Nin-To-Five : Chapter 61

Sunagakure

Ryoma, Jonin of Sunagakure, Vice-Captain of the Puppetry Corps

Living with the two Honored Elders of Suna was quickly eroding the ambient respect Ryoma had picked up for the pair. Not necessarily because they proved themselves less competent, but more because he was getting a first-hand perspective to their bickering and antics as siblings.

And, in some cases, getting some bickering thrown his way as well.

“It’s ugly. You should start over.” 

“Thank you for the input, Honored Elder Chiyo.” Ryoma groused, leaning up from the page he was drafting upon. Strewn across the large page was a series of diagrams and notations, most of which related to his planned upgrades for the Great Dragoon. “Can you describe how or is that to be left to my imagination?” 

He turned in his chair, casting an exasperated eye towards the old, pink-haired woman who loomed over his low chair. She squinted at the design for a bit, humming and hawing, making a show of thoroughly looking it over. Behind her, in the kitchen, Ebizo was in the middle of supervising a soup dish. While doing so, his knife expertly carved a hunk of expensive fish into fine strips and laid them out across a set of plates.

“The plates are ugly- and the proportions are nothing akin to a human.”

“The densified wood plates are superior armor to the steel layer thanks to their weight savings and almost peer protective qualities. I have to design the form around them.” Ryoma refuted with a bland look on his face, tapping the back of his pencil against the page that outlined those in further detail. “The proportions are nothing like a human because this isn’t a human. It’s a Kyojutsu.”

“You need a better name for it.” She ignored his refutations and continued to complain about its features. “A Kyo-jutsu? That could be anything, not just very large puppets.”

“What would you call it, Honored Elder Chiyo?” He made sure that his building annoyance gto through in his tone.

“I wouldn’t- puppets these big are slow, clunky, and nothing like what I’m practiced in.” Chiyo refuted in a calm, unimpressed manner. “But if you’re going to make them more common, you will need a name for them.”

“Riding Puppets or Puppetarmor.”

“Bad names. Riding Puppet doesn’t have to be large and Puppetarmor is what you wear- not what you hide inside of like a boy in his room.” Chiyo prodded him sharply on the side, making him flinch and swat the hand away with an aggravated look on his face. A sharp wooden thunk followed as his hand made impact, drawing his attention away.

Ryoma’s expression lost its building annoyance as he looked at her arm, which she held forwards and rolled the knuckles off for inspection. He raised his hand and flicked the side of the forearm, and a hollow thunk followed. 

He whistled in an impressed fashion. “You can’t even tell.”

“Correct, because puppets should be subtle, boyo.” Chiyo declared with a sharp tone, using the hand to flick him on the forehead. He reared back with a scowl, swatting at the hand again. 

“This design really isn’t the type of subtly.” Ryoma grumbled.

“None of your designs are. You’ve been a puppeteer for a decade and you haven’t made one thing that could be mistaken for anything but a puppet.” She waggled a lecturing finger at him, then nodded at his drafts on the page. “You need to hide the weapons better, and make it look more subtle- that’s why it's ugly right now.”

“Firstly- ugly is a subjective assessment-” Ryoma began.

“No it isn’t.”

“- secondly, I happen to like a blocky, boxy puppetmech.”

“Puppetmech? What does that even mean, boyo?” Chiyo raised a brow at him. A whistling pot behind them indicated that the tea was done. Ryoma briefly caught a glimpse of Ebizo swiping his knife and making an onion collapse into perfectly tiny cubes.

“Well it’s a puppet that’s also a mech, naturally.” He chopped a hand as if that made perfect sense, which it did.

“...” Chiyo stared at him in silent, artistic judgement. “...Call it something else.”

“Puppetwalker.”

“Too generic.”

“Warstrider.”

“Too explicit.”

“I’m out of ideas.” He shook his head irritably and turned back to the drafting board, returning his pencil to the page and filling out some details of the draft.

“I’m sure you’ll come up with a good name in time, Ryoma-boyo.” Ebizo said, walking over and gently placing a pair of tea cups and multiple sushi rolls out on the short table next to him. “Here- some snacks as dinner is getting ready.”

“Thank you, Elder Ebizo. I appreciate it.” Ryoma smiled and bowed his head, which the elderly man returned and slowly made his way back over to the kitchen region.

“Still, you need to do more to disguise its weapons, if you’re heading to war again.” Chiyo lectured over his shoulder with a frown. “The ninja of Kiri are unlike either that of Iwa or Konoha- every one of them is a cut above average, they kill the ones that aren’t up to par.”

“The bloody mist graduation, right?” Ryoma asked for clarification, to which Chiyo nodded gravely. 

A normal ninja graduation was a simple test after a somewhat lengthy training period, followed by an escort period in which young ninja are guarded by a Jonin to make sure they don’t just die to other, enemy Jonin and figure out how to take missions.

Kiri, the village of bloody mist, did things slightly differently. They paired their trainees off, taught them everything together, made them fight and understand each other on a fundamental level…

…then, when graduation came, they were forced to fight to the death. It was the single most harsh ‘graduation’ of any ninja village, but it guaranteed that each and every one of their ninja graduates was, at minimum, better than the other ninja they had paired them off with. An expensive way to ensure your professional murderers were in the top fifty-percent of graduates, at least in terms of killing instinct.

