When the comforts of civilization begin to dull our senses, we must never forget that in the beginning, there was war. And war. And more war. Long before there were empires, there were humans consumed with greed and the hunger for power. Resources, territories, information—these were the forms of sustenance upon which we preyed. Today, we call such habits vices. Oh, how arrogant we have become! Are we not still impelled by those primordial emotions? Is the advent of war so far-fetched? But alas, for you to truly understand, we must dive deeper into this land’s half-forgotten past.
There was a time when might was the only law that humankind knew. Fearsome clans roamed throughout the land, seeking amenable grounds within which they could take root and opposing forces against whom they could test their mettle. Given the irregularity of nature’s bounty, certain regions appealed more than others, and dominion over such coveted territories became the spark that ignited the earliest inter-clan wars. These fierce, internecine affairs tended to conclude only when one side had decimated their competition into oblivion, and many clans of story were rendered extinct during this period.
The victors of war, having claimed their territories, often made truces with surrounding locals, offering protection in exchange for access to the yields of agriculture. Over time, certain communities emerged as more dominant than others, either due to numbers or sheer talent, and their rapid expansion would force smaller, neighboring communities to either collapse into their fold or be devastated. When the dust settled, humankind found itself divided into the five major territories that we are familiar with today. And was the bloodshed over? With our lands obtained and our bellies filled, were we finally content?
06/01/2023 June is for Juggin
We made it y’all, another month of OTA, and fresh off the press we have another promotion ready. Leaving behind the opening bonus sadly, we welcome the jugggggg! June is for juggin AKA working hard, so we are making it a double rewards month for every mission completed! Yes we said it's double rewards, now you all can really get into the thick of those builds if you work hard enough. And who knows what you might uncover in the process. AND all jobs are free to enroll no quest EXCEPT ANBU(Black Ops) roles.
Mission Name Bird Lives Matter (I) Rank: C Repeatable: Once per PC Description: Every year, a few birds are sacrificed to the gods in a ritual as part of religious tradition on the Divine Mountain Tops. However, this year a group of activists have arisen and stolen the sacrifices, citing the traditions as "old" and "barbaric". The churches have requested that the stolen birds be retrieved before the ritual, by force if necessary. Objective: Retrieve stolen birds in Lightning Country, "Divine Mountain Tops". Rewards: 200 EXP, 25,000 Ryo
Being called up to solve a theft case was quite normal for shinobi. More often than not, the thieves wanted to profit off the stolen items. However, this time the thieves weren't just in the open. They also had the moral high ground.
Hyouka wasn't one to care about religion or morality until it benefitted her. As such, this kind of job wasn't one that she would be taking anymore. However, the identity of the other person who accepted this task forced her to accompany him:
Uchiha Hitora, a rare ex-Jinchuriki in a world where common knowledge dictates ending your time as a Tailed Beast's vessel also meant the end of your life. Now that all the villages were tightening up security on their Jinchuriki, Hyouka had to accompany him out the village just to keep up appearances.
Dressed in her usual black attire and jacket, she waited at the village gates for Hitora to show up.
“Why do I get the distinct feeling this is going to turn into a shitshow?" She mumbled to herself as she waited.
Post by Uchiha, Hitora on Jul 3, 2023 8:02:51 GMT -6
Why Is This Mission Name So Long?!
Hitora palmed a yawn as he approached where the woman awaited him. He was finally back to some semblance of normalcy after having had the Nine Tailed Fox ripped from his body, how he survived was still a great mystery to everyone in the know. He, however, was just grateful that he would have the chance to rip the still beating hearts of those who separated him from the Tailed Beast from their chests. He had already decided, regardless of if he were to get the beast sealed back inside of him or not that he would still end the lives of those involved no matter who they were.
Hitora waved at the woman, someone he had seen in passing back when he was still the Jinchuriki of the Nine Tailed Fox, he could not quite remember her name but he was sure it was something to do with Ice. Maybe it was Sharon, who knew anymore. He was wearing his normal attire, the black hakama, the white and black Shihakushō with the straw tabi and white toe socks. The inside of the black part of his Shihakushō was is standard bright red in color, and dangling from his left hip was his long black Katana.
“Hello there, so you’re the one who will be joining me, apologies for dragging you along but the village demands we keep the appearance of me being the Jinchuriki still.” Though at a glance it was clear that the influence of Kurama was fading from him. His orange hair was still slowly but surely returning to the black of his Uchiha Heritage, the whiskers that had appeared on his face had begun to fade as well, though they were still visible at this point in time, but definitely less noticeable than they had been just a few weeks prior.
