Ary Hyuuga

At the young age of 16, Neru was already widely known and respected by her peers and her infamous reputation feared across the land and other nations. She was known by many names, but there were few daring enough to even think of being targeted by her. It was a shame really. That some so genuinely calm and passive was misjudged because of the actions she had to take to fulfill her duty and accomplish her missions. But that was that, and there wasn't much else to it. Having been called in very early that morning, almost into the previous night some might say, she was briefed about the current mission. Once again, in part because of the terms and nature of the mission and because of the obvious shortage given the number of missions and few personnel, she was tasked with going alone. But it wasn't all bad. She was trusted with that mission for a reason. Though the mission was an S Rank and it held great dangers and potential misfortune, she was just as best of a choice as any other.

That morning, she had left nearly as soon as she had received the specifics on the mission. She wasn't particularly keen of some of her Anbu missions however. Though given her skills and her looks, there were quite a lot of times when her womanly body and her outfit were used in addition to her looks to lure in the targets and accomplish her missions but sometimes they were not. Those other times, she was forced to put on the Anbu uniform and that mask. Her only relieve was that such things were merely momentary and, as soon as she was done with the mission she would change back, and perhaps in the next, she could go as usual. But that was the end of her internal bickering. If Neru possessed one thing was the integrity and the professionalism with which she did business. Having arrived with enough time to spare at her destination, she cleared her head of any sort of thoughts not having to do with the success of the mission.

Given the details she was given and the ideas and plans of the crime lord, he was bound to make a move. On her way there, she couldn't quite pinpoint the location of any form of resistance. Granted, if such a strong missing ninja had been hired, he would have been wise enough to place his forces in a location where they would be easily spotted. Sure, she could have used her doujutsu to scan the area but alas, she had not. She could easily do so as soon as the lady came into her possession. Doing so before, while it may have granted her a way of seeing who was around her and how many, it would detract her and cloud her thoughts. It would slow her and maybe even push her to fight them. Wasting so much time would have been foolish as it could all have easily been a rouse while a different group awaited the arrival of the lady to take her without a fight.

Either way, she didn't have to wait too long. In a matter of minutes, the lady would arrive. She couldn't really see her initially until she spoke from within the carriage-like structure she was in. Nodding to the man that had accompanied her, she would see them off. From there on, it would be just the lady, the gentleman who drove the carriage, and Neru herself. During the first 20 minutes or so of their travel, everything was rather calm and quiet. In fact, it might have actually been too quiet. She found it odd that there were no birds to be seen or heard anywhere around. Then again...it was not strange. She didn't really need her doujutsu to know there were quite a lot of enemies around them. It would indicate why there was such a lack of animals in the area that would have likely been chased off by the assailant's presence. While she could also be wrong, in this type of situation, being extra careful was worth its weight in gold. Nevertheless, she chose not to hasten their pace. They would be attacked sooner or later, and running would merely push on the inevitable. She preferred they made the first move, and of course, they would.

Suddenly, there was a very loud uproar from the mountainside at both sides. While most would have surely blame Neru for this, they really shouldn't. The terrain really lend itself to an ambush against her. The way back however, was much farther this way. Going a different route would have given them enough chance to attack multiple times. Neru also felt comfortable enough with her abilities where the terrain and the ambush shouldn't really stack that much against her. Motioning her left arm outwards, the gentleman driving the carriage would stop it. As she did so, Neru would take a few gentle steps forward even while the boisterous noise from the crowd coming down the sides of the small mountainside contrasted quite heavily. Through her mask most could see that her eyes now looked very different. They were glowing red.

In an instant, she was able to gauge the number of assailants. Quite numerous at that; definitely more than she could care to think about. Once more though, it seemed battle was not only a physical but also a psychological ordeal. With her eyes, she could now see the life force of all present there. Quite a number of them were distressed by the presence of an Anbu while others were seemingly terrified of the way her eyes glowed red. It would not be strange if some of them doted her as a demon. There was also another peculiar visitor. Focusing her dojutsu, she found the missing ninja leading them about 200 meters away. He made his way towards her location albeit rather slowly. Most likely he was tossing the pawns away to die to warm Neru up for his arrival.

