"We could just jump to the moon…" Mana shrugged. "I've done it once."
"I suppose the moon would be a single good dash away. Without having to worry about interception or traps high in the atmosphere, we could pull it off if we time it right." Damisan scratched his head deep in thought, accidentally releasing the tied cloth that covered his face and fumbling over himself to wrap it back on.
"That's too dangerous," Shige-H shut the idea down. "If one of us misses the leap, they'll end up floating in the atmosphere and if they overdo it, they'll shatter the moon for everybody."
"Not to mention the crucial flaw with this idea." Skaven stared at the bent grass circle, slowly walking around and examining its complicated pattern. "What type of energy do you think may have caused it?"
"What are you talking about? It's clearly a landing pad…" Endo turned his eyes away with an indifferent scowl. Seething that the Nara would talk down to them this way.
"Exactly. Think about it, they didn't just land here and wander around the place looking. They hit us and ran. That means they can survey the area from up there and hit us with pinpoint accuracy. They can choose the place for landing with enough precision to snag up what they need and begone." Skaven pointed out, spreading his hands out while wandering around the field.
"They didn't get it right though." Damisan pointed out. "Isn't this a bit weirdly shaped for a landing pad? Almost like it's made of two circles rubbing close together."
"That's right." Mana snapped her fingers. "They must use some sort of beam of energy, like a stable ethereal bridge for transportation. They beamed it down the first time but missed their target by a step or two, so they shot again to get it right the second time."
"That seems to be the most likely course of events here…" Shige-H scratched her chin, confirming the theory with a nod.
"Humph. What a bunch of losers, all that planning, all those fancy powers and technology, and they missed. Big fat good that bridge of theirs is if you can hit the jackpot better by just jumping over…" Endo sneered with a mocking smirk. "Still, that leaves us with the same problem–how the heck do we get to the moon if we don't jump over?"
"Why can't we still jump, though?" Damisan wondered.
"Because of the same reason we don't instantly snap to our target location–if we're aware the enemy might be scouting the place and preparing traps–we risk running right into them," Mana replied.
"Right, we'd be screwed if we ran into traps in the atmosphere…" Damisan breathed out a few times in something resembling a pitiful cackle. "Maybe I could build us a puppet armor to fly all the way to space?"
"Don't your inventions usually end up blowing up or breaking?" Endo asked.
"Only because I blow them up…" Damisan shrugged.
"It might take too long." Shige-H shook her head. "We don't know what the Sky Clan if indeed it is the Sky Clan that's doing this, want with these people. Let's run through all of our options first. If we have no other choice, we'll trust Damisan to tinker us a rocket vessel."
"We could ask someone who knows." Mana turned her eyes up, scanning her teammates with a look that's hopeful and only a tad crazy.
"I thought you said this is the first time that the Sky Clan and Earth Clan would collide?" Shige-H placed her hands on her hips.
"In our universe, anyway…" Mana's lips stretched out, showing off her whites as her cheeks felt an influx of blood washing over them and becoming stuck as they formed hard pillows.
"That's just as long of a shot…" Skaven sighed, pocketing his hands and turning his sunken head to gaze to the side. "Even if Konoha lets us use their universal transportation technology, it's not supposed to be fired up willy-nilly. You, as someone who brought it there, to begin with, should know that."
"If anyone can make it work, it's us. If Naruto-san's Konoha will work with anyone, it's me. If Konoha will permit anyone to make such a trip with their technology, it would be Allied Ninja trying to investigate a potential invasion of the Sky Clan. Konoha was once a hotspot for clashes with the Sky Clan and it sacrificed the most but also bred the most notable heroes of war." Mana pointed out.
"You say that as if Konoha wouldn't be interested in forcing more heroes to pop up through the adversity of war," Endo said.
"Even if it's a long shot, it can work for us. The odds are good enough for us to try it. Damisan, you're our Plan B. Let's head to Fire Country and hope that putting the Nine Tales Gang down will keep attempts at our lives there to a minimum." Shige-H shrugged. Her expression suggested that she wasn't entirely ready to sign under the dotted line just yet, but she acknowledged that the odds were favorable enough for a shot.
There was a slight problem with heading to Konoha right away. Usually, the practice with Allied Ninja was that they messaged the Hokage ahead of time and requested entry. Technically, Allied Ninja were still foreign ninja even with their supernational competence in mind. It was just good manners to get the Hokage's permission lest one ended up standing in front of the gate like a fool or, even worse, had Konoha ninja all over them.
At the moment, the only place that the Stars could have found shelter in and send a message to Konoha from was Kusagakure. Given that their point of interest at the time of departure was the Grass Country, the Stars had gotten permission from Kusagakure to enter both the country and the village if needed. A bigger problem was that where Kusagakure, being the small and mostly politically neutral village that it was, required little convincing, Konoha may have wanted a meatier letter to grant them entry.
