An evening beneath the moon

It was a calm and quit afternoon in the moon village, much like it was everyday before, and most of the village was going about their normal routines. The day was beginning to wind down, with the sun slowly setting over the horizon, and those who called this place home beginning to end their days. Shops were starting to close up, schools letting out, and the young of the village coming out to enjoy the night life. It was just another peaceful day in Gekkousato. Cairo had spent most of his day in the village, shopping for specific kinds of gear, running errands, and really just going about his day. It was not often that the nineteen year old shinobi would actually go out and get things done, as he much preferred sitting under a tree and napping. He was however running out of supplies both in his ninja tool kit and back at home, and decided it would not hurt to take care of everything he needed to today. But now the day was coming to an end, and he was fed up with being responsible, it was time to take a load off a relax for the rest of the evening.

After returning all of his purchases to his home, Cairo decided he was going to head up to the peak of the village and visit the local waterfall. Strapping his blade to his back, he grabbed a bag of fruit, a pouch of water and made the trek through the village. It took him a bit to get through the busier part of the village, eventually making it up the forested path towards the waterfall. The sun had fully set now, allowing the moon to shine over the jungle, coating it in a soft glow. A group of monks had just passed, most likely headed towards the temple to get their evening prayers in, as the young Genin made his own way past the purple temple, and up towards the waterfall. He spent a few moments looking for a nice place to sit, inspecting several trees around the stream in hopes of finding somewhere to relax. However, as he took his time gazing around, something caught his attention, a twig snapping in the bushes ahead of him. His head jerked to look in that direction, his hand slowly moving towards the handle of his Katana. It seemed as if someone was already here.

It was yet another day for the lazy shinobi, while many people were out doing their usual routines of work, training, schooling or other mundane errands, Kenji found himself sleeping away most of the day as is usual for him. Of course when he couldn't sleep, he tinkered with Lingchi and ensured his prized puppet was in the best shape, it was probably the closest thing he had to a friend in a long while. His old academy buddies had all went on to do different things while he was content on simply floating on by and doing whatever job seemed somewhat easy to him.

Regardless, that was no excuse to simply spend all day lazing around the barracks and not getting any fresh air so here he was, resting against a tree near the waterfall with nothing but the fresh air, the moonlight and of course Lingchi resting against him. Or at least that's what he thought until he heard the sound of someone approaching his spot of rest.

"What do you think Lingchi? Go say hi?" Kenji asked his puppet companion in a lowered voice while using his chakra strings to turn the puppet's head to face him while also sitting the puppet up. "I dunno Kenji, what if it's a bandit?" Kenji spoke in a higher pitched voice while making the puppet's mouth move up and down in an attempt to make the puppet appear to be talking.

"A bandit? In the village? Don't be so silly Lingchi." Kenji simply laughed off his own concern voiced through the puppet, shaking his head ever so slightly. "Wow, you are right Kenji! So smart and wise, truly you are going to be the best puppet master!" Kenji once again spoke in a higher pitch voice reserved for the puppet, praising himself in a joking manner through the puppet. "Of course, you're too kind Lingchi. Now, let's go greet our new friend before we weird him out." Kenji simply told himself he was too kind before finally getting up and telling himself it was time to go meet whoever that was before they stumbled across him talking to his puppet. That'd be awkward to explain. "Hello, I'm Kenji Haruka and this is my puppet, Lingchi that I talk to and use my puppetry skills to make it talk back" Isn't exactly the smoothest opening line.

Kenji simply lifted the puppet and placed it on his back, wrapping some spare cloth around the puppet and his own body so it can rest securely on his back as he moved to go greet the newcomer. As he approached the person, his foot got caught on a branch and while trying to stop himself from falling, he stepped onto a twig and moved slightly into the bushes, no doubt making them shake. If that person didn't manage to overhear Kenji talking to himself way back there, he definitely heard his little slip up here.

