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Ninpocho Chronicles

Ninpocho Chronicles is a fantasy-ish setting storyline, set in an alternate universe World of Ninjas, where the Naruto and Boruto series take place. This means that none of the canon characters exists, or existed here.

Each ninja starts from the bottom and start their training as an Academy Student. From there they develop abilities akin to that of demigods as they grow in age and experience.

Along the way they gain new friends (or enemies), take on jobs and complete contracts and missions for their respective villages where their training and skill will be tested to their limits.

The sky is the limit as the blank page you see before you can be filled with countless of adventures with your character in the game.

This is Ninpocho Chronicles.

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Kazumi

Kazumi

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Night had fallen across the dunes of Wind Country. Silence had crept slowly in across the village until the only sounds were the soft winds rustling against the windows of the three story home of the Koizumi clan. With her brother and sister tucked safely away into their beds, Tsubaki pulled herself under her covers, a wave of relief flooding over her as the blanket's warm embrace threatened to pull her instantly into a deep sleep. Last night have been... strange. She could not remember going to sleep, or her dream walking in even the smallest detail. As far as she had remembered, that had not occurred since she had begun these strange nightly journeys and it was... unsettling.

A consequence of such, she had felt drained and almost lifeless all of the next day. The details of what actually occurred through those nightly ventures was still vague, but she did know if her hunt was fruitless then she felt as if the entire night's worth of sleep was for naught. Resting her head back onto her pillow, closing her eyes and trying to let the activities of the day sort themselves out, she let her mind wander. Tonight she would have to try twice as hard. She could recall back to how she felt during the caravan trip to the village went, nearly a week and barely any sustenance... everyone had assumed she had gotten very ill, but the truth of the matter would have unsettled them much much more...
 
Tucked in safe and sound. The middle child had actually made it home a little late, due to her losing track of time as she'd been training. Her leg had been wrapped, as she'd had to explain to their parents how she twisted her knee on the way home. By the time she reached her room, she was already sprawled on top of her bed, mouth hanging open in a comical manner. She's never had much trouble getting to sleep after a hard day's work, and her awkward positions and expressions may make some wonder just what goes on in that head of hers...

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In the middle of a dark featureless room, a single light shone down upon the young tomboy. She was lying on the ground, a thick strip of cloth strapped securely over her eyes. "Up..." A deep voice gently echoed along the blank walls. Slowly, she stirred from her resting position, clearly dazed. The voice suddenly rang through the room again, though this time it boomed, "Get. Up." The fierce tone spoke with such ferocity she could feel the room shake. The girl sucked in a deep breath, as if it were the first one she'd taken in years, forcing herself up to her feet. Her body froze completely still, not even thinking to reach up and remove the blindfold in order to see where she was. She knew she had very little time. The earth around her rumbled again, a faint hissing sound filling the air before the voice returned.

"Make no mistake. I am here to kill you. The question is..." The voice slowly faded, as if giving the impression she were safe for now. The moment she thought of moving, the hard stone beneath her rumbled again, this time beginning to crack apart around her feet. "Whether or not you will allow me to." Four thin spires of earth shot up from around her, connecting to the ceiling. In a mere instant, perpendicular pillars multiplied from each base, each of the stone rods splitting open with metal splinters that came no further than an inch of impacting the girl's skin at multiple points across her body. She was pinned, and judging by her stillness, she was aware of that. "...Now leave."
 
The thing line between consciousness and reality blurred, faded and disappeared as Tsubaki finally drifted off into her dreamless sleep. It was technically a misnomer, her sleeps had dreams, but they were not her own. The transition into the dream, or nightmare, of another was vague and she could not aptly describe the odd sensations. It was akin to the drive which pulled a starving man to food, or a greedy man to opportunity... it simply... was. One moment she was laying in bed, and then that nameless sensation... a strange state of existence followed, and before she understood what was happening, she was in the dream of another.

