There is always a moment of pure silence, where time seems to stand still. A moment of purity that gives way to absolute chaos.
As if in slow motion, the shinobi leader watched as the head of his captive, a priest, was sliced off as if by lightning itself, following suit a lobster the size of… no BIGGER… than an elephant rampaged through the encampment towards his prisoner.
‘Light the fires!’ he screamed, watching with a measure of satisfaction as the inferno burst into flame, promising the pain of the wretched puppet and that infernal Migoya. But such things were not meant to be as the lobster, ignoring the searing pain (and causing a rather delicious scent to occur) rushed over the flames and snatched his quarry away.
True, he didnt expect a giant lobster, but he did expect some sort of flying monstrosity from Migoya, and in retaliation he started to form handseals for a powerful jutsu.
Monkey, Tree, Fire, Monkey, Fire, Ram…
What…
Something had grabbed his robe, distracting him for the split second it took to finish the seals. Normally such distractions would be inconsequential, but he knew who he was dealing with. He looked down… at the decapitated corpse of the priest grasping at him.
The decapitation of the priest, followed by a gigantic lobster running through the darkness and then… flying upwards. This was not Migoya’s modum operandi - but how did he gather such forces so quickly? They had been paid to draw him out and get rid of him… but now he was not alone?
But Migoya was here. The dead started to rise.
—-----------
At not even ½ foot high, Mikki did not cast an impressive visage. Indeed, the small puppet looked relatively unimpressive, especially when next to a gigantic lobster creature. But appearances were deceiving, and Mikki, or Miksurendo, was not just any little tsukumogami.
He returned Uru’s gaze with a silent nod, the silent respect evident and clearly thankful for his rescue. But sentimentality could wait, and Mikki would certainly not be shown up - plus these bastards needed a spanking. Ill be better when those punks are all dead Uru-kun.
He turned his little wooden head to the sprawling scene below. He saw what Migoya was doing, the stopping of whatever jutsu the leader had been casting, and the streaks of blue ‘bolts’ that unerringly found the heads of the ‘Mikoboshi’ members. Kiko, no doubt. No… no one would steal his fun this time.
Handseals were formed, complicated, but powerful.
A rent in the very fabric of space appeared underneath several of the strange, robed individuals, causing a strange green glow to highlight them. Before they could react, multitudes of wooden puppet arms would reach forth from this void and start to rend at their flesh, ripping great gashes in their robes and causing streams of blood to gush forth. Additional arms grabbed some of them and held them close to the earth as even more mannequins started to tear away at their exposed flesh.
The wild, maniacal laughter of a small tsukumogami echoed in the ears of the screaming shinobi below. Scrambling to get away from the pit of puppet doom, the unbound shinobi ran clear and desperately tried to figure out what the hell was going on.
‘DIE MORTALS! DIE!!!!!!’
Strangely, and without concern for the sheer physics of the situation, Mikki pulled out another puppet… this one much larger than himself. Expertly puppeteering the creature with one small hand, both him and his large friend open up chest cavities, revealing metallic cones that soon issued gouts of fire on those shinobi running away. Soon their screams echoed alongside that of those being ripped apart by other puppets.
Again, the laughter echoed in the heads of all present.
Finally, Mikki turned to his lobster companion, the flamethrower being pulled back into the chest cavity, only for Mikki’s ‘hands’ to now be replaced with the whirring sounds of buzzsaws. Banging them together he caused a shower of sparks… If he could smirk he would be right at this point in time.
‘Ok fish man… throw me at the nearest one…’.
—---------------
‘After’
She has grown, Migoya thought to himself quickly. There would be indeed time to catch up afterwards, but now… now there was hope, and a glimmer of sweet, sweet revenge. Emotion was pushed aside for the moment, and the focus was now solely on revenge. Palid fingers reached into the cold, damp snow, reaching for the earth beneath.
Kiko’s arrow flew true, taking out the priest and stopping the spiritual attack on Mikki. Immediately, the form of a lobster… was that Uru… crashed through the camp, causing all eyes to focus on the enormous creature that leapt forward and snatched Mikki, flying him high above. The creature started to break the seals on the puppet, and Migoya watched somewhat impressed as Juutsu… unseen… aided the lobster. The seal was broken, and so was Migoya’s only true concern.
Pure ‘coldness’ started to spread throughout the encampment, the only sounds escaping were the desperate screams of those who were dying, and the sounds of a collapsing building, gasping out its last cry as the roof collapsed inwards. Those survivors, the strongest of the group, slowly felt… something… in the darkness, pulling as it were at their very souls. Migoya’s aura was cold, bitingly cold, but not the cold of frost. This was the cold of death, of someone who had mastered the last feeling a person had before they crossed over. The cold of a stilled heart.
A smirk formed on Migoya’s cold face as he felt the last rattles of death from those in front of him. Guards crushed by a lobster, those decapitated by the blue streaks of Kiko’s arrows. How she reminded him of Yong. And the smirk grew as more were added to the ranks of the dead, for as they fell, they rose once more. Decapitated, crushed, drained - all were his, and they now faced their own former allies. He focused on the leader, ensuring any responsive jutsu against Mikki was stopped by the grasping of a zombie. What a fool.
Migoya heard Mikki above. The show was about to begin.
Mikki’s jutsu came into effect, and more were added to Migoya’s ranks, screaming as they both died from the puppet attack, and then willed by Migoya as he enjoyed the wails of the dead and how they unnerved those who had survived.
