Pine
PK THOT ⚡
“Chosen Ones. The time has come for you to make your way to the Arena, where you shall meet your destiny. And also Aldur, but he’s less important. Good luck; we trust you will not disappoint.”
Silence. The sound was swallowed up about him in such an abrupt fashion that his mind wasn’t fully prepared to accept that there was nothing going on around him. His ears were still strained at the sound of wood splintering behind him on impact and the various booms of explosives being set off around him. The stillness around him felt even more sinister than the resultant noise from the training room’s occupants’s mingling bloodlust. Briefly, he considered the possibility that he may be dead.
Tetsuun’s legs began to burn from the effort of holding himself in a partially crouched position, which seemed to, indeed, confirm that he was still alive. Not only that, but that voice from earlier had returned, and with the boy calming down from his initial panic, the words seemed to finally register in his mind. He cracked open his eyes, but no longer was he standing on the pine floor boards of the dojo room. It took him a moment to adjust, his pupils dilating wider to drink in all traces of light it could find, but soon he was able to discern the tiny grains of dirt from one another that made up the ground.
His hands slipped from the back of his neck and he rose up to stand straight. The boy could still feel a lingering tickle from where a pair of brass knuckles where inches away from knocking his head right off his shoulders. He was alone again. The walls around him were shrouded with shadows, the only trace that anything still existed outside of this tunnel being the speck of light at the end of it. How cliché.
As if in response to that, the light trickled down the cylindrical path closer towards him, sparkles dancing along the length of the tunnel. In a sense, this aided in slating the building unease in the pit of his stomach that had been present from the very beginning, though no amount of mortification would truly be able to dispel this.
It took Tetsuun a moment to take in all that was happening. He was being teleported around yet again, and now it was time to start this challenge that everyone was talking about… or at least, that was his best guess for why they would send him to an arena. He knew that this was coming from the moment he had stepped out of that glass cubicle. However, it had taken him up to this point, with a path of glitter shimmering and beckoning him to trudge forward, in order for him to really come to terms with the fact that this was reality, and not some outrageous fantasy he nor anyone else had been able to conjure up, no matter how abstract the thought. More than anything, Tetsuun just hadn’t anticipated for everything to start so soon.
After a few more moments of hesitation, the pale boy began his trek forward, advancing towards the ever-growing radiance that was blossoming before his vision. Tetsuun’s dark eyes narrowed to slits, squinting against the irritant. Eventually, as the illumination seemed to devour the dark tendrils crawling up the walls of the tunnel. Finally, he had to cup his hand over his forehead to cast a shadow over his eyes, which mercifully alleviated the strain of his pupils shrinking back, and he emerged out from under the yawning archway.
The sight that he was greeted with was far from pleasant.
There was at least twice as many creatures here as there were in that room he had originally entered, all of them seeming even bigger and nastier than before. The boy stopped where he was, lingering at the edge of the tunnel, a worried look creasing his brow. These were all the people he was up against?
“Challengers,” the omniscient voice interjected again, ripping him forcefully from his thoughts. "This is the Preliminary Round. The goal is simple: impress us.” The arena had quieted down at this stage, the only noise left from them being the occasional whispers to be snatched up. “Think of this as a sort of celestial 'RPN's got Talent', where we, the Gods, are the judges. You are to come up to the stage, one at a time, and show off something. What you show is up to you: your fighting skills, perhaps; your powers, maybe; or even a more mundane skill, like singing or, I dunno... juggling. We have provided various materials for you to use at your behest. Thus, the stage is set: show us what you've got, and do not disappoint!
"Now, you may rise to the stage, one by one. There is no specific order, but please don't push in front of each-other. You are the Chosen Ones, for crying out loud, not a bunch of kids rushing for the Ice-Cream Truck."