In most occasions, in most spars, and in most battles like in most other things, Neru preferred the calm solitude of nothingness. There were just too many variables in the mission however. For starters, while she had successfully intimidated many of the petty criminals, there were still quite a few willing to fight. With the lady a few dozen or so meters behind her and a likely extremely strong  shinobi heading her way, she could not afford to remain idle. Rushing towards the petty criminals, most of them were armed. Some had swords, some were just armed with clubs, knifes, or other rudimentary farming tools. While Neru was never a devout student of Taijutsu, thanks to her doujutsu, she didn't have to. Specially since she was battling people who had no real grasp on Chakra. Her doujutsu presented her with the next set of movements each opponent  attempted just before they did. It was enough to block, dodge, counter attack and assert her dominance.

It was truly becoming somewhat boring. She was only dodging and pushing them back, hoping they would all run away just before the real battle began; but there was no time. "Water Release: Exploding Water Colliding Wave." Shifting her mask slightly up to uncover her mouth, she spit out a great volume of water that swallowed up and crushed her opponents in a devastating surge. Given the near unreal levels of chakra possessed by Neru, the amount of water created was amazing. It was enough to wash away all of the petty criminals, killing the large majority of them, with the rare few injured survivors escaping as far and as fast as they could. Given the type of terrain she was in and the amount of water she had summoned, the whole place was filled with water. It now looked more like a fair sized lake or river rather than a rugged path. Turning back, she would rush atop the water, and getting a hold of the gentleman and the lady, she would put them to safety atop a higher rock.

"You know you may be cute, who knows, but I still gotta kill you. Oh and I wouldn't turn your back on me if I were you." Feeling the voice near her to the point where she could feel it nearly behind her, she would swing forcefully back just to have her attack miss and the missing ninja appear below, quite a distance from her, standing atop of the water. "Star here for now." whispered Neru to the lady and the gentleman before jumping atop of the water, just 10 or so meters in front of her opponent. She would look him up and down without saying a single word. She cared very little for his appearance, though he wore predominantly grey clothing that covered most of his body. "What? Cat got your tongue?" he would say beginning to laugh. Running the fingers of her left hand through her hair she would respond, "There's no need to speak to the dead." "True."

In a matter of an instant, she would see what looked like an after shadow of his hands moving, but alas they were not. Her doujutsu was merely providing her the anticipated movements of his body to analyze the hand seals. Given the initial hand signs, and specially since she had also seem them used by their peers during their training and other battle experiences, she was sure of it. It was a Wind Release attack. Using her undeniable skill in ninjutsu, her hand seals were so extremely fast they were but a blur if at that. Having finished just a split second or so before him, her attack would be closer to hitting him than his hitting her. Most likely however, both attacks would meet head on albeit extremely close to her opponent given the faster hand seals. "Fire Release: Great Fireball Technique." "Wind Release: Stream."

Holding her mask up some, Neru would create an extremely large and hot fireball of massive proportions that traveled at an exceedingly fast rate towards her opponent. On the other hand, the opponent had used a Wind Release technique to blow an extremely powerful stream of wind her way. She had not just her doujutsu to thanks however. Seeing the hand seals just slightly before they actually occurred did not help much if her ninjutsu wasn't top notch. However, given that it was just about her best area, her opponent truly had little chance. In an instant, the two jutsus would collide. Given that one was inherently stronger than the other, the fireball would grow somewhat bigger and exponentially stronger, engulfing the target and delivering nearly untold damage.