The enemy shinobi started to fight back against their former colleagues, their skills far outmatching the dead, but strangely their attacks failed to fell the creatures, merely stop them for a time. On and on the zombies came, and Migoya relished at the fear that his enemies started to have in realisation of the futility of fighting death itself.
More died, and Migoya drew on those deaths, gaining both power and another warrior.
Flames now engulfed the field, and guards were felled by Kiko’s arrows. Migoya walked forward, his robes black as death, and his mask a simple plain ANBU one. The snow melted at his approach. His enemies saw him for the first time, and three of them started towards him, lighting dancing on one of their fingertips, another holding a glowing katana, and the third… activating their sharingan.
Migoya once again reached down into the earth, but this time the earth itself started to respond. He did not flinch as the chidori struck him, cutting off a large swatch of his robe and exposing the old leaf shinobi armour beneath. He knew pain, and this was nothing.
He did not flinch as the Nanjiro worked her blade expertly into the soft parts of his flesh, between the armour plates. He knew anatomy, and simply marvelled at her skill. This was nothing.
His eyes stared deeply into those accursed Sharingan.
—-----------------------
It was freezing cold, and the makeshift cardboard blanket barely kept any of it out. The young boy shivered in the frigid temperatures, his thin frame barely covered by a brown, rough potato sack. The boy, half-asleep, reached out in pain and fear, trying to grasp onto something.
Red eyes opened, welling with frozen tears, as they looked at the shattered remains of a small wooden puppet.
He knew he was alone. No-one loved or cared for him. No one wanted him. No one knew his name, only that he was ‘kooks’, the albino freak.
He should just let death take him.
It got colder, and with the cold came more pain and suffering.
He should just let death take him.
The sweet embrace of death… coldness… peace.
His hands grasped around the small wooden puppet, now somehow repaired.
—------------------
Migoya blinked, his eyes and mind coming back into focus as he heard the all-too-familiar sounds of buzzsaws. In front of him that accursed Uchiha now screamed as a small wooden puppet sawed his way through his chest. Migoya had been taken in by the accursed Sharingan yet again… but now Mikki had come to his rescue, thrown by the lobster it seemed from the sheer damage he was now causing.
His tattered and bloodstained robe hung limply on his small frame as he continued the powerful jutsu into the ground. The sounds of people dying, both from the flames, the zombies or Kiko’s arrows echoed in the background. Chakra pooled as Migoya’s rage was made manifest. It started as a slow rumble in the ground, causing all to look around with a moment of confusion. Then the shaking began. The very ground seemed to come alive, wrenching itself as if trying to scratch away an unwanted itch, as it started to split apart. The battlefield started to hiss as the snow started to evaporate and the very earth itself started to open, the glow of hidden lava now exposed to the air as Migoya expertly pulled the very land apart.
Mikki, covered with gore, leapt knowingly back onto Migoya’s shoulder. ‘Oooooh baby, this is going to be good!’
Migoya allowed himself a chuckle as he pulled his clawed hands apart, and with it opened up the earth fully. A wide gap appeared, a chasm of darkness that fell into a lake of lava, which now became the dumping ground as his zombies grasped their prey and fell with them into the gap. Screams filled the night sky as the accursed shinobi fell to their fiery deaths - rather fitting in the circumstances.
Avoiding another attack by a glowing katana, Migoya smirked as a blue-streaked arrow pierced into the shinobi’s throat, knowing that Kiko had his back. Juutsu and Uru were far above the battlefield, Kiko far enough out of the way for the next phase.
“You ready Mikki?”
Lets do this.
The merging of the tsukumogami and their contract bonds was a unique thing - some became living weapons, others glittery cloaks that bonded the two beings into one. For Migoya and Mikki, the bond was even closer. A blue glow surrounded them both, and with a flash of bright blue light a new figure emerged.
Nothing flash or spectacular. Just a small white haired child, wearing a simple brown robe with a brown leather satchel, holding a simple white-wood staff. The childs eyes glowed a distinct red in the darkness, as he looked towards the side of a nearby mountain. A single pale hand reached towards that mountain, and pulled as Migoya called on it to obey.
Again, a rumbling sound could be heard as the mountain responded to Migoya’s subtle jutsu - an earthquake that started small, but would cause the loose snow of the mountain to start to rumble forward towards the encampment. An avalanche.
The small boy would strangely float towards Kiko, offering a pale hand to carry her above the now devastating avalanche that would cover the damage done today. There would be no witnesses. There would be no survivors. One did not mess with the Myakashi.
Migoya’s voice was strange as he spoke, far from the commanding and charismatic leader - rather an innocent and kind voice - the voice of a boy. A boy that somehow was levitating… and obviously was far too powerful.
“Come granddaughter. I believe we have deserved some respite, and thanks.”
He carried the girl-sheep thing effortlessly, and rose to meet Uru and Juutsu to watch the white snow hiss as it struck the lava pit, and slowly fill it to cover the remains of Mykaboshi. The buildings, the pit, the bodies… all were covered and hopefully the nearby temple would not be too concerned…
Joy hit Migoyas heart for he had reunited with family, and once again was whole.
The boy chuckled as he passed Kiko to Uru, the hint of Mikki coming through.
Well that was fun. What next?
[WC: 2070]
