Saito Hachirou's Art of Loneliness

[Omoi Tetsu]

Abilities

Heart of the Sword
Duelist
Illusionist
Stalker
Barrier Mastery
Acrobatics
Insight
Hidden Power
Combat Instinct
Called Shot
Deflection
Shattered Reality

Weapon

Ballpeen Hammer

Weapon Augments

None. (Pending Approval)

Equipment

None.

Extra

1 Ability Card.​

Notes on Abilities

Unless otherwise stated, these are the effects that I will take from these abilities:

Heart of the Sword: I will be using Melee Accuracy, not Ranged, whenever I can. Allows me the use of a floating weapon on activation.
Duelist: +2 Gen DC to a target that I will select, +10% chance to Auto-dodge same target.
Illusionist: May cast one Genjutsu per round without being dropped out of stealth.
Stalker: May perform one Sneak Attack per round without being dropped out of stealth.
Barrier Mastery: Use barrier Jutsu without handseals. Barriers HP is +10% stronger.
Acrobatics: Capable of one additional activated auto-dodge per round
Insight: Shows me attacker's hidden actions.
Hidden Power: The user gains +.5 to all Secondary stats each time they lose 20% of their Max Hp, capping at +2 Secondaries.
Combat Instinct: Choose one opponent, the user gains +.5 to all Secondary stats each time their opponent lose 20% of their Max Hp, capping at +2 Secondaries.
Called Shot: Allows me to make Called Shots
Deflection: Partial hits upon the user are treated as one rank lower.
Shattered Reality: Targets effected with the user's Genjutsu take +10% damage from all damage types. Special Action - Shatter: For 0.5 AP and 5% Cp cost of the chosen Genjutsu, the user may choose to shatter their Genjutsu that is currently active upon a target to deal 375 x (Jutsu Level) as Illusionary Damage.
Suppressing Fire: The user gains +10% chance of suppression when using melee Taijutsu and basic attacks.
Extreme Understanding: User gains direct damage on Genjutsu equal to 10% of its CP cost (per round).
Secondary Nature: Target gains -2 Genjutsu Save for the rest of the battle when hit by a debuffing Genjutsu. This effect cannot stack on the same target.
Counteraction: User has the ability to use Taijutsu dodge against Ninjutsu. If at any time during this period they are hit by a Ninjutsu, they take a -1 dodge penalty, up to -2. Allows the user to choose which rounds it is active.
Snapback: User can make a Called Shot at +1 accuracy to activate Suppression on the opponent. Can only be done with basic attacks. Can only be used once a round per target.

Note: The above chart is meant for personal reference, and does not include all of the information regarding these abilities.

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Heart of the Sword​

“Those who love their weapons, and find them beautiful, soon find how much they also love killing, usually under the guise of honour, or nobility.” The man's ball peen hammer flew gracefully through the air in half arches, stopping abruptly, before cutting smoothly along a new angle. It's important to love what you do though... The words cut through his mind, past the thick, cold mist that had collected on his forehead and brow, like an intruder breaking into your home and fleeing before you could react to being violated. Hachirou shifted his weight completely to his right foot, leaning over and groping at the invisible arm in front of him as he swung his hammer upward toward a phantom armpit. The words echoed around his empty thoughts; he would have to admit, at least, the difficulty of going over the same routine over and over without any vision, no artistic substance, just dry utility and the weight of a theoretical life, soon fading under the pressure of his hammer. Once the elegant dance of a routine; with each passing repetition, these questions of the true purpose of each swing of any weapon had brought everything slowly into perfect clarity. The hammer, at first absurd as a choice weapon, was slowly tying him deeply to each action, and each time he grabbed now, he could feel the texture of the skin he was wrestling with, the thickness and weight of the arm he held, the distance to the rib cage or eye, and the snap of a bone cracking on impact. It's hard enough to do this every day, he reasoned. From deep inside, another voice reached out, 'Then don't.'

Training Ability: Heart of the Sword
WC: 282

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Duelist​

Open your mind; what do you see? The man was sitting on a small precipice, watching the traffic of the village below. There was nothing, as usual. No revelation, no pinpointed vulnerability or silent tell. Which of those men and women down there could fight? Who were the powerful? If he tried to discern their faces, recognize them by their gate or search for weapons, it would give him a bit of an advantage, but at this distance it was hard to make out these finer details. This was the trouble with designing your own routine, he reasoned. Not everything is going to work.

