[closed] Arrival at the Ghost Village!

[TyDie]

"Tch, this is so stupid... You know you don't even have to be here Amaya, I could've handled this myself. It's just a quick check in." Ryu pouted in the corner, looking out a small window in their room at the rolling waves. The two were aboard a small travelling boat, transporting them to a small village on an island of Water country. Their mission was simple as Ryu stated; make contact with a village and figure out why they had lost contact in the first place. Ryu, as always, wasn't thrilled at the idea of his sister tagging along, believing that he was the best around. "I hope we get there soon... Getting sick of watching the waves."

His hand rested on his hilt, anxiously flicking the sword slightly out of his sheath now and then and making an annoying 'click' sound each time the blade fell back into place in his sheath. It was a tick that he'd had for years, and one that no doubt Amaya despised. "The only weakness of Water country; everything is boats. Boats here, boats there, boats every-fucking-where... I'm about to say screw it and run to the village myself."

[Willoria]

Amaya was of course ignoring her brother's grumbling. Her only annoyance was that he had the window... and was complaining about it. The girl had been staring at the walls for some time now, dying for a view of anything really. No instead she sat sullenly in her own corner, spinning a senbon between her fingers and her frown deepening with each sound of her brother's sword snapping back into its sheath. She had complained to him about it at least three times already, and she felt like she was done warning him. Without looking at him she moved with a flick of her wrist, aiming to put the senbon firmly into his hand right between bone and tendon. She didn't want to maim him after all... just hurt him.

"All this bitching and at least you have the window." She turned and smirked at him a moment. "For a tough shinobi you sure do whine a lot."

[TyDie]

Ryu was looking out the window, hardly paying any attention to his sister at all as he lost himself in his own concerns... mostly being bored. However his attention was swiftly brought back to his sister as the sudden feeling of sharp pain shot through his hand, a familiar feeling. "Ow, bitch!" Ryu exclaimed and retracted his hand from his sword, shaking it back and forth as if to try and shake off the pain before checking his hand and seeing the senbon sticking out of it. With a grunt of rage he grabbed the needle with his other hand and threw it back at Amaya, though not with the intent to stab her with it. "Keep it up and you'll be the one whining."

Ryu crossed his arms over his hand, not even concerned about the pain still lingering in his hand or the small bit of blood dripping down his hand. He just wanted this to be over already... But a part of him was very curious about what all had happened. "You think they died? Some sort of plague maybe? Or maybe a big monster ate them. I hope it's something we can fight..." The boy kept fantasizing about some grand creature that he could kill, at least it'd make things more interesting than this stupid boat right.

[Willoria]

Amaya snickered at her brother's reaction to the senbon, grinning proudly as he clumsily tried to throw it back at her and she caught it with ease. She quickly cleaned it off and put it away with the others, rolling her eyes at him. "All threat and no action." she muttered. "As always." Naturally she knew her brother would never actually hurt her. At this point there had been too many close calls between them during training and he'd become almost paranoid about hurting her now.

The girl shrugged as Ryu started asking questions aloud, though she knew they were probably all rhetorical. "No idea. But if they're all dead it could be something completely out of our league, so lets at least be careful when we get there, hm? We can't just rush in blind. We need to make sure its something we can face. Its more important we survive to report back than get some kinda glory trying to fight something we can't best." She knew her brother could be stubbornly proud, according to her grandparents their father had been just as bad. But Amaya felt it was so much worse, because he was trying so hard to achieve his own fame already to stand out from their father.

[TyDie]

Ryu, the little hot head that he was, scoffed at his sister's responses to his questions. If they were dead they were too weak, and the world was better off without them. He wasn't going to rush in blind of course, she was right about that, but he had no doubt that he could take anything that tried to oppose him. "Tch, and admit defeat? No, i'm bigger and badder than whatever we're going to find here. And besides, knowing our luck, some miners probably hit a gas leak and the village was suffocated in their sleep. We never get any dangerous missions..."

Ryu went back to sulking in the corner, looking out the window at the waves go by, his hand falling back to his sword to begin his annoying habit of clicking his sword. However, after only a few more clicks of the sword, they finally heard a voice above deck. "LAND HOOO!" the voice of the man in the bird's nest yelled out, prompting Ryu to rise to his feet. "HA, about damn time!" Ryu set to work immediately, gathering all of his belongings up as well as a small set of rations he had brought along, stuffing it all in a small backpack before slinging it around and heading for the door. "Any longer and I would've lost my mind. Let's go see what the hell is going on." With that, Ryu headed topside, eager to get off of this damn ship.

