Mission Sunagakure Presents: Two Kings Part 1 - Rise of the Barons [C-Rank Modded Team Mission]

[Sand Event]

The underground railway had gone silent.

Where there had once been the steady hum of crystal engines and the faint vibration of steel through stone, there was only stillness. Dust hung in the air, thick enough to sting throats and burn eyes, swirling with each shallow breath the shinobi took. Lanterns embedded into the tunnel walls flickered weakly, their glow bending in the haze and casting warped shadows over the jagged wall of debris that now sealed the passage.

The collapse was total. Steel rails twisted into warped spirals, wooden supports shattered and splintered outward, and massive slabs of stone fused into black glass where heat had kissed the sand too quickly. The smell was strange, not smoke or fire, but something acrid and chemical that lingered faintly in every breath.

The deeper one looked into the ruin, the clearer it became that this was not a natural cave-in. The blast had sheared stone clean in some places and left subtle ripples in others, as if the force had been directed downward rather than outward. Sand, normally quick to reclaim whatever disturbed it, still lay in unnatural patterns. Smooth crescents swept outward from a single impact point like frozen waves.

Silence pressed in thicker than the dust. No drip of water. No distant clatter of tools. Only the occasional groan of strained rock somewhere overhead, an audible reminder that the collapse was not finished settling. Every movement risked dislodging more.

A handful of markers had been planted around the perimeter by the first response team, faintly glowing crystals stabbed into the ground at even intervals. They cast pale blue light in lieu of the failing lanterns, outlining the boundaries where it was safe to stand and where the ceiling threatened to give way. Beyond them, the jagged wall of fused rock and twisted metal loomed like the end of the world.

Somewhere past that wall, faint tremors pulsed irregularly. Barely perceptible at first, they grew clearer the longer one stood still. It was not the steady rhythm of a train or the distant rumble of machinery. It was something slower. Something heavier.

And faintly, too faintly for comfort, came the clicking.

It echoed from within the collapsed tunnel, soft and wet, bouncing unnaturally between jagged stone faces. Not constant, not patterned, but enough to raise the hair on the back of one’s neck. The sound carried an edge of wrongness that every shinobi here recognized instinctively. It was the sound of something alive. Something that did not belong.

The path forward was narrow and claustrophobic. The air was stale, the taste of dust clinging to every breath. Above, faint trickles of sand fell from cracks in the ceiling. The deeper teams pressed toward the rubble, the more the weight of the underground settled around them, a quiet reminder that they were one bad vibration away from sharing the same fate as the railroad.

Behind them, the faint glow of the mobile village’s lights barely reached this far. Ahead, only blue marker crystals lit the way. The air was heavy and still, waiting.

The silence did not last. Somewhere deep in the wreckage, the clicking began again, closer this time.

 

[Chikamatsu Kohana]

An all call for Genin and newly promoted Chūnin to the tunnels where the tracks were being laid so that the newly subterranean Sunagakure could travel stirred me from my lazy day. I arrived at the edge of the collapsed tunnel just as the first response team was pulling back. Shin worked as a Paramedic at times, but as I looked around the scene I could not see him. The air was thick with dust and the sharp sting of something chemical, lingering heavy in my throat. Lanterns flickered weakly along the walls, their light struggling against the haze.

“Medic!” one of the shinobi called. I nodded and quickened my steps, careful not to kick up any more dust. The markers, glowing carmots stuck into the ground, outlined the safe zones where it was still possible to stand without risking another collapse. Beyond those, twisted metal and shattered stone blocked any hope of passage.

I crouched beside a young shinobi rubbing his eyes, the grit burning them raw as his face was turning red. “Here, rinse your eyes with this,” I said, offering a small vial of saline from my pouch. He blinked gratefully as the burning eased while the saline dripped down his dirty face.

“Do you know what caused this?” I asked confidently of the squad leader, as though I was taking command of the situation. His grim shake of the head told me enough.

I stood and took a slow breath. My training was foggy as what I knew was from when Shin was training and I actually paid attention, but I knew enough to approach this cautiously. The unnatural cuts in the stone and strange patterns in the sand told a story of something deliberate and powerful.

