These bones are bigger then mine [Jelly][Private]

Age : 32 Posts : 1912

Konohagakure no Sato, the hidden village of the Fire country, a place that never managed to bond with Yoroi, or maybe it was Yoroi that never managed to bond with the village. For years now, Yoroi had been living in the forests of the fire country, not needing any humans around him in order to survive. In fact, he did his best to avoid people without knowing it, the first human he had even met being by accident. He had been following this woman for quite some time now, and due to some stupid mission, he had been left behind to wait for her in the village. Yoroi had, due to a past event, taken on quite severe abandonment issues, and as such, did not think she would ever come back to pick him up. His parents had abandoned him once, his friend the Tiger had abandoned him once, and now his new friend had left him behind in Konohagakure. Villages belonged to the list of things he considered as pointless wastes of space, for nature was all people needed to survive. Hell, he had been living on his own, without the luxuries of proper clothing and shelter for years. Even now, he had only one pair of clothes that had been sown back many, many times already, for it was not Yoroi’s thing to just sit there and do nothing. He protected Hani, meaning he needed to be strong enough to do such a thing in the first place, and to those that did something, things could go wrong. Rubble could fly, bones could break and clothes could rip, nothing about this being out of the ordinary, though it was his bones that got fixed sooner then his clothes.

Looking out over the treetops, he wondered what it would take for him to get back to Hani. Sitting on one of the large skeletons located on the mountain, he thought about the kind of animal that would leave skeletons as big as these. It was very interesting to him, for he had only hunted Deer, Wild Boar, had fought wolves and even killed bears, eating their flesh and using their pelts for warmth at night. For years, he had been the apex predator that would kill anyone who would try to kill him or steal his food, but when seeing bones as big as a house, it seemed that he was not the greatest hunter out there after all. If he would have met the owner of this skeleton, he would have been gone in a single bite, something that brought his spirit down a bit. Still, there must have been a reason why this massive creature had died, and he had survived all those years. Size did not always matter, and even though the creature had bigger bones, his had proven to be stronger, for he got to live, adapt and grow stronger so he could one day become the world’s apex predator once again. For this reason, he refused to be trained by other people, seeking out his own path and gaining strength in his own special way. He did not have to fight others in order to prove himself worthy of being a predator, because he had proven to be a warrior and a predator by the time most other kids of his age took baths, shopped for clothes with their parents and got nice cooked food, sleeping in the safety of a home.

This all paled in comparison to what he had been through, and he loved Hani for finding him and taking him with her, though at times it seemed like she’d rather be alone. This did not matter, because Yoroi believed that he could change her, and make her love having him around as much as he did with her. Despite all of that, he still missed living in the forest, for it was a simple life that was free from politics and war. The animals did not judge him, and he did not judge them, for all he could do was bide his time and strike when the time was right. That life however, was over, and he had sworn to himself that he would protect Hani wherever she went. Despite his beliefs in her never coming back, he would still stick around and await her return, hoping she would be different then his parents and the one responsible for raising him as a warrior, who strange enough was actually a tiger. This did not mean that he would just sit tight like a trained dog, waiting anxiously for her return to the village. Oh no, he would just head out and do the things he liked to do, be outdoors, explore new places he had not seen before, and even catching prey that he could cook on a fire. While Hani was gone, he could live like he used to, at least until she came back, or something else came up.

Age : 31 Posts : 471

Never before had Tani been so desperately restless as she found herself today. Sure, being stir crazy within the confinement of the walls of the small apartment she shared with her brother was no stranger to the girl; however it was rather uncommon for her to find respite from such discomforts in neither the village nor the training grounds. Her mind was like a swarm of agitated insects, whirring around inside her so sporadically and with such speed that she found herself frustrated and befuddled by how she could be thinking so much and at the same time so little. Without her brother around to entertain her due to still being out on his latest mission, the kunoichi had cast herself into the streets to find her focus, some kind of distraction to draw the storm in her head to one definite point she could ignore the whizzing static in favour of. After feverishly stomping every paved path in Konoha in search of something exciting to no avail, and then combing the training grounds for the same with equally lacking reward, she found her feet carrying her to the only place left to carry out her search; out the village gates and into the countryside.