"This is annoying…" Endo groaned. The swordsman held his head in between his hands as he stared at the rest of the Stars working on the message to one of the great ninja villages. "Mana knows a bunch of people there. Can't she just pull some strings and get us in? Skaven's a bigwig with the Konoha Black Ops, apparently. Can't he just sneak us through?"
"I don't want to use my favors on this when there's a legitimate chance of permission to enter." Mana gave Endo a wayward look. "Since you're not doing anything, we'll hand the message to you to encrypt."
"Also, I don't remember the exact nature of my connection with the ANBU, even if I would, or if I could sneak us through, there's no reason risking ruining the Allied Ninja's relationship with Konoha over something we can obtain legitimately." Skaven joined in on Mana's answer. "It's okay. I can encrypt the message. Endo is going to mess it up, anyway."
"I will not!" Endo jumped up.
Just a snap away from the two locking horns with each other. A hawk swooped through the bars of the Kusagakure aviary. Instead of landing on the system of resting bars or handing its message to processing, the hawk dived right down and flopped a package right on top of the scroll that the Stars were working on. Mana blinked, breaking out of the grimace of shock that she froze in. She handed the magnetic signet to the hawk that it used to follow her here and the hawk flew off with a squawk.
"What is this? It's from Konoha…" Shige-H pointed at the package.
"Whoa, talk about efficiency. They gave us their answer before we even sent the message…" Endo whistled out into the air with a sarcastic remark.
"No, you oaf, Mana wrote to Konoha about the World Magic Tour, right?" Damisan turned to Mana, then to Skaven and Shige. A plastic bucket flopped over Damisan's head, a temporary replacement for the mask that he had lost and not yet found a substitute for.
Mana ripped the package open, removing a pair of letters. This was odd. She didn't really expect two letters, certainly, she had expected something different from the second address she sent a message to. The ninja magician unraveled the first scroll, a loose poster smacked down on the table. It had a crude drawing of Mana's cheerful game-face with colorful letters and sparkly decorations. It was a poster for a magic show, yet there was no location penned down in the appropriate spot. Mana's eyes ran down the unraveled scroll, knowing full-well what she'd read in it.
"Mr. Hiro approved of my idea of starting the World Magic Tour. We'll have our excuse to enter different villages next time!" Mana gave everybody a thumb up, bending her gleeful expression to the side like a curious puppy.
"Finally, never looking forward to doing this ever again…" Endo rolled his eyes.
"You have done nothing though…" Damisan pointed an accusatory finger at the swordsman.
"That's good news. What about the second letter? Who's that from?" Skaven pointed at the other scroll with his chin.
"That's… Personal…" Mana scratched her neck with an awkward expression. She scooped the other letter up and bowed her head in apology as she stepped away from the table to run her eyes through its contents. It was just as she expected, not a direct denial, but it seemed that Mana's second request hadn't been approved just yet. Mana stuffed the second scroll into the storage seal in her hat and returned to the table.
"Was that from a boyfriend?" Endo wondered.
"Why? Jealous?" Shige-H nudged the swordsman, who faked outrage at the suggestion of the idea.
"Don't be ridiculous! I would kill him though." Endo crossed his arms.
"Why? Because you're jealous?" Skaven repeated the question with an inquisitive poke of his index finger.
"No! Because he's distracting Mana from the mission!" Endo lashed out. "In either case, we've got our excuse to walk into the village now. We don't need to spend any more time in these neutered wetlands."
"Hold up there, cowboy. Mana still needs to prepare for the show. It needs to look good, remember?" Shige-H said.
"Come on, it's Mana. The worst she can do if she's trying hard to fail is passable." Skaven shrugged with indifference, throwing the incomplete scroll with the message aside.
"We need to let Konoha know we're coming either way," Mana said. "It may not be necessary, but it's still common courtesy. If Mr. Hiro can sell a few tickets ahead of time, it'll make the show look more legitimate."
The gate leading the bustling crowds into and out of Konoha had been busy at the time of day that the Stars finally reached it. It was fortunate that Mana wanted to make a big splash with her entry, unlike a few times before, as people parted aside, forming a line in the middle between the arriving and departing lines of people through which a small caravan could pass.
It was even more fortunate that the driver of the said caravan was headed to Konoha in the first place and had once been a fan of Mana's shows. It took a brief conversation, but the man had been excited to see the revival of a once-grand idea for excellent evening entertainment in Konoha. Seeing how it required almost no effort from the man's part, just to let a handful of ninja to tag along with his caravan that had already been rolling their way.
