Toriel
Toriel felt like she was in over her head.
Once, a long time ago, she was a mother of two. They were rambunctious children who frequently got into trouble, roughoused, and generally did things that ended with one or both of them covered in scrapes or bruises. She healed them every time, chastising them and telling them to do better while fully expecting t...
2024-04-28 18:35:11 +0000 UTC View Post“I found one!”
“Me too! A red one!”
“Oh. Mine is red too.”
Sawa set the flag back where he found it, kicking sand over it. “That stinks. Did someone get here before us?”
“I didn’t see any footprints,” Kihon said.
Their third teammate finally gave them his name only after they set off from the village. They had been assigned Fukohei Oasis as th...
2024-04-21 21:49:14 +0000 UTC View PostStatler returned to his seat to find Waldorf already there.
“Where were you?” his friend asked.
“In the bathroom. Is the show back on?”
“You got here just in time.”
“Darn, I was hoping I missed it. Dohoho!”
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Kazagger shuffled his cards. “As you all already know, the Quiz is a game to ten points, first to reach it ...
2024-04-07 18:50:08 +0000 UTC View Post“It’s the Muppet Show, with our special guest, Honorable Ebizo! YAAAAY!!!”
---
The theme song proceeded as before, up until Fozzie’s joke.
Fozzie was standing onstage, wearing a black shirt and facing away from the audience. The theme song for his section looped once, before Zoot blasted a loud note to get his attention. Fozzie jumped and turned to face the pe...
2024-04-07 18:48:41 +0000 UTC View PostJiki usually preferred to use a single, very powerful and complex puppet in combat, but she was perfectly capable of using more.
Hime had been her masterpiece. Her limbs could telescope up to thrice their normal length without losing strength, and then fold up for storage. The two arms and two legs in her disguised form split and unfolded into three weaponized arms and four legs for suppo...
2024-03-31 20:13:53 +0000 UTC View Post“The Grand Alliance Wall of Lisiin is a wonder of the age, not just for its sheer scope and the strength of its construction, but also for its representation of a united Great Lisiin.
“The human kingdom of Larnach garbs its soldiers in red. The elven kingdom of Sanctum-Under-Willow marks its men with green. The dwarfish nation of Famnar Dus favors greys and golds. But the...
2024-03-24 00:31:06 +0000 UTC View PostOndori looked over the checklist, ticking them off as he went and murmuring under his breath.
Sasori waited patiently with a team of small puppets around him. Not Muppets, but child-sized combat puppets each two heads shorter than himself. They were completely identical save for the color of the raggedy cloaks they wore; red, blue, and green.
Next to him, with much less patience, Ji...
2024-02-18 22:18:22 +0000 UTC View Post“Great job everyone!” Ondori said happily. Sasori, good work with the sets. You got them in and out so quickly!”
“It was simple, Ondori-san.”
“And Ozu, I really like what you’re doing with Fozzie, he was very expressive.”
The swordsman sent back a lazy grin. “Well, with just one puppet I can put all my focus on it. Say, what do you think about giving him, lik...
2024-02-18 22:17:19 +0000 UTC View Post“It’s the Muppet Show, with our very special guest, Pakura the Scorcher! YAAAAY!!!”
Every lamp in the tent doused itself as the spotlights came up. The band started up a tune. Four vaguely feminine muppets kicklined across the stage.
“It’s time to play the music!
It’s time to light the lights!
It’s time to meet the Muppets on the Muppet show tonight.”
2024-02-18 22:16:09 +0000 UTC
View Post
A handful of training grounds were kept near the civilian sectors. Some for practical reasons, such as it being easier and cheaper to keep the small water-walking practice field near Suna’s deepest well. Others were for reasons of public interest; the park where Ondori first started his performance was technically listed as Training Ground Zero; a section of it was cordoned off for shinobi to...
2024-02-12 03:22:38 +0000 UTC View Post“I still don’t understand,” Yahiko admitted as they approached Suna. He glanced subtly towards the shinobi following them, hiding in the heat haze rising from the sand. “We’re infiltrating Sand, but they know we’re coming and who we are?”
“That’s right,” Jiraiya confirmed.
“...I don’t get the point.”
“The point is that it’s practice for the real t...
2024-02-12 03:21:39 +0000 UTC View Post“And what did the Kazekage say?”
“He didn’t say anything, yet,” Ondori said, leaning against the bars. “He and Ebizo-sama dismissed me while they discussed it with that… dog.”
Jiki scoffed, folding one leg over the other.
Ondori had visited Jiki again, this time with Ozu. He wanted to talk to someone about what he’d discovered, but the Kazekage had m...
2024-02-12 03:20:20 +0000 UTC View PostOzu had never been in the Workshop before. He’d never had a reason to. It was creepy, honestly, with puppet parts hanging from every wall, shelves covered in wooden heads and limbs. Weapons were scattered everywhere, and more than a few complete were strung from the ceiling looking like hanged men with staring eyes and gaping mouth…
Ozu shuddered.
Sasori looked up from ...
2024-02-04 19:52:07 +0000 UTC View Post“Nah.”
“What do you mean, nah?!” Jiraiya asked, dismayed. “This is your only job!”
The small orange toad glared up at him. “I am a toad. You ain’t getting me to cross the desert.”
“I already paid you!”
“That cheap sake ain’t worth the rice it was made from, and it definitely ain’t worth me drying myself out in the de...
2024-02-04 19:50:51 +0000 UTC View PostThe Kazekage looked over the report in his hand. Then he traded it for the report on the desk. They were both the same handwriting, and had almost exactly the same content, but the second was written with a different cadence and slightly altered diction.
