Hitomi rubs her jaw carefully, observing the large purple bruise that happened just the night before. It stung, she wasn't gonna lie, but it also gave her the look of a victim and not a killer.

Rubbing some rosemary oil and cream on her jaw and chin, she let out a little sigh and groans in frustration. This meant she and her husband need to now find the last three men before they leave later that month.

Braiding her hair to the side, Hitomi grabs the belt that held her o-tana and katana and clipped it around her waist before walking out of the room with light footsteps. The house was quiet, but it was like no one was home that morning, not even the maids or servants. Scanning the areas in confusion, Hitomi made her way outside with a strange look on her face before she found her brother practicing with a dummy and a bamboo stick, naked from the waist up and hair pinned up to keep it out of his way.

"Morning," Hitomi calls, making him halt and look over.

"Morning sister."

As Munenori gets a look of his sister, he tilts his head to the side to see if the thing on her chin was either a shadow or makeup. She looks over to the side, keeping the bruise away from his view. While they may have been distant, he still cared for her like the little sister she is.

"What's that?" Walking up to his sister, he grabs her jaw and turns it to the side. Hitomi rolls her eyes heavily and signs. "Who did this?"

"He's dead." Munenori frowns heavily. "He's the one that died yesterday."

"How were you involved?"

Pulling her face away from him, she takes out her katana and spun it between her fingers. "Domestic assault, really. Hit me in the jaw after causing a ruckus in the tobacco shop." Slewing the sword to the side, she stops the sword in front of the chest of the dummy and glances it up and down. "Grabbed me by the hair," Sliding the blade higher on the dummy, she held the tip under the makeshift chin of it and pushes it in. "And sliced my throat."

"I don't think he did that last part." Munenori gives his sister a strange look, making her look back at him with the most obvious "no shit" face he has ever seen.

"Whether he did or didn't, I should at least be glad that Kotaro was able to stop him. Even with the tana by my side, I don't think I was in a position to be able to do the shot."

"So, if Kotaro wasn't there?" She looks back at her brother. Blinking blankly at him.

"So what are you doing right now?" She quickly asked, nodding to dummy.

"I don't have a class today, so might as well get some of my own practice in." Swinging the bamboo sword, he gives a shrug of the shoulder lamely and looks off in the distance for a short moment. "Do you by chance want to help out with my practices?"

"With real swords?" Pulling out her katana, she gives him a little smirk before his blank expression made her frown. "Are you for real?!"

"There's a bamboo stick behind you." Munenori watches his sister drop her swords and grab the bamboo before lamely swinging it on her side. He knew how much she hated practicing with bamboo sticks instead of swords, and it was her prime weakness. Because bamboo swords were so light, the change in weight was hard for her to handle; making her swing too hard and losing her balance almost 100% of the time.

"You know how much I hate these." Hitomi takes the first sloppy swing at her brother, watching him smirk at his power.

"And that's the challenge."

"This isn't practice! This is unfair play!" Swinging again, she almost loses her balance to the left as her own weight followed the bamboo stick.

Grabbing her arm, Munenori pulls her into his body before staring into her with his deep, cocky smirk.

"That's so sly of you." Pulling out of his grip, she throws the sword to the ground before turning her back to him; crossing her arms and pouting.

"Oh, stop sulking." Munenori licks his lips as he watches her continue to ignore him. "It was just for fun." Her ignoring him made it an awkward situation as he was just talking to her back. Shaking his head, he walks over to the dummy and rests his bamboo against him before figuring out what he wanted an answer for.

"What are your motives for killing these men?" His sister let out a small sigh. Looking at him from over her shoulder, she nods her head to follow him before walking towards the back gate of the courtyard and out towards the woods.

~*~ Yagyu Criminal ~*~

Saizo watched the sky as his horse slowly walked down the dirt road, snorting and shaking his head in boredom. It was a silent ride with the soft sounds of its hooves clopping on the loose dirt. Though this subtle silence doesn't seem to last.

"Saizo!" Saizo let out a sigh in annoyance. "How long until we get there?!" Sasuke, who rode behind Saizo, complains.

"It will get longer the more you ask." He says through the grit of his teeth.

"But we've been riding over half a day without stopping! Why can't we just run the horses all the way to the city?"

"Running the horses will not only tire them out, but it will make the assassin hear us more. Or we could easily be ambushed by bandits. This forest isn't that trustworthy." Saizo scans the area before looking back at his partner.

"But it's so boring!" Sasuke continues to complain, lying back in his saddle and laying over the horse's loin.

"I don't give a shit how boring it is! Shut your mouth or I'm leaving you here!" Saizo shouts before another voice suddenly appears.

