A Stern Decision..Well Not So Stern [p, Profession.]

Age : 30 Posts : 1012

Mission Details:

“What do you mean that you couldn’t find any weakness?” A stone was tossed to the side of the cave nearby. The echo of the impact against the rocky surface floated in the air while the small group of men centered on the fire in the depths of the darkness. The light flickering only showed peeks of the features for the males; each one being somewhat similar with their porcelain masks covering their details; each mask being blank in appearance with no designs or individual shapes. The larger male, who chunked the stone against the wall, placed his hands upon his darkened locks. It was easy to tell even without his expression showing that he was more than unhappy with the explanation that he just received.

“Boss, I just..I just couldn’t find a hole or flaw! There was nothin’ there! At all! They are tighter than the chains that my wife beats me with.” The smaller male of the group stated with the quick swipe of his hand in the air. Once his voice ceased to come from his lips, the male quickly dropped to his knees while holding his throat with a tight grip. Red liquid squeezed between the tiny gaps of his fingers, the gurgling of his own blood was maximized from his mask holding his screaming on the inside. It sounded like he was in a whole different room from where the others laid; slowly letting his injury getting the best of him. There was no other reaction from the two other men in the room, why should they even react to this? It wouldn’t seem right to help out the guy once they caused the wound.

“I’m getting tired of your flaw filled plans.” The bulkier man came up behind the wounded other; pushing him on the ground with the tip of his sandals near the fire. If one was watching the situation, the ‘leader’ could clearly be the bulkier one, but that was not the case here. The third, and final man in the room stepped forth above the wounded male, looking down with his darkened eyes peering just through the holes cut for his red hues to peek through: “Why do you fail me every time, Akashi? I’ve done all I’ve can to give you all the resources, all the men, all the ninja tools that I could come up with yet you still disappoint me. Every. Fucking. Time.” With the last three words in rhythm, the leader roughly kicked the ribs of Akashi; forcing him to roll over closer towards the fire. His mask started to crack slowly, starting up from his chin to his right eye socket until it finally broke away from his face.

His emerald eyes shot up towards the smaller of the duo standing above him; gripping the side of his torso from the sudden kicks. “H-He’s failed you more! Ka-“ A heel of a boot pierced his lips pushing his teeth down to the pack of Akashi’s throat. The gagging sounds only increased with death getting closer within his sight.

“Just..suffer in your own filth.” Underneath the boot, a slip of paper stuck to the edge of the mouth of Akashi as the larger male and slender figure exited the cave. Akashi just laid there on the floor of the cave, allowing his body to remain warm from the heat of the element near him. With the loss of blood that he had received, as well as the physical contact, it was more than likely he wouldn’t last through the night at this rate. He knew it, and even accepted his own fate. The dark expression he held on his body could pierce any sort of wall or barrier that one could put up.

“Do it.”
“Yes sir.”

The larger male brought his right hand in front of his chest in a snake hand sign; grunting while focusing on the slip of paper in the mouth of Akashi. It was quick, but the effect was more than what they expected. The explosion from inside of the cave of Akashi’s direction let the dark smoke to escape out quickly from the mouth of the earth corridor. The darkened sky could hide the smoke for a few minutes, but the smell would certainly attract some unnecessary attention over the course of the night. It would become a problem for the duo exiting the cave if there was some sort of evidence left over, which was highly unlikely there was in the first place from the mere size of the explosion.

“We gotta ditch these clothes, they smell like the ash of the cave, and I do have some stains of Akashi’s blood on my sleeves. It’ll be a hassle to walk around the village in this, don’t you think?” The slender figure turned to his head over his right shoulder. The hulking man nodded in response, putting his hand underneath the porcelain mask gracing his crown.

-Elsewhere.