Tsubaki could feel her head ache from a violent rumble, although she had no head quite yet. The transition into the dream of another was not instant, and her consciousness was present before her body followed suite. Again the pain returned as the rumbling began once again. The faint edge of fear brushed against her mind as vision slowly grew from nothingness to light. There was a familiar sensation.. something that tugged at her mind... Mao? She had visited her sister's dreams more frequently than most, though she never seemed to recall her presence. A smile formed upon her non-existent lips as light coalesced into vague shapes. It always made her feel nice to be able to help her sister be free of her nightmares... though she seemed to have a never ending supply of them.
 
The very last thing she was at the moment was free. Making her way through a large cage of metal barbs while blindfolded was an easy way for the girl to get herself killed - especially when she couldn't tell the difference between a sharp object brushing against her skin or breaking her skin. But that was the point. She could not break. Her tensed body steeled itself, and she was ready to take her first step, the sharp point of a spoke just barely touching her cheek. Before she could make it any further, however, the sudden presence of another caused a faint shuffle deep beneath the earth. By the time all of the vague shapes became clear in Tsubaki's head, rather than the familiar visions of Mao falling behind others or unintentionally destroying their garden, she was greeted with the sight of the girl pinned in a tangle of metal thorns.

"Either you move, or you die." The harsh words brought one of the thorns near her leg to extend, roughly piercing through the back of Mao's knee and exiting through her thigh. While anyone at this point would lock up and screech in the unimaginable pain, Mao instead attempted to jerk the leg forward, realizing it was futile once the spike had locked itself in place. But she knew someone else was there, her head turned to face the invader during her momentary struggle. Her arms brushed forward against more of the spines around her, though they would nearly scrape against her body, her skin somehow solid enough to hold through the abuse.
 
The feeling of ground against the sole of her feet felt new, as if the sensation was a enlightening experience. This sequence was almost always the same, though she had found herself thrust into violent or horrifying situations without this almost enjoyable initaition period. Whatever feelings of enjoyment were quickly snuffed out as she saw her sister pinned inside the equivilent of a metal hedge of thorns. She had to try to keep herself from rushing forward to try and brashly rescue her sister, silently reprimanding herself as she forced her mind to remember that none of this was real...

All she had to do was to free whatever had a grip on Mao's mind. In the past it had been the worry of failure. Reassuring words, or a helping hand usually seemed to do the trick, just enough for the nightmarish essence to lose enough of its grip in this world so that she could tear it out and free the subject from its dark influence. So, what she had to do was to understand what was going on... why was Mao seemingly trapped in this haze of needles that jutted from these columns... and what was that voice? It was unfamiliar to her, she believed, but it must have been a voice she knew from the waking world.

"It is okay, Mao-chan. Everything is going to be alright." She spoke, her voice soft, smooth and reassuring. Hearing it actually brought a smile to the elder sister, as this was the only time she ever could actually speak without hating herself. "Shh, we will get you out of there. Don't worry." Tentatively she stepped out of the darkness and over into the light at the edge of the deadly forest of metal. The real question was... how?
 
The spikes continued to slide and scrape along her skin, leaving no mark or cut behind. The only struggle she seemed to have was trying to unpin her leg from the shard of metal jammed inside of her body. She didn't even look to be afraid, her expression showing only concentration as she tried to feel where each of the long shards were whilst planning her escape. "Get out." The voice was completely unfamiliar to Tsubaki, though Mao seemed to recognize it well enough that she should never disobey what the unseen entity told her. It wasn't until she registered the soothing voice that her struggling ceased.

"...Tsubaki?" The slow realization caused her concentrated expression to overcome with a look of surprise, and shortly even panic. "T-Tsubaki. What are you doing here!?" You'd think she would be pleased to hear that someone she trusted was here to save her. Instead, she tried to move faster in order to escape, her struggle causing the spines to brush harder against her body, eventually beginning to puncture her skin. Mao could feel the older girl's footsteps moving closer. "Get away! Get away right now!"