She didn’t know what she was doing or where she might go, or even what might happen if she came across trouble. All she knew was that at this moment her entire being was one in flux, she could hardly locate herself in the muddled mess of her mind and the only cure for thinking was feeling. “Why then-” she growled in frustration, as her sandaled feet crunched over rocky terrain she was yet to notice had started to break up the green monogamy of the forest through which she trudged, “-is nothing of interest to me today?!” Her blue-green eyes scrunched shut and she brought her hands to grasp the sides of her head as her frustration started the barely familiar transformation into irritation and anger. Something was missing, she was searching for something, and she just couldn’t for the life of her figure out what. The storm in her mind boomed and raged and crumbled anything coherent into yet more static to cloud the space between her ears and another growl ripped from her throat as she flung her eyes open and her left fist into the nearest tree.

‘I’m getting angry!’ The thought seemed to be the clearest thing to come through her mind all day and struck the girl like a brick to the face as she stood, stopped in her tracks. ‘Why am I getting angry?!’ Her breath came in great huffs as Tani took mental stock; her muscles were tense, left fist still pressed to the hard surface she’d struck, she could feel the fingertips of her right hand quivering like they did when she was worked up and she had to forcibly unclench her jaw. Something definitely wasn’t right; while it was common knowledge amongst those that knew her that the kunoichi had aggression out the wazoo and everything she did reflected the fiery passion she had for life, actual irritation was somewhat uncommon for the usually light-hearted girl and anger was something miraculously rare for her to experience. What made the situation ridiculous and a little bit unsettling, however, was that there’d been no clear trigger for all this; she’d simply awoken with a racing heart and foul mood. Her eyes fluttered shut again and her brow creased further past their already irritated slant as she tried to steady her breathing and calm her thundering insides. The last time she’d felt this way without direct provocation was just after Saikiko, her sister, had passed away…

Something inside her screamed to a halt and Tani roared in frustration as she lost her hold on what little progress she’d made; those hard found strings of thought slipping from her grasp and vanishing into the storm like a kite in a hurricane. Her left hand retreated from its place on the tree to cradle her forehead as the girl spun around to pace in the opposite direction. She couldn’t think about that. She couldn’t- it wouldn’t happen. That path went nowhere. She had to find something else, anything else; she needed to lose herself for a while, find some way to surrender herself to her instincts, her senses.. Small form folding into a crouch while both hands clutched her head and trying again to calm her breathing, Tani tried to focus on her surroundings. Sucking in deep breaths, she tasted the crisp air, smelt the earthy scent of the ground beneath her feet, zeroed in on the sound of the breeze rustling through nearby trees, then felt it washing her warm skin with its welcome coolness, felt a small leaf brush the back of her right hand as it fluttered to the earth, felt the dull throb of the knuckles of her left hand, the prickling sensation as air grazed open skin, a ticklish trickling sensation slowly, slowly making its way over the back of her hand..

Tani’s eyes snapped open; punching a tree once shouldn’t have broken skin. Blinking she took a better look around at her surroundings, finding herself crouching not on the compacted, grass patched dirt or leaf litter of the regular forest floor but instead on one of many near flat rocks embedded in the earth around her. Looking ahead she could see that the trees thinned as stone took over the terrain and the slight slope of the earth where she crouched quickly became a much more drastic one, littered with boulders large and small. Snapping her gaze to her left Tani saw not a tree, but a tall, three foot wide hunk of stone propped against a green backdrop of shrubbery and topped with a mass of wild vines. About four feet up its surface she could make out the tiny white and red of her grazed flesh and the resulting pricks of blood, proof of her spontaneous and unobservant attack. Clinging desperately to the feeling of exploration elicited from finding herself in this new area, the girl rose to her full meagre height and made a B-line for the tree line.

