Hi, my name is Minato. You can normaly find me on the battleship Nadescio, but Tira asked me to help her out with the Emerald Empire link. So enjoy!
Hi, my name is Minato. You can normaly find me on the battleship Nadescio, but Tira asked me to help her out with the Emerald Empire link. So enjoy!
Saito, Soujiro, and Tai Chi Man was given a mission to find out who intercepted a jewel shipment owned by the house they lived in. Along the way they came across a group of teenagers from the White Jade House. Saito issues them a challenge and the three are forced to fight three warriors from the White Jade. To make a long story short, the three young adventurers were forced to ware headbands of shame and Saito, the leader had to carry around a flag of shame.
Eventually Aoshi joined the group and they caught up with the bandits and tried to reason with them to get their jewels back. As Tai Chi Man politely put it "You don't understand I'm going to check those crates no matter what you say." (or something like that) Luckily when the fight broke out Saito was able to use his Gatosu move and kill the leader quickly, which caused the other bandits to freeze. On the down side, after that amazing kill, his Gatosu move was pretty much ineffective. Tai Chi Man went above the call of duty and killed all his foes and helped out Saito out by killing his also.
From the forest, Sojiro and Aoshi attacked from opposite sides. Sojiro quickly killed his bandits and was forced to kill some of Aoshi's because he got hung up on a guy on a horse.
The exact quote was "I'm not going to kill the horse."
Soujiro went off to practice so the next adventure is unknown
The group decided to test their skills at a martial arts tournament in another town. The trip there was uneventful.
First up at the tournament was Saito. He faced a strong opponent and was quickly eliminated from the tournament.
Tai Chi Man was next. His was the longest fight, but he met the same fate as Saito and was also eliminated from the tournament.
Aoshi- By some act of God, Aoshi was able to defeat his opponent and advanced to the next round.
Sojiro- With the most incredible display of fighting ability Soujiro destroyed the person who dared step on the stage with him.
Aoshi – Well reality finally set in and his next opponent was a novice in Mantis style. To save Aoshi some pain from reading this, he was paralyzed and was sent home to practice some more.
Sojiro – With what had to be the most amazing fight to date Soujiro defeated Keno man. The word from the stands was “It was like watching God himself fighting.”
Soujiro – All good things must come to an end. After sizing his opponent up Soujiro decided that he would let his challenger win. In the halls Soujiro heard a sad tale of his opponent needing money to help save his dying mother. So he did the honorable thing and let the man win. Regardless, he brought great honor to the house for advancing so far.
The young group of kids was brought in front of the master of the house to be given a mission. Basically the mission was to kill an entire house. The reason was they were bad for business. Despite having a bad feeling about the mission since murder is against the law, they decided to take it. After having second doubts while planning the assassination, they decide to poison the wine and during the night while a celebration is taking place they will strike.
Unfortunately, the plan did not go as planed. Soujiro, feared that he was seen while placing the poison in the wine, decided to stay at another hotel. During the night Aoshi heard some noise outside on the ledge. He made a noise and looked out the window to see a figure with a large sack on his shoulder jumping from rooftop to rooftop. Concerned, Aoshi knocked on his friends doors and when hearing no reply went to Soujiro’s hotel. When Soujiro asked Aoshi what was wrong, Aoshi said “they bailed on us.”
Soujiro asked how he knew that and Aoshi responded “I knocked on the door and there was no answer.”
Soujiro told Aoshi to go check in their rooms and comeback only if there is a problem. So Aoshi went back to his hotel and knocked on their doors again. Still no reply, Aoshi decided to go back to bed.
The next morning, Soujiro goes to meet the rest of the group and discovers that Saito and Tai Chi Man are both missing. A ransom note is found in their rooms with their gear. Soujiro and Aoshi decide that the mission must continue and hopefully they will find their missing comrades in the house they are attacking.
That night, Soujiro jumps over the wall and lands like a cat on the roof. Aoshi jumps and lands like garbage can. With the guards now alerted, Soujiro quickly surveys where the guards are coming from. Quickly becoming surrounded, they decide to cause a diversion with some explosives they have and get to the next building. Before they are ready to make their move, a ninja attacks from behind and hits Aoshi in the chest with a poison-throwing star. As Soujiro watches Aoshi roll of the roof and land on the ground, he quickly lights his explosive and throws it at the ninja to cause the ninja to move away from him. Sojiro then jumps down and picks the dying/dead Aoshi up and places him on his shoulders. Lighting another stick of dynamite, he throws it down at the guards, causing them to scatter from the shrapnel that was attached to the explosives. Jumping back on the roof, he throws one more stick to cover his escape into the night. After getting out of town Soujiro saves the life of Aoshi by cleaning out the deadly poison.
Soujiro and Aoshi arrive home to find their house is under observation by the Shadow Hunters. The Shadow Hunters are internal security for the government. Aoshi was questioned first, and after being hesitant in giving out information he asked who she was and that’s when things changed. The person’s name was Jun (short version) (One thing that you should keep in mind is Jun was in Barsaive and Aoshi’s other character met up with her. When Jun left the party, finding her and rejoining her became a top priority for him.) Now back to what happened. After hearing her name, Aoshi became a talking parrot and agreed to tell her what she needed to know. Jun gave Aoshi a chance to bring along Soujiro so he would not have to face what was going to happen to the house. After all, she knew that Soujiro had saved Aoshi’s life and wanted him to have the opportunity to repay that debt and save Soujiro. But Aoshi turned a blind eye and left his friend to the wolves.
When Soujiro found out what Aoshi did, he heard the stories of what happens to people who commit such crimes decides to commit halakiri and die honorably for his crimes. Aoshi on the other hand was taken to a safe house and told the authorities everything they wanted to know and was released after his house was disbanded.