[Willoria]

Amaya rolled her eyes at her brothers response, one that had come to be very typical of him. "You're going to be the death of me." she muttered, knowing he'd hate that statement too. Her and her twin brother had a tendency to fight at almost a constant, but the two still cared about one another. He had beaten himself bloody over a training incident that had nearly ended in Amaya's own death. She knew it was an accident, but it didn't stop his reaction. Their grandmother was an expert in Iijutsu and had preserved Amaya's life, but the close call had left both with infrequent nightmares.

She rolled her eyes as he went back to sulking at the window and of course clicking his sword. She found her hand straying to her khyber blade, grip tightening over the handle of it before the call went out that land had been spotted. The girl almost sighed in relief as she knew this meant the clicking would at least stop for a short time. She followed him out the door and up, shaking her head and sighing heavily. "Let's just get this shit over with." she muttered.

[TyDie]

Ryu hardly caught anything that his sister had said, knowing full well she was probably muttering some shit about him and his gung ho attitude. He could scarcely believe she was his sister sometimes, or at least he wondered if she was his father's daughter. She didn't seem to have any of his sense of honor or glory... But then again, his mother wasn't quite the same as Ryoga was. She took after Ren far more than he did, which made her calculated approach annoying in comparison to his own favored approach of "slash first, ask questions later".

Nevertheless, there was far more to be concerned with now that the twin's boat was making landfall. A few minutes after the call went out, the two shinobi would be on deck, watching as they came closer to shore. Once they made their way into the island's dock, Ryu wouldn't even wait for the crew to anchor themselves, leaping off of the deck to the wooden dock. "Let's go Amaya, time to see what's going on around here." Ryu would run ahead off the dock, making his way to the village ahead of them. Once there, he'd find that indeed there were very few people walking around, and all of them seemed incredibly paranoid. Many stayed inside, and could be seen through their windows, while those in the streets were constantly peering over their shoulders.

The village was the center of a mine that provided Kirigakure with ample raw materials for the Muramasa family. As such, the mine was of value, but it was clear they had done little mining recently, as their carts were all empty. "Get a load of that Amaya... empty carts. I bet that's why we're here, Muramasa family wants their money, so now it's our problem. Hey, you!" The male twin called out to a shifty, dirty looking man, beckoning him over. The man was scrawny, almost emaciated even, probably poor or just hadn't thought to store food in case of shortages. "Y-Yes?" Ryu crossed his arms with a huff and shook his head... this guy was easily twice his age, and not even half the power. What a waste of a life... "Who the hell is in charge here? We're here from Kiri."

The poor guy seemed to turn hysterical with joy at the realization that shinobi were present now, dropping to his knees and raising his hands to the sky before trying to reach for Ryu in praise. Ryu, of course, took a step back out of offense and disgust. "Oh happy day! Kiri shinobi to save us!" "Get the hell away from me you dirty fucker! Who the hell is in charge here?" Perhaps Amaya would have better luck getting a straight answer out of him, because if he kept up his act much longer Ryu was likely to kill the bastard.

[Willoria]

Naturally Amaya rolled her eyes at her brother's antics, but also she knew better than to let him get too far ahead of her. She leaped over the side of the boat after him and landed on the dock, trying to keep up as best as she could. She couldn't quite match his speed but eventually she caught up to him, just as he cursed at the old beggar. "Ryu!" she snapped at him, giving him a shove before placing herself between Ryu and the beggar. "I'm sorry, sir, my brother is a complete hothead sometimes." she told him, reaching into a pouch and extracting an extra rice cake she'd brought with her.

"Here, but eat slow, you look like you haven't eaten in awhile and we don't want you throw it up right?" she nodded to the old man and he seemed to understand, nodding with her as he gingerly took the food she offered him. Silently she wondered if the ship they came on had brought enough food to make sure everyone got at least something. She was certain there would at least be supplies, given the way their trip was arranged it had to be something for this town on that ship. "Can you tell me where to find someone in charge?" she asked the man, after giving him a chance to take a couple bites of the rice cake she'd given him.