With that he pulled the copy of the mission scroll that he had from the inside of his Shihakusho, causing the small necklace of Kurama with the sapphire eyes to jangle against his chest within his Shihakusho, and read the mission for an idea of where to start the search. “Well…we don’t quite know where these ‘activists’ seem to be holed up, that would be too easy, I’d imagine though that perhaps starting at the last church where the birds were and doing our own investigation might yield some sort of clue or indication where they went. Unless you know where they went to already…?”
As he finished speaking he turned his eyes that were blacker than the void of space to the woman, as if he were asking her many questions and yet none at all. He merely wanted to stretch his muscles a bit, and get out of the stuffy hospital and the gaze of constant surveillance by the village that such a predicament as he had been in would most definitely warrant. It was tiring ducking the ANBU that had constantly kept an eye on him, though he doubted he ever truly ducked them and they merely let him think that he had lost their trailing team.
■(Mission) Is it over if they have the high ground? (Hitora)
Soon enough, a young male appeared exactly as Hyouka had read in the documents: A young man similarly dressed in black, sporting a single-edged sword slightly longer than the double-edged one on her own back. In contrast to his black eyes, Hyouka had a peculiar case of heterochromia, though her red and violet eyes weren't so prominent one would notice on first glance.
She returned the greeting. “It's alright. Just expect to see my face again if you're going out of the village in the future."
Hyouka kept silent as Hitora produced and read about the mission from a scroll. She had already read it before leaving the house, so she just waited for him.
“That's right, we don't know where their base is." Hyouka produced a pamphlet from her jacket with her left hand, turned it around so he could read it from his perspective and reached out towards him. The pamphlet only said to stop the barbaric and outdated sacrifice of birds and to join the protest in front of the church.
“It used to only be once a week, but since there's a week to go before the ceremony, the protests are going to be held every day starting today. I don't know if we'll make it before today's protest ends, but even if we don't, we can just wait 'til tomorrow's.
Any other questions?"
In the corner of her eye she saw ANBU personnel hiding behind a corner. She saluted quickly by locking eyes and nodding her head with the slightest of movements before turning her attention back to Hitora.
Post by Uchiha, Hitora on Jul 4, 2023 8:41:43 GMT -6
THE BIRDS AREN'T REAL!
Hitora sighed, he could see the woman making eye contact with the ANBU agent over his shoulder. He was quite tired of being followed by these people already and he shook his head as the gently took the pamphlet from the woman. “No, no real questions at this time, other than how do you want to play this? Shall we try to be diplomatic or shall we go for aggressive negotiations right away and force them to hand over the birds?” Hitora skimmed the contents of the pamphlet as he waited for her to respond.
It was your typical cult like activist group, taking about how the birds were so precious and should not be treated in such a way. Whilst he agreed that the birds lives shouldn’t be forfeit for the humans, he also knew that they were still, from a legal stand point at least, property of the religious group as far as he could tell. Meaning that they could do whatever they pleased, sure they were killing the birds as part of this whole process, but as long as the village was not being tasked with ending this religious ceremony there was naught that he could do.
Nor did he really care to, after all he was not really a believer in any religion nor did he quite care for the safety of the birds. This was just a mission to him, a job to be done in this case. “Well then, shall we head out to this protest? Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll have the stolen birds with them so we can be done with this in time to get dinner, after all I’m sure there is some sort of fair area set up to profit off the ceremony.”
Hitora spoke the last bits with a wry smile that showed he was half joking and half serious, after all for some strange reason wherever people gathered there seemed to be those wanting to make a quick sale on some cheap goods that had surely been marked up and gouged in terms of price for even the most basic of items.
■(Mission) Is it over if they have the high ground? (Hitora)
Hyouka answered Hitora's question seriously. “I prefer to talk to them diplomatically then secretly follow behind them so I know where to go when I decide it's time to switch approaches."
Nodding to his suggestion to leave, she turned towards the exit, greeted the guards and walked out.
As their feet carried them towards the sacred mountains, Hyouka started speaking up again. “Just so you don't end up asking the abbott this: even if he does agree to stop using live sacrifices, the practice isn't really up to him to change. There's an entire chain he has to send a petition up before anything can be done about it. Long story short, it's not something he can change within the span of a week much less a month."
Thinking for a bit, she decided to change the topic. “Have you been to the Divine Mountain Tops before? I haven't gone much since I was a kid. My parents used to force me over once every month or two. Boring as shit. I think even the parents of our latest generation don't even care for it anymore."
Of course, being a kid, she also thought of ways to escape going to church service. Ninjutsu training worked sometimes, but it wasn't always foolproof.
Post by Uchiha, Hitora on Jul 7, 2023 10:49:38 GMT -6
Itching To Go, No Where To Go.