“The fuck was that?” Mokuzai narrowed his eyes from above his bandages while kneeling on the wet earth. The explosion from moments before caused him to freeze in his position; eyeing the area where the smoke came forth into the sky; swirling the darkness around with gusts of wind. There was something about the scent of the air for the few moments that followed the explosion which caught his interest. It was a rather familiar scent at that; something he has been a part of himself.

“Sulfur?” It was an explosive tag; something that he knew all too well. The fact that it was used nearby caught his interest and allowed him to be a bit more careful with the choice of his steps towards the area. He had nothing to do for the rest of the night, and with something like this in the area, why would he throw away the chance to see what it would be?

Age : 30 Posts : 1012

The fact that the explosion caught the attention of Mokuzai was one thing all together. He usually ignores such things going on in other countries, but seeing that the water country has been his main base for a year or two, he was mildly concerned with what was going on in the area. “Either someone pissed the wrong person off, or I’m just havin’ a bad day with placements. I just need to learn to not let the curiosity get the best of me this time.” He mused to himself underneath a light breath from the bandages. The wound on his face was starting to heal just small fraction; it was nowhere near fully healed or even looking physically better, but the random pains that he would receive from it started to subside over time. Either he was healing, or the pain receptors were just too fried and dead to give a rat’s ass about telling him about the infection growing on his face. Moku decided it would be better if he would leave his equipment nearby for him to eventually come back and get in case this was just a small get together of rogue ninja that decided to be flashy. It was a common misconception that nuke-nin went around causing trouble whenever they pleased.

It took planning and the right people to pull off such events. Nuke-nin just weren’t given the right image and were only stuck with stereotypes of automatically being evil even if it was right, but that’s not the point here. At least not for Mokuzai. With his feet pressing into the softened earth, he placed his left hand on his right sleeve, rolling up the cloth to expose the tattoo wrapping around his wrist. The seal held weapons and various other items for him to pull out of his inventory in case he needed to make a quick getaway. It was a little nifty technique that he had come up with while traveling with another nukenin by the name of Akira Tenshi.

It probably wasn’t the smartest thing for Mokuzai to come forth and do this, but it was rather straight forward, and considering his choices, it seemed to be the most pleasant one to go with. Was running away even an option? It was at first, having thought that the explosion came from Kirigakure. If it had come from its direction, there would be no doubt that Moku would be moving away from that area just as quickly as he approached it. It wasn’t that he would be scared, but he wouldn’t want to get involved with the efforts made by the villages. He wasn’t a mercenary; no way would he work for someone. After the fall of Inoshi and the contract that they had, Mokuzai decided to not take any more ideals from the villages and offers from other minor services. It was set in his mind that he would no longer be a slave to himself, and others.

The ripples in the puddles from the falling rain just added effect to the silence that the forest had. No sign of wildlife or man being in the area after the explosion. It was rather eerie, but it couldn’t be helped as well. With a small breath coming from his lips, Mokuzai gazed over the perimeter in front of him; allowing his chocolate optic to catch the images spreading in front of him.

“If the beings that caused this explosion were nearby, they wouldn’t be cuttin’ from the middle, now would they? If I would cause an explosion, I would be going around actin’ like nothing has even happened at all. But with the size of this forest mixed the benefits of the mist, darkness, and storm, the source of the explosion could be hiding at any corner. This is exactly like capital island all over again, I can’t deal with this.” He stopped mid-trek, placing the palm over his features with a mild shake to his head. Traps and fire were not his forte; nor did he plan them to even be used for his own power.

The area in front of him was nothing but branches and broken down tress from the force of the rock and shrapnel resulting from the explosion nearby. To think I was this close, huh? Was it a mere coincidence that he was even nearby for the first place? Probably. Probably not. It didn’t matter to him if he was the only one to check out the place nearby, but it did help him relax just a wee bit knowing that he was going into this alone. There was no back weight for him to worry about, nor was there any sort of signal for him to give off to help someone move forward. He did miss Yoi, but the freedom to do what he wants without thinking twice really helped him out over all. He didn’t feel any remorse for his decisions and choices that lead to other events.

