Kengen vs the first taker.

The sun was beating down on Suna today, hot as always, baking the sand so that it to radiated heat, trapping the citizens both from above and below. There was no shiled from the heat, and an outsider would have found the harsh conditions taxing. Not the residents though. They were very much used to this daily cycle of intense heat at night and the shocking shift to cold as the sun went down. Especially Kengen, who had lived here his whole life and spent almost every waking minute that he could in training. It was the reason he was considered an honorary member of his clan. To be granted with such a title, one did not have to be overwhelmingly powerful, honorary members were ones that showed promise from an early age adn were gifted with a kinjutsu, a worthy gift on top of the clans secret jutsu. They may not have possessed a kekkei genkei, but they certainly made up for it. They were still formidable to say the least.

Kengen was in sparring area 12, a sand pit which was large enough to host a large get together if need be, not that it was ever used in that way. He removed the Bo staff from his back and slammed it into the ground before him, causing it to stand up right all on its own, three and a half feet above the surface, visible, the other half a foot hidden below the surface of the dessert. He quickly jumped on it and maintained his balance with one foot, bending at the knee and raising his other foot and placing it at that bend in his leg. This was the crane stance. Just good for keeping balance with very small area to reside upon. With a flick of his wrist, one of the weapon pouches on his legs and made a hand sign with his left hand, making an upward motion with the other.

Instantly six glass kunai shot up and out of their holster and continued into the air until he lowered both of his hands. At this time, the kunai all did a 180 turn now scattered in the air, and headed back towards the ground, aiming to impale the ground.

Kengen jumped off of his staff and landed on the ground, forming another hand seal and then stamping on the ground. Six spikes of sand rose up about an inch high off the ground, randomly through out the arena. The six kunai landed neatly on each of the points and rested, balanced perfectly. Kengen, pleased, went and gathered the glass kunai and replaced them in his holster. He had just gotten started.

"Doing a bit of training ehh?" Tousen said as he wandered into the area after observing some of the training that was going down. He hadn't even taken the time to understand exactly what had happen in Sunagakure since he had left. In fact, since coming back from his missions and training he was more or less getting a feel for the latest.... renovations that had taken place in the village; quite neutral actually. It was all just sand after all and anything built on a weak foundation was bound to collapse at one point or another.

"How about we have at it. I'm sure fighting another individual would be more fun then fighting nothing..."

Tousen said this, turning his right hand and rested it upon the hilt of his blade; his palm rounding it lightly. He was the only one in the training area at the time; apparently everyone else had been scattered about trying to either pick up the broken pieces from the chaos or make it somehow worse. He wanted something to warm up on before he took on the task of returning order to a broken village. It was a bit more then he could do on his own, but he was confident that his current ability would make him more then ample part.

Kengen was just about to initiate another series for his training, this time based on speed not accuracy, when he was interrupted by a fellow suna shinobi. It was a male who seemed to be a bit older then Kengen and perhaps higher in rank. Maybe a chunin, or a well seasoned genin, one of the two, but he was banking on the first one. It seemed that he was in the mood to train as well, asking Kengen for a sparring match with out hesitation. Maybe this guy would be entertaining. Kengen had lately only been training by himself, and it was getting rather dull, but he trudged away at it anyway. He did what he must regardless of how unpleasant it might have been.

I suppose that sounds like a grand idea Kengen said as a small grin broke out across his face. There was nothing he preferred then a good battle. And if this guy was actually a higher rank then him, well he was sure to get one. He didnt care, and he wouldnt back down ever. He actually was glad at the chance to fight someone that looked stronger. He was also kind of flattered. Obviously he had seen something he liked, or he wouldnt have bothered. He didnt strike him as the kind of guy to partake in boring activities. Then again, not many people were here, so maybe he was just bored and any prey would do. Not that it mattered much in that aspect either. A fight was a fight, and here he was presented with an opportunity. It was about time.

Kengen grabbed the bo staff standing up before him in the ground and retrieved it, spinning it around in the air before holding it in both hands, the motion stopping with a resounding smack. This was no special weapon, no heirloom, but it was still his pride and joy. He wasnt very skilled with the fancy arts of weaponry or anything above the basics, but the basics he did know well. That was all he ever planned on learning, for it would be sure to serve him later on. One who mastered basics conserved energy and could focus more on simple things in elaborate ways. Thus was his understanding of life.