Scaling over and weaving around the rocky terrain with the manoeuvrability she was used to making use of by moving around the forest, the girl made her way up the small mountain that had sprout up from the ocean of trees and greenery below. Then, just as she was getting used to the new terrain, she started to spot skeletons dotting the area; not those of humans, but of what appeared to be large animals, none of which Tani could identify. If she were in a better state of mind she might take more care to precede cautiously; she was outside the village and in an area that held plenty of hiding places to monopolise on and a laughably appropriate atmosphere to make bandits or nukenin wish to haunt the place. Mind still racing and driven only by her need for a distraction, however, the kunoichi pressed on relentlessly, aiming for the subconscious goal she’d set herself to reach the summit without stopping. Her little self-set challenge soon came to a halt though, as she climbed to the top of an exceptionally large hunk of stone, which had previously obscured the view between two faces of the mountainous heap of rocks, and her bright eyes fell on the presence of what appeared to be a young boy.

He sat alone atop one of the larger heaps of bone, short turquoise hair shifting lightly in the breeze that blew over the mountainside as he seemed to peer out over the vast forest of Hi no Kuni. She couldn’t see his face due to her appearing from far off to his right side, slightly further up the large rock formation, and hoped that as a result he hadn’t spotted her in her oblivious climb. Tani’s heart raced, was he a bandit? A young nukenin? She couldn’t see any shinobi equipment amidst his simple black clothing and he appeared to be around the same age as she was herself… Then a part of his apparel caught her eye; the fabric bands of what looked like might be a ninja village headband. Curiosity now entirely peaked and the mental storm still pushing her onwards, the girl made a snap judgement that could end quite poorly for her if her assumptions were wrong. Wrenching herself up to stand confidently atop her stone wall, one hand found her hip while the other subtly drew a kunai from the holster on her thigh, slipping it into her baggy jacket sleeve for concealment as she called loud and clear over the howl of the wind as it swept the crevices of the mountainside.

“Hey you over there!” She bellowed in the boy’s direction, “You got a moment to spare?” With their proximity to Konohagakure, if that was a hitai-ate tied around his waist, he was most likely either a Leaf shinobi or used to be; in both cases she’d feel comfortable engaging the individual in combat, either to try take him in or as a friendly spar according to the case. The kunoichi hoped that grabbing his attention would cause him to move in a way that would allow her to confirm which by increasing the visibility of the accessory around his waist. As soon as she saw the shine of metal and that familiar, unmarred, stylised leaf pattern, a grin broke out across Tani’s face; finally, she’d found something interesting. Finally, she’d have a distraction. “Oh sorry, slip of the tongue; what I meant to say was: ‘You got a moment to spar’.” Teeth flashed in her eager grin as her eyes narrowed, watching the mysterious boy closely for any movement or signs of hostility.

Spoiler:

Age : 32 Posts : 1912

It was nice to just sit in the serenity of nature, looking out over the forest without a single care in the world, the way the world was intended to be before people started building villages and waged war so they could gain more land to build their stuff on. To Yoroi, it seemed that people where by far the most power hungry and foolish of all animals out there, and he felt ashamed that he was one of them. In the past, Yoroi had believed himself to be a one of a kind creature that had been put on the earth to grow up as it’s apex predator, though this became much less likely when Hani had found him all those years ago, and he saw with his own eyes that the race he belonged to was not something that was supposed to be on this world. The world Yoroi belonged to was nice and simple, and it was all about feeding and surviving in the wilds, testing ones strength to survive with that of another. When he was taken with his new friend to the village of Konohagakure, he felt a strong urge to return to the forest and never come out again. He saw people walking the streets with weird kinds of clothing, buying the stuff he had to make on his own, simply buying food from a butcher and people wearing strange headbands with metal plates that fought each other just for fun. He did not like a single thing about the new world he had been introduced to, which led him to become that much closer with Hani. As long as she would be there with him, things would be okay, though he did not want to be left alone in a place like that. If Hani never came back, Yoroi would go back to the forest and leave the village behind him once more to live in peace and solitude, as a predator.

