Doing the Guarding { Private | Mission | Complete

mission taken!;:

Guard duty; the penultimate activity of Ai's life. At the very least, they feel it's probably what they're going to be left doing for the rest of it all. They preferred it vastly over assassination tasks, anyways, especially with how they've been lately; a little peace guarding the village? They could handle that. Not that they would slack, though- they were on alert the entire time, ignoring the jitters and ugly muttering of the other hidden ninja on duty. Envy was a sin, Ai mused, staring straight ahead against the wall with a hand on their sword. Nothing would get past them, they'd be sure of that.

It helped a lot that they had their Buyougan active, orange and pink eyes lighting up dimly in the night sky. They pushed it past the fifteen meter limiter, of course, working it up to thirty of sensing ability. Patrol wasn't as necessary when you could pick up the chakra signature of everything around you. Obviously as a Genin the skill wasn't refined enough to give them any information past that something was there, but they latched onto that, noting the figures of their other guard mates and animals here and there.

After a few minutes they decided it was best to look around and check to make sure that the signatures noted WERE just animals, worried that maybe they might have been relying on the technique more than they should. It stayed active as they moved, shades of blue shuffling in the edges of their vision. Nope... everything checked out, nothing out of the ordinary to rouse suspicion; though Ai did feel bad for scaring that squirrel away...

Ai's ears twitched, neck snapping to the side as they stretched the Buyougan out farther... there wasn't anything of note around, just a few animals, maybe one more than before...

A yelp later and Ai was off, eyes flashing and their sabre being drawn in a blink. The shocked sound had come from a chuunin on duty; and Ai saw now, why, narrowing their brows and staring at the creature before them. it was nothing but a rabid fox, foam dripping from its mouth... it probably had rabies, meaning there was no way they could let it come into contact with anyone. They especially could not let it get into the village. They crouched low, ignoring the panicked cries of the other guard, and circled the animal. It didn't seem to even care about his presence, instead smashing through the area with wild eyes and bared teeth. Poor thing...

Duty came first, they duly noted, letting the Buyougan fade out as they dashed outwards; sword signaling their fall downward near the creature, though it sloppy ripped itself to the side before they landed. "Smart guy... I apologize for this, fox, but I've been tasked with stopping entries to the village. You'll have to fall here or leave."

Ai was hoping to scare it off without having to kill it, placing explosive seals every so often to direct the fox in another direction. After awhile it seemed to stop caring, bracing an explosion and losing a leg; before lunging at the fencer, causing Ai to parry the attack with a flick of their sword and step back. They'd have to get the sabre cleaned, now, and suppressed a sigh. Blood covered the ground, the two barely a few meters away from the wall but in a more forest-esque area. The other guards had recovered and were watching, looks of amusement and disgust present on their faces, but Ai ignored them further.

"It doesn't seem like you're going to follow my directions. This is your fate."

A quickly scribbled out seal creates a clone from a swirl of smoke, the sound tampered so as not to alert anyone, as the other seals before it were. The clone was charged with a single command; a suicide attack. It jumped forward, sword drawn, stopping on top of the fox; and impaling itself through the chest.

* [ BOOM ] *

It was a few minutes later that Ai was done cleaning up the bloody mess, thankful for their training in Fuuinjutsu and ability to seal away the messier bits to dispose of more ceremoniously later. A clean attack would have been better, yes, but they didn't want to risk getting close enough, and they weren't exactly stocked up on ranged techniques. A quick bow of prayer and a stretched led them back to their original position, glad to see everything was still calm, though of course they had kept a close eye on the wall the entire time just in case. The snickering, taunting guards weren't exactly a reassurance.


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