Four genin stood on top of a great dune watching a breathtaking sight that appeared before them once they finished the great steep climb. Mana was the first to recover from total awe, she was currently checking and loading several kunai dispenser devices she found and snagged from the camp of raiders that Meiko so fantastically dispatched by herself. The Viper’s Pit was one of the largest and well equipped raider camps in the whole Land of the Wind, it only made Mana admire how awe striking Meiko was and realize what the wedge between her and her ninja friends actually was.
This whole time after being taught by Meiko and then picking up some tools from the mobsters and the raiders Mana was starting to feel like a part of the team but she couldn’t have disposed of several hundreds of raiders surrounding her while unarmed to save her life and Meiko did it so easily, so casually. She was wounded, cut and bruised but she acted like those wounds barely even mattered to her, Meiko was cheerful and vibrant the whole way there. Mana never really was even close to their level… Not until her chakra control is restored.
The ruins were amazing, it was this giant castle composed of three colossal towers placed in a trinity position with smaller channels that could’ve been at least a hundred meters tall connecting the sky reaching towers. The fortress was completely run down, sand must’ve pelted against the stone walls for centuries and yet it didn’t look like it did any lasting damage. All it did was ruin the paintjob… Surrounding the towers of the castle was a collection of four captivating walls that could’ve been at least fifty meters tall. Each of them had red steel plated ornaments that were blunted a little and had minor damage but looked mostly intact. At the center of each wall was a demonic smiling face, the wall looked a bit overly decorated to be practical but the sheer size of it must’ve granted more than enough protection by itself…
“This is the Rashomon Gate, isn’t it? Those walls?” Kouta asked the team for clarification.
“That’s right. One of the strongest defensive ninjutsu techniques, each one has a seal that absorbs chakra to nullify ninjutsu techniques, similarly to Meiko’s armor except thousands of times more potent” Shimo nodded.
“If it’s so amazing why does it have that gapping hole in the center!?” Meiko yelled out right into Shimo’s ear angrily making the young man lean back in fear and shock of how simply the blacksmith got pissed off by him comparing this masterpiece to her armor.
Meiko was quite observant, right on the center of the southern wall there was a giant hole, it went all the way through the Rashomon leaving at least fifteen meters radius hole, enough for a caravan to fit through except it was made so high up that one would’ve had to lift the caravan up there to fit it through.
“So what’s the story of this place, Mana?” Meiko asked scratching the back of her head while the four made their way down the dune, carefully so that they don’t shift any sands beneath their feet and tumble down.
“I’m not that well educated in Sunagakure history but this here used to be one of the largest and most dominant settlements during the Settlement Period. Back before there were ninja villages and ninja were just freelancing wandering tribes, it is said that it was built by a great warrior who was so charismatic and such an amazing strategist that he lead his followers to conquer every other settlement, he was one of the first merciful leaders who accepted those who wished to join his side instead of killing them which lead to the size of his tribe spiraling out of control. These ruins belong to a castle which was the first attempt to settle down, you could say this here is a predecessor of what later became the ninja village” Mana explained.
“Maybe that Fennec guy is trying to do the same thing? Maybe he’s so fascinated by this past leader of the desert tribes that he’s trying to repeat his success?” Kouta wondered as the four got closer and closer to the giant hole in the Rashomon.
“Fennec is using money and influence to buy his way into leading the raiders. That is nothing like what the King of the Desert, as he liked to call himself, was. The King took people in by being someone people wanted to be around, he was merciful, he was also strong and he always knew the right thing to do in any situation he ended up in. He has never lost a single battle and he expanded his tribe through fighting the opposing tribes and taking in those that wished to switch sides” the magician looked at Kouta surprised that he cared so much about this Fennec, she herself had almost forgotten about him. Probably because she was so focused on the mission at hand… Someone like that had to come into her mission report however, hopefully Konoha would inform Sunagakure about such a person so that his quest for a bloody revolt could be stopped before it escalates…
“Hmph… Now I’ll have to run up the wall all the way there, instead of just using my chakra jets!” Meiko complained looking down at her desert attire and internally lamenting her lost armor. She must’ve missed her armor a lot but she never held it against Mana, deep inside the redhead must’ve realized that Mana did what she had to and that she never meant for Meiko’s precious armor to get molten into a solid lump of black rock.
