Michino spent no less than a week recovering fully. Partly due to the repercussions of re-entering the Wind Country from the atmosphere, but mostly from using his demonic blood. Tapping into their demonic sides was something the Toraono weaved into their combat training the moment a child begins to show signs of latent power. Nearly every soldier their clan produced could tap into the gifts of the Demon Beast King, and a rare few could do more than just ‘tap’. Michino had more power than he knew how to handle, and having only finally confronted his fear of using in the face of adversity the soldier decided he needed to hone it before making the trip back. Especially since that trip had to cut through the Godsfall.
Okibi had shown him on an old map where they roughly were. The Dead North mountain range where the oldest and most powerful of sand worms were said to nest. Only 5 kilometers below where they were, was the fastest route to Suna; the Godsfall. Even then, they couldn’t just cut right through it with all the Unbent activity, though he was going to desperately try. Over his multiple trips of getting lost in that strange part of the desert, there was only a handful of tricks that actually worked. Amazingly walking in a straight line was one of them, but Michino doubted the entire war had just simply been wrapped up over a single attack, and there was bound to still be dangers in the dunes awaiting any traveler. Tack on that it was also a weird part of the desert where crazy stuff just happened for no reason, and well, safe to say the martial artist was more than just a little concerned. Especially when it came to transporting Otami. Her mother completely downplayed the child’s ‘loss of sense’, as she seemed to be disconnected from the world all together. In the following week of training while Okibi began making packs to travel, the soldier watched the teenager simply allow a venomous snake to bite her, fall into a hole while walking absently, stare at the sky during a wild storm while resisting both of the adults trying to drag her back into the cave…it was like there was a core part of her mind that just wasn’t there, or something was just barely controlling her every now and again. Yet then, she wasn’t always like this either. ‘Days of Clarity,’ Okibi called them, when her daughter was just a normal sixteen-year old girl who had been raised away from civilization. She would ask the questions Michino expected: more details about a father she had never met, why he was training his body so harshly every day, if she could study the Tora-no-Ken as well, how long it took to master, and the most requested - would she get to meet Tama? It was a question that caused him to stiffen up, as he was not sure on how to answer. Was the mad scientist even still alive?
After the seventh day, Michino unleashed a powerful attack that was a mix of blade mastery and demon fire-laced ninjutsu. He sheathed his blade after the attack, standing before an open path in the mountains that had not been there before his sudden strike. Rocky debris crumbled down the sides of the newly formed 5km canyon that lead directly towards the golden dunes. Otami looked on with eyes of sheer awe and Michino was certain he would be hearing question from the girl for the rest of the day on how to do that. The demoness in his head groaned even as her twin gave a patient smile before lifting his backpack. The dawn was cresting over on their left and a cold wind kept the swirling golden grains dancing through the air. Lifting a hand to his face, he pulled up a cloth to protect his mouth before nodding towards the other two to follow his lead. They didn’t walk down the new crack in the mountains either, but ran, as the trio could already feel the dangerous invertebrates borrowing towards the surface.
Tama’s eyes opened up slowly, taking in the low lights of crystal lights in the corners of the room. His body felt heavy and sore, perhaps a little sick, but it was alive. He inhaled deeply, tasting for the first time in literally hundreds of years the dusty room. Ever since he had broken away from the Universal Karma’s curse, he began to stop tasting, feeling pain, or anything worth living. It caused him to begin coughing until his body turned on its side. Before long though, the coughing turned into chuckles. The mirth of his mouth began to bubble up harder until the mad scientist was full laughing in his absolute victory. He had done it. Ryuu Tama had beat the Universe itself in completely preventing his death as he breathed in the oxygen into a brand-new body.
Once his fit of laughter was done the scientist gathered his legs under him and pushed up into a wobbly stand. His naked feet padded across a surprisingly cold stone floor. His hand touched the material of the clothing he had laid out for himself before the transfer, its softness a dream. Caught suddenly by how curiously sensitive he was, the scientist reached down and stroked the wood of the table his clothing had been laid on, feeling every last groove and splinter as he did. He drew the hand back and rubbed his thumb over the fingers a few times, noting that he seemed way softer than normal too. Was it because he had been a wraith of time stranded away from normality so long? Tama’s eyes narrowed. No…his senses were…
Grabbing the pile of clothing and bundling it under his arm, the nude Hybrid rushed down the stairs that lead into the cloning vats where had stored the rest of his normal furniture. Digging through the boxes from his last move he finally managed to find a hand mirror and quickly pulled it out to look at his face. When he did the scientist dropped the vanity glass and his clothing in a startled cry as he leaped away from it. His back hit a dresser, the pain sharp and brimming over with burning fresh nerves screaming at him.
