Tales of a Ninja Magician: Of Journeys We Make

Cutting Lightning

The Stars lined up around the opening near the shrine where the meeting between Hanada's men and Ijiki's mercenaries took place. Endo turned his head to Damisan, ready to mock the prosthetics user for his heavy and loud landing that, as he had expected, would either leave a hefty thump or break the branch that the self-puppeteering ninja landed on. However, the samurai apprentice just grimaced and turned his attention back to the forest shrine. Damisan had moved as quietly as any other ninja with his prosthetic limbs, landing with a muzzled, rubbery hum that was almost pleasant to the ears of the few who heard it.

"Something's wrong..." Skaven whispered.

"You think?" Endo sneered at the Nara. "Your pals betrayed Hanada's guys and left them in a body pile. How close exactly were you back in the day?"

"Come on, Endo, Ijiki's mercenaries tried to kill Skaven on sight. There's no need to lump him in with the rest of them..." Shige-H tried to reason with her fellow Stars member.

"All isn't as simple as a deal gone wrong, little dudes..." Shitaka sighed. "Those mercs rocked those Hanada's men good, but they didn't take the tissue sample, nor did they move from the scene of their betrayal. Why would they do that?"

"Something's definitely fishy here..." Skaven grit his teeth as his face grew dire. "Raitoncide isn't the type of guy to scheme something like this. One can penetrate his plans by one's first look, most of the time..."

"Maybe he's ranked up in the world since you've left the criminal ranks?" Endo tilted an eyebrow. "Either way, it only makes things easier that he didn't leave–makes it really easy to go down there and kill them both then get the sample and leave this mess for Konoha's Black Ops to sort out."

"It seems that way," Shige-H bit her lip. "Can we really ignore such an obvious opportunity to claim what we've come here for? I'm afraid this is a risk we might need to take..."

"Even if this is a trap," little Tomi growled out. "We've got the numbers and superior strength on our side."

The bald and cut-up mercenary jumped off of the pile of bodies he was sitting and pondering on as if shocked by his own crackling aura of Lightning Release chakra. He sustained a flight via separate lightning jolts emanating from his hands and propelling him off of a golden field of static electricity on the ground. A resonating pulse of electricity passed through the ground when Raitoncide landed on both his feet and raised a vial over his head.

"Alright, you stupid Allied Ninja shits, I know you're out there, somewhere, watching and shaking your little legs, weak in the knees, like always! I'm gonna make this shit real simple for you! You come out and I don't smash this vial and fry whatever's inside!" Raitoncide let a jolt pass his body upward from down below, passing and crackling off of the vial he held in his hands, making it difficult to say just how much more of this unstable and destructive voltage the sample could take.

"W-What!?" Skaven lost his cool. "Why would he be willing to destroy this sample!? What're you two really after?"

A weighty whistling noise filled the air, followed by a wooden bump. The vial fell out of Raitoncide's hands and rolled to the side while the mercenary with an electric personality let out a painful grunt but then transitioned into a chuckle. He looked up to where little Tomi flung her boomerang at him and raised his arm up while his other arm weaved a couple of one-handed hand seal variants.

The boomerang smacked Raitoncide's hand on its way back as the little beast-girl burst from the cover of the leaves and grabbed the returning boomerang out of the air and landed on the ground in plain sight. Endo joined the friend to all animals and connected two of the crossed blades behind his back to a single, double-bladed sword before coating it in Lightning Release chakra.