“You’ll have to be carrying me too, I could probably run up the wall for a couple of steps but no way I’d manage to go that high…” Mana mumbled a little bit ashamed that she had to be carried around.
“Fine…” Meiko sighed grabbing hold of Mana’s arm and casually tossing her several meters into the air so that the girl landed right on top of Meiko’s back. The blacksmith leaped up and stuck to the wall so that once Mana landed the blacksmith had already scaled several steps up the wall.
Suddenly after maybe about fifteen steps the girl tripped up, the blue burst of chakra coming out from Meiko’s feet dimmed and the blacksmith grabbed hold of one of the Rashomon’s decorative fangs around its mouth keeping herself from tumbling down. Mana felt the liberating desert breeze before the state of weightlessness change into the paralyzing fear of freefall, she was falling down to the sands below, a fall like that could’ve broken her legs and maybe injured her back, possibly even broken her neck if she landed the wrong way.
The magician tried her best to adjust her position but right before the closeness of the ground made her stop her breath and brace for impact she felt someone’s arm wrap around her middle section. Mana coughed up as the sudden stop of fall felt almost like she had hit something but she felt quite lucky to be caught, obviously had the fall been greater than this she may have suffered internal bleeding but Kouta managed to somewhat repurpose his weight to do his best and stop her fall not instantly but gradually.
Mana smiled and thanked the young man who managed to notice her falling and then turn back and dash all the way down the wall faster than a bullet and properly repurpose the energy of her fall so that she didn’t suffer too many injuries. One could’ve only expected as much from a medical ninja. As the young man dashed through Meiko on his way up the Rashomon the blacksmith waved and apologized before hopping back onto the wall and sticking her feet onto it so that she could finish the run up.
“What the hell was that, Meiko? Mana-chan could’ve died from a fall like that…” Kouta softly warned his teammate to be more careful.
“Sorry, I think I lost control halfway…” the blacksmith’s mood changed back to being almost depressed and disappointed. It must’ve been just like that time in the Katabami mines when she botched the simple Academy transformation technique. Focusing one’s chakra to run up the wall or on top of the surface of water was no rocket science, it was something that most ninja were able to do with no hand seals or without even thinking much about it, only genin right out of the Academy had to focus to pull this technique off. Meiko’s chakra control must’ve been really iffy if she just tripped over like that, it was like the chakra just stopped moving through her feet or something.
“How do you mess up Art of Tree Climbing? It’s a simple Academy technique, I mean you used C-Rank Storage Seal before… Well, anyways, nice save, Kouta” Shimo appeared to be a bit confused by the whole situation but then got over it. He had no reason to doubt Meiko’s effectiveness, the blacksmith just took out an entire raider encampment by herself, what did it matter if she sometimes had trouble with basic ninjutsu?
“I’ll take care of Mana-chan on the way down, just in case…” Kouta nodded and took the magician up in his arms before leaping down and activating his surface climbing technique right before he hit the ground in a larger burst of chakra to break his fall.
Shimo leaned down and examined the hole in the wall before leaping down in a similar manner as well, he questioningly suggested Meiko to help her get down just in case she didn’t feel like it but the blacksmith answered his kind glare with a look of fury, almost like she felt like her teammate was looking at her condescendingly. The Yuki swordsman just shrugged and leaped down, letting the redhead’s sad and distant state to soon follow him. Meiko just appeared to be completely out of it for a while after her small trip-up.