He was young. Way younger than he should be. The face in the mirror said barely early twenties, when he knew for a fact that he should easily be in his late forties. His hand stroked up at his clean face, patting the soft flesh, confused on how this was working since the body he had designed was, itself, supposed to be close to his living age as possible. Theories and book pages flipped through his mind as he thought back on every possible out come of the experiment, cross examined by all of his current knowledge, and Mikaboshi was the only thing that made sense.
The genes in this body were amazingly his own. It had taken a lot of money, time, and heavy bribes but Tama had managed to get a hold of some of his old pickled flesh. It was just a chunk of arm skin, suspended in fermaldahyde, a piece of himself that had been used in the earliest part of solving the mysterious aging problem. It, and the early research, had been abandoned in one of the many labs he had made in his deepest days of madness…which had also been when he had been eating human souls the most. It was just a theory, but, he suspected that his newly cloned body had stable Ancient genes, unlike the original. When his old master woke up the latent evil lurking in his blood, the Ancient genes began attacking his human ones. This was old information and the base of his study on what eventually lead to his cure - exchanging out his chakra coil. Since it was his own hand that crafted this form, he must of accidentally balanced out his genetic code to work with the deadly linage. Perhaps now, instead of aging him, the Ancient DNA was now repressing the process, but it didn’t activate itself until his soul fully merged with the body. Which meant he was still in his late forties…just really didn’t look it. He was going to have to test a few thing, but, at least now his hair was finally back to normal.
A few minutes later and the scientist donned his lab coat before reaching up to straighten his tie a little. Scraps of cloth that were originally part of the suit lay scattered around him, snipped away from a few precise jutsus. It normally would have taken him hours of trail and error, multiple suits, and far more resources he’d be willing to sacrifice to accomplish such a simple task as trimming the access of a bad fitting suit; but when you could manipulate time freely, why not learn? Once he reached the bottom of the stairs again, Tama inhaled gently and flicked his wrists upwards. The air condensed around his form, then quickly lifted him up the stairs back into the main room. The explosion of air blew out candles and turned over what little furniture he had left as the scientist descended back onto the magic circle and looked up at the ceiling. His control on how much air he could manipulate, unlike his other Hybrid brethren, was limited without a secondary form of control. His hands slipped into three seals that released the pores of his flesh to throw a quickly condensed mass of chakra into the air. However, unlike the other Hybrids he heard roamed about Suna, he doubt they ever had to learn how to use the elements with hand seals first. Raising his hands into the air, with a bead of chakra focused at the center of both palms, he grabbed the air with his chakra like a net. With a single swing of his arm all of the air in the dungeon suddenly shook before exploding upwards sending all that was left of the Uzumoreru Palace up towards the sky, and back down into the cavern below; while a mad scientist shot up and through the lone opening at the peak of the mountains.
The night had come unnaturally fast for the trio pushing through the Godsfall, followed then by a sudden storm. Dodging through the sand worms seemed like a walk in the park now as the three, linked together in a single line by hands, carefully proceeded through a full blown desert storm. Lightning was striking mere feet away from them at least six times, and through the roar of the wind Okibi begged the ebony giant to find shelter, but he continued to repeat; we can’t.
The Godsfall was a part of the Wind Country that wasn’t to be trifled with. The moment they stepped off the path Michino knew by heart, they would be lost and most certainly would die. Yet needle like rain, deadly lightning turning the ground to glass mere feet away, and a wind strong enough to blow away all three of them pushed down hard. Okibi had no idea how the man leading her along even knew where he was going, and her faith was wavering. Then, the next sudden thing she knew, they stepped onto dry, hot, sand. A giant orb of firery death burned down on their wet forms, quickly drying the water from their clothes. The mother looked around, releasing the Toraono’s hand and looking back at her daughter who had the same perplexed look. There wasn’t a single cloud in the sky.
“The Godsfall is a land of mysticism and curses. It does not follow the laws of this world, and in fact has a very core set of rules to obey if you want to travel safely. Day can be night, night can be summer, and summer can be the end of the world all in the span of three minutes. I have walked through here a number of times, far more than I wish to count, and have a number of working theories on why its like this. Just keep following me, no matter what you see or what is happening, and we’ll make it through so long as we don’t come across any of the Unben-”
A black, grisly, hand shot up from the burning dunes and gripped at Michino’s fire leg. The creature, burned from demon flame, quickly popped up from the sands with six more rising a little slower behind it, howling in pain and looking to fight. On reflex the martial artist struck the creature’s solar plexus with enough force to send it hurtling back towards its comrades.