Straightening himself up, Kenji walked through the bush, pushing the leaves out of the way and revealing himself to the mysterious person while also finally seeing who it was that was out here. What he could say about the slightly taller and stronger looking man was that he either looked like he was poor or that he really didn't care about his clothing.

"Can't say I expected to find someone else up here... So what brings you this way?" Kenji idly commented as he looked at his surroundings, seemed the man was following the stream and was on track to finding Kenji's own resting spot if Kenji didn't come meet him here. Although he couldn't help but ask what brought this rougher looking man up here, it wasn't exactly the most sociable place to visit.

Cairo's hand now rested on the soft fabric handle of his blade, keeping it sheathed but ready in case whoever, or whatever was in this bush wanted to attack him. It only took a moment for this entity to reveal them self, as a man with a clothed object on his back broke through the brush. It seemed that this man was the one who had stepped on the twig, and that his rustling in the bushes was most likely him walking this way. Cairo was worried someone was going to interrupt his resting place, but it seemed like he was the one to actually disturb another. Lowering his head slightly, the young man let out a sigh and released the grip on his blade. He relaxed his shoulder and stepped forward towards the other man.

"Well, i was headed this way to enjoy a nice evening under the moon, relax a bit. It seems like you had the same idea as me though. I am sorry to bother you, and can leave you be if you wish." He had to be honest, it was a bit of a bummer that someone else was already here, as this was one of the most isolated places in the village, and had the best view of both the sky and jungle beneath it. It was only a matter of time until others found this beautiful place by the stream though, so he could not be too mad if someone else wanted to enjoy the beauty the world had to offer. A bit let down, Cairo smoothed out the edges of his coat and turned as if to leave the spot, hoping to maybe find another location to rest for the evening.

Kenji listened to the man's explanation for coming down this way before he offered to leave the lazy shinobi alone, something Kenji could only grin at. "Hey, plenty of jungle for all of us to enjoy and I somehow doubt you came all this way just to be loud." Kenji would explain with his grin, after all the taller shinobi did strike Kenji as the strong silent type. "Name's Kenji Haruka by the way, pleasure to meet ya." Kenji would introduce himself with his smile, offering a hand for the taller shinobi to shake.

After the introductions, Kenji couldn't help but notice the man's sword he had against his waist, a simple katana and wasn't a bad choice of a blade. "I take it you use bukijutsu as well?" Kenji asked as begun to take off the loosely wrapped Lingchi, placing the puppet against the tree. "I'm not too bad at it myself, but as you can see, I prefer other methods of attack." Kenji would explain his own skill with bukijutsu before lightly tapping Lingchi as he mentioned his other method of attack.

"Well you are right about that, i actually came up here to do just the opposite of be loud. This is one of the best places in the village to just relax and enjoy the view. I normally come up here to be alone and just relax. Did not think anyone else knew about it to be honest. The jungle is quite big is it not, id be happy to share my little spot of paradise with ya Kenji. Im Cairo by the way, its a pleasure to meet you." He would nod his head a bit and allow a gentle grin to spread over his thin scruffy face. He was not one for making friends or being overall chummy with strangers, but this man had good taste in hang out spots, and it couldn't hurt to have another lazy comrade to enjoy the beauty of the village with.

That is when Kenji noticed the blade on his side, so this man was skilled in the combat arts of weapon techniques as well huh. Cairo raised an eye brow as the man took the fabric wrapped item off of his back, sat it down and revealed, a puppet? Now this man had Cairo's interest. He had clashed blades with several people in the past, gone toe to toe with ninjutsu user, tai fighters and even the random summoner, but never had he the pleasure of squaring off with a puppet user. It was quite the intriguing idea. He chuckled once again and allowed his arm to rest on the sheath, tapping the handle with his hand.