Slowly, the metal shards she was pinned around began to turn, each of them slowly facing Tsubaki at the edge of the deadly maze. The ground slowly shook, that deep, booming voice echoing across the walls. "Secret...Tell no one...Weakness..." Now Mao was very scared, gritting her teeth as she focused all of her effort on pulling her leg out from the thick spine that locked her in place. All the while, the large needles steadily grew toward Tsubaki. "Your weakness...Secret...Tell no one..." The chanting gradually echoed louder the more Mao panicked inside of her prison.
 
Tsubaki paused her step, pulling back as the spikes seemed to turn towards her in a threatening gesture. Just because this was a dream, did not mean that she could not feel the pain from being stabbed... something her syster was thankfully immune to. "It is alright Mao. Relax, I am here to help. Everything is going to be okay." Again she tried to speak soothingly and calmingly, but the more worried Mao seemed to become the more that fear pressed down onto Tsubaki's mind. It was not her fear, of course, but its presence weighed heavily on her as it seemed to empower the nightmare, causing tinges of that same emotion to try and manifest inside of Tsubaki's mind as well.

She vigorously shook her head, trying to keep herself focused as she stepped forward, staying out of reach of the spikes as she tried to get as close of a look as she could. She had learned to not pay much mind to what actually went on in people's nightmares, but this was her sister and the unsettling chanting was becoming increasingly hard to ignore. "We will get you out of there. Don't worry, I am here for you. Everything will be fine." She continued, her attention shifting from Mao to the spikes that seemed to threaten her very presence.
 
"Tsubaki, you don't understand! I--" Her voice was cut off again by the deep chanting that filled the room. "You're weak...You'll die..." Mao continued her panicked tugging, trying to break herself free from impalement. However, Tsubaki would find that her words eventually brought the spikes to stop growing, the sharp edges ceasing their advance toward the dream-walker. The girl's freed leg lifted, taking a deep breath, looking as if she may finally begin making her way out of there in one piece.

"Unless..." The voice brought the walls to shake, each of the spines facing Tsubaki suddenly growing at a rapid pace, threatening to pierce through her body like tissue paper. Just before they could reach their target, Mao's foot stomped down on the ground, causing a large tremor across the room that shook the metal shards from their roots before impaling the older sister. Her body strained, her pinned leg bending far enough to snap the thorn stuck inside her body from the pillar it was connected to. With her body freed, she reached out to tear away one of the main pillars in a surprising feat of strength, placing herself between the remaining spikes and her caring sibling. "You can't be here because I--!"

"Unless I make you unbreakable." All of the remaining thorns of metal turned toward the pair, each of them suddenly shooting forth in an effort to stab through both of them. Mao's arms outstretched, covering Tsubaki from the incoming storm. Hundreds of metal spines stabbed into the ground and wall around them, though the ones focused on the pair made it no further than the younger girl's back. They were stuck, shaking, unable to break past Mao's hardened skin. "I don't want you to see me like this." She almost couldn't speak those words, her voice breaking. Even with the blindfold covering her face, it wasn't difficult to tell that she was at the verge of tears.
 
That feeling of fear continued to weigh heavily upon her, making it feel as if the mere act of standing was taking all of her concentration and strength. Everything seemed to move faster than the eye could see and yet as slow as snail. Mao's voice, the unnamed voice, the chanting, the sound of the pillar breaking, it all blurred together in a hazy mixture. Why was she having such a hard time staying focused? She never had any issues like this before! The spikes seemed to be extending closer and closer to her, inch by inch, but she was unable to move fast enough to even raise an arm to shield herself. Then, as if everything snapped into place around her, Mao was standing there, shielding her from the sharp thin tendrils that burrowed into the ground around her while others seemed to shoot around.