“Quick! Move towards the glowing blue gem in the distance no matter what the desert looks like! Never stray off the path and don’t spill and blood-” The sicking crunch of bones and flesh under the pressure of stone interrupted the Toraono. Looking at Otami, she had a very nonchalant face with a single fist raised up. Very slowly the soldier turned around to face the grisly spectle as he grabbed his katana to prepare for what would come next. One didn’t just simply spill blood on the Godsfall’s golden grains…it almost always summoned literal demons. Omnious black clouds began to swarm the sky, rushing in out of nowhere. The sun was quickly blotted out, a pitch black darkness covered everything, and the disturbing sounds of something eating the squished foes replaced their vision; probably for the better.
“Toraono!” snorted something big and horrible in the darkness, “I smell you, show yourself. I wish to taste your other sacrifices…”
“Back, Phumbaba!!” roared the demonkin as his purple flames ignited around him at the draw of his blade. The weapon itself was also covered in the crackling lavender flames, seemingly leaping at the fat green demon revealed before them. The monster stepped back a few feet, wary of the Toraono’s demon fire, but not afraid of it.
“You know the rules of this part of the desert! ‘Blood spilled upon the unholy grains of the Godsfall will be met with a creature of deadly shade, deal struck or battle won, only then can you move on.’ It’s on the fine print, child.”
“I am fully aware of your bargins, but the blood spilled was not by purpose. If you wish, we will fight, but, do you really want to?” the flames increased in size as Michino released a bit more of his chakra. The green demon before the group knew full and well that, even if he could disconnect the two women behind him, he’d still be out numbered. The creature grunted and rolled the bloody rocks around the sand until it became a grotesque mud ball of Unbent. The overgrown imp sneered at the soldier and snapped his fingers, giving someone a pass in the Godsfall for the first time in a century. The sudden darkness that had swarmed them erupted, tearing away from the sky like old sheets. The heat and sun was suddenly back on them both and Michino turned to look at Okibi who looked terrified and actually quite done, while her daughter looked as indifferent as usual. Ignoring the building pain from surging that much demon blood, the warrior turned back the blue gem in the distance and held back his gigantic hand. Owari gripped her daughter’s and then tightly grasped the soldier’s offered hand as once again she was pulled along through the shifting horrors of the Wind Country’s forbidden desert. Towards a shining blue gem in the far distance…
Sunagakure.
Okibi had shown him on an old map where they roughly were. The Dead North mountain range where the oldest and most powerful of sand worms were said to nest. Only 5 kilometers below where they were, was the fastest route to Suna; the Godsfall. Even then, they couldn’t just cut right through it with all the Unbent activity, though he was going to desperately try. Over his multiple trips of getting lost in that strange part of the desert, there was only a handful of tricks that actually worked. Amazingly walking in a straight line was one of them, but Michino doubted the entire war had just simply been wrapped up over a single attack, and there was bound to still be dangers in the dunes awaiting any traveler. Tack on that it was also a weird part of the desert where crazy stuff just happened for no reason, and well, safe to say the martial artist was more than just a little concerned. Especially when it came to transporting Otami. Her mother completely downplayed the child’s ‘loss of sense’, as she seemed to be disconnected from the world all together. In the following week of training while Okibi began making packs to travel, the soldier watched the teenager simply allow a venomous snake to bite her, fall into a hole while walking absently, stare at the sky during a wild storm while resisting both of the adults trying to drag her back into the cave…it was like there was a core part of her mind that just wasn’t there, or something was just barely controlling her every now and again. Yet then, she wasn’t always like this either. ‘Days of Clarity,’ Okibi called them, when her daughter was just a normal sixteen-year old girl who had been raised away from civilization. She would ask the questions Michino expected: more details about a father she had never met, why he was training his body so harshly every day, if she could study the Tora-no-Ken as well, how long it took to master, and the most requested - would she get to meet Tama? It was a question that caused him to stiffen up, as he was not sure on how to answer. Was the mad scientist even still alive?