They had a correspondingly high quality of average ninja as a result. 

Completely fucking psycho- but since when were ninja supposed to be anything but bloodythirsty, psychotic weapons, huh?

Kiri was pretty unpopular as far as ninja villages go.

“It shouldn’t matter too much- I don’t expect to actually use the Dragoon much against Kiri.” Ryoma shook his head, tapping the pencil on the page. “It’s too big and heavy, and Kiri is largely saturated with water. The first patch of mud I come across would get the frame totally stuck, and then I'd have to spend time digging it out again.”

“...You’re spending all this time working on a puppet you don’t intend to use?” Chiyo replied in an unimpressed fashion as he reached over and popped some sushi into his mouth, chewing thoughtfully.

It was, like all of Elder Ebizo’s food, very good. He wasn’t much of a sushi guy, but it was hard to deny that the combination of meat, rice, and whatever this filler was- was top-notch. “That’s not what I said- I said I don’t expect to use it much, not not at all.” Ryoma replied through a mouthful of sushi, taking up another piece and chowing down. “In its intended role, it’s going to be indispensable to me. In any other role? I’m better off not bringing it out at all.”

He shrugged. “Besides- the Kazekage is having me train eight others in how to use them, so it’s best I reserve my Dragoon in the coming fights and focus on fulfilling objectives they can’t.”

“You suspect them capable of replacing you and your dragoon?” Chiyo asked, reaching over and snatching a piece of sushi for herself. “Egh- tuna.”

“Yeah? It’s not like piloting a dragoon-style puppet is hard. Sure you’re a big target, but so long as each of them have a team dedicated to protecting their flanks, they’ll be fine. The hardest part is just getting used to not being able to float the puppet around like normal.”

“You shouldn’t presume something to be simple just because it is simple for you, boyo.” Chiyo reminded with a stern frown. “Expecting anyone to be your equivalent in- brother! How many months is that Rasa dedicating to preparations?”

“Six months, sister.”

“Expecting anyone to be your equivalent in six months, or to have an equivalent puppet in that time, is delusional.” Chiyo walked around, taking a position right in front of his line of sight so he couldn’t ignore her.

“I’m not expecting that!” Ryoma protested mildly, using a hand to make a brushing motion towards her. “They’ll probably have some teething issues- but they’re not exactly starting from scratch here. They’ll have all my notes to reference, both for design and operation- and I’m the one in charge of actually building the frames anyways.”

He shrugged. “Sure they won’t be great- but they’ll probably be fine. I have faith in them.”

“You’ve been doing this for half a decade. They will have a few months.” Chiyo shook her head. “There’s humility, and then there’s nonsense. None of them will be your equal in this. Not one.”

“Well it’s good that I’m not just giving tips on giant puppets then, huh?” Ryoma groused. “That’s not my only trick, you know?”

“...How long did it take you to create chakra strings with your feet?” She asked with a raised brow.

“...Uh. Maybe a year?” Ryoma recalled with furrowed brows. “I had to figure out how to keep the wood dragoon upright while using my hands for other things. But- I imagine others will take to it much faster than me, now that they know that it exists.”

“They will take longer than you did.” She stated bluntly, without any particular evidence to support the claim. She snagged another bite of sushi for herself, then drank some tea. “That puppetarmor of yours… none of them will master it in time for Kiri.”

Ryoma sighed in a long-suffering way, leaning back fully in his chair and raising his hands, letting them drag across his face.

After a few moments of listening to Ebizo watch simmering water, he dropped his hands. “And I suppose Bolters are high technology that no one will figure out either?”

“No- those are garbage. Even a child could master them.”

Thank you.” Ryoma sighed dramatically, waving a hand at her. “I’m glad my minimal-investment, disposable puppet design is in fact a minimal-investment-”

“It’s not.” Chiyo corrected. Ryoma stood up from his chair and then laid out across the floor, face-down. 

“A sword is a minimal investment puppet. A rock. A branch.” Chiyo ticked off her fingers as she spoke, then sipped her tea. “Those bolters require knowledge of rapid-release seals and explosive tags at minimum, then explosion seals to make them actually useful, then a fire-release technique and experience in handling poisons in order to make use of those gas-cannisters.”

“The basic bolter is just a kunai launcher and a bunch of explosion seals, Honored Elder Chiyo.” Ryoma groused.

“An explosion seal that you invented, boyo.” She said the word ‘boyo’ like someone might say ‘dumbass’. “There was no such seal before.”

Ryoma turned his head away from the floor, squinting over at her. “It- no? Sure I had to figure it out on my own, but without a seal like that explosive tags would just be targeting shiki for the technique- there wouldn’t be much point in using them over a more effective…”

He trailed off as she continued to glower down at him, stone-faced. 

“Did you think every ninja was simply stupid for not bringing in a thousand explosives into each battle?” She asked rhetorically. 