It was faint at first, but soon the sound of percussion instruments crescendoed to fill the stadium, indicating that end of the omniscient voice’s announcement and mark the beginning of the round. As this became evident, the murmur of voices seemed to grow in increments to a chatter, the occasional person trying to shout over someone else before dying out again.
Tetsuun felt his chest tighten, and in an attempt to compensate this, sucked in as much air through his nostrils as his lungs could take. This ended up being a rather shallow breath, his chest rising only faintly as the scent of dust seemed to attack his senses. He knew he couldn’t stay where he was, lest he stick out too much amidst this company of freaks. Without acknowledging the first person to eagerly jump to the challenge, he moved forward to mingle with the crowd.
Every person he passed seemed to be at least a head taller than him. One girl, her form unstable with wisps curling about where her edges should have been, could have used his head as an arm rest, if she so desired. Another, clad in traditional robing, was not quite as tall as the girl, but the collection of fox tails swaying behind him all seemed to suggest otherwise. Tetsuun knew there had to be someone that didn’t even remotely intimidating amidst this crowd. Alas, the more he looked, the more these large figures seemed to rise up, all looming over them and concealing the ones with relaxed, gentle features from plain sight. If these were all the contestants though…
He needed to find Katsuro. They had just been right next to each other, the jonin couldn’t have been too far off, could he? The boy continued his plummet through the depth of the crowd, twisting to and fro to fit in between the small gaps that people allowed themselves with their conversational partners. The longer he looked, however, the more it seemed like an impossible task to hunt him down. That old fart smells like sewage. How hard could it be to find him? He was just another competitor, yet as he continued ducking and weaving between people, he began to see the same faces, none of which were was he was looking for.
Tetsuun stopped in his tracks, a halting epiphany slamming into him with the force of a stampede. Katsuro was here… he was another competitor.
Loathe as he was to admit it, Katsuro was better than him in every way imaginable and more. Katsuro was a jonin, his sensei, it was his job to be that good. Tetsuun could acknowledge that much… privately, he wasn’t stupid. If Katsuro was here… some of these competitors must be just as good as him in combat, if not better. So then what the hell am I doing here? Tetsuun couldn’t measure up to a jonin, let alone some brute that had whatever strange powers… or flaming canines that he was completely ill-equipped to deal with. That much had been proven in his previous little scrap with Katsuro, in which the most he had been able to do was smash his stupid glasses up a bit.
He was as good as dead, and the boy knew it. Tetsuun’s eyes darted up, meeting a pair of hazel eyes, which bore into his brown ones critically, seeming to cut right into the heart of his anxiety. The genin swiveled away from the stare, tilting his chin up to pretend to examine the raised stage with rapt attention. His eyes were unfocused, however, looking beyond the platform and effectively blocking out all that was around him.
The boy attempted another deep breath. Whatever the case was, he had to try something. He had plenty of time. There was a multitude of contestants eagerly pressing against one another to be next in line to show off what they had. Tetsuun could simply take this time to examine all of his options.
He considered himself to be an intelligent person. That could be something that would make himself stand out amongst the rest… except how would he do that? In fact, the more he thought about it, the more he came to realize he wasn’t even remotely certain about what made him markedly witted. Was it that he knew the concept of clones better than his last teacher? If he made clones, they should at least serve some kind of purpose, and having them corner a group of straw dummies didn’t seem to display any discernible talent. Was it that he was able to react quick enough to avoid that mammoth of a girl’s punches half the time? Was it that he didn’t need a field manual to be able to recognize a paper bomb when he saw one?
Tetsuun reached one hand up and to the back of his neck, raking his short fingernails just at the edge of his scruff of black hair, probably scratching a little more rough than was necessary. Alternatively, he could just… never get on that platform. What would happen if he didn’t, anyways? He’s already lost this competition before it even began, so what was the point of making a fool out of himself? In his final moments here, he could at least try to seem a little respectable. What would they do anyway? Send him back? He wanted nothing more in the world than that. His family needed him, and no flashy advertisements of ultimate glory could distract him from that. Maybe they’ll kill him if he refuses. Well, then at least I wouldn’t have to worry about anything. Tetsuun attempted to push his increasingly morbid sense of humor to the back of his mind. No. Death was not something he was just going to accept.