Sitting in the small shaft of light that had risen from the otherwise darkened room, the young man came to find himself stewing in deep contemplation, a flask of liquor at his side in this otherwise monkly abode. What to do... He soon found himself wandering along the local inns, choosing, at first, other intoxicated vagabonds to make temporary enemies out of, intentionally stumbling into them, or carelessly waving his arms up into their face while cursing. He would watch their feet and shoulders as they lashed out at him, making a small game out of evading their lazy and sympathetic attacks in the smallest window of space and time. He would see how long he could go without evading at all, and when he did move, he would let the knuckles graze along his skin. If you could see a person's shoulders, he would soon find, it hardly mattered what their hands were doing. He felt, before long, that he could read these movements with his eyes closed. If he had only a single finger against them, he could see their whole attack in the way they shifted their weight.

Training Ability: Duelist
WC: 294

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Illusionist​

There was a man in the village where Haichirou grew up who fell into a meat slicer at a local deli and lost his whole arm. When he was in the hospital, his employer threw the man's arm in the garbage and sent to ask whether or not he would be returning to work that day. Hachirou's father said only this on the topic; “It's amazing what people can survive through.” Just imagine what people don't survive though. How resilient people are, and how incredible the blow must be when even this doesn't quite do the trick.

Atsuko had just gotten out of the hospital. Haichirou could feel the sweat from his hands slipping against the loud plastic foil that wrapped the flowers, now rattling like an opened potato chip bag in the biting Winter wind. “I didn't expect you for another hour!” She answered the door wearing an old, ratty Christmas sweater with the steam of soup, now boiling over, marking a trail of tears along the tile behind her stove. She really was remarkably beautiful. “You're making this pretty early, in that case.” The girl was in a whirlwind of motion, knocking down a small stack of dishes on the way to reach for a soup-stained ladle. “You can have some too.”

There was so much he wanted to tell her. She had an incredible amount of energy for someone who had just left the hospital, and Haichirou had to work considerably just to catch up to her, but when he did, wrapped his arm around her stomach and kissed her along the cheek. “Shouldn't you be in bed, resting?” He would ask as he stole the ladle from her hand, gently nudging her out of the way by the hip. He wanted to tell her that even if she really was tricking herself into believing she had perfectly recovered, he could see how pale she had gotten, with a thin film of sweat now permeating her skin. She'd briefly told him about the chills she'd been having, about the loss of appetite, so he could only really take this as a good sign. She never really followed up too long on her medical issues, probably on account of the pained silences that usually followed them, but the man knew how much it was taking out of her. He would tell her how beautiful she looked, how much it brightened his day just to see her. Most of all, he wanted to tell her that he no longer loved her. He didn't really know why either; one day there was just nothing left.

Training Ability: Illusionist
WC: 436

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Stalker​

It was Autumn when they moved to Iwagakure, but Winter was quickly approaching. As a result, the warming comfort foods provided by the Saito's many soup and noodle dishes were drawing in old customers and new with a fervor unmatched by any week in Summer. Hachirou, taking after his father in work ethic and business acumen, took to running the restaurant while his mother and father cooked, but even with everyone wringing out every drop of sweat they had between them, it was simply not feasible to carry on the responsibilities of the entire restaurant between the three of them, and they soon sought outwards for additional help.

In general, working under one's parents does not inspire a great deal of enthusiasm as the demand for work increases. When Haichirou had any kind of opportunity to reflect on his disposition, which was not often, he would simply pass it off as a Season, like the bitterness of Winter, that one must simply endure with a kind of stoic persistence until the strain slackens.

It was Atsuko, the new girl Haichirou's parents had hired, that immediately shook him from this dreary sleeping state. It wasn't anything like falling in love, except in that every chance he had, he'd speak to her, and every word he got in return sent a small jolt of electricity through him.