“...It wasn’t that hard to figure out- just a few years of workshopping during my academy days.” Ryoma grimaced, pushing up from the floor. “Someone would’ve figured it out before me.”

“If the Sealing Corps has, they certainly haven’t been using it. Their techniques are specialized in other directions- Sealing-Shiki are rare, boyo. There’s only a handful in Suna who practice in both fields.” Chiyo explained in a somewhat more patient tone. “You spent those eight years in the Academy learning as much as you could, in as many fields as you could. Most ninja do not spend so much time picking up the basics in every disparate art like you did.”

She reached forwards and flicked him on the forehead. He grumbled as she did, wooden fingers making a dull thwack noise as they impacted his forehead. “Listen to me carefully, boyo, I’m only going to say this once. You’re right that you’re nothing prodigious in any one field, save maybe puppetry specifically, but you spent more time learning the basics in everything than most ninja will ever bother with.”

A hook on a fishing wire extended from her sleeve, snaking forwards to hook him by the collar and pick him up off the floor, making him stand upright. “This wide base of knowledge gives you a great advantage over your peers- you’re able to put things together in ways none of them know how to do. Wide foundations make for taller towers, they just take longer to get there.”

She looked him up and down briefly, before sighing and reaching up to brush dust off his shirt. “Those bolters of yours- they’ll be easy to spread around if you give them a model to copy, but creating them from scratch was more than just slapping garbage together, boyo.”

“...Actually the original bolter was almost literally just garbage I found.” Ryoma refuted weakly, reaching up to rub the back of his neck. 

“I know, Gentai still has it.” Chiyo replied with an obnoxiously dry voice. “Come- brother is done cooking. We’re going to eat dinner now.”

—

“Water Release is the most balanced of the elements.” Ebizo began with a calm, fatherly tone. He sat on the other side of a deep pool in the middle of a stone patio, in which Ryoma could see a few lazy fish moving back and forth. “Its fluid nature makes it more malleable than earth, but easier to concentrate and control than wind, fire, or lightning. It maintains its shape to a degree, and is useful for both offense and defense.”

“Water will overcome and exhaust fire of its heat, but will be absorbed and devoured in turn by earth. Water will dissipate both wind and lightning, which diminishes the potency of wind but increases the reach of lightning. Water will naturally seek to accumulate and consolidate- and thus in a clash between two water ninjutsu, the stronger will overcome and be strengthened by its lesser counterpart. Save in circumstances in which they are evenly matched, in which case both attacks will be negated. Water is weightier than any element save earth, and thus its physical impact is second only to earth.”

“The first lesson of Suna-style Water Release is consolidation.” He reached forwards and dipped one finger into the water, then pulled it up slowly. A long tower of water reached up out of the water, stuck on the end of his finger. He dragged it out in a figure eight, and it separated from the pool entirely, a snarling dragon’s head appearing at the end of the water strand.

Then, the water lost its binding power and collapsed back into the pool again. “To complete the first lesson- dip your finger into the pool and use chakra to reach out, grasp the surrounding water, then pull it up and out of the pool. Use none of your other fingers. Keep your finger straight and unmoving while doing so.”

“Similar to chakra strings then?” He asked, reaching forwards and experimentally dipping his finger into the pool.

“Similar- but water is unlike a puppet. Water is formless, shapeless. A puppetry string cannot be used on a formless thing, otherwise one could grasp the air.” Ebizo nodded, placing both of his hands on his knees.

Ryoma, finger in the water, nodded, then started experimenting. This sounded very similar to surface-walking, but as applied to water instead of the typical water walking. Water walking was repulsive, to keep the user suspended on top of the fluid. Surface walking was attractive, to keep the user stuck on the surface as they moved.

So if he used too little chakra, nothing happened. If he used too much…

A tiny explosion of water happened around his finger- the fluid pushed away by his sustained energy. He narrowed his eyes.

A fish bit around his index finger, his eyes widened, pulling the hand-

He lurched forwards suddenly, the fish retreating into the waters and bringing his hand with it. His head was thrown into the shallow pool and soaking his entire upper half.

The fish let go of his finger, allowing him to pull back and clamor back onto the patio fully, staring at the pool with a vaguely offended expression and completely soaked hair.

“The fish of this pool are particularly fearsome.” Ebizo explained with absolutely no mirth in his voice. So little mirth that it was suspicious, in fact. Ryoma glowered at him.

A ghost of a smile overtook his lips, then vanished. “You must be quick. Dip your finger in, gather the water, then pull it out. Before the fish take notice of your digit.”

“I would’ve worn different clothes if I had known I’d be fishing.” Ryoma grumbled, starting to experimentally dip his finger in and out of the pool, shifting the flow of his chakra around as he did so.

“...You own other clothes? I only saw the one set when you used our washer and drier.”

“I own a few copies of this same outfit.”

“Ah, prudent.”

It was at that moment that a fish managed to grab his finger again, and he was dragged bodily into the pond.

“Mhm? Be careful Ryoma-boyo.”

“Thank you, Honored Elder Ebizo.”

Water ninjutsu practice was proceeding about as well as Ryoma could’ve hoped for, he supposed.