With the tip of his boot pressing against the bark of a tree to rest against it, he felt something crush underneath the weight of his being. Looking down, clothes layered on the ground with shards of white hardened material. Kneeling down to place the items in the palm of his hand, he looked around the area, smelling the fabric on the ground with the exact same scent as the explosive material used. “Mother fuckers.” He sighed underneath his breath. Now knowing that he wasn’t alone in the area, he started to get pissed off. Not just because of someone losing their life, why would he care about that? It was them being reckless without any plan to hide their clothing right.

Standing up on the heels of his boots, Moku clenched his fists to the side of his hips, throwing his head back in another large sigh.

“Why can’t people be smooth about this shit?”

Age : 30 Posts : 1012

With the area of the explosion literally meters away from Mokuzai, he decided that checking out the explosion and the surrounding perimeter probably wasn’t the smoothest thing that he could possibly do, nor did he want to make a run into a trap and be forced to fight his way out. Conflict was nowhere near on his mind at this point of time and during the night. With just getting back into the water country, Mokuzai was only concerned with getting back into Kirigakure as quickly as possible so that he could seek just the right amount of refuge for a few days. It was all he needed and wanted. Traveling like he has been over the past few months would tire out a normal shinobi easily if given the chance to show them what it is like to be nukenin.

“Alright. I need to quit my bitchin’ and figure out what the fuckin’ duck is going on ‘ere.” Mokuzai tapped his chin in thought for a few seconds. There was no need to rush with the knowledge that he had come up to underneath the tree. It was practically laid out tow him that someone had caused this explosion, but for what reasons? Were they village shinobi? Would they be able to do this again if they had the resources? If he had used his head from moments before, Mokuzai would have the ability to track them, they couldn’t have gotten far from the area with the explosion only happening a few minutes ago.

With his breath starting to slow down, and his lids shutting over his optics, Mokuzai brought both of his hands to his chest in an idle position. There was no reason for him to rush this process, it allowed him to focus on what was needed to be done, and actually pinpoint their locations. As long as they haven’t scattered off from outside his tracking limit, then Mokuzai would be able to get to them, or head in the direction that they are heading in before they made a break for it out of the area. It was his only plan that he had thought out for once, but with this actually something he could be proud of. Probably the only time that he could actually seem cocky with a good reason, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

“Alrighty, pansies. Let’s see where you’re goin’ to be playin’ hide ‘n seek at, mmkay?” Speaking to himself calmed him down in the stressful situations like this. Although it does seem a bit more on the lunatic side, Moku didn’t care what others thought of him. Why should he? He was his own being and only his opinion should be worth somethin’. Not someone who doesn’t even know his first name.

The sensory ability that he possessed proved to be worth more and more as often as he had used it. Being idle in position allowed the ability to fully shine and reach its limits on how far it could track someone. The view that he saw inside of his head was rather beautiful to him, honestly. If he could explain it in words, he would, but people would probably think he would be going crazy for thinking like this. Only other sensory-types would be able to fully understand what he would be talking about. The world was void of color, only being in a grey scale that only grew darker over the area where the lightest colors once danced on one’s eyes. The chakra that he saw was neither blue, nor the typical dark chakra that was mostly associated with various darker ninja; the chakra could change color rapidly like neon signs on various shops. It was purely unique to Mokuzai (as far as he knows) and allowed him to have a bit of fun hunting down his prey for a few seconds.

Two very blurry images appeared off to the southwest towards a minor village nearby Kirigakure. It wasn’t too far off, possibly only 92.5 meters, but it was just about out his limit of tracking. “Well slap me silly, hang me upside down, and make me yell from havin’ a carrot slap my ass. You guys are really in the wrong area at the wrong time.” A small chuckle came from his throat while walking towards the direction of the chakra he sensed earlier before. The excitement in his body grew exponentially when he finally spotted a couple nearby the explosion. It was easy for him to get away from the area with swift movements, he just simply didn’t want to be falsely accused of causing the explosion and potentially murdering the animals, or beings, inside the cave. He would rather not deal with the shinobi that would come up on the scene over the course of the night. It was already starting to become annoying by following the footsteps of the duo he tracked.