Tetsuun’s mind reeled, grappling vainly at ideas that passed through his mind, all of which were decidedly poor. Time wore on, but the only half-decent answer that he could come up with would be to toss around the dummies a little bit which, even then, was awful, because he was rather certain at that stage that he would look like a joke compared to everyone that had went before him. This idea further vexed him, staring out at someone’s back that had scooted in front of him to get a better look at the stage, yet not even registering that such a thing had happened. He waited, biding his time, anticipating some great idea to come to him if he just waited long enough…
Fuck it. Tetsuun’s face scrunched up into an irritated scowl, finally noticing the creature that stood before him, casting a shadow over where he stood. The boy brushed past him roughly, digging his shoulder into the creature’s back, eliciting a growl as he stormed past but nothing more.
After a number of similarly aggressive encounters, he finally arrived to the stage, where he found it a little more difficult to maintain his facade. Tetsuun's grimace softened, slowing his pace as he took one step after the other with care. The boy's head dipped down, as though to make sure the placement of each of his sandals was securely placed on the one step before dragging himself up the other. Ascending to the top of the stairs, the boy paused, making the grave mistake of looking back out into the the gathering of contestants. The crowd swam beneath him, the sight of so many of them practically bringing on a wave of nausea. He looked around with a jerky snap of his head, but the damage was already done. He had seen flashes eyes, a few locking onto him with expert precision, as though he were a target. People have been actually watching these things? Great...
Tetsuun had already plotted out what he was going to do, step after step. He knew the best way to properly exhibit his abilities. He approached the computer, exaggeratedly large buttons arranged neatly in rows, and he began to search for what indicated a fresh batch of dummies. The first keg in his plan was that there were dummies still standing there, untouched by the previous person that was supposed to annihilate them in whatever way they could. Tetsuun had already gone to up to the computer, however, and it would look incredibly awkward if he just stepped away at this stage. His hand hovered over the buttons, eyes flicking between them as he led his palm over each. However, he could not find it. The worst part was that he knew it had to be in some obvious spot, like the center. That would only make sense, wouldn't it? So where was it?
Blood began to rush to his cheeks, heating them up in his frustration. Forget the new dummies. Tetsuun's hand slid to the edge of the computer where he pushed himself from it, attempting to appear casual and as if he had planned that from the very beginning, though it was very apparent to anyone that had been watching that this was indeed not the case.
He stood now in the center of the raise platform. Four dummies, stuffed full of some material that plumped up the thick material encasing it, stood in a semi-circle before him, unmoving, uncaring. Tetsuun's hand slipped down to the holster at his side, flicking open the button and digging one finger to hook into the ring of the kunai knife, but something else gave him paused. He felt more handles of the knives than he should have, considering he had used that one in the training room. However, when he lifted his palm just enough to keep the flap open and examine the holster's contents, it soon became evident that there were five in there once again.
He stared at this for a moment, but the increasing volume of the other challengers around him brought him back to reality. Focus. Tetsuun inhaled deeply through his mouth, if only to let it back out again through a sigh.
In one quick movement, he yanked the kunai out from the holster, twisting it so he could group it roughly by the end, the bandage wrapping the handle permitting easy grip. The slightest amount of chakra was focused into his feet and, bending his knees to a crouch, he sprung up, taking to an notable height that took him up and beyond the dummies. Twisting somewhat midair, he brought his hand out and over his shoulder before throwing it back down, zooming straight for the dummy farthest to the right.