The hit caused quite the explosion and a cloud of smoke to rise up. Thankfully, Neru could see right through it. She had hoped that the wind enhanced fireball at such close range would have been enough to completely remove her opponent from the battle, but alas, it was not. While the missing ninja had indeed received the full power of the attack, just a second or two after, he had manipulated the chakra under his feet to allow himself to fall through the water. Nevertheless, the damage had been done. He had certainly been burned and hurt beyond belief. But it could have been more if he had stayed on the surface...though she couldn't blame him for trying to stop the fire from charring his skin. "Wind Release: Stream." She had made a mistake, one she was bound not to make again if she left the mission successful. She had been using her dojutsu to focus on his surroundings, on himself to try and see if he was damaged enough to put him out of the fight. In doing so, she hadn't expect him to retaliate quite so fast and she had managed to overlook the buildup of chakra within him she should have so easily seen.

In a matter of seconds, there were quite numerous air currents blasting through the surface and around her. He planned on firing off numerous waves of said wind and manipulating it to hit and kill her. Aided by the water they lifted as they exited the surface, the attacks carried quite a lot of power. Just as quickly as the air currents had gone past the surface, they would impale her. About three wind currents would strike her in her midsection from the back and the front. Eyes wide open in disbelief, she looked on. After coughing, her body would cave onto itself revealing her as a mere decoy; a water clone she had created. It was not quite clear, at least to her opponent, when she had used it. He had been hit, and his view clouded and senses busy by the pain the fireball had caused him. Also, under water, the visibility must have been impaired at least some. There was a good chance that the seemingly distracted nature from Neru was but the rouse of the clone as her professionalism would amount for none of that.

"Water Release: Hiding in Water Technique" whispered a female voice somewhere. However, the biggest concern and problem for her opponent, was that she was nowhere to be seen, and since he was just now about to resurface, the location of the voice was hard to pinpoint. "You've been bad..." said the same female voice quite gently. As the missing ninja resurfaced, he would see Neru walking steadily and slowly towards him. Given where the voice had now been heard, there was no doubt, it was her who had spoken.  Though he was still very visible strong and ready for a fight, his clothing had been burned and his body very charred. Still, he rushed atop of the water, and retrieving two of his kunai, he would thrust them deep into her chest, possibly just below her breasts. Neru would smile, coughing up blood. "That's just not nice." The same voice, with the same tone would speak from behind. A second Neru, placing a hand over the burned shinobi's mouth, would pull his head back, "Lightning Release: False Darkness." In an instant, a spear of lightning was emitted from Neru's mouth, impaling the shinobi's head and killing him in the spot. The second bleeding figure of Neru before the shinobi would vanish soon after.

One of the things not many knew about Neru was that she was an incredibly powerful user of Genjutsu. While she didn't care to spend so much time practicing her use of weapons or her hand to hand combat as she saw what little she knew as enough, her Genjutsu and Ninjutsu were above most. Not only that, but her doujutsu gifted her a unique and irresistible genjutsu that could fool even the Byakugan and thus, the opponent had been no match. Looking down at the lifeless body of her opponent sink below, her expression was not quite discernible. She was neither happy nor relieve. In most ways, one could say she just lacked the emotion at the moment to care for anything else but her duty.

Jumping back to where the lady and the gentleman had been waiting, the latter had been kind enough to shield the woman's eyes from seeing the horrific end of the shinobi. Nevertheless, though Neru surely could, perhaps going up the mountain range and around would make it easier for them, and avoid the water altogether. The rest of the way back would be quite faster than she had anticipated. Perhaps it was because she had a lot on her mind. However, she was thinking a lot about nothing. Her mind was empty but at the same time full of nothing. She felt no remorse for what she had done. It wasn't her that wanted to kill the shinobi. It was the mission that requested it and she had just delivered. Nothing more. Soon, they would have arrived at the Daimyo's place; quite large to say the least. Given the boisterous nature of the lady and the way she greeted and spoke to the Daimyo's son, it was obvious that the mission was likely the most exciting and dangerous thing she had ever done. Even with it all that had trasnpired, it was enough to make Neru chuckle. Either way, she was thanked for her aid by the Daimyo, his son, the lady, and the gentleman. With a bow, she would leave into the darkness, and return to her village.

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