The girl, however, was a little ambivalent; always seeming to walk a very thin line between returning some of the man's considerable (he thought) charm, and withdrawing a little into the quiet of her work. Still, he worked. Without letting his emotions overtake him, he tried as well as he could to slowly carve away a warm spot in her affections. Knowing as he had, from a small degree of experience, that there is a relatively small window of opportunity for asking a girl out between 'too soon' and 'too late', he began to get increasingly anxious as days and weeks passed, without any opportunity for the fatal question presenting itself. The girl was always either drowning in work, speaking to his parents, or surrounded by her newly formed friends, where he was not particularly eager to embarrass himself.

He followed her home. It wasn't exactly that he intended taking this line of action, but more that he lacked the inhibitions and good sense to stop himself when he saw her on his day off. The next time he saw her, outside of work, he caught himself, even after the considerable guilt the first little adventure had incurred, almost beginning his tracking session again. Instead though, he reached out to her, unsure even of what he was doing or saying as the words were messily pouring out of him. As his face lit up slowly to a fiery red, she said yes.

Training Ability: Stalker
WC: 465

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Barrier Mastery​

Hachirou once had this one friend; you know the type. This guy, he would always come over, ask to drink all of Hachirou's orange juice, start by making friendly conversation, but usually just end up silently going through Hachirou's book collection and little hand held board games. This piece of work, we'll call him Hamilton, he would turn up at the Saito's restaurant; this is where Hachirou works, mind you, and he would buy food, but constantly, in a kind of pleading tone, ask if he could get such and such at a discount, or have a small side for free if there were any that were going bad. Hamilton would put in just enough friend points, that a rubber backboned person could almost excuse the bad behaviour to themselves, if they really wanted to avoid a confrontation. Anyway, one day Hachirou simply said “No.” He told Hamilton, he could not have the other patron's leftovers, he could not have free extra breadsticks, no extra rice, no nothing. That was the end of it. A three month long headache settled in a single conversation.

Training Ability: Barrier Mastery
WC: 184

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Acrobatics​

First, you lay the bricks flat. For three weeks, Hachirou would walk along them like this, out in the forest. By week four, he felt his calves had stopped burning quite so intensely through the circuit, and decided it was time to turn them up on their narrow end. In two weeks time from this, he had them all turned up in their most precarious position, carefully easing his weight onto each brick, falling frequently, but walking along them until his feet were hardened by blisters, his calves chiseled from this careful hike over the course of several long months.

Training Ability: Acrobatics
WC: 101

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Insight​

There was something incredible about seeing her there, well within the tiny, but no less ancient, cavernous pockets that the Western wall of the cliff face was speckled with. She really seemed like something from another world; the way she awkwardly walked along the edge of the wall in bare feet, her crystal clear black eyes that seemed to burn holes in whatever she set her gaze on. It was like staring into a candle; bright and with a note of simplicity, but occasionally impossible to look away from.

This wasn't the first time they'd made it out to this small, forgotten opening, but every other occasion was an entire day set out to trek for the mountain view. Here, they were a little more careless, having a picnic in the trees, going out to hunt for frogs and damselflies, and finally making it down there only after the sun had begun it's slow creep into the warmer colours of evening. He gently took her arm. Hayate hadn't met them this time at the entrance. They had all become so familiar with each other that he hardly noticed their coming and going any more, which worked out well so long as they could remember which days he was scheduled to patrol. On more than one occasion, they had to make a rather embarrassing dash back to civilization when they had realized their miscalculation. Occasionally, they would be prepared for the trek, but not entirely for any decent social engagement met along the way.

As he was holding her, she fell asleep. He was watching her in the moonlight then, but soon found his eyes opening to a new moon, one that had flown across the sky. What time was it? He stroked Atsuko along her hair, the last time he'd feel this way about her, and told her to wait where she was. As he clumsily tripped along the narrow steps leading back up the mountain, he scanned the vegetation and stone silhouettes uselessly for his comrade, all as his thoughts began to race ahead of his heart, and lungs. Had he gone and left them? Had Hayate even known they were coming down today? It was too late. He should have just taken Atsuko and ran while he could. He wasn't exactly quietly traipsing back up, and saw no sign of anyone so far. Just as the thought had entrenched itself in the man's head though, he heard some hoarse yelling coming from the place he had just left. It was too late.

When he returned, she was curled tightly into a ball, her face down toward the stone as one of the men in black was telling her not to try pulling the knife out of the small of her back.