Missed. The metal blade tore easily into the material of the dummy, but it was just barely too far above where the heart should be. He had overshot the vital point. This fact lingered like a haze in his mind, fogging this thoughts, but he had to keep going. Maybe no one else would notice, after all. Still in the air, just now feeling the gravity's fingers closing in on his attire to tug him back down, he dug into the pouch behind his back. With practiced ease, he grabbed the end of the wire spool and snaked its way through a series of shuriken, before tugging the string of metal out altogether. Tetsuun was always prepared for this move.
The wire began to lace between his fingers, finding a comfortable position for himself. With a gesture of his arms, the spool reeled out, laces of silver dancing across the stage. With another gesture, crossing his arms over his chest, he brought them down in a quick whip-like motion, the star-pronged weapons following the path, spinning along the wire as he began his descent through the air. The shuriken all caught on the dummies's material, the last of their spinning giving them the proper momentum to turn the blade right into the stitching. However, much to Tetsuun increasing vexation, they were scattered about the body erratically. Had it been two real people, the assault would have been annoying more than anything.
His lips peeled up from his teeth in frustration, but he had to keep going. Tetsuun tugged back on the wires, stiffening them to silver lines that shone only with the sun hitting the right angle. Suddenly, he was in control of how he landed. The yanked them just enough to the side to guide himself down, smoothly changing his trajectory to be just over the final dummy. He was falling faster now, and just as it may have seemed like he was going to fall past the dummy, he stretched out his legs. Tetsuun wrapped them around the dummy's neck in over to land on the shoulders, nearly falling over from impact, but the dummies were specifically designed to pick themselves back up before they could fall. With that knowledge, Tetsuun pulled out another kunai, and clapping his hand on the dummy's head, pulled it back to expose the neck, and with one quick swipe, dragged the black across the material.
Without warning, the boy hitched a breath, air catching in his throat as he shuddered so violently he lost his balance. With no hope of recovering, Tetsuun collapsed onto the stage floor in an ungraceful heap. He winced, the impact shooting up his tailbone and provoking another gasp from him. He managed not to roll onto his back too far, instead catching himself on his hands that shot out to support himself behind him. The boy's eyes were wide, the slightest bit of a tremor shaking his gaunt frame.
That didn't feel like some straw man. That felt like a person - a real life, in the flesh human being that he just split open and poured the stuffing out of. He had not expected that. Tetsuun had never, actually slit someone's throat, but instinctively, he knew that's how it would feel. That epiphany, that knowledge sent another quiver coursing through his body, heart racing in his chest.
He had no idea how long he sat there like that, wide-eyed and his breathing turbulent. What finally shook him from his daze was a particularly annoyed cry ringing up from the crowd believe. Tetsuun blinked, confused at first, then angry. He looked like an idiot sitting there! It didn't matter if he even had done anything well up until that point. None of it mattered! Those last few seconds made him look like a complete and total imbecile! A complete pushover! If he hadn't ever been dragged to this stupid challenge, that he never wanted to be a part of anyway, and those stupid "gods." hadn't ever decided to use realistic dummies...
All rationale abandoned him. His ears had turned crimson in his fury. Suddenly, he got to his feet, stomping his sandals against the stage with all the fierceness a boy of four foot six could must. Tetsuun turned his enraged glare to the sky, seemingly where the omniscient voice resided. "Hey!" he shouted out, voice cracking from under the pressure of his rage.
He waited, lips trembling with anger, but there was no response. If anything, the contestants around him had begun to hush ever so slightly, some turning to whisper to each other. Tetsuun looked across the expanse of the sky stretching out before him, finding nothing but wisps of white painted over a baby blue canvas. What was he expecting? A personal apology? This knowledge of his own stupidity at the thought of that ever happening served nothing in the way of quelling his wrath.
His eyes narrowed, squinting up. Finally, he threw his arm up, middle finger sailing high into the air for all to see. Tetsuun did not remain that way for long, however. Instead, he dropped his arm back down just as roughly, fingers tucking into the palms of his hands to curl into fists, and he stamped his feet as he stormed off the stage. He radiated hostility, prepared to push anyone aside that may have been standing in the wrong spot. After all, it was all he could do to keep himself from crying.