As such, he took to leaving the village and just going to places in the fire country wilderness, to see if there were still things left to find that he enjoyed. Suddenly, he could hear a loud feminine voice over the sound of the wind, making him wonder who it could be that would bother him during his time of peace and solitude. Yoroi’s interest was not really peaked, just turning his head slightly to the right, looking over his shoulder to see that there was a girl that had for some reason climbed the same mountain as him. Why would other humans go to places such as this, that was the one thought in Yoroi’s mind as he just turned his head and looked back at the forests ahead of him. The girl asked him if he had some time to spare, something he did not really understand. He did not choose how time was spent, not did he have any form of control over it, meaning he had no time to spare or give to her. He had only been among humans for a while, and did not fully understand the meaning of some of the stuff that other people took for granted. It was for that reason that most sarcastic remarks and jokes did not really fly well with him, and took to angering him rather then making him laugh about it. As such, he did not understand what she meant with that statement, and chose simply to ignore it. Feeling the wind blow gently by him, he could hear that the girl was not yet done with whatever it was she figured she would get done here, and she continued talking about how she misspoke on something, and had intended to ask if he would be up for a spar with her. It seemed weird to him that someone who did not even knew him would ask for a spar, when such a thing might cause her great pain, and could even lead to her death if he would have been a Missing nin, or worse.

Letting out a deep sigh, his posture did not change much, though his mind set to a slightly more annoyed state. He never enjoyed doing something as silly as a spar, for he did not have the skills to be in a spar without maiming or killing someone, nor did he enjoy it. If he hurt this girl, he would most likely not be allowed to go back to the village and be with Hani, if she ever came back. If she hurt him badly, chances were that his instincts would kick in, and he would then again have to worry about the first problem. Formulating a sentence, he figured he might as well say something so it did not seem like he did not understand what she said, or simply ignored her. “What is it that you seek to gain from sparring me. Would you beating me, a stranger, somehow give you a better sense of self? Would it be simply to boost your confidence, or is there another reason that would push you to fight me?” Yoroi said, not turning around as he spoke, just sitting in his spot and looking out across the forests of the fire country. It made him wonder, if she beat him, would she somehow be hailed as a warrior, would she be considered a skilled fighter, or would she just remain the same. No one would see them hear, so people would only go with what she told them, which in his eyes was not that impressive. If she could provide a valid answer, he might consider having a spar with the girl, though he would have to hold back on using his powers, meaning he would most likely lose the fight ahead of time. He would not tell her about it, nor did he intend to show her his powers, for she would just think of him as a freak of nature.

Age : 31 Posts : 471

After giving her a glance when she first started speaking, the blue haired mountain boy had seemingly dismissed her presence and returned to his stoic silence thing, and Tani was starting to get agitated when it seemed he would simply not acknowledge her at all, leaving her to deal with her restless mind some other way. Just as she was about to open her mouth to verbally prod him some more in hopes of him doing anything interesting, he finally found his own voice and his calm enquiry met Tani’s ears over the wind. A scoffing bark of laughter had to be supressed at the concept of her, of all people, requiring a confidence boost from beating this boy; not that she assumed anything about his abilities or the difficulty of their potential fight, she just already held enough self-worth that she didn’t need to seek more in the form of random victories. Having half succeeded in preventing the sudden outburst of humour, the kunoichi’s grin remained in place while she simply shook her head in response to his suggestion of what her motivation might be. The kunai up her sleeve being returned casually to its holster as she did so; it didn’t seem likely she’d need to deflect any projectiles from this apparently unarmed and unaggressive ninja in a hurry.

“…Peace of mind.” Her voice cut clearly through the distance between herself and her opponent to be as she tried to keep the mental hurricane at bay. Her grin slowly came to be replaced with a more serious expression as she continued to indulge his request for reasoning as best she could in her state of mind. “As a shinobi, which I can see you are by your ‘belt’, you too must have strong instincts for combat; so maybe you’ll understand when I say ‘I need to get in touch with my instincts.’” Still watching the boy carefully for any reaction he had, Tani slowly started to make her way down and around the mountain; moving around the rocks and bones with as much grace as manoeuvring around the forest while growing up lent her. Keeping most of the distance between them, the girl moved around in a very small section of an arc, driven to face her company closer to face-on without going so far as to be lower down the hill side.