As her senses cleared, she finally was able to comprehend her sister standing there, facing her as she forced herself to speak. It was almost enough to break Tsubaki's resolve right then and there, but she walled off that part of her mind and shoved it has hard as she could to the side. Stepping forward she reached around Mao, putting her hands between the spikes that pressed against the girl's back as she gave her sister a desperate but comforting hug. "It is okay Mao. This isn't real. Shhh, it-." she had to hesitate for a second to keep her own voice from cracking from the wave of emotion that seemed to press down around them, "it is going to be alright. I am here for you."
 
Nothing about this felt right. Just as Tsubaki had to consciously focus all of her concentration and strength on helping her sibling, Mao had to focus hers on the same, her body standing like a stone pillar itself in order to guard her older sister from the life-threatening dangers behind her. As much as the metallic spikes struggled to impale the girl, one of the broken thorns was still lodged through her right leg, the injured limb trembling beneath the emotional and physical pressure currently placed onto her. As much as Tsubaki tried to explain how this was all just her imagination, this scenario felt far too real compared to the other much tamer nightmares Mao had been saved from.

"I...I wanted this." Her voice uttered, her breath catching as soon as she felt her blindfold wet with her welling tears. "I wanted this." She repeated, her tone more firm, as if she were trying to tell herself that truth rather than the one comforting her. The sound of earth cracking drowned out Mao's quiet sobbing as the metallic spines began to crumble, breaking apart into tiny pieces of rubble that gathered around the pair. With the threat gone, the younger girl's arms shook as they returned the hug given to her, a thick rivulet of blood trickling down her leg from the open wound left behind.
 
Tsubaki continued to hold her sister, the weight slowly seeming to lift off her soul as the spined crumbled to rubble around them. It was wonderous that everything felt to real here, in the dreamscape. She could feel her sister's warmth, her almost ragged breaths as she tried to firmly speak, the sharp chill of the air around them. It was almost... real. Many dreams were whimsical, fantastical and outright impossible, and while she would have said the same for this one just a year ago...

Eventually she reluctantly pulled back from Mao, looking down to her sister with a pleased, if still ragged, smile, "I am proud of you Mao. You really are very brave." That was something she always had difficulty accepting, not that she would ever say it. She wanted to protect her sister from being hurt, ever. That feeling extended to their little brother, but that looming threat of something going horribly wrong was ever present with the painless middle child. "It is all better now. We are safe." She spoke softly, telling this to herself as much as she was her sister.

Then, suddenly, she took a careful step back and clasped her hands to her chest and closed her eyes as she tried to focus. This was the time that the nightmare was the weakest, during the calm. All she had to do was feel it out and rip it out so that it couldn't torture her family anymore. Taking a slow and deep breath, she concentrated as Mao stood in front of her, trying to extended her hazy senses out around them to try and find the dream's dark heart but... something was... wrong. She couldn't feel it. She knew it has to be there, but for the first time ever... she couldn't feel it.
 
Mao sniffled as the calm set in, reaching up to finally free herself from the blindfold in the midst of rubbing her eyes. The tomboy rarely cried, and she was quick to steel her resolve again in those moments where she did. Tsubaki's words of encouragement brought a similar smile to stretch across her lips as well. As difficult as it was for her older sister to say, it meant the world for her to hear. No matter how dark the moment was, Tsubaki always managed to know what to do. It was a quality she had always aspired toward. To hold steady.

She didn't seem to mind Tsubaki's strange moment of focus, instead moving her attention down toward the hole that had been torn through the joint in her leg. It was impressive how quick the bleeding was able to stabilize, the girl sitting down as she retrieved a roll of bandaging to cover the wound. Carefully, she covered the lower-half of her thigh and her knee with the white cloth. "Hey, Tsubaki." She tried to get some of her older sister's attention, briefly looking up toward her. "We can't tell mom or dad about this, okay? If they ask, I twisted my knee on the way home." That excuse may sound awfully familiar to the one she'd given to them not so long ago in reality.
 