Ondori had written two mission reports. One from himself… and one, allegedly, from Kermit the Frog.
Satoshi was genuinely unsure...
2024-02-04 19:49:06 +0000 UTC View Post“And a one, and a two, and a one two three--”
“Hi-ho, Kermit the Frog here, and welcome to an impromptu performance here in lovely this-village-doesn’t-have-a-name in Nohara no Kuni!”
Kermit looked towards Ondori, then back towards where the ceramic monstrosity stood, wavering back and forth like a snake preparing to strike.
“Er. Er.” He turned to the fr...
2024-01-28 23:26:20 +0000 UTC View PostInoichi was not freaking out. After all, the Hime apparently dying, while tragic, had little to no bearing on the mission. She wasn’t a client, just someone they happened to meet while on duty. That being said, oh sweet merciful spirits this woman just died out of nowhere.
Inoichi could do little more than stare. The woman was slumped over, not breathing!
The door opened ...
2024-01-28 23:24:40 +0000 UTC View PostFuuma shuriken, concealed within arm. Once activated, the weapon extends, unfolds, and spins at high velocity. Functional at melee range. Can be fired as a projectile at higher speed than most can achieve with such a large shuriken. Expected to be able to carve through stone when launched, and saw through logs while still attached to puppet. Preliminary name: Windmill Surprise.
A...
2024-01-28 23:22:55 +0000 UTC View PostThe clay digger’s name was Horu, and after making a token effort to wash himself he made tea for himself and Ondori that Ondori politely pretended to drink. The cup was covered in mud. Most of the hut was covered in mud.
“You know, it’s not healthy to take your work home with you so much,” Ondori said.
“Heh?”
“Nevermind. Horu, are you the only one digging up clay...
2024-01-22 00:23:06 +0000 UTC View Post“That has to be our target,” Inoichi insisted.
“Are you sure?” Choza was less certain. “I’m almost certain that our target is a woman.”
“Our target is a mad puppeteer. How many of those could be in Field country right now?”
“I don’t know if I’d call him mad.”
“He was having a conversation with his puppets. And making it talk back!”
Cho...
2024-01-22 00:21:24 +0000 UTC View Post“I think it was a bit overwrought.”
“Well, I thought it was lovely. I hope I get half so lovely a send-off,” the shinobi argued.
The merchant disagreed. “I’m just not certain of the thought process behind it. If he wanted to retire the old frog, why bring attention to it? I wouldn’t have acknowledged it at all.”
“No no, see, I heard from Gurosu that ...
2024-01-22 00:17:24 +0000 UTC View PostA proper stage was set up now. Lousy ninja, many of the citizens thought, watching the space be empty one moment and then, while no one was watching, suddenly there was a stage. Why couldn’t they build houses quickly like that?
It wasn’t a large stage, but those who knew what it was for recognized that it didn’t need to be to do its job. A black curtain formed the backg...
2024-01-15 01:04:43 +0000 UTC View PostOzu returned to Suna with a broad grin and a sketchpad in his pocket. Helping Ondori with his puppet shows had been surprisingly fun, and the practicalities of chakra threads had proven themselves on his latest mission; so many tripped up shinobi, so many weapons pulled from hands. Why didn’t more ninja learn about it?
The Land of Bears had been a strange place, doing its best to distra...
2024-01-15 01:01:53 +0000 UTC View PostThe trip back to Suna was a quiet one, and thankfully quick. Jiraiya had been kind enough to have his female student patch up Gurosu. It wasn’t a good job, but it would hold until he could get it properly looked at by a medic.
The Kazekage took most A-and-S-rank mission reports personally, if possible. Anything less than that he let his subordinates in the mission office take c...
2024-01-15 00:59:53 +0000 UTC View Post“It’s been a long time since I went on a caravan mission,” Jiraiya said as he wrapped up the paperwork. “But I’m pretty sure this is a bigger group than normal.”
The speaker for the merchants nodded, smiling. “We had a good time in Suna this time around. It was mostly thanks to Ondori-san, at that.”
“Oh?” Jiraiya handed the clipboard back.
“Oh my yes. Mos...
2024-01-08 14:00:12 +0000 UTC View Post“I knew it!”
“What?”
“I knew it! Buss, they’re meeting with the Toad Sage right now!”
“What?! Are you sure, Senko?”
“It couldn’t be anyone else. And the head ‘merchant’ is meeting with him now.”
Senko and the eye-patched ninja sped towards the border where Senko had just come from and watched from a safe distance.
Buss swo...
2024-01-08 13:00:09 +0000 UTC View PostThe next few days were relatively uneventful.
The guard rotation remained unusually active, but now they had something to do. After her dad reported the attack, Mayor Thorndyke looked almost pleased. It wasn’t an expression Amelia was used to seeing on him, since he usually looked angry whenever she was around. But he was all too happy to be able to make all the soldiers milling around ...
2023-12-17 03:57:02 +0000 UTC View PostGanondorf, Hjaalmarch
As they traveled along the road in a horse-drawn cart, Ganondorf inspected his new sword.
It was not a masterwork, in truth. Ganondorf had never worked this ‘moonstone’ before, nor the quicksilver it needed to alloy with to be worth anything. The Legion smith, Beirand, was happy to provide his help however, and so the sword was still well w...
2023-12-11 00:03:57 +0000 UTC View PostMr. Wood stepped inside his home and shut the door behind him. He closed all his windows and drew his curtains shut. Then, as an afterthought, he doused every candle as quickly as he could. Soon, the only light in his home was the sliver of fading sunlight under his front door.
It wasn’t dark enough. He could still see it as though it was an inch from his face.
“Please, please p...
2023-12-04 01:22:03 +0000 UTC View Post