Training Ability: Insight
WC: 465

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Hidden Power​

No one wants to train every day. He could see his breath, his skin felt like it was made of dried mud and twine, pulled too tight against the bone, yet still he put one foot in front of the other, the echoes of the sidewalk hitting the silence of the night hard. The night was barren and cold, each icicle sweat stabbing the bone of his cheek or forehead, and his mind was a swirl of swill from interrupted dreams and incoherent sentences, but he still sped up. There was no reason to do any of this. Those who train for three days a week need reasons, and those who have trained for one or two years. When every drop of inspiration has left you, that's when the real test of the soul begins; here and here alone is where the warrior is forged, out of steel and the fire of hell that is jogging at 5am.

Training Ability: Hidden Power
WC: 158

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Combat Instinct​

It's just theory. Every ounce of sweat you put into swinging that little hammer around means nothing when the real situation is in front of you, if you haven't prepared yourself. And this isn't just some lesson on conditioning either. Preparing yourself on a personal level, deciding ahead of time what is truly worth killing and dying for, these things contribute to decisiveness, and decisiveness factors in every bit as much to speed and endurance as the hardest of physical training.

It was maybe 10 am when the beast had appeared. It was obviously not the brightest string of decisions that had led the man out into the middle of the forest, and the wild dog almost certainly found him by the awful stench emanating from his clothes and person (a smell which almost knocked him out the moment he was awake). The dog snarled, it's spit drooping down the side of it's chin. The man felt no resilience this time, no will to kill some hungry, deranged dog, or to be killed by one pointlessly. This is the life you prepare for though, you're not always ready when the time comes, but it will come along, nonetheless, indifferent to your feelings, preparedness, or acceptance.

Training Ability: Combat Instinct
WC: 205

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Called Shot​

In the absence of any human help, the wind could be cultivated to match some of the spontaneity of the human spirit. Tied to a string was a small mirror, in front of it, a lit candle, melted to affix itself to a nearby tree. The rules for this practice were simple enough; keep hitting the attack dummy, but when the light flashes in your eyes, you must immediately hit one of the spots designated by black marker. For every dent in the wood that falls outside of these markings, that's ten push ups. Each time you feel that you've hesitated too long, that's twenty bicycle kicks. Stopping to let yourself sweat meant ten suicides. This may not seem like a great deal of punishment, but they add up quite quickly.

Training Ability: Called Shot
WC: 131

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Deflection​

Turn your hips, step in, turn them again, step back. Repeat ad nauseum. The footwork here is not dramatic; you only have to move your body an inch or two, but you train like this, for hours, both to condition your calves and core, as well as to ingrain each movement into you, until it becomes second nature. Next is what we call “Opening the Door”. All you do is step back slightly, the same motion attached to all of these little footwork drills, and turn your body, sliding your back foot out perpendicular to the line of your opponent's attacks. The man was drenched in sweat; his instinct for training was always to put every last bit of effort into all that he did, but in this case he was cursing himself for it. He had to make the movements smaller, and to somehow find a way to both relax and be quick when he went to execute them, otherwise it would just never work.

Training Ability: Deflection
WC: 167

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Shattered Reality​

The wood all around him was beginning to turn soft, too closely exposed to the elements. He was a half an inch from a cold and barren world, a world where animals still laid in wait, ready to eat your guts out, for no greater or nobler reason than hunger. Here we have, or suppose we have, justice, and vengeance, and malice, but it feels no different, the young man reminded himself, how much bitterness was present or absent in the sharp pangs of bones grinding up your flesh and muscle.

When he was younger, his Mom had him locked away for two months for getting into a brawl with this other kid. When Hachirou tried to remember what it was over, he found he couldn't even really remember the boy's name, but he nearly killed him. Just look at him now, the life he had made for himself. Anyway, she told him something important before he left. She said he'd learn how to be a person in there; he didn't really understand it at the time, all he did was lash out at her, but he was beginning to see it now, something he couldn't quite explain. Back then he just felt like attacking everyone, it didn't matter who they were, they were all the same faceless person, laughing at him behind his back, going out of their way to plot and make his life harder. He never really knew why, he never really understood, or felt he even had time to think of it. Sometimes you can have an experience though, and it's more important than reading a hundred books, or having someone tell you right to your face what the problem is; all this cold knowledge was useless to someone like him. Sometimes you have to see it for yourself, you have to see the hurricane smashed house you've made of your life with your own two eyes, and either move forward, or perish. He wanted to live.