Hitora would follow the woman, listening to her speaking about him not asking the Abbot to try and change the ritual instantly or something. This made the Uchiha scoff followed by a short and low chuckle. “I have no plans to speak to the Abbot about anything but information to help find those who stole the bird, to be honest I could care less about the religious beliefs of the Country itself, seems kind of pointless to me as a Shinobi whose fate will be decided on the battlefield to believe in anything beyond myself and the powers, I have within me.”
Hitora continued to follow the woman, sometime later she would ask him if he had ever been to the Divine Mountain itself. He shook his head, the darkening orange locks bristling a bit as he did. “I have not been to the Divine Mountain, at least not that I recall nor that I had been told of. If my parents believed in such things, they didn’t bother to tell me about them at all. As far as I care its just a regular mountain that some crazy old people decided would be the center of their ramblings.”
Hitora was not one for religious or pious thought processes. He was being a hundred percent honest when he earlier said he did not believe in any force outside of those that he could actually experience and to date the had never had a religious experience. The closest thing he supposed that he had to one was when the Nine Tailed Fox was ripped from him, and he did not die. “If anything, others should start bowing to me as a God, after all I somehow survived having a Tailed Beast ripped from my body.” He let out a wry laugh at that thought.
The thought of others worshipping him as a God, but that was a short-lived happy thought because his mind then turned back to the fact that he had lost the Tailed Beast itself inside of him. No, he was not going to let himself forget that moment nor color it as something positive. He was going to get the demon sealed back inside of him. This mission was just a warmup, something to help prepare him for the task of winning the honor back for himself, not even a matter of pride of the Uchiha itself.
He would place his hand over his stomach where the seal had once been shown to any who would look below his Shihakushō. After a bit of walking however, the two of them would eventually reach the start of the path to the Divine Mountain, the stairs that would lead them to its apex, though he was not quite sure if they should head straight up or look for some representative of the Church to deal with down here in hopes of starting their search for the birds. As of this very moment, however, the young Hitora had his five senses all turned up to their maximum, hoping to end this quickly.
Hyouka could understand Hitora's point of view. However, he was not alone. The village would back him, and in the case they couldn't, they'd take revenge where possible. She chose not to speak about it, though. After all, the village had literally just failed someone big time and that person was none other than Hitora himself.
Hitora's humor regarding the miracle of his continued existence was not lost on Hyouka. “Oh yeah, you really do count as a walking miracle. Unfortunately that's going to be kept secret for now, so no telling anybody yet."
Soon, the church's roof started coming into view. A long flight of stairs appeared, but they were nothing to shinobi who could skip them by jumping high. From the bottom, nobody could be seen, so if the protest was still being held, it would be up outside the church.
Leaping up the path, Hyouka could already hear the chanting of slogans becoming clearer and clearer as she neared the church. Quickly, she looked up into the sky to check the time of day.
Early noon. They got here faster than she expected, perhaps because Hyouka remembered the way.
As expected, as soon as they reached the top of the path, a group of people came into view. They raised up banners and flags with slogans matching the pamphlet Hyouka had shown Hitora earlier. Hyouka deliberately shifted her gaze away to the church's doors after a glance.
Hyouka would speak once Hitora caught up. “Alright, you wanna try your hand at negotiation or you wanna meet the abbott first?"
Post by Uchiha, Hitora on Jul 8, 2023 10:08:02 GMT -6
Look! Its a BIRD!
It did not take long for them to encounter the many banners and iconographies of the ritual and religion behind said ritual. They were celebrating it seemed, likely still in the early stages of this celebration as the various stalls and shops were still setting up. Like any other ritual or festival, there seemed to be an almost unnatural desire to have it also masquerade as a festival, ‘any chance to have a party I suppose…’ thought the Uchiha as he looked around a little bit at the people who were hard at work setting up for the coming days of relaxation and consumption.
It was then that the Jonin that was with him asked if he wanted to go to the church first or try to negotiate with some of the protesters who had also shown up and were actively protesting this whole process due to the sacrifice of the birds. “I suppose trying to talk to those that have the birds currently couldn’t go too terribly wrong…” He then looked sideways at the woman he was with as they walked, his left arm resting in the hilt of his black and red sword hilt.
He then began to look through the masses of the protesters to see if he could find someone that looked relatively high ranking. He eventually found someone that looked to be the leader of one of the protester groups and smirked a bit to himself. He then walked up towards the man, his eyes still the black lumps of coal that they normally were. “Hello there friend, so you’re trying to protest the killing of the birds in this here ritual is that more or less correct?” He was a bit on the nose regarding this situation, but there was no really good way to make this connection start naturally.