He stood ready for the opponent, the grin not subsiding. This was going to be fun.

"Good, hopefully we will both learn something from this experience..."

The 'training' wasn't necessarily a priority as was obtaining information. Tousen was interested in the state of Sunagakure as is and at some point he would probably settle in and ask the one training what he knew of the recent events. For him, this would be more of a bonding experience, in which two individuals gain a sense of respect for one another through combat and competition; with that said, he didn't know anything about his opponent as of yet and for now he stood in something of a ready stance waiting for him to make a move. In all honesty, Tousen was more of a counter attacker himself; waiting for opponents to show weaknesses and then exploiting the to the best of his abilities. Physically attacking wasn't necessarily his strong suit and something he would have to make priority in his training in the near future for his more brute force of defensive inclined opponents.

However, he had basically issued the little spar, it would be silly for him to not take the first move when given. Normally he would start a battle with a genjutsu or a chain of illusion to protect himself, but this wasn't the time nor place. He would attack straight forward as a sort of test but not put himself in harms way. He turned his hand about his hilt, grasping and pulling his blade from its hilt while with his other hand forming and using a release upon it so that his blade assumed its 'C' ranked form. He then turned it in his hand to the reverse side; in this way, though his blade and any attacks would still do decent blunt damage, none of the resulting cuts or damage would be any worse then skin deep; simple flesh wounds. Even though he didn't plan on landing any life ending blows to his opponent nor did he think that he would be careless enough to do so, this was a decent safe precaution.

He apparently used a staff of sorts. There was no internal chakra running through it from what he could tell and it seemed as if it was simply a normal staff. From his general form he seemed younger then himself but there was something very different about the make up of his body then normal individuals; nothing he have ever seen or sensed. Perhaps this was something worth looking into after all? He had no way of actually seeing the boy or for that matter poking him open to investigate so the only and best way to determine the nature of the oddities of the boy was active experiment; like anything else, and a healthy curiosity of the world around ones self. He turned his blade in front of himself in his right hand, raising it slowly and then swiftly downward with a small amount of chakra behind it, compressing the air into a medium and sending a blade of chakra at the body in a straight path that would normally cut him in half at the hip should it be a normal attack. Seeing as though they weren't too far away from each other (about 20meters) he would have enough time to dodge, and Tousen would have enough time to gage his speed from the first attack while preparing for some sort of counter attack. "Kenkyaku"

Spoiler:

As he had planned, this guy had effectively initiated the first move. Kengen wasnt too keen on making the first move, and based on the simplicity of this first attack, neither was he. It was an obvious gauge of abilities, and he knew this, because that was his own style. This was going to be interesting if the two shared like or the same strategy and battle style. That would mean it would come down to who was truly faster, smarter and stronger. Also who had the better jutsu and knew how to utilize them. All of these factors would play key.

He notice how earlier the guy had turned his sword to the duller side. This would be helpful as it appeared that in no way was this to be a death match. That would complicate things as a lot of his technique was based on killing. At least one of his techniques he could think of was officially off limits, or if he did use it, it would have to be with the greatest care as to not cause major damage if he was successful in its use.

That was all for later though. Right now he was faced with the first step, avoiding being defeated in one blow by this wave of chakra that had come through the sword at him. It wasnt anywhere near point blank range, so he had plenty of time to react to it. It was just the how that he had to pick. That wasnt to hard either. He had time, and so he had options. His options werent limited, and the option he picked, he hoped would be affective.

Kengen spun the bo staff around his head, and reaching back with both arms, held it at an angle to his own right, Tousen's left, and stamped it into the ground, pushing off, and sending him cartwheeling to the side. As he spun in the air in an evasive maneuver, his right hand made three hand signs, unseen by the opponent, while the other held on to the staff. When he landed, his feet gingerly holding him up, the jutsu activated as his chakra traveled through the ground and would create spikes that would shoot up directly into his opponent's feet and splay outward, holding him fast.

The maneuver had done a few things. One was getting him out of the way with out showing his real speed. It did however, show some of his reaction time, but that couldn't be helped. Secondly, it hid his hand signs so that the opponent couldnt tell he was making them, or if he could, wouldnt see what they were, unable to tell they were of the earth element. Also, the way this jutsu worked, it would be difficult to tell he had even done a jutsu in the first place, and this was his trap. He stayed crouched with his eye on the ninja who had started this, and waited calmly.