“The way I see it though,” Teeth flashed again briefly as a fleeting smirk crossed Tani’s lips; the storm was still raging, but she could feel it fading into the background with each beat of her pounding heart and each step she took. Her insides squirmed in a comfortingly familiar way as her sandaled feet came to rest on a steady plane of hard dirt, roughly the same height up the mountain as the boy was while perched atop his macabre mount, and little more than fifteen meters from it. The prospect of battle had given her a taste of shelter from her thoughts, and at this point she had no intentions of letting that go. “you’re either from my village, and a spar here will help to be sure you’re ready to handle the unexpected…” The kunoichi’s feet slipped from her black sandals and kicked them aside fluidly of their own accord while she watched the mysterious mountain boy closely, almost unblinkingly, as she had from the start of her stalking down to this position.

“Or you’re not…” Hands flew through a familiar series of seals as she continued to speak. “In which case;” Finishing her hand movements quickly, the girl’s stance then widened and lowered significantly as her fingers curled into the tiger paw position, arms rising to rest with dynamic tension in the air before her; a position that was very obviously aggressive. Muscles ready to spring and rearing to go, Tani’s cool eyes burned beneath her creased brow, the tiny girl oozing intensity and ferocity as she finished her statement. “you’re in my territory.” While she’d usually race in and initiate combat at this point, and with the incessant crackling of that mental static boy did she crave to do so, she needed to know the nature of what she was starting. “So, which is it?” The familiar warmth of katon chakra flowing through her skin calmed the girl slightly which she waited for an answer, be it verbal or through action.

Spoiler:

Age : 32 Posts : 1912

It apparently mattered a great deal if he was to be a Shinobi from the village or not, and she seemed to believe that all of this was for some reason her territory, which was all together just absurd and stupid, not to mention that it was also impossible. He was a little bit annoyed by the things she told him, because the way in which she said it, it seemed like he was not allowed to be here if it was up to her. He did not fully understand her intentions for coming over here and trying to lure him into fighting her, something he did not like to do one bit. She seemed like the fighting type, or at least the one that would be able to look after herself quite well, especially for a woman. Many would try to look as strong as they possibly could, it is however quite annoying to see that people tried acting like a big shot to him. It did not work, for he was the kind of person that was easily intimidated or impressed, not really having the kind of emotion needed for such things. Standing up from his seated position, he turned around and looked down upon the girl from the large skeleton he stood on. Letting a deep sigh escape his lips, it seemed best to address the situation before it would escalate into something worse, something he’d rather not be a part of. If anything was to happen to the girl, she would most likely go back to the village and cause him some sort of trouble, which is something he could not afford when Hani was not in the village.

“I don’t smell your scent on this country, nor do I see some other kind of mark that is placed on these lands that state that this here belongs to you. Maybe I didn’t pay attention, but I do believe that your name is not on here somewhere. You humans are so annoying, always taking things that do not belong to you and pushing other people out if they do not bear your mark. As you can see, I bear your mark of the leaf, though I don’t really enjoy fighting people from the village all that much. You can say that I don’t really like the village, so feel free to come on over and hurt me, if that is what you’d wish to do” he said, wondering if she understood what he meant with the things he just told her. Yoroi brought up all the things that bothered him, all at once so he got it out of his system and out into the open. If she really wanted to fight him for whatever reason she had in mind, there was the chance that she would end up beating him, which he in turn could not allow either. He knew that if things would push too far, there was a big chance of someone dying, and that someone would most likely not be him, not today at least. He had to get stronger so he could eventually be with Hani again, which was one of the reasons as to why he could not get himself into any trouble with the people from her village. If he shamed her in this village, he would most likely lose her the moment she got back… if she ever got back.

His bones itched inside of his body, and it seemed as if his body wanted to fight, but his mind knew better then to simply walk right into a potentially troublesome situation. On the other hand, this would be a great test to see how well he could fight without having the girl figure out that he was a Shinobi with a bloodline as powerful as the Shikotsumyaku, the Dead Bone Pulse of the Kaguya clan. It never really took much to get his instincts sparked up and ready for battle, though it was his mind that was gradually becoming stronger, strong enough to resist a fight when he really did not want to have any part in it. This time however, he was not that sure if he really wanted to keep himself clear or if he wanted to get own with things. Keeping his eyes on the girl, he would give her the opportunity to either start the fight, or back out and stop it from happening all together. In order for her to get to him, she’d have to rush up the skeletal structure first, meaning he would see her coming and would have time to respond to it, rather then being taken by surprise.