| abstract | - As the call for war reached the ears of the great land of Kumogakure, the village prepped for battle. Standing in his office, the current and Fourth Raikage A readied himself as well. "Raikage-sama, should you be going into battle. You are the Raikage." chimed a worried advisor. "Of course I'm going out there!" he called. Giving out a sigh, the advisor began to shuffle through the papers infront of her. Pulling out a sheet and passing it to A, she coughed to get his attention. "If you are, than you should know that Kirigakure is trying to push ahead and take our half of the land on Sendai Isle. As the Raikage, you should do something about it" she said. Giving a hearty grumble, he snatched the paper and crumbled it. Channeling his Lightning natured chakra around it, he pegged it at the wall causing a very narrow hole. "Meirei!" called A slamming his fist through his desk, shattering it. "Not another one" thought the Raikage's Assistant. Appearing from a puff of smoke, the leader of the Kinkaku Force Meirei Rōga appeared. "You called, Raikage-sama?" Meirei said kneeling down the to benevolent kage. "I'm sending the Kinkaku Force, along with a group of Fourty Shinobi out to Sendai Isle. I am naming you Commander of this Mission." he said folding his arms and smirking at the shinobi before him. Lifting his head, Meirei smiled and simply said "Yes'sir". About an hour after his meeting with the Raikage, Meirei now sat upon the mast of a large boat. Several Shinobi gathered onto the boat, much to his amusement. "Seems Raikage-sama finally has trust in me." Meirei thought. Jumping down, he landed before the several shinobi and saluted them. "Some of you know me, as Leader of the Kinkaku Force- others have not even made eye contact with me. I am respectful to all, who are respectful to me. I hope you will remember me as a fond leader." he said. In unison, the group of shinobi all called "Yes Meirei-sama". Turning to an eldery man, Meirei waved his hand. "Time to depart, head out to our dock at Sendai Isle!" he called folding his arms. "Aye aye." said the old man spinning the wheel. Meanwhile, on Gunpō, several ships boarded the south coast, and were immediately intercepted by several shinobi, their forehead protectors revealing them to originating from Kirigakure. A tall, red-haired man descended from the middle ships, nervously trying to light up a cigarette. As the their man set foot on the island, red-haired man approached the nervous smoker, with a wide grin on his face. "Still can't handle a little boat-trip, Sakaki?", he shouted, laughing while more men came running from the mainland to help landing the weapons, supplies and men from the boats. Sakaki gave the other red-hair a stare, and eventually succeeded in lighting the cigarette. Taking a deep inhale, he calmly blew out the smoke. "Say, Murasaki, you better give me a good reason why I boarded those goddamned ships. I thought the plan was to just sneak into the capital village and take it by surprise?" Murasaki nodded, and his grin disappeared as his face grew serious. "Yes. But apparently, there's some bastard who revealed our plans to the Cloud and they're sending in some heavy stuff now. My division is light-weight, so even f we managed to survive their reinforcements, our numbers would be to small to take over the village." Murasaki's hand nervously played with the hilt of his sword, until he clenched his wrists and folded his arms before his chest. "So what have you got for me?" Sakaki picked his cigarette out of his mouth and quenched it under his foot before answering. "Some of my men, some Second Division, and a few healers. Should be enough to take over the village. Also, I got this from the Investigation Unit." Sakaki reached in a punch hanging at his left hip, and pulled out a scroll, giving it to Murasaki. He folded it open, the scar on his face deforming as wrinkles of concern appeared on his forehead. "Kūbunai, eh?" Sakaki shrugged as he lit another cigarette. "I don't know, Murasaki-san. Nobody does." Murasaki nodded, and after a few moments folded up the scroll. "Well, it appears thy're sending a guy named Meirei Rōga down here. Dangerous guy, ninjutsu and taijutsu foremost. And he possess the Byakugan." Hearing the name of the famous dōjutsu, Sakaki no longer looked to the sky, but once again reached into his pockets. "That reminds me, Ao told me to give you this." He held out a tag, fiddled with numerous kanji and other signs. Murasaki nodded, as if he understood why Ao had given him the