"Well, you could say that, i have been known to be quite skilled with this beauty right here. She has seen her fair share of battles. I see you use more than just a sword to do your bidding huh? I'll be honest with ya Kenji, i have never tested my metal against a puppet user." He looked up to the sky for a moment, taking in a deep breath, allowing the evening air to grace his nostrils. Cairo then lowered his gaze back towards the man, now with a very excited and devious smile plastered on his face. "So what say you Kenji, fancy a little spar this fine evening?"

"It is quite surprising we managed to stumble across each other considering the size but you know what they say, great minds think alike." Kenji would confirm with the man as he stretched his back a slight bit, his puppet wasn't exactly the lightest thing and with the shinobi's almost constant slouching, he wasn't really suited for carrying things on his back.

However once the man challenge Kenji to a spar, he couldn't help but grin at the suggestion, he has been eager to test his puppet against someone and someone who could fight with a sword meant it'd be less risk to his puppet. Last thing he'd need is to toss his poor puppet into the river to stop any fire jutsu from turning all his hard work into nothing but ashes.

"I haven't exactly got the chance to give Lingchi here a good test run anyways, you're on!" Kenji told the man with a grin as the one eyed shinobi knelt down before his puppet and begun to unwrap the puppet of the spare cloth Kenji brought. "Just a fair warning, my puppet isn't exactly built for sparring so some of the weapons you might want to avoid having them hit any major arteries." Kenji warned the swordsman as he finished unwrapping his puppet, taking this time to lift up the puppet's face mask and hood as well.

"It would suck having to explain we were just having a friendly spar when I accidentally nicked your jugular with a flying kunai or something, you know?" Kenji would jokingly provided an example of what to come, of course not revealing his actual weapon that was housed within his puppet.

Standing back up, the shinobi would raise his fingers and bring the puppet to it's feet and revealing it's 5 feet, 10 inches size to the two taller shinobi. It's glass brown eyes would be staring lifelessly at the taller of the two, peeking out from underneath the hood and above the face mask that hide away almost all of it's face. The gray cloak hung loosely on the puppet and extended pass it's hands and down to it's mid thighs. The legs of the puppet was wearing a pants strikingly similar to the one that Kenji was wearing and boots that also shared an uncanny resemblance to the puppeteer's own boots.

"So what do you think? Intimidating enough?" Kenji asked with a grin as he brought the puppet in front of him, the puppet merely standing in front of him and seemingly limp for the most part. "Oh and tell ya what, I'll let you have the first hit." Kenji added, almost forgetting to offer the first hit, wanting to test his puppet's own defensive abilities first and foremost.

---

Kenji used Puppet String Technique [10 CP Cost]

Chakra: 90/100
Stamina: 100/100

Cairo watched as Kenji, the new man he had met, began to unwrap his puppet fully, allowing the moonlight to settle on the wooden creation, almost giving it a life of its own. The young man smirked as he watched the scene play out, while he had never fought a puppet master, he had seen several in his life, and was aware of just how deadly they could be. Kenji had finished prepareing his weapon, then preformed a jutsu Cairo was fully aware of, the puppet string technique. With another smirk, he grabbed the handle of his blade, leaving it in its sheath, and readied his body. This was going to be a real challenge.

Obviously this was meant to be a friendly spar, and even though he did not personally know this man, they both fought for the Hidden Moon village, and this made them comrades. While he wanted to test his swordman ship skills against a real puppet user, he had no intent of really harming this man, and knew how to pull his punches, or his blade so to speak. He could not help but chuckle as Kenji offered him the first strike against his puppet. While it was a generious offer, Cairo knew better than to target a puppet, and had his eyes set on the real prize, Kenji.

He would however take that chance to make the first move, and allow himself to set up for the greater advantage. Kenji had positioned his puppet, which looked like a wooden human, directly in front of him, between the two sparring shinobi. Kenji was about five meters from the man, with his puppet in front, being four meters from Cairo. Breaking through the defense was going to be hard, but he had to try. He took off in a quick sprint, moving right towards the mans puppet, pulling the blade fully from its sheath and making his way to his enemy.