With the minutes passing by each and every foot placement, Mokuzai started to sulk with every other step that he had taken. “Why does it have to be so far away? Do they always walk like this? Come on, guys, just give me a bre-“ He quickly rolled behind a tree to place his back against; a simple maneuver.

He was thrown off from the beings in front of him, one slender with long blond hair. Mokuzai couldn’t tell if they were male or female from their body structure and features that exposed themselves. The opposite structure was obviously male, with the hulking attire and stature. Not really someone that Mokuzai wanted to deal with one on one.

“So you think we got another potential member on our hands, huh? A child would probably do better than Akashi. You idiot.” The slender one brought their back hand towards the cheek of the larger male; causing Mokuzai to flinch in response. Broski’s got some guts. I give heshe that. Moku still didn’t know what to label the newcomer, so the simple nickname ‘heshe’ came into mind, which was appropriate of course.

“We’re not alone, boss.” The hulking male turned his head over towards the tree nearby with Mokuzai. His eyes widened suddenly while gritting his teeth. Shit! Why couldn’t I sense him? Moku sighed softly, stepping from the tree and clearing his throat while looking over the two figures.

“Well. Uh. Hi.” Mokuzai waved towards the duo in an awkward fashion, perking out his lips from underneath the bandages. “ Couldn’t help to notice that you and heshe was near the area of the explosion so I just got curious an—“ Mokuzai squinted his eyes at the slender figure, bending forward at his waist. “Oh. You’re a dude. My bad, bro. My bad. Just..don’t go to prison, ok? You’ll become someone’s sock puppet in a few minutes.”

Mokuzai placed his hands behind his back while shifting on his heels to try to get some weight placed on his back in case one decided to head towards him and start a little something something.

SC Used:

Age : 30 Posts : 1012

“Is this the guy, Hugo?” The slender man kept his hand over his mouth while eyeing Mokuzai up and down with his fiery orbs. The attire of the male was rather eye catching in the nukenin’s eyes. Nothing said ‘I’m a bad guy, come and attack me’ more than a large cloak over most of their body length. “Oh, wait a minute. Wait a minute! I didn’t sign up for this one, man. I’m all clean on this slate just like the women over at the local whore house. Maybe not as clean as them, but you’re gettin’ my point, right? I don’t need to get into this. I don’t want a part of this.” Mokuzai knew what was about to go down, and the gut feeling in his stomach grew slowly. If anything, Moku wanted to avoid any sort of conflict in any way possible yet he felt like these two could jump him at any moment and actually succeed to take advantage of him. “What are you going to do to me?” He quickly stated in a high pitched voice, slowly changing it to a more sensual tone to play around with the mood. “What are you going to do with me?” He brought his index finger to his lips and popped out his hips with a bend of his knees. It was worth the shot to bring the guys to some sort of distraction to cut the tension between the trios.

“Ah, so you have a name big guy! I was goin’ to call you fat-ass anyway, but Hugo slips off the tongue more, huh?” Mokuzai dropped the funny act quickly, getting a tad bit more serious for the situation at hand. Hugo gritted his teeth while placing his fists to his side. It was very apparent that Mokuzai was starting to get on his nerves from the moment he met him. It was rather humorous to Moku that the conversation started out like this. It wasn’t really the first impression that he wanted to make, but it got the job done over all. “Why you mo-“

“Hugo!” The slender male stated the hulking male’s name with command much like a master over their dog. Hugo stopped instantly only narrowing his eyes over towards Mokuzai. It was rather impressive that a skinny being could command this man with utter ease. Either Hugo is just dumb, or this other guy has something that I don’t really know about. Mokuzai had to be careful with what he did here. Not only was he outnumbered, but he was probably outwitted as well; not something he was used to.