mysterious scrap of paper, and putted it in his pocket. "So, what do we do know?" Murasaki asked, as he yet again extinguished his cigarette. He didn't reach for another one, however. Murasaki smiled, and signed Sakaki to follow to a nearby tent. In the tent, there was table with a map spread on it, portraying the area around the islands and the upper and lower parts of the Land of Water and the Land of Lightning, respectively. Murasaki moved his hand across the map, and started explaining. "Well, according to the information of the Investigation Unit, they've set sail only recently, so it'll take them around a day to get to the island, and a couple hours to get to the capital. This gives us an advantage, but only if we succeed in conquering the capital before their reinforcements arrive. They're probably not really well-equipped for a siege, and it will be much easier fighting them off from inside the village. This means we have to act quickly, and leave within maximum two hours, so we still have enough time to conquer the village before that Meirei guy arrives. The original plan was to attack during the night, but we don't have time for that. Understood?" Sakaki nodded. Murasaki got up from the map and laughed out loud. "Wow, it's really been a while since I've been so worked up about something. This war really is serious, isn't it?" Sakaki gave him a cold stare, and marched out of the tent to gather the troops and instruct them about the plans made. Murasaki stayed behind, laughing, but also thinking about the fact that they should really organize things better in the military, two officers alone could make far more mistakes than when they were assisted by lieutenants. Already at sea, the shinobi of Kumogakure were pumped for battle. Sitting at the head of the ship, Meirei had his arms folded and was listening to his men behind him. Words like "Unsure" and "Scared" filled his ears, causing him to stand up and turn around. "I have one last statement for you all." he said walking up to a Jonin who had a worried look. "Yes Meirei-senpai?" asked the worried shinobi. "Do you trust me?" he said with a straight face. The entire crew stopped what they were doing and watched the situation unfold. Looking down at the ground, the worried shinobi clenched his fists and looked into Meire's face. "I have no details on how you lead, nor have I ever served alongside you in a mission. We come from different parts of Kumo, I'm a Medic and your a close combat sort of guy. So yes, I do not trust you." said the shinobi with a face completely different from before. Clenching his fists, the crew was unsure of how Meirei would react. The shinobi glanced and saw the smirk on Meirei's face, followed by his loud bellow of laughter. "I'm glad to hear that. I didn't want any mindless foot soldiers serving alongside me in this war. You're, no you're all entitled to your opinions and ways of doing things." he said placing his hand onto the shinobi's shoulder. "But you must remember, if we are to survive learn to trust those of your own blood. We must be stronger than the rest, Kirigakure won't know whats coming!" he chimed pumping up his troops once more. "Thank you, Meirei-senpai." muttered the shinobi before him. Nodding his head, Meirei walked to the side of the boat. "Whats the estimated time of arrival?" he asked. "We will arrive in the night, its gonna take a few hours." said the elderly captain. Glancing at the sides of his ship, he turned back to his troops. "This trip, along with the trip to the capital is quite a long journey. We need a quick way to get there." he said. "I might have a way." called a Jonin from the crowd. Stepping forward, was a tall man with spiky black hair and a solid black line going down his nose waved his hand. "Motoi-san. I didn't know you were accompanying us." Meirei said delighted that Motoi was on the team. "So, whats the idea?" Meirei called. Clapping his hands, he slammed his palm to the ground and a summoning circle appeared. A puff of smoke appeared from under the boat, and it was colossus. From the cloud of smoke, what appeared to be an island rose up and lifted the boat high up. "This can't be? can it?" Meirei called in excitement. "Whats going on? called several other Jonin on the ship. "Say hello to the Giant Island Turtle of Kumogakure!" Motoi called as the turtle lifted up its head from the water. "He swims at insanely fast speeds, and will halve our time." Motoi stated. "Amazing Motoi! Push forward to Sendai, we cannot let Kiri beat us." Meirei called.
|