The man nodded and pointed without a word, perhaps too scared to speak again after Ryu's reaction previously. Amaya followed the direction he was pointing, a building that looked like some kind of business. She thanked the man and nodded, heading that way before giving her brother a quick glare.

[TyDie]

Ryu did little but huff with annoyance as her sister pushed him aside and dealt with the dirty beggar. Honestly, he didn't have the time or patience for these kinds of matters, but if Amaya wanted to deal with the undesirable he was all for it. That just meant he would have less to do with the gross bastard. He watched the exchange, the man eating the rice cake and giving Amaya the information requested with a simple point to a small hut a couple dozen meters away from the twins. Ryu rolled his eyes as Amaya glared at him, following behind her as the two made their way to the building. Whatever, at least they wouldn't have to deal with the common rabble anymore; they would get to talk to the head honcho.

Ryu wasted no time simply walking into the building, finding what appeared to be a living room in a poor state of appearance. It wasn't unlivable of course, but you could tell that whoever lived there had no respect for the place. "Hey, who's the foreman around here?" Ryu called through the building, not caring at all about the invasion of privacy. A few moments later a man responded from the kitchen. "Who the hell barges into my house uninvited? Do you have any idea who you're talking to!?" Not long after the voice rang out a short, chubby man rounded the corner, and immediately recognized the headbands adorning the twin's foreheads.

His tone and disposition changed immediately. "Oh my! Kiri shinobi! Thank goodness! Ahem... Please excuse the state of the building, we're experiencing a bit of a slave shortage... that's why you're here." The man dusted himself off and gave a small bow before the twins, to which Ryu simply nodded his head, not so much a bow as it was his recognition of the man's bow. "Muramasa, Takeda, at your service." Takeda waddled over to a small chair and took a seat, motioning for the twins to push some stuff off of the nearby couch and sit if they wished. Ryu declined, not wanting to catch whatever disease might be present on the couch, instead choosing to stand.

"Yeah yeah, Muramasa in charge, got it. So what the hell's going on? Your family back home is pretty pissed you know, this mine hasn't had any output for weeks. We expected to find you dead... so where's the iron?" Takeda coughed a little and shifted his eyes about, clearly disconcerted by his family's concerns in regard to the mine he was in charge of failing recently. It wouldn't be good for him if the clan head made it a priority... he'd get fired, or worse. "Y-yes well, uh, about that... It's a tricky situation you see. My slaves, they've uh... disappeared." The man scratched his head and crossed his arms, clearly not phased by the potential loss of life and far more concerned with the loss of labor.

Not that Ryu cared. They were slaves after all, and most were hardly close to what his mother was. "So the man starving out there... slave too, huh?" Takeda nodded in affirmation. "Everyone here except myself, a few guards and taskmasters, and the boating crews are all slaves belonging to the Muramasa family. We had close to a hundred a month ago... now less than 30 remain."

[Willoria]

Amaya followed her brother into the building, frowning at the state of things inside. She couldn't even help a wrinkled nose and look of disgust as the chubby man waddled into the room. When offered a place to sit she didn't accept either, choosing instead to remain standing and cross her arms over her chest, letting her brother do more of the talking. Of course she bristled at the mention of the slaves. Ryu may have been comfortable enough to brush it off, telling himself their mother wasn't like this, but to Amaya it was more. She hated her mother for the way she left this life, but simultaneously admired her for what she had pulled herself out of. It made her sick to see people treated this way, even slaves, never even given the opportunity her mother was given to prove herself worth so much more.

"They're probably dead." she suddenly said, getting snippy with the man as he spoke of the slaves disappearing. "Those people are less than skin and bones, and you have them mining? The exhaustion is killing them one by one, I'd be willing to bet money on it. But look at you." she seethed, stepping forward she drew her khyber blade from her back with a tell-tale sound. She poked at him in the belly with the tip of it. "You certainly aren't lacking, are you now?" she told him. "How can your stock perform if you don't give them the necessary food to walk, much less to mine.... pathetic fuck."