“So you heard the explosion nearby? What did you think of its source? Did it throw you off from our position?” Mokuzai started busting out laughing, holding his gut with a tight grip. The fabric practically tugging at his fit figure. “Did it work? Hahaha, dude. Dude. My man. My homie. My main squeeze. Do you think I would have found you guys if it worked? I didn’t even mention the explosion at all before I even got ‘ere. What did you think I was comin’ ‘ere for? Gah. You’re clearly lackin’ something I thought you had. So disappointing.” Mokuzai shook his head at the thought of the man being a bit smarter than he should have appeared to be. It was a shame that the slender fellow looked like he did, and still acted a bit dim- well fully dimwitted. It was practically gold to Moku that the man thought he was a genius.

“I-Well. Still.. Answer the fucking question.” It was like he didn’t care that he just made a fool out of himself, which Mokuzai kind of gave him credit for. He knows when he is wrong at least.. “I found some clothes and porcelain material nearby the source of the explosion. I didn’t dare go inside for two obvious reason. Fuckin’ dead things, and fire. Fuck both of them in the ass with a cactus. I just can’t deal with those at the moment. Goin’ through some hard times at the time.” Which, wasn’t really a lie coming from Mokuzai. It was all fun and games up until that point where the slight serious attitude came forth from the nuke-nin.

“Well.. With that attitude, we could use you. I’m Suga. Pleasure.” Suga bowed his head in a respectful manner, while Mokuzai stood there dumbfounded yet again. “The fuck kinda name is Suga? Suuuuga. Suuuugah. Sugar. Sugar tits.” Mokuzai kept going on and on about various subjects that had no way intervened with the subject at hand.

“But for real though. I don’t do work for people I just met. I don’t even do work for other people. I’m not into that anymore.” He shook off the offer that Suga gave him, shifting his weight to his right side with his right hand on his hip. His left palm faced the sky as his elbow dug into his own ribs. “You just got the wro-“

“I’ll pay you triple any price you’ve made so far.”

“Oh.. Now we’re talking.”

Age : 30 Posts : 1012

“So how much did you get paid for your last mercenary work..I never got your name from you.” Suga started to tilt his head softly at the remark made by Mokuzai who suddenly caught his interest. “I honestly can’t remember, but I’ll throw a number out to you and we can work a little somethin’ out, right? Depends on what you want me to do, man. I’ll base the price on that. Just call me Moku. it's simple.” Mokuzai leaned his shoulder against the tree nearby, pushing all his weight on the right upper arm. His forearms started to slowly fold in place in front of his torso while looking over the features of Suga. It was odd that he even thought about offering some sort of compensation for the job at hand. Must have been something big that the duo were working on.

Suga cleared his throat while looking over towards Hugo who remained nearby with his body still shaking from rage that Mokuzai caused to course through his veins. “That explosion was just a test on the village nearby that we kinda wanna..reach.” It started to peak Moku’s interest the moment that Suga started to talk about making havoc come forth in a village. It was something that Mokuzai had personally done before and wouldn’t mind doing again. “So you want me to murder a bunch of people as quickly and quietly as possible?” It was a simple contract to start, indicate and end. By dawn, the village could be wiped out from existence if Mokuzai did it right with his own abilities.

“Not..really.” Suga raised his hand in sort to explain things. “Seeing that we can’t get Kirigakure without the sensors tracking our position the moment we set foot in their perimeter and all, Hugo and I, are trying to see how to start on minor villages and actually work our way towards the fortresses. We try to find the weakness in their security, walls, and find some sort of information out about the village from the inside. We would then sell the information to brokers and make cash from the flaws of said village. It’s kind of a win-win for us in some situations, but the current village is a bit more difficult, at least for our skills. It’s not a large village at all, but it’s nothing to play with. We were going to try to use the explosion to gain the attention of their guards to try to get inside and grab a scroll they’re holding hostage in one of the middle buildings.”