Silence. The sound was swallowed up about him in such an abrupt fashion that his mind wasn’t fully prepared to accept that there was nothing going on around him. His ears were still strained at the sound of wood splintering behind him on impact and the various booms of explosives being set off around him. The stillness around him felt even more sinister than the resultant noise from the training room’s occupants’s mingling bloodlust. Briefly, he considered the possibility that he may be dead.
Tetsuun’s legs began to burn from the effort of holding himself in a partially crouched position, which seemed to, indeed, confirm that he was still alive. Not only that, but that voice from earlier had returned, and with the boy calming down from his initial panic, the words seemed to finally register in his mind. He cracked open his eyes, but no longer was he standing on the pine floor boards of the dojo room. It took him a moment to adjust, his pupils dilating wider to drink in all traces of light it could find, but soon he was able to discern the tiny grains of dirt from one another that made up the ground.
His hands slipped from the back of his neck and he rose up to stand straight. The boy could still feel a lingering tickle from where a pair of brass knuckles where inches away from knocking his head right off his shoulders. He was alone again. The walls around him were shrouded with shadows, the only trace that anything still existed outside of this tunnel being the speck of light at the end of it. How cliché.
As if in response to that, the light trickled down the cylindrical path closer towards him, sparkles dancing along the length of the tunnel. In a sense, this aided in slating the building unease in the pit of his stomach that had been present from the very beginning, though no amount of mortification would truly be able to dispel this.
It took Tetsuun a moment to take in all that was happening. He was being teleported around yet again, and now it was time to start this challenge that everyone was talking about… or at least, that was his best guess for why they would send him to an arena. He knew that this was coming from the moment he had stepped out of that glass cubicle. However, it had taken him up to this point, with a path of glitter shimmering and beckoning him to trudge forward, in order for him to really come to terms with the fact that this was reality, and not some outrageous fantasy he nor anyone else had been able to conjure up, no matter how abstract the thought. More than anything, Tetsuun just hadn’t anticipated for everything to start so soon.
After a few more moments of hesitation, the pale boy began his trek forward, advancing towards the ever-growing radiance that was blossoming before his vision. Tetsuun’s dark eyes narrowed to slits, squinting against the irritant. Eventually, as the illumination seemed to devour the dark tendrils crawling up the walls of the tunnel. Finally, he had to cup his hand over his forehead to cast a shadow over his eyes, which mercifully alleviated the strain of his pupils shrinking back, and he emerged out from under the yawning archway.
The sight that he was greeted with was far from pleasant.
There was at least twice as many creatures here as there were in that room he had originally entered, all of them seeming even bigger and nastier than before. The boy stopped where he was, lingering at the edge of the tunnel, a worried look creasing his brow. These were all the people he was up against?
“Challengers,” the omniscient voice interjected again, ripping him forcefully from his thoughts. "This is the Preliminary Round. The goal is simple: impress us.” The arena had quieted down at this stage, the only noise left from them being the occasional whispers to be snatched up. “Think of this as a sort of celestial 'RPN's got Talent', where we, the Gods, are the judges. You are to come up to the stage, one at a time, and show off something. What you show is up to you: your fighting skills, perhaps; your powers, maybe; or even a more mundane skill, like singing or, I dunno... juggling. We have provided various materials for you to use at your behest. Thus, the stage is set: show us what you've got, and do not disappoint!
"Now, you may rise to the stage, one by one. There is no specific order, but please don't push in front of each-other. You are the Chosen Ones, for crying out loud, not a bunch of kids rushing for the Ice-Cream Truck."
It was faint at first, but soon the sound of percussion instruments crescendoed to fill the stadium, indicating that end of the omniscient voice’s announcement and mark the beginning of the round. As this became evident, the murmur of voices seemed to grow in increments to a chatter, the occasional person trying to shout over someone else before dying out again.