[TyDie]

Ryu's eyebrow raised suddenly as his sister's temper made itself known, the young girl approaching the head of the mining operation with her khyber blade at the ready, not so gently poking the portly man in his belly as he sat. He, of course, was terrified as the girl's rage filled the room like a dense fog. Ryu, on the other hand, smirked as his sister threatened the man, silently loving the fact that for once he wasn't the one jumping the gun. "Woah! Pointy tip! Hey, easy now, relax! Let's talk this over!" Clearly Takeda wanted the woman to put her weapon away, but Ryu would step in to see that that didn't happen. "Maybe you should hurry up and tell us what the fuck is going on instead of fearing for your shitty life. Come on, out with it."

"Alright, the miner's aren't dropping from exhaustion I swear!" Takeda whimpered and gasped as the tip of the weapon pressed against him. Sweat beaded on his forehead as he struggled to stay as far back from the knife as he could. "The miners, they were scared of something down there! They say other miners were taken by something, and later on they found bones! They say some monster lives down in the mine and they woke it up, but I thought it was just stupid talk to get out of mining! Now please, ease up!" Ryu glared at the man in disgust as he spoke, clearly not even really knowing what was going on.

"You mean to tell me that your sorry ass didn't even go check the mines to confirm their concerns? You just sent them down there to their deaths? What the hell is the matter with you!? Amaya, gut this fucker and let's get on with this." "NOOOO, WAIT!" Takeda pleaded for his life, pointing out the window at another man walking by the foreman's building. "Him! Go talk to him! He was the first one to bring it up to me! He knows the most!" Ryu looked out the window at the dirty, but admittedly burly looking middle aged man, black hair cascading down his back in an unkempt ponytail. He looked back to Takeda and Amaya, shaking his head in disgust one last time before nodding his head to Amaya. "He's not worth the time it would take to clean your sword. Plus I think he pissed himself, we should go before we smell it."

Without another word he'd head for the door, leaving the Muramasa with the wet pants to clean himself up.

[Willoria]

Amaya was enjoying herself a bit too much as she poked at the man with her knife. Each time he acted like he had nothing to tell, she pressed a little harder, by time they were ready to step out and he'd already pissed himself, there was a red spot on his shirt. Nothing life threatening of course, she hadn't pierced him deeply, but enough to bring forth a little blood. She didn't want to get close to him, but as her brother left the girl paused and leaned over him, her khyber blade now against his throat, lifting his chin with it to force him to expose his throat more. "I won't kill you." she told him darkly. "Be rest assured... I will report every piece of this when we get back. Slaves might be no better than workhorses here, but even a workhorse gets fed. Feed your stock, care for them the minimum, or I'll talk to my friends in the Head Hunters and see that someone pays you a visit." The man looked terrified as she finally left the small house, and she knew if he'd known her name he would have feared further. After all, Karagata Shiv, the leader of the Head Hunters, was practically her uncle.

She was grinning as she joined her brother now. "Pretty sure he shit himself too." she told him, chuckling as they went in search of their next lead.

[TyDie]

Ryu smiled and laughed as his sister told him the guy probably filled his pants up, a sort of deep laugh that you would let out after an incredibly funny joke. "Hahahahaha! That's awesome, good on ya! People like that piss me off, no consideration for anyone but themselves... makes me sick." To punctuate, he spit off the man's porch, then made his approach towards the slave who had made the first report to Takeda. "Oi, you there!" He called out to the dirty, gruff man, who turned and raised an eyebrow at the inquiry only to find Kiri headbands. "Shinobi... Good. About time someone with some competence showed up. Takeda can hardly wipe his ass."

Ryu crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow at the vulgar, offensive statement towards the man's owner. "You know I could kill you for talking about your owner that way right?" The man looked Ryu dead in his eyes, clearly unafraid despite the truth of the boy's statement. "Are you going to? I just heard you laughing about making the guy shit himself, you really gonna kill me when you made fun of him yourself?" Ryu stood his ground and stared deep into the slaves eyes for a moment, as if reading the man's soul... And after a few moments he let out a small breath and held out a fist to the man, a sort of friendly greeting. "You've got balls, I respect that. Kazuki, Ryu."

The man grinned and met the boy's fist with his own, giving a nod of agreement. "Getsugo, Kouta. I'm guessin you two are here to help with that monster huh?" Ryu nodded in affirmation. "Yeah. The mine stopped putting out resources, so the Muramasa family sent shinobi to figure out what's going on. Clever move, good way to go over your owner's head." Kouta shrugged nonchalantly at the boy's assumptions. "We slaves can't go through the same channels the rest of y'all can. We gotta get creative. Takeda doesn't know his head from his ass, so when he told us to go down and die in the mines we refused. The ones who didn't... never came back." The man looked down to the ground... clearly he lost some friends down in that mine or something, the deaths weighed heavy on his shoulders.

