worked diligently, though he was really getting tired of shoving things into bags by the time most of the rubbish was cleared. He grabbed a broom to finish up the last bit when he heard a loud crash and a yell from behind him, making his head spin around. There, standing over a crashed pile of chicken crates, the farmer was clutching his head while a whole flock of ten chickens scattered and flapped their wings. Seeing Jun staring, he quickly pointed after them.

“There! Please help, go and get my chickens before they get away!” Jun’s mouth lay open at the sight, but he quickly snapped to it at the cry for help. “Right, on it!” he affirmed, leaving the broom behind and jumping after the fleeing flock. They had already scattered quite a bit, and there was no way Jun could carry them all at once. He’d just have to run back and forth with them as fast as he could. Finding two starting to go down the street on the left, he dashed after them, reaching down and snatching one up in his hands before tucking the wriggling bird under his arm, wincing while it pecked at his flesh. “Yeah, hold on! I’ll let you go soon!” he tried to assure it (as if it could understand him), while he ran after the second, scooping it up with one arm. The chicken seemed to have different ideas, however, and Jun quickly found it scrambling up to the top of his head. Struggling, he managed to secure it under his other arm before running them back to the farmer.

“Here’s two!” he announced, quickly ushering them back into their crates before taking off after the others. He managed to snag another pair similarly to how he had done before, trying to keep an eye on where the others were going so he wouldn’t lose track of them while he ran the next pair back. “Four down,” he muttered, leaping back up onto the roof for a better vantage point. A child’s scream altered him to the presence of two more down in the alley, and he quickly jumped down to see her cowering into a corner. “H-help!” she cried with tears in her eyes, and Jun only smiled at her sympathetically before running up behind the chickens and grabbing them up in his arms. “You’re okay, they’re not that scary. See?” He stroked one chicken’s chest feathers with his thumb, only for it to peck at his hand and elicit a startled yell. The girl gave him a look as if to say ‘I told you so,’ and he grinned back sheepishly before turning and running them back to the farmer.

“That’s six,” he says, turning back toward the streets and scratching his head. “.. Four more… but where did they go?” Sighing, he turns and runs back down the lane, looking around for any more signs of chicken crossing.
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WC: 727 | TWC: 1,959/2,500

“They can’t have gone that far,” he told himself, scratching his head as he wandered the outside of the trade district. He was a bit away from the hustle and bustle now, and perhaps it was this lack of noise that allowed him to hear a soft clucking somewhere in the distance. Narrowing his eyes, Jun followed the noise down to the stream, where he saw three of the chickens gathered on the gravel by the water. “There you are,” he said quietly to himself, exhaling a slow and steady breath before walking calmly and carefully over to them.

As he got closer, he reached his arms out and stooped down, his tongue stuck between his teeth. “Come on, little chicky,” he coaxed, bending down slowly and picking up the first chicken gently. To his relief, it seemed to not mind getting picked up so much. He breathed out a sigh, tucking it safely under his arm and looking at the other two, contemplating. “Hmm… if I leave you two here, you promise to stay put?” he asked, waiting and watching for a moment even though he knew they wouldn’t say anything back. “Okay,” he said, turning and walking his calm chicken down to the farmer.

“Just three left to find,” he updated the man, who wiped his brow with sheepish gratitude. Then Jun jogged back over to the stream to collect the two he had left there, scooping one up into each arm and toting them back, seeing them safely locked up in their pens. “Still one missing, no?” the farmer questioned him, looking a bit dejected. “Well, I suppose if I have to take the loss..” Jun frowned, waving his hands in front of him a bit. “No, no! I’ll find it, I promise! Just, uh… Let me look around a little bit more, okay? I’ll get you that chicken, gramps.”

A bit frantically, Jun took off once again through the busy streets. That chicken had to be around here. He checked narrow alleys, behind street signs, under carts and vendor stalls. No sign of a chicken. He groaned as he slumped against the wall of a curio shop, scratching his head with frustration. “Where could that chicken have gone off to?!” Just then, somewhere off to his right, he heard a singular cluck. His head snapped up, and he slowly peered to the side. There, sitting quite comfortably in the lap of the shop owner, was a fluffy brown chicken. Jun’s jaw dropped. There was no way. Shuffling closer, Jun hesitated, rubbing the back of his neck a bit while the shop owner looked him over. “Buy something or move along, sonny. I don’t do charity.”