Tetsuun felt his chest tighten, and in an attempt to compensate this, sucked in as much air through his nostrils as his lungs could take. This ended up being a rather shallow breath, his chest rising only faintly as the scent of dust seemed to attack his senses. He knew he couldn’t stay where he was, lest he stick out too much amidst this company of freaks. Without acknowledging the first person to eagerly jump to the challenge, he moved forward to mingle with the crowd.
Every person he passed seemed to be at least a head taller than him. One girl, her form unstable with wisps curling about where her edges should have been, could have used his head as an arm rest, if she so desired. Another, clad in traditional robing, was not quite as tall as the girl, but the collection of fox tails swaying behind him all seemed to suggest otherwise. Tetsuun knew there had to be someone that didn’t even remotely intimidating amidst this crowd. Alas, the more he looked, the more these large figures seemed to rise up, all looming over them and concealing the ones with relaxed, gentle features from plain sight. If these were all the contestants though…
He needed to find Katsuro. They had just been right next to each other, the jonin couldn’t have been too far off, could he? The boy continued his plummet through the depth of the crowd, twisting to and fro to fit in between the small gaps that people allowed themselves with their conversational partners. The longer he looked, however, the more it seemed like an impossible task to hunt him down. That old fart smells like sewage. How hard could it be to find him? He was just another competitor, yet as he continued ducking and weaving between people, he began to see the same faces, none of which were was he was looking for.
Tetsuun stopped in his tracks, a halting epiphany slamming into him with the force of a stampede. Katsuro was here… he was another competitor.
Loathe as he was to admit it, Katsuro was better than him in every way imaginable and more. Katsuro was a jonin, his sensei, it was his job to be that good. Tetsuun could acknowledge that much… privately, he wasn’t stupid. If Katsuro was here… some of these competitors must be just as good as him in combat, if not better. So then what the hell am I doing here? Tetsuun couldn’t measure up to a jonin, let alone some brute that had whatever strange powers… or flaming canines that he was completely ill-equipped to deal with. That much had been proven in his previous little scrap with Katsuro, in which the most he had been able to do was smash his stupid glasses up a bit.
He was as good as dead, and the boy knew it. Tetsuun’s eyes darted up, meeting a pair of hazel eyes, which bore into his brown ones critically, seeming to cut right into the heart of his anxiety. The genin swiveled away from the stare, tilting his chin up to pretend to examine the raised stage with rapt attention. His eyes were unfocused, however, looking beyond the platform and effectively blocking out all that was around him.
The boy attempted another deep breath. Whatever the case was, he had to try something. He had plenty of time. There was a multitude of contestants eagerly pressing against one another to be next in line to show off what they had. Tetsuun could simply take this time to examine all of his options.
He considered himself to be an intelligent person. That could be something that would make himself stand out amongst the rest… except how would he do that? In fact, the more he thought about it, the more he came to realize he wasn’t even remotely certain about what made him markedly witted. Was it that he knew the concept of clones better than his last teacher? If he made clones, they should at least serve some kind of purpose, and having them corner a group of straw dummies didn’t seem to display any discernible talent. Was it that he was able to react quick enough to avoid that mammoth of a girl’s punches half the time? Was it that he didn’t need a field manual to be able to recognize a paper bomb when he saw one?
Tetsuun reached one hand up and to the back of his neck, raking his short fingernails just at the edge of his scruff of black hair, probably scratching a little more rough than was necessary. Alternatively, he could just… never get on that platform. What would happen if he didn’t, anyways? He’s already lost this competition before it even began, so what was the point of making a fool out of himself? In his final moments here, he could at least try to seem a little respectable. What would they do anyway? Send him back? He wanted nothing more in the world than that. His family needed him, and no flashy advertisements of ultimate glory could distract him from that. Maybe they’ll kill him if he refuses. Well, then at least I wouldn’t have to worry about anything. Tetsuun attempted to push his increasingly morbid sense of humor to the back of his mind. No. Death was not something he was just going to accept.