[Willoria]

Amaya laughed along with her brother, still grinning as they came up on the slave they had been told to speak to. Of course, as her brother made some comment about the man talking about his owner that way, Amaya slapped Ryu upside the back of his head and frowned at him. Otherwise however she didn't interrupt, and waited as the man explained to the pair what was going on. "Well I'm pretty sure your boss is going to disappear soon... once we get our reports back to the Muramasa." she told him, smirking slightly as she spoke. "In the future though, don't hesitate to sneak a note to one of the ships, you might be slaves but that doesn't mean you have to suffer in helplessness." she remarked, sighing. "I'm Kazuki Amaya." she finally said, introducing herself as well. "Our mother was a slave before she was a shinobi, before she married a leader of the Seven Swordsmen... even slaves can find their way up."

Amaya wasn't above trying to encourage slaves to rise above their stations, even though she'd heard rumors it was even harder nowadays for some reason or another. She was still young enough she didn't delve into politics too deeply. She didn't miss though that clearly he had lost friends in that mine, to whatever monster lurked below, and the girl quickly tried to move the subject ahead without dwelling too long. "What do you know about this monster? Any reports on what it looks like or does from the survivors?"

[TyDie]

Kouta was admittedly dumbfounded by what Amaya had to say about slaves, stating that the twin's mother was in fact a slave at one point. "Wait... your mother... a slave? I wish we could all be so lucky... I'll hold out hope that I get the chance to prove myself. Nice to meet you two, most shinobi don't give slaves the time of day." The man gave a small bow before continuing on to answer Amaya's question, though the answer would shed little light on the situation. "...No one has lived to talk about it. Some of them don't even believe it's real, but I saw those bones. Human skeletons, picked clean of each and every last bit of meat, bones crumbling to dust after the marrow was drained out. And they were far too new to be ancient remains. There's something down there alright."

The man's fear was clear, but what was he to do? He wasn't trained to fight like the two shinobi twins were, he could hardly defend himself against something of such power. But they stood a better chance than he did. Ryu, admittedly, was a little caught off guard by the description of the remains left by whatever was down in that mine, but he had to maintain composure. After all, this was what he wanted. "Heh, this got interesting fast." Kouta narrowed his eyes slightly at Ryu, clearly not finding it nearly as enjoyable as the young swordsman did. "Ain't nearly as interesting when you're not sure if you're gonna wake up in the morning."

Ryu shrugged, but gave no verbal retort, which was an improvement from the normal backtalk he gave people he thought were cowards. "Speaking of that... you two look pretty young. Are you sure that you're up to the task? Maybe reinforcements would be a good idea..." Ryu, the hothead he was, of course took that as an attack on his ego. "Ha, and share the glory? Hardly. We've got this, just another day for us shinobi right Amaya?"

[Willoria]

Amaya smiled at the man's reaction, going so far as to return his bow with one of her own before the conversation continued. Of course, as expected, her brother wasn't going to entertain the idea of reinforcements and even seemed to expect Amaya to agree with him. However when he turned to look at her he'd be greeted by the sight of her rolling her eyes at him and giving him a look before turning to Kouta to respond. "We're equipped to handle most threats." she tried to assure him. "We'll take a look and assess things, if it looks like too much we'll send for reinforcements before getting too far though." she added, reaching out to grab the man's wrist and giving it a light squeeze in reassurance.

She turned and gave her brother a look that strongly suggested he'd better agree with her 'or else' of course. She knew he probably wouldn't listen to her, but she had to try. She could see Kouta was more concerned for their safety than anything, given what the poor man had obviously already seen.

[TyDie]

Ryu didn't miss his sister's urge to agree with him about getting reinforcements if the need arised, but he didn't understand why. She wasn't afraid as far as he could tell, and this guy wasn't getting involved... was he? "Do you want to come too Kouta? Since you're so concerned, maybe you can make yourself useful and hold a torch." It was a playful taunt, but one that Kouta responded to with a serious tone. "Shit, if it means getting revenge on that thing i'll do whatever I can." Ryu honestly hadn't expected that answer. A man, not versed in any form of martial art and who had no idea what ninjutsu even was, was willing to follow them into a dangerous cavern to help them in any way he could?