Training Ability: Shattered Reality
WC: 332

Important Note: Pending Admin approval for additionally purchased ability slot.

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Weapon Creation

Weapon Name: Ball Peen Hammer
Base Damage: 130
Damage Type: Bludgeoning
Weapon Class Bonus: +2 Accuracy, -10% Damage
Augments: Primal
Additional Bonuses: Suppressing Fire (Void Adept)
Additional Notes: This is a regular ballpeen hammer; it's about a foot long, and fairly light weight.

 

[Yaku]

Spoiler

Heart of the Sword​

“Those who love their weapons, and find them beautiful, soon find how much they also love killing, usually under the guise of honour, or nobility.” The man's ball peen hammer flew gracefully through the air in half arches, stopping abruptly, before cutting smoothly along a new angle. It's important to love what you do though... The words cut through his mind, past the thick, cold mist that had collected on his forehead and brow, like an intruder breaking into your home and fleeing before you could react to being violated. Hachirou shifted his weight completely to his right foot, leaning over and groping at the invisible arm in front of him as he swung his hammer upward toward a phantom armpit. The words echoed around his empty thoughts; he would have to admit, at least, the difficulty of going over the same routine over and over without any vision, no artistic substance, just dry utility and the weight of a theoretical life, soon fading under the pressure of his hammer. Once the elegant dance of a routine; with each passing repetition, these questions of the true purpose of each swing of any weapon had brought everything slowly into perfect clarity. The hammer, at first absurd as a choice weapon, was slowly tying him deeply to each action, and each time he grabbed now, he could feel the texture of the skin he was wrestling with, the thickness and weight of the arm he held, the distance to the rib cage or eye, and the snap of a bone cracking on impact. It's hard enough to do this every day, he reasoned. From deep inside, another voice reached out, 'Then don't.'

Training Ability: Heart of the Sword
WC: 282

Duelist​

Open your mind; what do you see? The man was sitting on a small precipice, watching the traffic of the village below. There was nothing, as usual. No revelation, no pinpointed vulnerability or silent tell. Which of those men and women down there could fight? Who were the powerful? If he tried to discern their faces, recognize them by their gate or search for weapons, it would give him a bit of an advantage, but at this distance it was hard to make out these finer details. This was the trouble with designing your own routine, he reasoned. Not everything is going to work.

Sitting in the small shaft of light that had risen from the otherwise darkened room, the young man came to find himself stewing in deep contemplation, a flask of liquor at his side in this otherwise monkly abode. What to do... He soon found himself wandering along the local inns, choosing, at first, other intoxicated vagabonds to make temporary enemies out of, intentionally stumbling into them, or carelessly waving his arms up into their face while cursing. He would watch their feet and shoulders as they lashed out at him, making a small game out of evading their lazy and sympathetic attacks in the smallest window of space and time. He would see how long he could go without evading at all, and when he did move, he would let the knuckles graze along his skin. If you could see a person's shoulders, he would soon find, it hardly mattered what their hands were doing. He felt, before long, that he could read these movements with his eyes closed. If he had only a single finger against them, he could see their whole attack in the way they shifted their weight.

Training Ability: Duelist
WC: 294

Illusionist​

There was a man in the village where Haichirou grew up who fell into a meat slicer at a local deli and lost his whole arm. When he was in the hospital, his employer threw the man's arm in the garbage and sent to ask whether or not he would be returning to work that day. Hachirou's father said only this on the topic; “It's amazing what people can survive through.” Just imagine what people don't survive though. How resilient people are, and how incredible the blow must be when even this doesn't quite do the trick.

Atsuko had just gotten out of the hospital. Haichirou could feel the sweat from his hands slipping against the loud plastic foil that wrapped the flowers, now rattling like an opened potato chip bag in the biting Winter wind. “I didn't expect you for another hour!” She answered the door wearing an old, ratty Christmas sweater with the steam of soup, now boiling over, marking a trail of tears along the tile behind her stove. She really was remarkably beautiful. “You're making this pretty early, in that case.” The girl was in a whirlwind of motion, knocking down a small stack of dishes on the way to reach for a soup-stained ladle. “You can have some too.”