Tetsuun’s mind reeled, grappling vainly at ideas that passed through his mind, all of which were decidedly poor. Time wore on, but the only half-decent answer that he could come up with would be to toss around the dummies a little bit which, even then, was awful, because he was rather certain at that stage that he would look like a joke compared to everyone that had went before him. This idea further vexed him, staring out at someone’s back that had scooted in front of him to get a better look at the stage, yet not even registering that such a thing had happened. He waited, biding his time, anticipating some great idea to come to him if he just waited long enough…
Fuck it. Tetsuun’s face scrunched up into an irritated scowl, finally noticing the creature that stood before him, casting a shadow over where he stood. The boy brushed past him roughly, digging his shoulder into the creature’s back, eliciting a growl as he stormed past but nothing more.
After a number of similarly aggressive encounters, he finally arrived to the stage, where he found it a little more difficult to maintain his facade. Tetsuun's grimace softened, slowing his pace as he took one step after the other with care. The boy's head dipped down, as though to make sure the placement of each of his sandals was securely placed on the one step before dragging himself up the other. Ascending to the top of the stairs, the boy paused, making the grave mistake of looking back out into the the gathering of contestants. The crowd swam beneath him, the sight of so many of them practically bringing on a wave of nausea. He looked around with a jerky snap of his head, but the damage was already done. He had seen flashes eyes, a few locking onto him with expert precision, as though he were a target. People have been actually watching these things? Great...
Tetsuun had already plotted out what he was going to do, step after step. He knew the best way to properly exhibit his abilities. He approached the computer, exaggeratedly large buttons arranged neatly in rows, and he began to search for what indicated a fresh batch of dummies. The first keg in his plan was that there were dummies still standing there, untouched by the previous person that was supposed to annihilate them in whatever way they could. Tetsuun had already gone to up to the computer, however, and it would look incredibly awkward if he just stepped away at this stage. His hand hovered over the buttons, eyes flicking between them as he led his palm over each. However, he could not find it. The worst part was that he knew it had to be in some obvious spot, like the center. That would only make sense, wouldn't it? So where was it?
Blood began to rush to his cheeks, heating them up in his frustration. Forget the new dummies. Tetsuun's hand slid to the edge of the computer where he pushed himself from it, attempting to appear casual and as if he had planned that from the very beginning, though it was very apparent to anyone that had been watching that this was indeed not the case.
He stood now in the center of the raise platform. Four dummies, stuffed full of some material that plumped up the thick material encasing it, stood in a semi-circle before him, unmoving, uncaring. Tetsuun's hand slipped down to the holster at his side, flicking open the button and digging one finger to hook into the ring of the kunai knife, but something else gave him paused. He felt more handles of the knives than he should have, considering he had used that one in the training room. However, when he lifted his palm just enough to keep the flap open and examine the holster's contents, it soon became evident that there were five in there once again.
He stared at this for a moment, but the increasing volume of the other challengers around him brought him back to reality. Focus. Tetsuun inhaled deeply through his mouth, if only to let it back out again through a sigh.
In one quick movement, he yanked the kunai out from the holster, twisting it so he could group it roughly by the end, the bandage wrapping the handle permitting easy grip. The slightest amount of chakra was focused into his feet and, bending his knees to a crouch, he sprung up, taking to an notable height that took him up and beyond the dummies. Twisting somewhat midair, he brought his hand out and over his shoulder before throwing it back down, zooming straight for the dummy farthest to the right.
Missed. The metal blade tore easily into the material of the dummy, but it was just barely too far above where the heart should be. He had overshot the vital point. This fact lingered like a haze in his mind, fogging this thoughts, but he had to keep going. Maybe no one else would notice, after all. Still in the air, just now feeling the gravity's fingers closing in on his attire to tug him back down, he dug into the pouch behind his back. With practiced ease, he grabbed the end of the wire spool and snaked its way through a series of shuriken, before tugging the string of metal out altogether. Tetsuun was always prepared for this move.