Ryu smirked and crossed his arms, giving the man a nod. "Keep that up and I might buy you myself Kouta. I like your attitude, and that's a great idea; grab a torch. We'll need it." Kouta gave a nod and walked away from the two shinobi, clearly looking to gather some supplies from a nearby bunkhouse. While they stood alone, Ryu turned to Amaya. "Can you believe this guy? I've never seen a slave with so much courage. Reminds me of mom kinda..."

[Willoria]

Amaya rolled her eyes as the man went to get a torch and whatever else he needed. "Yeah, mom's courage turned to cowardice the minute she didn't have dad though didn't it?" she rolled her eyes and sighed heavily, crossing her arms over her chest as she looked at her brother. "He shouldn't go with us. He's worse than a civilian, he's a slave. He's never been allowed to stand up for himself in his life, he has no concept of how to fight. And I don't just mean as a shinobi. He probably couldn't even slap someone! What are you thinking. He's going to get himself killed, if not one of us."

Amaya rolled her eyes again and huffed, turning towards the mine they had seen and started walking towards it, obviously frustrated enough she felt the need to walk it off and get a minute before Kouta rejoined them.

[TyDie]

Ryu scowled at his sister as she spat her venom about their mother, wanting desperately to backhand her for her comments. "I've told you before to shut your mouth about our mother, Amaya. That doesn't change just because we're not at home. I didn't think that he'd actually accept, but i'm glad that he did." He followed after his sister as she walked towards the mine, knowing full well she wanted to distance herself from him. He knew, he just didn't care; they were stuck on this mission together, and he wasn't done talking yet.

"He's got a fire in his eyes. He wants to get revenge on this thing, it killed his friends. Look me in the eye and tell me you don't respect that... Or are you a bigger coward than he is?" Ryu glared at his sister as his own venom came out, clearly pissed. "I've known that guy for 2 minutes and already he's shown less fear then half my graduating class. He deserves the chance to prove himself, you said so yourself. If he thinks he can handle it, it's his life on the line." Ryu finally crossed his arms, his piece said, though of course Amaya always had some kind of comeback. It never ended with these two...

[Willoria]

Amaya made a frustrated sound and stomped her feet as Ryu pursued her, and the girl spun on her heels to face him, clearly seething. "You can blind yourself to what mother did at the end of it all all you want. It doesn't change the truth! She ran into the arms of another man and died for it! She let herself become useless alone, and I won't be that!" she snapped at him, snarling under her breath as she glanced around, not wanting Kouta to hear them fighting over him, or their mother. "The issue is, it isn't just his life, Ryu! You think he's going to survive this? He won't, not without us intervening and then its going to be one of us dying in his place."

The girl crossed her arms, fuming because she couldn't get away from her brother, and she couldn't stop the constant rage in her chest at the circumstances around her mother's death. It was something she had never really forgiven her for, leaving the girl in a strange position where she both respected her mother for the strides she had made from the life she lived, to hating her for perceived weakness and the way she died.

[TyDie]

Ryu desperately wanted to continue the argument between him and his sister, as he obviously had plenty more to say about their mother's death. Rest assured when this was all over, they'd be brawling. However, Kouta returned soon after Amaya finished her side, an awkward look on his face. "Woah... Am I interru-" "No. It's fine." The tone in Ryu's voice would show that it was most definitely not fine, but Kouta wasn't going to get in the middle of a sibling quarrel like this. "Riiight... So I got a few torches and some basic medical supplies... just in case."

The man's backpack was slung over his back, and a torch was already in hand, the oily rag on one end not lit yet. Ryu gave a nod, looked to the still seething Amaya, and let out an annoyed sigh. "Alright, let's get this over with. Stay behind us Kouta. Guide us through the tunnels." Kouta gave a nod and gestured towards the mineshaft entrance, and the three would make their way into the dimly lit cavern towards a small freight elevator. It was a cramped fit, meant for mine carts and slaves, but the three would make it work well enough. Behind them, Kouta would begin to pull on a rope, and slowly but surely they'd descend into the darkness...


To Be Continued