After hearing the explanation, Mokuzai sighed softly while getting off from the tree. “You’re pretty much makin’ me do the exact same thing that my father wanted me to do in Konoha. You guys are a bunch of idiots. Why are you wastin’ your time?” Mokuzai couldn’t believe that he was actually considering to help out these guys because of the price that they had offered. He quickly brought up three fingers, his index, and middle and ring digits on his right hand in front of Suga. “Three million ryo, and I’m yours. If you think about it, it’s like you’re winnin’ a date with me! Fancy mancy stuff, bro. You can’t miss out on this one time deal!”

Suga and Hugo’s jaws dropped from his offer, rubbing the back of their necks for a few seconds to stare at each other. “Make it two million and then we got a deal.” Suga quickly retorted back towards Mokuzai. It was a decent offer and he personally wouldn’t mind dealing with it. “Fine. Fine. But make sure you bring protection for the after party, ok? Don’t need any babies comin’ from your disco stick.”

Mokuzai turned his back on the duo, throwing up his arm in a waving signal. “I’m guessin’ that’s the village in the horizon? If you stay here, I should be back here pretty soon. I mean. Hide, of course, and I’ll track your chakra, but you need to get out from here. I want my money, not some dead bodies to loot afterwards.” It was time to actually get to work, and Mokuzai needed to make sure he didn’t get a second shuriken with poison tossed towards his opposite cheek this time. He brought up his left hand to hold his left cheek while walking in the forest towards the village nearby. With the night sky still in effect, he would actually be able to use this to his advantage; maybe he would be able to bullshit some of the things to actually make it seem a bit real.

The information he knew he wasn’t going to get. It was too much hassle to even risk his life to just get some leaked information about the village, but the other two things, he could mess around with for a bit. The very first thing that he wanted to do, was to create, or expose a flaw in the borders of the village nearby. It seemed like a good way to see how the village worked, or what they needed to work on. Picking up an ability to use as some sort of distraction was just useful to Mokuzai. He had the perfect plan to draw the guards away just enough so that he could patrol the walls of the village.

Kneeling down behind a tree, Mokuzai rolled his neck with a low grunt. “Hm.” He simply hummed underneath his breath, getting a good look at the gate that led into the village. Basic two guard set up, nothing too much to worry about. Mokuzai couldn’t really pinpoint too many guards, but they could be hiding their chakra signatures for all he could know. “Alright, boys. Let’s do this.” A series of handsigns came forth from the nuke-nin, allowing his hands to collide in a small manner that would wind up with a burst of power.

“ Mokuton: Moku Bunshin no Jutsu “ Ebony wood started to protrude from the right side of Mokuzai, branching off into an arch and slowly form on the ground. Legs started to gain shape with the clothes slowly starting to appear on the figure. It was the first time that Mokuzai even got the chance to use this technique since teaching himself to do this, and it was mighty impressive to say the least. It allowed him to work in two ways, and get to land decent tactics on his enemies if everything were to go as he expected them to.

Turning his head to look over the clone, Mokuzai shook his head while tapping the back of the ‘Mokuclone’. “Man. You’re one ugly son of a bitch.” Which didn’t really make sense since the clone was practically a flawless copy of Mokuzai. Maybe it was just to get a little boost of self-confidence going? Who knows. The duo nuke-nin stood up from behind the tree, cocking both of their necks. “You know, we can kill two birds with one stone, right? Don’t go into the village unless you have to. I don’t want you to draw too much attention to yourself. That would just blow the plan out of proportion and I wouldn’t be able to get that cash and make it rain on us buck-naked.” A soft chuckle came from Mokuzai’s throat, stretching up his arms while walking away from the Mokuclone. “Just go distract the guards and see what they do? If that’s the only defense they have, it must be pretty simple to get them to do what we want.”