A meter in to his dash, Cairo let go of the blade, like a mad man. Using the momentum from pulling the sword out, the genin juggled the sword, allowing it to free float for a second, giving him full access to both of his hands. While the sword hovered he completed a simple set of hand signs, then quickly grabbed the blade out of its floating position, everything happening in the blink of an eye. For him it was a natural move, one he had done several times, but to an onlooker, it would have looked like a crazy circus act. This was not it for his move though, as he was going to launce the second part of his attack.

With his jutsu activated, and his sword back in hand, Cairo neared the puppet, now only a meter from the mans weapon. However he was not going to clash with the wooden creation, and instead go over it, aiming directly for the man. What would have looked like a step, Cairo jumped into the air, using the momentum of his run to carry him up, as he soared upwards though, he used his right foot to step off the air, as if a solid step was there, just free floating. Using both the momentum and the step up, he would soar up, flipping over both the puppet and the puppeteer. Cairo would rotate in mid air and land behind the man, delivering a single percise slice to the mans back. If he was unable to dodge or defend the blow, he would feel a very light cut across his upper back.

Chakra: 95/100
Stamina: 85/100

-Movement used- 5 meters
-1 action- Cast Step of the Wind
-1 action- Slicing with the sword

Jutsu Used
-Step of the Wind
-Blade Juggling

Kenji knew to expect something once Cairo did his little sword trick that gave him the time needed to perform hand signs and didn't see any obvious jutsu happen. What he wasn't expecting was for the man to jump into the air and jump off of said air to leap over both Lingchi and himself. Still he knew better than to sit back and allow the man to make a jump so quickly Kenji jumped forward while moving his puppet to take his place, the shinobi turning as he jumped so he could properly raise the puppet's hands to act as it's defense against the sword strike. Just because it can take a few hits, doesn't mean Kenji would be too eager to replace the parts that would inevitably get damaged if he let them go unopposed.

Landing a meter away from Cairo's landing spot, Kenji watched as the blades of Lingchi's fingers attempted to block the incoming sword strike and he heard the satisfying sound of metal ring out as Lingchi's clawed fingers crashed against the Cairo's katana. "Gonna have to be more sneakier than that!" Kenji would taunt his fellow swordsman with a smirk, although really he was hoping his comment allowed his puppet's mouth opening to go unheard from the swordsman.

Allowing his chakra to take a finer control of the puppet, he begun to set the gears in motion of the puppet's interior launcher and within seconds senbon begun to fly out of the puppet's mouth and rip through it's face mask. The time to fire all 10 of the senbon properly loaded was short as they all flew out one after another and they were all aimed right for the swordsman's chest. "Like so." Kenji told Cairo with pride as his smirk grew into a grin.

---

Movement Used: 1 Meter
Actions:
Used Claw Fingers [2x] to block Cairo's sword strike.
Used Mouth Senbon Launcher to fire 10 Senbon aimed at Cairo's chest

Chakra: 90/100
Stamina: 100/100

Cairo's feet dug into the soft dirt atop the cliff as he gritted his teeth at the sound of metal clashing against metal. He had managed to complete the areal flip, but did not noticed Kenji dash forward underneath him, replacing himself with the puppet. As the man delivered his slash, it was not met with Kenjis soft back like he had expected, but was instead met with the metal claws attached the his comrades puppet. Sparks flew through the night air as they clashed, this man deflecting his initial assault. The man he was currently engaged with in battle had let out a snarky remark, something about having to do better than that, and he was right, if Cairo wanted to win this bout, he needed to step his game up. His thoughts were soon interrupted though as something suddenly tore through the raggedy piece of cloth that hung from the wooden things face. "Dammit, i should know better" Cairo cursed under his breath as several metal needles, or senbon flew out of the things mouth, and stabbed him directly in the chest.