"How foul language from a ninja like you." Saizo held onto the reins as the horses suddenly spook as a woman in black appears in the road in front of them. She stood with confidence as her eyes gazed at the surprised ninja. "I expect a more proper tone as you do work under politics and law."

"What?!" Saizo shouted, furrowing his brows together in aggravation. He seriously didn't want unwanted company at the moment and the comment only made his mood worse.

"Who are you?" Sasuke asks, staring at her in confusion.

"That, you don't need to know, as for my information,"

Sasuke looks at his partner and finds a look of suspicion in his eyes. He was thinking about something, but this looked like it could go in two ways.

"We can't trust her," Saizo whispers.

"But she may have something that we need." Sasuke held up a finger to the girl before looking at Saizo, debating against him like he always does.

"It could be false!"

"Maybe, but we at least will have something if it is useful information." Sasuke pushes Saizo, making him turn to the woman and scan her body. She wore tight leggings that were covered in different braids on twine and string. Her top was loose as it fell over a shoulder, showing what looked like burn marks and scars from years ago. Her hair was down in her face, covering most of it from view, but Saizo was able to see that her eyes were a bright sea green color, making her pale skin seem more sick than healthy. But the mask on her face didn't help identify her, as it covered anything that maybe show her neck, chest, or lips. Reading just her eyes wouldn't give him an obvious answer.

"Oh, it's useful. Whether for this or that, you'll want to hear it." She plainly comments as she watches Saizo glance her up and down.

Sasuke and Saizo glance back at each other moment before Sasuke shrugs his shoulders, signaling that it was Saizo's final decision.

"What is it?"

"Hm?"

"The information! What is it?!"

She raises an eyebrow and holds out her hand at him, almost like a way to say "chill".

"You don't have to blow up like that." Saizo pulls out his sickle as a warning before Sasuke stopped him. "It's a warning about a man. Westerner. Englishman to be specific."

Saizo and Sasuke both tilt their heads.

"We aren't near any big cities. Why would there be any Westerners inland?" Sasuke looks at her in confusion.

"Does he have anything to do with these murders?"

The girl pauses, glancing down and choosing her words.

"I would just watch the trees more." She turns to her right and begins walking off the dirt path, Sasuke quickly dismounts and catches up to her, grabbing her forearm and halting her movements.

"Who are you?" Sasuke asks her gently, hoping this time she will answer him and they will have a source.

She turns to face him, eyes piercing his as they squint in annoyance. Pulling down her mask, she reveals to him burnt, thin lips with a scar lined symmetrically down the center of her lip to her chin. She only shows him for a moment before covering it back up with her half face mask.

"If you knew my story you would know." Tearing her arm from his grip, she disappears in the trees just as quick as she appeared, leaving the two ninjas alone once again on a dirt road.

~*~*~ Yagyu Criminal ~*~*~

"Where exactly are you taking me?" Munenori asks his sister before they made it to a clearing.

And in the middle of the clearing stood a piece of stone. It wasn't very nicely cut, it wasn't linear or round, but it held into the ground steadily as it seemed to have been there for quite a few years. Getting a closer look at the tombstone, it was carved out with the simple writing of "Corpse" with nothing else. Looking back at his sister, Munenori watched her bow to the ground and pray to the grave. He couldn't do much but just bow in respect.

"This family meant the world to me." Hitomi begins, raising her head but staying on her knees. "They were the sweetest people, had the most loving children, and the more caring mother. I loved them like my own family. They had nothing, but so much of everything. Her son had the cutest crush on me. Said he wanted to marry me when he got older and was the magistrate of Kyoto." Munenori watched his sister. Her voice was quivering and tears ran down her cheeks. He has never seen her like this, not even as a child.

"I couldn't save them. I couldn't even say sorry to them." Covering her face, she sobs.

Munenori felt torn. If she was telling him this, then there was a solid reason for her murders, but that still didn't make it right as it didn't need to occur as an assassination. They would have been put to trial; imprisonment at the very least.

Kneeling down, he takes her hand and turns her face towards him. Her eyes seemed to swell as there was a slight redness in her whites and her lower lip trembling in despair. He couldn't say anything, he just leaned in and embraced his heartbroken sister.

"They deserve to die for their sins," Hitomi mutters in his chest as she held onto him, continuing to sob like a child who witnessed an animal being cut in two.

He could only close his eyes and take a breath. This situation was coming together and he was torn between two states of a crime. Take the side of the law and trial the rest of the men, or continue to allow his sister to kill the men?

"Hitomi, let's go home. I think you've had enough for today." Munenori pulls her off of him and gets a look of her red face. She needed rest and some lunch.

Hitomi nods her head, standing with her brother and walking back to the mansion hand in hand.