Jutsu used:

115/135 CP
115/135 CP

Age : 30 Posts : 1012

Mokuclone cracked his neck for a few seconds, adjusting to the sudden life that was brought to his body. For a wood clone, the guy was pretty light weight, but sturdy at the same time. “I’ll try my best, man. I can’t promise that I’ll do exactly what you want, but whatever.” The fact that there were now two sassy Mokuzai’s in the world for a few minutes could have started a blackhole somewhere. There was only room for one sassy-asshole of that nature to exist. The faster, and cleaner that the duo cleared this little mission, the faster they could go back, collect their cash, and get the fuck out of the perimeter. The village insight wasn’t as small as Mokuzai thought it was going to be. He clearly underestimated the girth and population of the village. It was a common mistake that he was used to doing, but he needed to drop the little comedic act he’s had going on all day to just focus on what he needed to get done.

The guards at the gate narrowed their eyes at the outline of the structure of the Mokuclone. No details could be made yet, but if plans did go right, the whole situation was about to explode for a few moments. This might not be the only ranks that they could have in their village, and Mokuclone was probably about to figure that out once he got into action.

“Oi! What business do you have here?” One of the guards yelled towards the clone. With his trek almost complete, the Mokuclone cupped his hands around his mouth so that his voice could reach the guards. “I’m just gettin’ tired of walkin’ around! I just want to come in to rest.” He was just disobeying rules, and he knew this. Why not rebel for a bit and see what he could find out? The guards, being naïve and bit too open-minded, smiled towards each other as Mokuclone got closer and closer. The initial encroachment took a total of ten minutes, which allowed Mokuzai to do what he was set to do.

Mokuzai placed his fingertips on the wooden wall surrounding the village. It was nothing like the concrete wall that Konohagakure had set up around it’s village, but it was damn near as thick, and covered in spikes that could potentially turn out to be harmful to the likes of other shinobi that were attempting to break in during nightfall. It came to surprise that he didn’t find any sort of bodies that were still caught in the spikes. Either they were removed by the lovely villagers, or they just never existed in the first place. “ I see. I see. They had to pick patrollin’ the borders as one of my things that I’ve had to do to fulfill the contract? Do they just not take me seriously, or do they expect me to know all about how to do this and that. I ain’t no dog. Fleas suck too much to even consider bein’ a lone wolf.” He shivered at the thought of the parasites crawling all over him; itching almost came to his mind the instant he thought of the situation. Each step was heavy, yet swiftly placed around the border. He started on the opposite side of the Mokuclone that started his trek towards the guard entrance. It was pretty straightforward and allowed Mokuzai to work quickly, but effectively on what he had to do on hand.

His eyes lowered to the ground of the area underneath the spikes, pressing his booth heel against the base of the trunk. “It’s soft..The saturation from the rain still remains after a few days. If they were to get an attack from a lower angle, the whole wall could collapse on the other side and slowly fall and bring the rest of it down.” It was a rather unfortunate thing to find out, honestly. Mokuzai didn’t want to figure out what other flaws that the village had. They apparently had too many, and it showed that they were quite experienced with dealing with attacks on a regular basis. It’s not that he was bothered by the potential slaughter, it was just the poor defense that this village had set up. It was too easy. Way too easy. Something had to be up for that. They expected people to get through, but for what reason?

“Ah, so you wanna go and get some rest, hm? I see. Well. We have the best hot springs and spa treatment here. We just need to confiscate your weapons before heading on in, if you don’t mind?” The guard held out his hand towards the Mokuclone, who looked confused, raising a brow in response to the offer. “Uh. No. I don’t mean any harm, but my items stay with me. There is no other way around that." The guards clenched their jaw, gripping their spears with their left hands just a bit tighter. “I’ll repeat one more time. Give us your weapons, and you’ll be free to go inside. You’ll get them back once you leave.” Mokuclone dropped his head, bringing a palm to his features once again. It wasn’t the plan to go inside, but there was a spa in there. The men didn’t know he was a clone, or he thought, and allowed him to go inside with a very reasonable request. Opening his pack, he dumped out the contents, which were just useless wooden cloned items that were purely aesthetic.