Aoshi was reunited with Saito and Tai Chi Man. It turns out they were kidnapped and were let go when the kidnappers found out the house was no more. Now in need of money they go visit a weapons smith they once did a job for and asked for a job. It turns out the weapons smith was sending a group of people to the Draconian Empire to try and negotiate for some precious metal to make weapons. In exchange of guarding the negotiator and help in the negotiations, he will make them special weapons with the metal they bring back. Now the Draconian empire is high on a mountain surrounded by the most intense cold. There is no known magical item that can protect the party from the cold. The only thing that can potentially save them is internal energy. Tai Chi Man and Saito both have internal energy and will most likely survive, but Aoshi does not. The three decide to take the mission.
The trip was uneventful until they reached the second to the last town. Staying at a hotel, during the night they are ambushed. As the ninjas attack, Saito proves that his gatotsu can go through anything yet again by impaling two ninja’s and then crash through the wall. Upon landing, he discovers to his horror to many ninja’s to count surrounding the building. After several hours of fighting, the three amazingly kill all the ninja’s without taking critical injuries.
But what of Sojiro’s new character. That remains to be seen.
It should be noted that Aoshi was played by the gamesmaster for this session since the person who plays Aoshi could not make it. So Aoshi was played to his full potential and looked cool while doing it.
After being questioned by the police and having to pay a hefty fine for the damages they caused, they found themselves out on the street. After spending about an hour standing around they realized that all the inns were closed and they were forced to sleep on the streets for the night. During the night, they finally realized that they had no clue about anything on House Draconian. The next day they tracked down someone who could give them the information they were looking for and spent the day talking with him about art and other things, while Saito slept during the talks.
The next day they continued on their trip and their trip was uneventful to the next town. There they gathered some supplies and tried to figure out how to endure the cold. Tai Chi Man was forced to teach Aoshi internal energy so he could survive the cold. (since Aoshi was played by the Games Master, Aoshi would have learned it regardless so Tai Chi Man agreed.) Just outside the town, they met a mercenary samurai who quickly attacked them with an energy wave attack. During the fight, Saito proved two very important points.
1) The Gatosu can not go through energy attacks yet
2) No one gets up from the choke slam!!!!
Aoshi stood guard and protected the negotiators. Realizing that he was going to be defeated Tai Chi Man decided to bribe his way out of the situation. Fortunately the mercenary took the money and let them go.
While ascending the mountain, they encountered a very harsh blizzard. Saito was forced to burn up much internal energy to survive. Unfortunately one of the negotiators died from the cold before they could reach the top. By some act of God, they managed to find their way to House Draconian and stood outside the door for thirty minutes before they realized they had pic axes on them so they could knock on the door without fear of their skin sticking to the door due to the extreme cold.
After being lead into the fortress, the guards asked them what they wanted, the party to frozen to say anything asked for a place to warm up from the cold outside and they would explain their business. They were lead down a hall to some rooms where they could stay. Hoping for a hot bath, they were surprised to find that there was no running hot water here. The Draconians who live here prefer the cold. Realizing that they could not use the money they brought with them to bargain with, they sat for a long time trying to come up with things to trade with. But they had no access to any kind of material good. (The hint from the GM went over their heads as the hours ticked by) After spending a lot of out of game time they finally came up with plan. They would offer themselves. (I bet, at least one person was thinking, “Damn that Uso errr Sojiro. Why did you have to die. You know we can not negotiate to save our own lives.) Well the time came and they stated their case to the guard. Satisfied with their response, he would grant them audience with the head of the martial arts school. A week passes and she finally comes back from her training in the mountains.
To make a long story short, they offered the money they brought and themselves to the Queen/Head of the School. The deal is they are to perform to acts of service for them. If they fail or refuse the task then they will be cursed. They agreed. Their first mission is to assassinate the son, Yagamashi of the Poison Sparrows Clan during the Rites of Initiation. They hand over their money and they are given a small bar of the Ickslicium. Not wanting to go through the cold, they ask for airship transportation back. They lucked out and they were teleported back to the weaponsmith’s home.
The weaponsmith was overjoyed at their return and he quickly went to work on the metal. He told them to return in one week and he will have their weapons ready as promised.
A week passes
The heroes return to find a saddened man. He tells them that he is not able to work the metal. No matter how hot his furnace is the metal puts the fire out. Wanting to keep his end of the bargain, he offers to make them excellent quality weapons and give them 5,000 tailes each. They agree only on the condition that once he is able to work the metal, they will be his first customers and he will offer them a fair price. He agrees.
Observations from judges, participants and the crowd.
Judge. “I don’t know about that Saito kid. He seems to be trouble. All the kids fear him.”
Li, Shaolin monk “Mr. Tai Chi Man. You would think one would find better use of his time then to try and impress Wu Dang School..”
Everyone in general “You would think if someone is trying to test themselves they would know how to spell their name. I was surprised Taco(ma) even passed.”
20% of the drop outs on the first day “He said what????? I feel to sick to continue.” Referring to Saito’s poem. See link for details.
20% of the other drop outs “Saito’s here…….AHHHHHH I don’t feel so good. I need to use the toilet. I want my mama.” After finding out Saito is in their testing group the day after the assassination of Yagamashi.
Anza contestant – “Quit your crying if you can’t spell your name go home!” speaking to Taco(ma)
Taco(ma) - “This can’t be happening, I know I can spell my name. I want to speak to the judge NOW.”
Notes
Out of 250 kids only 50 passed. Normally 50% pass.
There was only one 100%
There was one death due to mysterious causes.
End of part 1
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