Jun shook his head quickly, awkwardly pointing to the chicken. “.. Um… that chicken…” The shopkeeper’s eyes lit up. “Oh, my new pet! Wandered right by my shop it did, and just loves my roasted pine nuts.” The shopkeeper crooned as she fed the chicken from the palm of her hand, the hen clucking happily. Jun grimaced slightly. He would just have to tell her. “Look,” he started, an apologetic expression on his face. “That chicken… actually belongs to a vendor in the market, he’s selling a whole load of them. This one escaped… it hasn’t been paid for, so I need to take it back.”

The woman looked affronted, and clutched the chicken tighter to her breast. “You can’t take my Cluckles! We’ve bonded now, look how she eats from my hand!” Sighing, Jun gestures again to the chicken. “Okay… so you want to keep it as a pet. How about you give me money to take back to the farmer? If she’s worth that much to you, you’re willing to buy her, right?” The shopkeeper’s eyes narrowed, her lips pursing while her hand stroked the hen’s feathers. Finally she lets out a sigh, rummaging in her purse and mumbling before shoving a wad of ryo into Jun’s hand. “Here. Now leave me and Cluckles in peace.”

Grinning, Jun clasped the money between his palms and bowed. “Thanks so much!” he told her earnestly, before running back to the farmer. “Hey, old man! I found your chicken… well, someone found your chicken. They didn’t wanna give it back, but they sent some money back to pay for it… is that enough?” He handed the money over, and the old man eyed it suspiciously while he counted it. Then he chuckled. “It is enough, I even made an extra 300 ryo on that deal! Thanks, kid. You’re a lifesaver.”

Jun smiled and nodded, happy that adventure was all over. And the stall he was cleaning up was just about finished, too. ‘Looks like I’ll have time for training after all,’ he thought happily to himself, grabbing the bags of garbage he’d left and taking them over to the dumpster.

“Hey, kid!” Jun blinked, looking around a bit. The voice seemed to have come from the butcher, who was waving him down from a few doors away. Curious, Jun ran over, tilting his head. “What’s up?” he asked. The butcher looked relieved. “Look, my usual delivery boy never showed up and I need this crate of meat delivered to the Inuzuka compound. Think you can do it? You’ll get the other boy’s usual pay.” Jun looked over to the crate, which looked a bit large and heavy. ‘Well,’ he thought, ‘I suppose that can count as a warm up for my training.’ He smiled confidently. “Sure, I can take it.”

The butcher clapped him on the back, smiling back in thanks. “Good lad. Someone at the compound should give you your pay, no need to come back here.” Nodding, Jun approached the box, grabbing hold of it tightly. “Alley-oop!” he shouted, hefting it onto his shoulder with a groan. It was heavy, but nothing he couldn’t manage. “Right… off we goooo!!!” he shouted energetically, starting off at a run toward the Inuzuka compound. The quicker he got done, the quicker he could hit the training field.

In no time he found himself at the gates to the compound, having worked up a sweat and grinning at the dog-tamer who was standing in wait. “Got your delivery!” he announced, before dropping the heavy crate at the man’s feet with a relieved sigh and rubbing out his shoulders. Chuckling, the man nodded and handed him a wad of cash. “Appreciate the swiftness. Take care now.” Jun chuckled in return and pocketed the money, wiping his brow on his sleeve. Now, finally, he could go and do his training…. But first, ramen.

[Exit]
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WC: 1,097 | TWC: 3,056/2,500

Mission Claims:
5,000 Ryo
25 AP

WC Claims:
+30 Stats (15 Chakra, 5 Vigor, 5 Strength, 5 Speed)
1,500 for Shadow Clone -> 1,556 left
500 for Feint -> 1,056 left
1,000 for Block -> 56 left, discarding remainder

Jun Uzumaki wrote:
[Exit]
_______________________
WC: 1,097 | TWC: 3,056/2,500

Mission Claims:
5,000 Ryo
25 AP

WC Claims:
+30 Stats (15 Chakra, 5 Vigor, 5 Strength, 5 Speed)
1,500 for Shadow Clone -> 1,556 left
500 for Feint -> 1,056 left
1,000 for Block -> 56 left, discarding remainder

Approved