The expression of concentration on Tsubaki's face was nearly a desperate one as she tried her hardest to feel it out. That concentration faltered breifly as Mao called out for her, but she kept her eyes closed and continued to try and concentrate anyway. When Mao finished talking though, what she said belatedly struck a chord in her and her eyes quickly opened as she looked over towards her sister. "Twisted your..." Was it a coincidence? Surely it must have been. She was only mentioning that because it was fresh on her mind. Nothing specifically like this could happen to Mao. This was... no, it wasn't possible.

With that thought planted in her mind, she closed her eyes and once again attempted to concentrate. As she did an ephemeral dagger jabbed into the side of her psyche as she let out a pained yelp, nearly doubling over from the sensation. There was nothing obviously wrong, but that pain seemed to drive down to her core as she resisted the urge to collapse to the ground. As she opened her eyes, the world had become fuzzy and as she worked to push herself to a stand, she nearly collapsed backwards as the world around her became vague and indistinct.

Again the pain jabbed into her mind and this time she collapsed to her knees, her head bending over as she pressed it agaisnt the ground, cradling her hands around it as she tried to ignore the overwhelming sensation. "What-...Agghhh!" She began to cry out as the invisible force increased the pressure on her, mentally retreating inward as her body was reduced to a pained screaming shell that tried to curl up into a small ball in front of Mao.
 
What was and wasn't possible was a line that continually blurred the more they focused on the world of ninja arts, including the state of her own external presence inside of her little sister's mind. The more she thought about it, the less crazy it may all seem. Mao seemed pretty intent on perfecting her performance of wrapping her leg, making sure it was all done properly and that it would stay in place. This was interrupted when she glanced up toward her sister, noting the imperceivable pain she was clearly going through. "Tsubaki?" Her worried look would eventually blur around the increasingly dull room.

Once Tsubaki dropped down to the floor, Mao would quickly crawl over to her. Something was hurting her, but she had no clue as to what it could be. Was it something she did? Is this why she was told that nobody could know? "Tsubaki!" She threw herself over the older girl, as if trying to protect her from some external force that may be causing this.
 
The screams continued for either an eternity or a few scant seconds once Mao had tossed herself atop her sister in a confused desire to help. Then, without any preamble, the screaming stopped and Mao would thump to the floor as the form she had been cradled over suddenly vanished. The ear hurting scream was replaced by complete silence, save for any sounds Mao herself made.

Back in Sunagakure, Tsubaki shot up from her sleep with a pained yelp, breathing heavily as she seemed to fight against her own body for breath. That pain in her head had subsided, but the memory of it lingered as sweat beaded on her brow. She looked around her private room, peering into the shadows cast by the moonlight as she tried to understand what had just happened. She felt as exhausted as she had before she went to sleep, and that pain continued to resonate in her mind, but neither of those things were what haunted her... "what happened...." she muttered quietly, her low cracking voice barely a whisper as she stared disbelievingly across the room.
 
The sudden shock caused her to gasp for breath, quickly returning to consciousness by the act of falling to the floor. It took her a moment to sort out her faculties, rolling over onto her back and glancing back to the bed that she had just tossed and turned off of. What just happened? At this point, she knew that she at least had to make sure that she didn't hurt herself in her sleep, giving her body a quick once-over. She would stop at her right leg, noticing a tinge of red that began to bleed through the bandaging. "Ah, great." She silently muttered to herself. As long as she kept weight off of it, the wound would close.

This kept her on the floor, leaning her head back and staring up at the ceiling as her mind lingered on the dream she'd had while it was still fresh in her mind. Why did Tsubaki suddenly show up in the middle of her training? And more importantly, what caused everything to go horribly wrong? It wasn't often that she could remember her dreams so clearly. Maybe it didn't have any real meaning, and it was all just a figment of her imagination. But it all felt so real.

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