The man seemed to brighten up with a big smile on his face that his group’s efforts were garnering such attention. From a Hidden Cloud Shinobi at that too! He was practically ecstatic over this revelation. “Why yes! We find this whole process to be quite barbaric in this day and age! They could do away with this pointless ritual entirely at this stage in our lives or if they needed to they could use a bird simulacra instead! But they opt to continue killing these innocent birds as if they were just a nuisance animal or overpopulated!”
It was then, as the man was speaking almost to put a period on his statement that a bird flew over their heads and decided it was time for it to do its business. That bird must have had a large meal earlier because well…the man that Hitora was speaking to soon had a large glob of white bird crap landing square on his head. Hitora could not help but stifle a bit of a laugh at the timing of the situation, but managed to keep his composure all the same while he listened to the man go off on his little rant as it seemed…
Hitora picked talking with the protestors first. Hyouka nodded and followed along. Normally she would propose that they split up, but Hyouka knew that was not an option after what happened to Hitora. Thankfully, the first person they approached was enthusiastic.
She listened to the conversation, but her eyes got drawn elsewhere as a bird approached. It was the exact same species as the one supposed to be sacrificed. She contemplated catching it, but hesitated. Hyouka didn't have the Sharingan and couldn't spot any markings on the bird. Not to mention, catching a bird in front of anti-bird violence activists was not the most sound of ideas. They still had a week.
Hyouka was very glad that she did. She even backed up a bit in preparation to jump up and catch it. Before anyone could react, there was a soft thud, then the man speaking had his hair weighed down by something white. She backed up even more.
“That's gonna need a thorough washin'..." She muttered. Perhaps Hitora might be close enough to hear, but the protesters weren't.
Perhaps it was karma, even if the church's teachings say little about the subject.
At this point, Hyouka gave up the idea of catching it immediately. She turned her attention back to the group of activists, watching for anyone possibly stepping out of line.
Post by Uchiha, Hitora on Jul 15, 2023 10:23:28 GMT -6
Moving Along.
The man had a flabbergasted look on his face as a bird had landed a shot square atop his head, even a bit on his face. He however, to his credit, was able to regain his composure pretty quickly and asked if Hitora had any questions. It was at that moment that he heard Hyoka make her comment about how he’d need a washing after that large a movement landed on the man’s head. This caused Hitora to nearly break his composure again but he was able to reign himself in somehow. He then gave a warm smile to the man.
While he smiled the young Uchiha’s fading whiskers somehow became more apparent to those who might be looking at him and he said “Sure, I’d like to speak to those in charge of this whole thing…who might have information on the birds that were stolen from the religious people over there” then he hooked his right hand over his shoulder, his thumb pointing towards where the church or whatever they called the place where the religious activities took place was located “I’d like to meet such a person, they sound just up my alley!” Hitora kept the smile on his face the whole time.
Though he smiled and spoke in a warm tone, his left hand stayed resting on his Katana’s hilt. Only those familiar with him would recognize that it was his ready stance when trying to look nonchalant and staying in a conversation. Hitora considered using his Sharingan to help his case but figured that he would just be wasting his chakra to do that, the man proved this point a moment later. After looking like he was deep in thought for a moment, an action that seemed completely foreign to him he said “Sure! I can take you to Marusai-san! Follow me!”
He would then start to walk for a good few minutes, leading the two Kumogakure shinobi to a tent furthest from the temple and the festivities area where the protest was set up. “Marusai-saaaan! I brought some pretty interesting people to come meet you! They wanted to know more about the guy who orchestrated the act of saving the birds!” The blissfully unaware idiot all but shouted out as they approached the tent. An audible sigh could be heard from the tent as they were shown into the tent as the man within the tent, Marusai Hitora supposed, was seemingly rather tired of the man’s stupidity.
“How many times must I tell you not to talk about that Kouki?” The man seemed rather exasperated at Kouki. He then turned around and stared at Hitora’s forehead for a moment and ran a hand over his face. “Goddamn it Kouki…You brought Ninja here, you knew that the cult up there were going to hire someone to bring the birds back. Good job.” When Kouki began to speak, he was silenced by Marusai raising a hand to silence him and signalling him that it was time for him to leave the tent.
Without another word Kouki left looking dejected and depressed that he messed up again, it seemed he could do nothing right. “So, let me guess: The cult hired you cloud ninja to take the birds back for their little ‘ritual’ of murder, that about, right?” He looked from Hitora who as always had his arm resting on his hilt to the icy woman known as Hyoka, trying to gauge their reactions and what they would do next. Hitora decided to let Hyoka speak first, she was the Jonin on the mission after all, she should be the one to speak to the leader first afterall.