“This crack in the wall… It was made by a punch, a really, really out of this world punch” Shimo dropped a bomb once he landed down on the other side of the Rashomon to Kouta and Mana. The medical ninja gently placed Mana onto the ground with a kind smile that was supposed to let the girl know that if she needed his help she could have relied on him any time. Honestly she didn’t need that, Mana already would’ve relied on anyone in her squad for help. She had grown quite fond of all three of her teammates, then again, she grew fond of pretty much anyone pretty soon…
“Isn’t Rashomon Gate strong enough to withstand a B-Rank ninjutsu technique, with a chakra absorption seal the rank may be bumped up to A-Rank…” Kouta wondered.
“Yeah but techniques like that wouldn’t have left so little damage on the ground around the gate or the other parts of the gate. It looks like the hole was blown out by a concussive hit, look over there…” Shimo pointed at a giant pile of stones having destroyed a small group of clay houses that were built inside the walls. The castle had a small ring of clay houses that were apparently supposed to house ninja who didn’t live in the castle and any non-ninja settlers.
“It didn’t look like the big slugger took much of an effort, if he or she had, the blow would have cracked the rest of the gate because of lack of control and finesse, now the blow just worked like a battering ram but concentrated enough to only damage the center where the blow was focused in. If a blow of such caliber hit the ground it’d cause a shockwave strong enough to blow a village away…” the great rogue detective Shimo continued to analyze the surroundings.
“So someone strong enough to punch a village to dust beat us to the punch?” Kouta wondered, “Well, I guess it only makes sense, after all, aren’t those scrolls Mana took the intel from like really old? Maybe some historic superninja already found the Box?”
“Question remains if this hole was made long ago or just recently… We know that Kouta’s father is after the Box too” Mana replied.
“Oh, so B.U.B. is a box then?” a loud and deep voice hit the ears of the four genin making them instantly turn around to see Kusagoro and his squad of friends sitting on top of a larger clay structure, possibly what used to be a barrack of soldiers. “Interesting… What kind of a box is it?” the man smiled visibly excited by this sidequest of his.
“Father!? Did you blow that hole? This is a historic monument! Konoha and Sunagakure are supposed to protect it together as per the village peace treaty…” Kouta shouted out angrily.
“Yeah, I may have punched that darned thing a bit too strong, we only needed a hole large enough for a person to fit through, we could’ve ran up all the way but it was getting really annoying… It just turns out that this gate is a bit too crappy even when I don’t make an effort” the man thundered out an arrogant laugh.
“Anyways, I will need you guys to tell me what this box is and what it looks like ‘cause me and my team searched this dump through and through and we found nothing… I guess we saw some pretty sophisticated looking stuff but we didn’t know if it was B.U.B. or not” Kusagoro grinned while explaining. It didn’t look like he was in the mood for a conflict, all he cared about was to find that box. All that this was to this man was a giant game, just a race to entertain him while his license is suspended and he’s unable to fight people in his high ranking missions.
“This is ridiculous, father, stop this nonsense, Hokage-sama told us to…” Kouta tried to talk his father down but the voice of his father, now in a much stricter tone interrupted the medical ninja.
“The wench told you guys to confirm that the B.U.B. exists, that’s all. That’s all your mission records in the archive building said. You guys shouldn’t care about actually bringing the B.U.B. back home so there’s no actual conflict with you guys telling us what it is. After all, we can tell you if it’s there or not, the castle is still filled with traps for raiders and treasure hunters, it’s pretty dangerous for some young whippersnappers like you to roam around there” Kusagoro explained.
“If we tell him about the box, Mana-chan won’t be able to use it…” Kouta whispered to the squad trying to tell them to not open their mouth.
“Oh? So this little brat wants to actually use this B.U.B.? Behind the Hokage’s back? What a disappointment…” Kusagoro’s voice informed the four that the man moved right behind them in a brink of a moment and overheard everything that the medical ninja whispered. Such speed was invisible not only to Mana, it was completely untrackable even by ninja, even Shimo looked completely blown away by it and that youngster focused on outspeeding his opponents.