Spoiler:

The first move gave his opponent plenty of time, but also allowed himself ample time to settle down and watch. His opponent did a few agile moves that displayed his dexterity, not only with his own body but with the seemingly normal staff that he carried. It was almost unnecessarily flashy in the way he turned, but unknown to Tousen this was just a way for him to use his hand signs without being noticed and it would have seemed to have worked. Thankfully, with both of Tousen's feet planted firmly on the ground, he could feel the movement from under him directly before the spikes shot upward from the earth. Seeing as though he had sensed nothing from under him before hand, Tousen's experience told him that this was the work of an earth based jutsu. Tousen did a quick and small hop backward; only a few feet which would be enough to evade the 'D' ranked technique. If it weren't for the fact that his sense of touch was so intuned, he could have easily fallen victim to such a technique. It was a good starting move to attempt to immobilize ones opponent from the get go.

However, as he jumped backward his left hand formed three hand signs. He used the 'False Invisibility' Genjutsu in order to mask himself from his opponents view. To his opponent, he would have seemingly disappeared. In it's 'C' ranked form he could mask his entire body form his opponents view in the form of the illusion. He was most likely watching the hand signs as he cast them meaning that the illusion would have worked; many shinobi depended on their sight as their primary sense and Tousen was curious to see how this genin would react to the disappearance of his opponent. Though it was an illusions, one might not expect a genjutsu, thus Tousen didn't expect him to attempt a Kai right away.

Spoiler:

'Rat bastard' Kengen said to himself as his first move missed as the opponent moved out of the way just in time before his attack hit. There was only one explanation here. He had been paying attention, a lot of attention, for that attack to miss. He had set it up almost perfectly. Either he had been paying extreme close attention to EVERYTHING around them, or he had some kind of heightened sense of feel or whatever. At any rate, he knew that attack should not have missed, since up till then, he had been observing Kegnen and was probably focused on the opposition himself. Then he disappeared. Just out of no where, gone and away. Kengen smirked, it was an obvious tactic to shield himself from the bounds of sight so he could sneak up on Kengen and finish this assassin style. It was a good and simple trick, but it would not work on him, at least not this day.

Kengen stabbed his staff into the ground once more, a foot below the surface, the other three sticking up and above. Kengen jumped on to the end as he had in his own training not so long ago and balanced in the crane stance, keeping one foot on the pole and the other tucked behind his bent knee. This way he would be able to feel any attack from below by the vibration of the staff and be granted more time to react then if he were directly on the ground. To cover attacks from all the other sides, he had another strategy at work.

Quickly he retrieved two of five panes of glass from his pouch, each of them 3 inch squares with a thickness of about an inch. He flipped them into the air and quickly made seven hand signs. He was able to finish in time thanks to the ability to using only one hand for a hand seal. This way he was able to create two hand signs almost at once, and shortening the time needed just enough to where the jutsu deployed right as the squares spiraled back down right at his midriff.

Glass Particle Cloud

Instantly both pieces of glass shattered into severl thousand pieces, no longer visible to the human eye as anything more then just a dusty area in the air. The particles quickly formed a wall all around him and above his head. Now if the opponent tried to attack him, Kengen would see the movement before it got to him as the cloud all around him had about 1.5 meters of distance from his actual body. Not to mention that as soon as the opponent did break this almost invisible barrier, if at all, he would focus all the glass pieces to this one section, creating some very irritating problems for this man, especially if he did in fact have a heightened sense of touch.

His concentration was broken quickly though when a new comer came and stood in the middle of the field. Kengen was skeptical at first. Was this guy going to interfere. He had no clue who he was, but based on his appearance he was in fact a chunin of the sand village. He paused for a moment and began to speak.

Tousen, we have a problem, several people taken to make an attempt at leaving the village, you are being ordered to seek out and detain, kill if neccesary, any of these ninja you come across. The man stopped to look at Kengen standing there. Take this brat along with you if you want. This is an unofficial mission and will not count for your records.

Kengen frowned at the insult but didnt say anything as the man disappeared. He gathered the cloud into one section and let it fall to the ground in a small dust pile and leaped off his staff, removing it from the ground and strapping it back on his back. He wanted to replenish the number of his glass panes, but that wouldnt be needed, he would need chakra if this Tousen would accept his aid.