There was so much he wanted to tell her. She had an incredible amount of energy for someone who had just left the hospital, and Haichirou had to work considerably just to catch up to her, but when he did, wrapped his arm around her stomach and kissed her along the cheek. “Shouldn't you be in bed, resting?” He would ask as he stole the ladle from her hand, gently nudging her out of the way by the hip. He wanted to tell her that even if she really was tricking herself into believing she had perfectly recovered, he could see how pale she had gotten, with a thin film of sweat now permeating her skin. She'd briefly told him about the chills she'd been having, about the loss of appetite, so he could only really take this as a good sign. She never really followed up too long on her medical issues, probably on account of the pained silences that usually followed them, but the man knew how much it was taking out of her. He would tell her how beautiful she looked, how much it brightened his day just to see her. Most of all, he wanted to tell her that he no longer loved her. He didn't really know why either; one day there was just nothing left.

Training Ability: Illusionist
WC: 436

Stalker​

It was Autumn when they moved to Iwagakure, but Winter was quickly approaching. As a result, the warming comfort foods provided by the Saito's many soup and noodle dishes were drawing in old customers and new with a fervor unmatched by any week in Summer. Hachirou, taking after his father in work ethic and business acumen, took to running the restaurant while his mother and father cooked, but even with everyone wringing out every drop of sweat they had between them, it was simply not feasible to carry on the responsibilities of the entire restaurant between the three of them, and they soon sought outwards for additional help.

In general, working under one's parents does not inspire a great deal of enthusiasm as the demand for work increases. When Haichirou had any kind of opportunity to reflect on his disposition, which was not often, he would simply pass it off as a Season, like the bitterness of Winter, that one must simply endure with a kind of stoic persistence until the strain slackens.

It was Atsuko, the new girl Haichirou's parents had hired, that immediately shook him from this dreary sleeping state. It wasn't anything like falling in love, except in that every chance he had, he'd speak to her, and every word he got in return sent a small jolt of electricity through him.

The girl, however, was a little ambivalent; always seeming to walk a very thin line between returning some of the man's considerable (he thought) charm, and withdrawing a little into the quiet of her work. Still, he worked. Without letting his emotions overtake him, he tried as well as he could to slowly carve away a warm spot in her affections. Knowing as he had, from a small degree of experience, that there is a relatively small window of opportunity for asking a girl out between 'too soon' and 'too late', he began to get increasingly anxious as days and weeks passed, without any opportunity for the fatal question presenting itself. The girl was always either drowning in work, speaking to his parents, or surrounded by her newly formed friends, where he was not particularly eager to embarrass himself.

He followed her home. It wasn't exactly that he intended taking this line of action, but more that he lacked the inhibitions and good sense to stop himself when he saw her on his day off. The next time he saw her, outside of work, he caught himself, even after the considerable guilt the first little adventure had incurred, almost beginning his tracking session again. Instead though, he reached out to her, unsure even of what he was doing or saying as the words were messily pouring out of him. As his face lit up slowly to a fiery red, she said yes.

Training Ability: Stalker
WC: 465

Barrier Mastery​

Hachirou once had this one friend; you know the type. This guy, he would always come over, ask to drink all of Hachirou's orange juice, start by making friendly conversation, but usually just end up silently going through Hachirou's book collection and little hand held board games. This piece of work, we'll call him Hamilton, he would turn up at the Saito's restaurant; this is where Hachirou works, mind you, and he would buy food, but constantly, in a kind of pleading tone, ask if he could get such and such at a discount, or have a small side for free if there were any that were going bad. Hamilton would put in just enough friend points, that a rubber backboned person could almost excuse the bad behaviour to themselves, if they really wanted to avoid a confrontation. Anyway, one day Hachirou simply said “No.” He told Hamilton, he could not have the other patron's leftovers, he could not have free extra breadsticks, no extra rice, no nothing. That was the end of it. A three month long headache settled in a single conversation.