After the seventh day, Michino unleashed a powerful attack that was a mix of blade mastery and demon fire-laced ninjutsu. He sheathed his blade after the attack, standing before an open path in the mountains that had not been there before his sudden strike. Rocky debris crumbled down the sides of the newly formed 5km canyon that lead directly towards the golden dunes. Otami looked on with eyes of sheer awe and Michino was certain he would be hearing question from the girl for the rest of the day on how to do that. The demoness in his head groaned even as her twin gave a patient smile before lifting his backpack. The dawn was cresting over on their left and a cold wind kept the swirling golden grains dancing through the air. Lifting a hand to his face, he pulled up a cloth to protect his mouth before nodding towards the other two to follow his lead. They didn’t walk down the new crack in the mountains either, but ran, as the trio could already feel the dangerous invertebrates borrowing towards the surface.
Tama’s eyes opened up slowly, taking in the low lights of crystal lights in the corners of the room. His body felt heavy and sore, perhaps a little sick, but it was alive. He inhaled deeply, tasting for the first time in literally hundreds of years the dusty room. Ever since he had broken away from the Universal Karma’s curse, he began to stop tasting, feeling pain, or anything worth living. It caused him to begin coughing until his body turned on its side. Before long though, the coughing turned into chuckles. The mirth of his mouth began to bubble up harder until the mad scientist was full laughing in his absolute victory. He had done it. Ryuu Tama had beat the Universe itself in completely preventing his death as he breathed in the oxygen into a brand-new body.
Once his fit of laughter was done the scientist gathered his legs under him and pushed up into a wobbly stand. His naked feet padded across a surprisingly cold stone floor. His hand touched the material of the clothing he had laid out for himself before the transfer, its softness a dream. Caught suddenly by how curiously sensitive he was, the scientist reached down and stroked the wood of the table his clothing had been laid on, feeling every last groove and splinter as he did. He drew the hand back and rubbed his thumb over the fingers a few times, noting that he seemed way softer than normal too. Was it because he had been a wraith of time stranded away from normality so long? Tama’s eyes narrowed. No…his senses were…
Grabbing the pile of clothing and bundling it under his arm, the nude Hybrid rushed down the stairs that lead into the cloning vats where had stored the rest of his normal furniture. Digging through the boxes from his last move he finally managed to find a hand mirror and quickly pulled it out to look at his face. When he did the scientist dropped the vanity glass and his clothing in a startled cry as he leaped away from it. His back hit a dresser, the pain sharp and brimming over with burning fresh nerves screaming at him.
He was young. Way younger than he should be. The face in the mirror said barely early twenties, when he knew for a fact that he should easily be in his late forties. His hand stroked up at his clean face, patting the soft flesh, confused on how this was working since the body he had designed was, itself, supposed to be close to his living age as possible. Theories and book pages flipped through his mind as he thought back on every possible out come of the experiment, cross examined by all of his current knowledge, and Mikaboshi was the only thing that made sense.
The genes in this body were amazingly his own. It had taken a lot of money, time, and heavy bribes but Tama had managed to get a hold of some of his old pickled flesh. It was just a chunk of arm skin, suspended in fermaldahyde, a piece of himself that had been used in the earliest part of solving the mysterious aging problem. It, and the early research, had been abandoned in one of the many labs he had made in his deepest days of madness…which had also been when he had been eating human souls the most. It was just a theory, but, he suspected that his newly cloned body had stable Ancient genes, unlike the original. When his old master woke up the latent evil lurking in his blood, the Ancient genes began attacking his human ones. This was old information and the base of his study on what eventually lead to his cure - exchanging out his chakra coil. Since it was his own hand that crafted this form, he must of accidentally balanced out his genetic code to work with the deadly linage. Perhaps now, instead of aging him, the Ancient DNA was now repressing the process, but it didn’t activate itself until his soul fully merged with the body. Which meant he was still in his late forties…just really didn’t look it. He was going to have to test a few thing, but, at least now his hair was finally back to normal.
A few minutes later and the scientist donned his lab coat before reaching up to straighten his tie a little. Scraps of cloth that were originally part of the suit lay scattered around him, snipped away from a few precise jutsus. It normally would have taken him hours of trail and error, multiple suits, and far more resources he’d be willing to sacrifice to accomplish such a simple task as trimming the access of a bad fitting suit; but when you could manipulate time freely, why not learn? Once he reached the bottom of the stairs again, Tama inhaled gently and flicked his wrists upwards. The air condensed around his form, then quickly lifted him up the stairs back into the main room. The explosion of air blew out candles and turned over what little furniture he had left as the scientist descended back onto the magic circle and looked up at the ceiling. His control on how much air he could manipulate, unlike his other Hybrid brethren, was limited without a secondary form of control. His hands slipped into three seals that released the pores of his flesh to throw a quickly condensed mass of chakra into the air. However, unlike the other Hybrids he heard roamed about Suna, he doubt they ever had to learn how to use the elements with hand seals first. Raising his hands into the air, with a bead of chakra focused at the center of both palms, he grabbed the air with his chakra like a net. With a single swing of his arm all of the air in the dungeon suddenly shook before exploding upwards sending all that was left of the Uzumoreru Palace up towards the sky, and back down into the cavern below; while a mad scientist shot up and through the lone opening at the peak of the mountains.