He could feel the cold steel pierce through his clothing and stab into his flesh, warm thick blood running down his chest now as the pain began to enter his mind. It was not enough pain to stop him in his tracks, but it hurt like hell. He was going to have to be more careful, for who knew what kinds of tricks and traps lay within the puppet. Through gritted teeth he allowed a forced chuckle to escape as he leaned forward, applying pressure against the puppet. "That was a pretty clever move Kenji, i wont let you get me again though." As he taunted the man and applied force, he allowed his left hand to slip into his open shirt, pulling out a smoke bomb and quickly pressing the activation button. Just as he would finish his sentence, Cairo would allow the small metal sphere to hit the ground beneath Lingchi as it erupted in a plume of smoke, covering all three individuals in the dark black smoke.

As the smoke filled the area Cairo would use the same left hand to pull out a sticky exploding note this time, and move it towards the side of his blade which was currently still clashing with the puppets steel claws. Since he was applying pressure with his body, he would use the cover of the smoke and the pushing sensation to cover his next move, as he gently placed the sticky side of the note on the puppets chest. He had hoped the smoke would hide the sight of him doing this, and the pressure he was applying would prevent Kenji from feeling anything else touch his puppet. As the smoke filled its entire 5 meter range, and the note now attached to the puppet, Cairo would let off completely, removing his blade and back stepping the full 5 meters, getting right to the edge of the smoke, but remaining within it still. He took a crouched defensive stance, and waited, making sure to listen and see if the deadly wooden creation would follow, or retreat.

Chakra: 95/100
Stamina: 85/100

-Movement used- 5 meters
-1 Action: Activate Smoke Grenade
-1 Action: Place Exploding note

First attack prevention consumed from the senbon hitting his chest.

Kenji was a bit surprised his little gambit had paid off and all Lingchi's senbon found it's mark, hitting the taller swordsman in the chest but despite that, Cairo found the will to keep the pressure on Lingchi's own clawed hands. The puppeteer was hoping that he could just get Lingchi to take a few swipes at the swordsman once he either moved or flinched when he got hit but it seemed the swordsman was able to bear the pain.

Didn't matter at least, his next move was already planned and ready to go, a hatch on the puppet's lower back begun to open but that plan stopped as soon as Cairo chuckled... What was this swordsman planning? Kenji's answer came in the form of thick smoke right behind Lingchi that stopped his view of what was happening. It put him on edge that he could no longer see either Lingchi nor Cairo but he took comfort in knowing that Cairo was still applying pleasure onto Lingchi's finger knives.

Still didn't mean that this little stalemate he and Lingchi had was going to last forever and he couldn't exactly see what either of the two were doing so Kenji quickly jumped back, finding himself a meter out of the smoke that still restricted his vision. He still didn't see anything but he did feel the pressure on Lingchi's claws let up and what followed sounded to be movement somewhere in the smoke but he couldn't quite pin down where Cairo had went.

Now came the question of bringing Lingchi back and prevent his puppet's strings from getting cut or to rush in like a fool and try to strike dead ahead. Kenji is reminded of a story he had heard somewhere back in the academy, about some shinobi named "Riroi" who had foolishly charged into a large crowd of enemy forces while screaming his own name. He ended up getting his team captured by the enemy forces.

So naturally Kenji did the same thing, minus screaming out his name but probably will have the same result. Uncertain where he was hitting, Kenji simply rushed Lingchi straight ahead and while the puppet moved straight ahead, it's right claw was swinging widely in a horizontal sweep from left to right. Regardless if that actually hit anything or not, his next attack was already in motion, it's left claw swinging equally widely in a vertical slice downward. Here's hoping he wasn't going to feel his chakra strings get cut or he just sent his puppet into some sort of trap.

---

Movement Used: 5 Meters
Actions:
Used Claw Fingers [R] to strike horizontally, left to right.
Used Claw Fingers [L] to strike vertically, downward.

Chakra: 90/100
Stamina: 100/100