“We can’t rush in,” I said, voice steady despite the knot of unease tightening in my chest. “I suppose I will prepare some med supplies for anyone injured, but we need scouts with sensory skills to detect what’s out there before anyone else moves forward. If no one can y'all can take care of yourself and I will do it. My Chikamatsu sensory skills should be top notch, but I suppose I haven't tried them for myself.” My voice trailed off at the very end realizing my old sensory skills were actually that of Shin's.

I could feel my own heart beat faster as the clicking grew louder, a reminder that whatever was inside was still alive, and waiting.

“Keep your comms open,” I added, “and report any movement or sounds immediately. We can’t afford to be caught off guard.”

For a moment, I closed my eyes and focused on steadying my breath. I’m not new to the memories of battle or pain as I carry a lifetime of them inside me, but this body, this new life, is still unfamiliar. I have the knowledge, the experiences, but not the muscle memory or instincts I once had as part of the Inner Circle. The underground was silent and heavy, but it wasn’t empty. And despite this body’s limits, I had to be ready.

 

[Chikamatsu Kasai]

The workshop walls had been her cradle, her cocoon, but also a cage. The smell of oils, ink, and parchment strewn across worktables. All of it had felt enormous when she first opened her eyes, but that enormity had shrunk quickly. Her nature pushed her outward as fire never lingers politely in a lantern. It climbs, spreads, and reaches for whatever lay just beyond its grasp. So, when the summons came whispering of a collapse on the underground rails, Kasai followed via instinct. She told herself it was duty, even if the truth was simpler. She wanted to see, to feel, and to experience the world around her.

The tunnels carried her farther than she had ever gone. Every sound fascinated her still; things like the hurried slap of boots on stone, the sharp rasp of armor plates shifting, and the hollow rattle of tools striking rock. She noted quickly how her bare feet echoed differently than the others. She could keep her steps soft, yet each step reminded her she was still slower, and less certain. It was a truth that stung as she desired perfection. It was like a hunger in her chest, one that no food or simple comfort could soothe. A thing that whispered she was incomplete, and that if she could only move as they moved, look as they looked, then she would finally be whole. Her hand slid across the wall as she walked. The stone was rough and dry, but beneath it she imagined the shape of the world shifting. Like a pressure deep in the earth grinding as teeth do. Even the walls here seemed stronger, older, perfected by time in ways she was not, and then, she reached the edge of the collapse.

The railway had ended in ruin. Where rails should have stretched in clean lines, they now twisted in grotesque spirals. Metal gleamed where heat had warped it, and wooden supports jutted like broken bones from the sand. Massive slabs of rock, once the surroundings of this tunnel, now fused together in slick black glass as though lightning had erupted beneath the earth. The air was bitter, and stings her throat with each shallow breath. It was not smoke, or fire, but something worse. Dust swirled in the weak lantern light, falling and rising with each exhale of the shinobi clustered nearby. It coated everything, muting sound and making the tunnel feel muffled. Kasai stepped closer, her molten eyes wide and dancing with flame. She had imagined disaster as chaos, but this was different. The patterns in the sand told her so as the smooth crescents radiate from a single point, the unnatural sharpness of the cuts in the rock. This was not the earth giving way of its own will, something powerful had struck here.

Blue marker crystals lined the floor with a steady glow. Shinobi worked quickly around the scene, setting more markers, guiding injured comrades to safer ground. Kasai’s gaze found one among them who did not move like the others. A girl similar to her in appearance, stood at the edge of the debris, steady and deliberate. She handed vials to a shinobi whose face burned raw from the dust, and she spoke to others with calm words Kasai could not hear. Something about her pulled Kasai’s focus. A thread ran between them, something unspoken and undeniable. She looked at the set of her shoulders, the curve of her jaw, and knew this was her family.

The realization landed heavy, like a stone in her stomach. Kasai’s thoughts tangled wondering if this woman would look at her and see only an unfinished experiment? Her chest burned with a desire to prove herself. She moved closer, her bare feet whispering over the glass, where every step still felt loud as she perfected her gait.

Kasai wanted to speak and to say something sharp, something bold, and declare herself as a flame meant to burn alongside any other shinobi. Yet the words caught as if the dust had swallowed them. So instead, she stood near the one she felt tethered to. She watched Kohana move with measured motion, and studied the way the woman held herself, and the way others listened when she spoke. Her chest tightened again, that unrelenting hunger gnawing at her ribs. There will be a time to act, but for now she will simply listen to the clicking, and press her hand to the ground in hopes it may offer a warning of what is to come.