The wire began to lace between his fingers, finding a comfortable position for himself. With a gesture of his arms, the spool reeled out, laces of silver dancing across the stage. With another gesture, crossing his arms over his chest, he brought them down in a quick whip-like motion, the star-pronged weapons following the path, spinning along the wire as he began his descent through the air. The shuriken all caught on the dummies's material, the last of their spinning giving them the proper momentum to turn the blade right into the stitching. However, much to Tetsuun increasing vexation, they were scattered about the body erratically. Had it been two real people, the assault would have been annoying more than anything.
His lips peeled up from his teeth in frustration, but he had to keep going. Tetsuun tugged back on the wires, stiffening them to silver lines that shone only with the sun hitting the right angle. Suddenly, he was in control of how he landed. The yanked them just enough to the side to guide himself down, smoothly changing his trajectory to be just over the final dummy. He was falling faster now, and just as it may have seemed like he was going to fall past the dummy, he stretched out his legs. Tetsuun wrapped them around the dummy's neck in over to land on the shoulders, nearly falling over from impact, but the dummies were specifically designed to pick themselves back up before they could fall. With that knowledge, Tetsuun pulled out another kunai, and clapping his hand on the dummy's head, pulled it back to expose the neck, and with one quick swipe, dragged the black across the material.
Without warning, the boy hitched a breath, air catching in his throat as he shuddered so violently he lost his balance. With no hope of recovering, Tetsuun collapsed onto the stage floor in an ungraceful heap. He winced, the impact shooting up his tailbone and provoking another gasp from him. He managed not to roll onto his back too far, instead catching himself on his hands that shot out to support himself behind him. The boy's eyes were wide, the slightest bit of a tremor shaking his gaunt frame.
That didn't feel like some straw man. That felt like a person - a real life, in the flesh human being that he just split open and poured the stuffing out of. He had not expected that. Tetsuun had never, actually slit someone's throat, but instinctively, he knew that's how it would feel. That epiphany, that knowledge sent another quiver coursing through his body, heart racing in his chest.
He had no idea how long he sat there like that, wide-eyed and his breathing turbulent. What finally shook him from his daze was a particularly annoyed cry ringing up from the crowd believe. Tetsuun blinked, confused at first, then angry. He looked like an idiot sitting there! It didn't matter if he even had done anything well up until that point. None of it mattered! Those last few seconds made him look like a complete and total imbecile! A complete pushover! If he hadn't ever been dragged to this stupid challenge, that he never wanted to be a part of anyway, and those stupid "gods." hadn't ever decided to use realistic dummies...
All rationale abandoned him. His ears had turned crimson in his fury. Suddenly, he got to his feet, stomping his sandals against the stage with all the fierceness a boy of four foot six could must. Tetsuun turned his enraged glare to the sky, seemingly where the omniscient voice resided. "Hey!" he shouted out, voice cracking from under the pressure of his rage.
He waited, lips trembling with anger, but there was no response. If anything, the contestants around him had begun to hush ever so slightly, some turning to whisper to each other. Tetsuun looked across the expanse of the sky stretching out before him, finding nothing but wisps of white painted over a baby blue canvas. What was he expecting? A personal apology? This knowledge of his own stupidity at the thought of that ever happening served nothing in the way of quelling his wrath.
His eyes narrowed, squinting up. Finally, he threw his arm up, middle finger sailing high into the air for all to see. Tetsuun did not remain that way for long, however. Instead, he dropped his arm back down just as roughly, fingers tucking into the palms of his hands to curl into fists, and he stamped his feet as he stormed off the stage. He radiated hostility, prepared to push anyone aside that may have been standing in the wrong spot. After all, it was all he could do to keep himself from crying.
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