Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Games of Body and Soul

The Curious Case of Oribu Panther

The next workday took almost no time at all before turning hectic. From tackling the complaints from disgruntled Security officers who have now found themselves suspended indefinitely until the licenses of those who were verified and approved for the clash with the Diamond Hand were unsuspended and joined the taskforce, to the elementary difficulties of building such a taskforce, to begin with.

The old Security chief was a massive help, lending his great experience in managing the force and giving insight into the experience, personalities, skillset, and history of the people Mana and Itemi were going through. The magician had never imagined Itemi to be this skilled with managing paperwork, skimming through towers upon towers of files, instantly identifying cooked documents or "freebie" arrests with a pair of glares on the files.

Okasune-san was right, whatever the man took away from the force by being a rambling machine of little to no ability to keep something to himself, the officer was amazing at writing detailed and textbook-right reports or identifying when reports were either rushed or otherwise tampered with.

"You know, all those men and women we've suspended will now join the Diamond Hand's ranks, most likely." Chief Chontai cleared his throat, raising a valid yet long discussed between Mana and Itemi point.

"Yeah, that's kind of the plan. We'll draw clear lines, let everyone choose instead of having to worry about being backstabbed all the time in a game of who's who." Mana sighed.

"The kid was not entirely truthful to what she was thinking. This was just an idea she cooked up, a plan. Somewhere inside she still worried about it, wondered if the plan was too cold and calculated to be put to use when human lives were at stake. Sometimes I wondered if this kid ever planned around civilian lives before. If she knew what a powerful internal factor it was or how it could derail a perfectly good plan." Itemi kept on rambling to himself as his eyes ran down another file.

"You know, if the enemy force is too powerful, if there is no hope for victory, even the most idealistic and hopeful will tip to the Diamond Hand's side. Not because they agree with them but because they want to survive." Chontai scratched the back of his neck.

"The old man was tired, hell, I was tired. The girl had not slept for a pair of days either. She looked much better now than she looked yesterday, she must have been getting back into shape. That was the only explanation, still, even given her supernatural body and mind, she'll begin getting weary eventually and it didn't look like she had anything to seek solace in." Itemi pulled out another smoke before lighting it up. It was a massive fire hazard but whereas earlier in the night Mana stopped the officer from doing it, now she had grown accustomed and somewhat numbed to it.

"You should move your family and hide. As a defector, they will come after you. Even if the dirty and scorned officers have not already leaked the information of your involvement – they soon will." Mana looked softly at the old man.

"Do you truly think that I was as foolish as to bring up a child in this world, given my status and circumstances? My wife has accepted the consequences of being involved with me long ago, she's been nagging me about being secretive and grumpy for too long. If anything, she'll be glad to hear about the fact that I pissed some thug badly enough for us to be targeted." Chontai laughed out. His laugh was not genuine, there was a hint of bitter in it.

"So instead of bringing up a child who could potentially face danger because of their relation to you, you'd rather derive them from life completely?" Mana asked quietly, almost like leaving the question out in the air, like she herself was still trying to determine what her stance on such a decision was.

"It's not deriving a child of life if they haven't been born. You cannot derive from life something hypothetical. Just by living your life you're deriving thousands of children of life. It was a sick way of thinking about it but, then again, the magician girl was just a child. That train of thought gave me an idea..." Itemi decided as he flung his smoke aside, letting it spread its black and blazy powder across some downed paperwork. Mana hurried from her chair to pick it up and properly dispose of it, something she's found herself doing quite often recently.