Training Ability: Barrier Mastery
WC: 184

Acrobatics​

First, you lay the bricks flat. For three weeks, Hachirou would walk along them like this, out in the forest. By week four, he felt his calves had stopped burning quite so intensely through the circuit, and decided it was time to turn them up on their narrow end. In two weeks time from this, he had them all turned up in their most precarious position, carefully easing his weight onto each brick, falling frequently, but walking along them until his feet were hardened by blisters, his calves chiseled from this careful hike over the course of several long months.

Training Ability: Acrobatics
WC: 101

Insight​

There was something incredible about seeing her there, well within the tiny, but no less ancient, cavernous pockets that the Western wall of the cliff face was speckled with. She really seemed like something from another world; the way she awkwardly walked along the edge of the wall in bare feet, her crystal clear black eyes that seemed to burn holes in whatever she set her gaze on. It was like staring into a candle; bright and with a note of simplicity, but occasionally impossible to look away from.

This wasn't the first time they'd made it out to this small, forgotten opening, but every other occasion was an entire day set out to trek for the mountain view. Here, they were a little more careless, having a picnic in the trees, going out to hunt for frogs and damselflies, and finally making it down there only after the sun had begun it's slow creep into the warmer colours of evening. He gently took her arm. Hayate hadn't met them this time at the entrance. They had all become so familiar with each other that he hardly noticed their coming and going any more, which worked out well so long as they could remember which days he was scheduled to patrol. On more than one occasion, they had to make a rather embarrassing dash back to civilization when they had realized their miscalculation. Occasionally, they would be prepared for the trek, but not entirely for any decent social engagement met along the way.

As he was holding her, she fell asleep. He was watching her in the moonlight then, but soon found his eyes opening to a new moon, one that had flown across the sky. What time was it? He stroked Atsuko along her hair, the last time he'd feel this way about her, and told her to wait where she was. As he clumsily tripped along the narrow steps leading back up the mountain, he scanned the vegetation and stone silhouettes uselessly for his comrade, all as his thoughts began to race ahead of his heart, and lungs. Had he gone and left them? Had Hayate even known they were coming down today? It was too late. He should have just taken Atsuko and ran while he could. He wasn't exactly quietly traipsing back up, and saw no sign of anyone so far. Just as the thought had entrenched itself in the man's head though, he heard some hoarse yelling coming from the place he had just left. It was too late.

When he returned, she was curled tightly into a ball, her face down toward the stone as one of the men in black was telling her not to try pulling the knife out of the small of her back.

Training Ability: Insight
WC: 465

Hidden Power​

No one wants to train every day. He could see his breath, his skin felt like it was made of dried mud and twine, pulled too tight against the bone, yet still he put one foot in front of the other, the echoes of the sidewalk hitting the silence of the night hard. The night was barren and cold, each icicle sweat stabbing the bone of his cheek or forehead, and his mind was a swirl of swill from interrupted dreams and incoherent sentences, but he still sped up. There was no reason to do any of this. Those who train for three days a week need reasons, and those who have trained for one or two years. When every drop of inspiration has left you, that's when the real test of the soul begins; here and here alone is where the warrior is forged, out of steel and the fire of hell that is jogging at 5am.

Training Ability: Hidden Power
WC: 158

Combat Instinct​

It's just theory. Every ounce of sweat you put into swinging that little hammer around means nothing when the real situation is in front of you, if you haven't prepared yourself. And this isn't just some lesson on conditioning either. Preparing yourself on a personal level, deciding ahead of time what is truly worth killing and dying for, these things contribute to decisiveness, and decisiveness factors in every bit as much to speed and endurance as the hardest of physical training.

It was maybe 10 am when the beast had appeared. It was obviously not the brightest string of decisions that had led the man out into the middle of the forest, and the wild dog almost certainly found him by the awful stench emanating from his clothes and person (a smell which almost knocked him out the moment he was awake). The dog snarled, it's spit drooping down the side of it's chin. The man felt no resilience this time, no will to kill some hungry, deranged dog, or to be killed by one pointlessly. This is the life you prepare for though, you're not always ready when the time comes, but it will come along, nonetheless, indifferent to your feelings, preparedness, or acceptance.