The night had come unnaturally fast for the trio pushing through the Godsfall, followed then by a sudden storm. Dodging through the sand worms seemed like a walk in the park now as the three, linked together in a single line by hands, carefully proceeded through a full blown desert storm. Lightning was striking mere feet away from them at least six times, and through the roar of the wind Okibi begged the ebony giant to find shelter, but he continued to repeat; we can’t.
The Godsfall was a part of the Wind Country that wasn’t to be trifled with. The moment they stepped off the path Michino knew by heart, they would be lost and most certainly would die. Yet needle like rain, deadly lightning turning the ground to glass mere feet away, and a wind strong enough to blow away all three of them pushed down hard. Okibi had no idea how the man leading her along even knew where he was going, and her faith was wavering. Then, the next sudden thing she knew, they stepped onto dry, hot, sand. A giant orb of firery death burned down on their wet forms, quickly drying the water from their clothes. The mother looked around, releasing the Toraono’s hand and looking back at her daughter who had the same perplexed look. There wasn’t a single cloud in the sky.
“The Godsfall is a land of mysticism and curses. It does not follow the laws of this world, and in fact has a very core set of rules to obey if you want to travel safely. Day can be night, night can be summer, and summer can be the end of the world all in the span of three minutes. I have walked through here a number of times, far more than I wish to count, and have a number of working theories on why its like this. Just keep following me, no matter what you see or what is happening, and we’ll make it through so long as we don’t come across any of the Unben-”
A black, grisly, hand shot up from the burning dunes and gripped at Michino’s fire leg. The creature, burned from demon flame, quickly popped up from the sands with six more rising a little slower behind it, howling in pain and looking to fight. On reflex the martial artist struck the creature’s solar plexus with enough force to send it hurtling back towards its comrades.
“Quick! Move towards the glowing blue gem in the distance no matter what the desert looks like! Never stray off the path and don’t spill and blood-” The sicking crunch of bones and flesh under the pressure of stone interrupted the Toraono. Looking at Otami, she had a very nonchalant face with a single fist raised up. Very slowly the soldier turned around to face the grisly spectle as he grabbed his katana to prepare for what would come next. One didn’t just simply spill blood on the Godsfall’s golden grains…it almost always summoned literal demons. Omnious black clouds began to swarm the sky, rushing in out of nowhere. The sun was quickly blotted out, a pitch black darkness covered everything, and the disturbing sounds of something eating the squished foes replaced their vision; probably for the better.
“Toraono!” snorted something big and horrible in the darkness, “I smell you, show yourself. I wish to taste your other sacrifices…”
“Back, Phumbaba!!” roared the demonkin as his purple flames ignited around him at the draw of his blade. The weapon itself was also covered in the crackling lavender flames, seemingly leaping at the fat green demon revealed before them. The monster stepped back a few feet, wary of the Toraono’s demon fire, but not afraid of it.
“You know the rules of this part of the desert! ‘Blood spilled upon the unholy grains of the Godsfall will be met with a creature of deadly shade, deal struck or battle won, only then can you move on.’ It’s on the fine print, child.”
“I am fully aware of your bargins, but the blood spilled was not by purpose. If you wish, we will fight, but, do you really want to?” the flames increased in size as Michino released a bit more of his chakra. The green demon before the group knew full and well that, even if he could disconnect the two women behind him, he’d still be out numbered. The creature grunted and rolled the bloody rocks around the sand until it became a grotesque mud ball of Unbent. The overgrown imp sneered at the soldier and snapped his fingers, giving someone a pass in the Godsfall for the first time in a century. The sudden darkness that had swarmed them erupted, tearing away from the sky like old sheets. The heat and sun was suddenly back on them both and Michino turned to look at Okibi who looked terrified and actually quite done, while her daughter looked as indifferent as usual. Ignoring the building pain from surging that much demon blood, the warrior turned back the blue gem in the distance and held back his gigantic hand. Owari gripped her daughter’s and then tightly grasped the soldier’s offered hand as once again she was pulled along through the shifting horrors of the Wind Country’s forbidden desert. Towards a shining blue gem in the far distance…
Sunagakure.