“No way! Mana will get her chakra control back, we’re not letting these guys get their hands on the box!” Meiko yelled out and lunged forward pulling both of the curved swords she looted off of the raiders. The steel cracked into multiple pieces upon hitting Kusagoro instantly without leaving a scratch.
The jounin continued to stand there with his hands locked on his chest, looking seriously ahead right at the castle, he didn’t even bother to turn around and face Meiko and the rest of the team.
“I see… So you’re involved in some criminal activity behind the Hokage’s back, huh, Kouta? Well then… I guess it actually is fine if we kill this brat and all of her brainwashed friends. They’re bad influence on you, Kouta” Kusaguro declared without turning around. His team leaped off the barracks roof and charged forward. A large brute pulled out a steel rod and drove it through his shoulder making a handseal as large metallic gloves wrapped around his arm, his steel backpack extended into tank-like armor that covered his entire body and his legs and then a large helmet like dome shut powerfully around his head with a blue visor fueled by chakra lighting up on his front, two awesome cannons shot up from the backpack armor and then locked onto the man’s shoulders and aimed forward.
“Holy shit, this is awesome!!!” Meiko screamed getting all of her desperation to save Mana’s dream and depression for failing her basic Academy technique behind her. “I’m taking this guy on, I want his armor!” the blacksmith girl yelled out charging to take the man on.
Shimo pushed Mana behind him and got into a sword drawing position to intercept the Hyuuga butler-like looking lady rushing at him and the weird guy beside her. The man had changed his attire from before, most likely because the weather in the desert didn’t let him wear his usual warm jacket. The man now only wore a simple pink shirt which made him look like some singer from Kumogakure when combined with his crazy licked back and flooding with hair gel black hair.
“Father, stop this!” Kouta yelled out rushing out in front of his father and pleading him to call his squad off. The boy knew his companions a little bit more than he may have wanted to admit. While his mother hated the bunch and so they didn’t come over as much as his father may have wanted it, there were several cases where the boy had to meet them. They were so much ahead of the skill level of his teammates that the medical ninja knew the only way to survive this fight was to plead his father to call this madness off.
“I’m doing this for your sake, for both of our sakes. I won’t let your honor be dragged down and shoved into the dirt by those guys. What do you think the old wench would say if she knew you used the B.U.B. behind her back, she’d suspend your license or even terminate it. Also bringing those traitors in will possibly score some points with the lady for me, we’ll be leaving on missions and training like the old days in no time…” the man calmly explained, still continuing to turn his back at the giant scuffle behind him, choosing to just strictly stare at the sky reaching towers of the castle in front of him.
“No, I won’t let you hurt my friends and definitely not Mana-chan!” Kouta roared out as his fist lit up with a blue flame of chakra surging through his body, bursting through his fist as it was all focused into this amazing blow. The ground shattering punch hit Kusagoro right in the face and stuck there for a moment. The ground below Kouta and his father sunk, the shockwave from the blow blew the clay buildings around the boy and his father away, it crushed the ground below them into a crater and then as the boy focused into his punch and pushed it forward with even more determination and force the crater deepened and deepened, widening its radius endlessly.
“I won’t let you hurt them… I won’t let you hurt Mana-chan because… Because I like her!” Kouta roared out pushing his fist with all of his chakra focused into it. Using all of his Juugo legacy to fire his chakra through his body as if it was a cannon, reshaping his feet into cannon-like structures and then pushing his fist deeper into his father’s emotionless and unfazed face using all of the medical ninja prowess to enhance one’s strength. Kouta’s father’s face dyed with surprise as the boy managed to break through his defenses and lifted the man’s body up and sent him crashing through the countless clay building toppling all of them down before digging the man deep into the eastern Rashomon Gate, leaving a small dent in the wall.
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