Training Ability: Combat Instinct
WC: 205

Called Shot​

In the absence of any human help, the wind could be cultivated to match some of the spontaneity of the human spirit. Tied to a string was a small mirror, in front of it, a lit candle, melted to affix itself to a nearby tree. The rules for this practice were simple enough; keep hitting the attack dummy, but when the light flashes in your eyes, you must immediately hit one of the spots designated by black marker. For every dent in the wood that falls outside of these markings, that's ten push ups. Each time you feel that you've hesitated too long, that's twenty bicycle kicks. Stopping to let yourself sweat meant ten suicides. This may not seem like a great deal of punishment, but they add up quite quickly.

Training Ability: Called Shot
WC: 131

Deflection​

Turn your hips, step in, turn them again, step back. Repeat ad nauseum. The footwork here is not dramatic; you only have to move your body an inch or two, but you train like this, for hours, both to condition your calves and core, as well as to ingrain each movement into you, until it becomes second nature. Next is what we call “Opening the Door”. All you do is step back slightly, the same motion attached to all of these little footwork drills, and turn your body, sliding your back foot out perpendicular to the line of your opponent's attacks. The man was drenched in sweat; his instinct for training was always to put every last bit of effort into all that he did, but in this case he was cursing himself for it. He had to make the movements smaller, and to somehow find a way to both relax and be quick when he went to execute them, otherwise it would just never work.

Training Ability: Deflection
WC: 167

Shattered Reality​

The wood all around him was beginning to turn soft, too closely exposed to the elements. He was a half an inch from a cold and barren world, a world where animals still laid in wait, ready to eat your guts out, for no greater or nobler reason than hunger. Here we have, or suppose we have, justice, and vengeance, and malice, but it feels no different, the young man reminded himself, how much bitterness was present or absent in the sharp pangs of bones grinding up your flesh and muscle.

When he was younger, his Mom had him locked away for two months for getting into a brawl with this other kid. When Hachirou tried to remember what it was over, he found he couldn't even really remember the boy's name, but he nearly killed him. Just look at him now, the life he had made for himself. Anyway, she told him something important before he left. She said he'd learn how to be a person in there; he didn't really understand it at the time, all he did was lash out at her, but he was beginning to see it now, something he couldn't quite explain. Back then he just felt like attacking everyone, it didn't matter who they were, they were all the same faceless person, laughing at him behind his back, going out of their way to plot and make his life harder. He never really knew why, he never really understood, or felt he even had time to think of it. Sometimes you can have an experience though, and it's more important than reading a hundred books, or having someone tell you right to your face what the problem is; all this cold knowledge was useless to someone like him. Sometimes you have to see it for yourself, you have to see the hurricane smashed house you've made of your life with your own two eyes, and either move forward, or perish. He wanted to live.

Training Ability: Shattered Reality
WC: 332

Important Note: Pending Admin approval for additionally purchased ability slot.

All above is approved. Guess your not going kinjutsu method?

Weapon Creation

Weapon Name: Ball Peen Hammer
Base Damage: 117
Damage Type: Bludgeoning
Weapon Class Bonus: +2 Accuracy
Augments: Primal
Additional Bonuses: Suppressing Fire (Void Adept)

For wep, you don't have to put base damage, though guessing that was more for personal reference? Just remember to put the -10% damage modifier on class bonus.

Oh and please go to your control panel, to shop and display all your jutsu and item purchases. After I see primal in your name, I can accept this item.

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Thanks very much, and I think I've corrected everything. You know, I never even considered the kinjutsu route, might not have been a bad idea though.

 

[Omoi Tetsu]

Weapon Creation

Weapon Name: Ball Peen Hammer
Base Damage: 130
Damage Type: Bludgeoning: Naturally causes suppression
Weapon Class Bonus: +2 Accuracy, -10% Damage
Augments: Primal
Additional Bonuses: Suppressing Fire (Void Adept)
Additional Notes: This is a regular ballpeen hammer; it's about a foot long, and fairly light weight.

Minor clarifications added.

 

[Yaku]

Weapon Creation

Weapon Name: Ball Peen Hammer
Base Damage: 130
Damage Type: Bludgeoning: Naturally causes suppression
Weapon Class Bonus: +2 Accuracy, -10% Damage
Augments: Primal
Additional Bonuses: Suppressing Fire (Void Adept)
Additional Notes: This is a regular ballpeen hammer; it's about a foot long, and fairly light weight.

Minor clarifications added.

Approved