All the fun and none of the glory, sounds like my idea of a good time. You willing to accept my help in this?

Spoiler:

For those with techniques to shield themselves from view, it was common to attempt such a thing. A shinobi of experience would have was in which to defend themselves from an unknown, unseen opponent, and Tousen was curious to see how the boy would handle such a situation. Tousen walked slowly about the boy, keeping the same parameter to the boy; forming a radius around him. He walked lightly so as to not make any noise against the sand and even bothered to use the water walking technique to keep his steps from leaving foot prints. All the while stalking about him he watched the boys actions. Not one, but many different small moves that to Tousen seemed a bit unorthodox. He had placed the staff into the ground and perched himself upon it. At first, this seemed as if a strange move to make.

He could have issued an attack from that moment, when the boy slipped two new objects from his person. He then, using hand signs caused the two objects to shatter into smaller and smaller bodies of origin until they were nothing but mist like fogs on either side of him. But what was it that he had used? Earth itself was apparently his element of choice but dust of earth would settle while this dust seemed to linger on. Then Tousen remembered something...

His electromagnetic sense allowed him to pick up on source of electricity and electromagnetic fields via reading infrared waves. However, glass and many forms of polarized plastics prevented this process. With this sense, he could only see a blur around the boy; was it possible that this technique involved glass specifically? In any case, it was most likely a defensive move used to protect him from all angle. But what of the stance upon his staff? If the glass fog was suppose to act like a defense about him then perhaps the staff was to give him coverage from bellow. If he had come from behind him such as underground then he would have a bit more time to react. It never occurred to Tousen that he was using the staff to feel the ground; especially when the ground was composed of sand that naturally absorbed shock and thus nullified many most subtle vibrations.

In any case, Tousen had two options. The first was the most passive; seeing as though his opponent had taken the time to put a defense into motion, he could easily use the time to set up and prep further paths of illusionary manipulation which would make getting a blow on his opponent much easier, or he could attack his opponent in a more original style in order to land a blow. The most thoughtful of attacks would be to moonstep above him and attack with another Kenkyaku; using the bladed projectile (made blunt by the reverse style) to attack from directly above him. This was a great option because on top of the staff, he most likely wouldn't have enough mobility to escape and salvage his defensive techniques; infact if he didn't hit his opponent, he would make sure to split the staff that he carried in two; also, he would attack at a range close enough that his opponent would hardly have enough time to recognize the origin and nature of the attack AND effectively get out of dodge. Seeing as though it was a spar, he would use this technique. If push come to shove he himself would still be invisible to his opponent and as long as he didn't know it was an illusion he could keep his target ignorant to the fact that he was even using genjutsu to begin with.

Suddenly, his move caught hesitation in the form of another individual. They were the only two in the training area with the exception of the fast moving individual that caught his senses. He was apparently coming for him, as from a steady motion he made a 'B-line' toward Tousen causing him to turn his attention from the spar to the individual as he landed in the sand and spoke immediately, his voice slightly hampered by a heavy breathe as though he had been running for quite some time.

Tousen, we have a problem, several people taken to make an attempt at leaving the village, you are being ordered to seek out and detain, kill if neccesary, any of these ninja you come across. The man stopped to look at Kengen standing there in his somewhat awkward defensive stance and apparently had no respect for their spar as he spoke. Take this brat along with you if you want. This is an unofficial mission and will not count for your records.

The man quickly took his leave and Tousen, with a sigh, sheathed his sword. Upon completely sheathing his sword, he would become visible to his genin opponent, now ally. The next move was most likely to run some recon and scout the walls, and it was always easier when one had multiple people on the job; after all his 'eyes' alone couldn't see everything.

All the fun and none of the glory, sounds like my idea of a good time. You willing to accept my help in this?

He said; a tone hinting maturity beyond the look of his age.

Of course, though I'm not necessarily here for any hint of glory. As for a good time, well I suppose it could be entertaining. You may aid me if you choose to; I will see what I can do about making it worth your while...

He said, turning his foot on the sand and taking off, not expecting the boys response to be in word but in action; if he was serious about helping then he would most likely follow along to their next destination...

OOC: Topic closed! Continued in any place that people attempt to flee the village. The trap is set!