“I’ll just come back and get them ‘ere, hm?” He flashed a grin from underneath his bandages, walking passed he guards and into the village. There was just a bit of information that he could use for the beginning. No weapons allowed in the village? That seemed to be legit, but common information as well. Mokuzai bit down on his lip while looking over the wall. It wasn’t too complex, if he wanted to, he could just use his own mokuton to create a small wedge that the men could tell the brokers to use to pry a small opening for the men to get into incase the village went under attack. In all honesty, the whole wall was a major flaw to being with. There was no need to make another flaw for the contract; it was already made by the same villagers that resided inside. It was kind of ironic once Mokuzai started to think about it.

The Mokuclone walked with the guards towards the bathhouse, slipping off his boots once he got inside the building. The setting was a bit odd once he actually started to look around. There was no clerk, no visitors and no other clothes in the locker area. Maybe they’re just back in the springs. “Do you guys always just sit there and wait for customers to come out?” The clone laughed while rubbing the back of his neck. The guards remained quiet, looking straight ahead for a few moments. With the clone being made a bit sturdier, Mokuzai was able to retain the information that the clone experienced, not really seeing what it did, but the thoughts were connected to a certain degree.

With the backroom opening to the Mokuclone, he slowly started to approach the door frame, leaning in to see darkness embrace his optics. He felt a pair of hands on his back, pushing him in the door and shutting it behind him. This isn’t a normal spa. He heard growls in the back of the room, piercing yellow eyes shinned in the little light that pierced the cracks of the door. Some sort of feline? That’s..odd. It looked peaceful from the ou The thoughts stopped suddenly, and Mokuzai started to get a bit more interested in this village.

He usually keeps his personal business out of contracts, but once he reported back to Suga and Hugo, he might honestly take a chance to see what was the theme for the village. “That’s just..Hm.” He stuck out his tongue against the bandages, placing his hands between two of the trees that formed the wall. Focusing the chakra to his fingertips, Mokuzai allowed all ten digits to expand, forming two decent sized wedges between the gap in the trees. He might as well leave it there just in-case things did get a bit messy after all.

The guards, for all he knew, were still in the village. “If they are feeding some random people to that animal, why are they that size? Where are the other villagers?” Mokuzai spoke to himself while going into the forest from where he came from moments before. His fingers grazed the back of his neck, seeing the silhouettes of Suga and Hugo in the horizon. The darkness still worked to his advantage, but he was still disturbed about the findings of his venture.

“So.” He started out once he approached the shinobi. “There are fuckin’ lions in the village in the spas. I don’t know if that’s the only place, but fuckin’ lions. Of all things. Also, the area around the village is completely moist, so you could use that to your advantage to take down the wall that way. I don’t know if you want to do that, however, seein’ how there are fuckin’ lions in there.” Mokuzai shrugged, coughing slightly into his hand. “I created two wedges that Hugo, or whoever wants inside the fuckin’ lion village, so all they, or he, has to do is push them to the opposite sides and it’ll start to crack the wood. It’s Senju wood, so it’ll be able to take a lot of strength.”

Suga and Hugo started to laugh uncontrollably, shaking their heads softly. “Lions? Hm..” Suga started to put his hands in the depth of his pockets, pulling out a wad of paper surrounded by a rubber band. “Here.” He tossed the stack towards Mokuzai, who caught it rather easily. However, he pulled out another stack of equal size, waving it near Mokuzai.

“I’ll give you another contract to get my lions back.”

Mokuzai sighed softly, dropping his arms while looking at the ground. "Guh, fine."

[mission end. Lion retrieval continued in another custom mission.]