While the way Endo put it, that if they wanted the man robbed or dead–he'd have long since been so, was crude and no proper way of talking to someone who was so helpful in the end, that didn't mean that the young man wasn't right or that the caravan driver hadn't considered that same thought at least once.
"This is so embarrassing. Why am I the one that has to do this?" Endo grumbled as he flung a few playing cards with sealing glyphs lighting up and exploding in harmless yet flashy and loud lightning sparks.
"You want an easy passage into Konoha, don't you?" Skaven rolled his eyes from inside the caravan. Even if the Nara had thoroughly enjoyed seeing his fellow Stars member humiliated by serving as an attraction for Mana's show that was to take part that same evening, he did a fair job at hiding that sentiment.
"I don't know, I think it's kind of cool…" Damisan shrugged, grabbing another handful of cards and flinging them up for attractive incineration to colorful cinders in mid-air.
"We should have just placed Damisan on our caravan and paraded around the village with him. The freak's enough of a distraction by himself." Endo sighed, signing himself away for the fate of inevitable humiliation he was going through.
"Whoa there…" the pair of ninja watching the gate flickered from their posts, appearing in front of the caravan. "What's this now?"
The two staggered back and braced for combat with kunai in hand when rays of neon light burst forth from the roof and Mana slipped out from the caravan, contorting her body through the open window and onto the roof. In her posing and flexing, the ninja magician had concealed one of her hands, weaving a hand seal. Star-shaped sparks followed by a flash of electric light that enforced the neon lighting hundredfold in a smoky light show resulted in quite the entrance.
"Ta-da!" Mana spread her arms, revealing nothing but her top hat and a plastic wand in her hands to the stunned ninja. "Konoha's Sorceress, that's me by the way, has chosen Konohagakure to kick off the World Magic Tour!" Mana bowed and winked, introducing herself to guards she had interacted with a few times before or after missions as if she had never met them before.
"Is this whole rock 'n roll act gonna be a problem? You guys told me it's not gonna be a problem…" the caravan driver tipped the beak of his hat up.
"Please, don't worry, we have this matter settled with the Konoha Administration. They'll let us pass soon enough, they're just not used to Mana's… Presentation. It's been a while since she's been true to herself like this." Shige-H tried excusing her group's antics before the coachman.
"Mana-san…" one of the guard ninja placed her hands on her hips. "I hope you know that you're considered a foreigner ever since you've joined the Allied Ninja. For your sake, Lord Seventh better know you're coming."
"Ladies and gentlemen arriving in Konoha, a show of splendor that you will witness if you visit Hiro's Hall this evening! Also, to those departing, a penny to consider postponing your departure until next morning. To these two lovely volunteers…" Mana tapped her hat with the plastic wand, letting Usubane's head peek out.
"Please don't grab my ears, Mana-san! They're really sensitive, it's like someone pulled you out by your hair to us, you know…" Usubane whined out, nodding her head repeatedly before she pulled herself out by grabbing hold of the edges of the hat. The physically adept ninja rabbit vaulted and flipped in mid-air and landed in the very confused hands of the male gate guard, who just blinked a pair of times and unsuccessfully tried shutting his jaw. "And to the stifferson right here… Something that's exactly what you've been dreaming of!"
"Seeds of magnolias for my garden?" the female guard wondered out loud before Mana pulled out a tiny, folded paper envelope.
"Even better," the ninja magician beamed a smile down her way. "A permit for entry!"
"Damn, this looks legit…" the guard scanned it through and stuffed it back into the envelope. "I'm going to make a copy of that for the records. If you could, please stay here until that's done. You can be on your way then."
"That's on you. If you played along, you could have had a rabbit too…" the guard's partner shrugged before Usubane popped into a cloud of smoke in his hands, becoming just a loose handful of party streamers.
"Well, Mr. Coachman, I guess there's no further reason for us to inconvenience you. Thanks for everything!" Shige-H shook the man's hand as the Stars departed from the caravan and let the old-timer roll further on his business. "Come see today's show!"
"I go back on what I've said earlier…" Endo rolled his eyes, scanning the surrounding travelers, gardeners, and construction workers, also young ninja and merchants passing by and scanning the highly unusual sight of lingering confetti and smoke still trailing up in the air. "This thing's way more embarrassing. It's like they all know what we've done…"
"Y-Yeah… I'm not sure how Mana can do this. All those eyes make my stomach… Oomph… I think I'm gonna hurl…" Damisan pulled the plastic bucket on his face tighter down just so nobody from the curious observers got even the tiniest peek of what was underneath.
"That's the thing… When have you last seen Mana like this? She's like… A whole new person." Skaven looked on to Mana's back as the magician strolled alongside the guards to their post where they could quickly copy her permit for the record books. "Though, strangely, this just feels right for her. Like it's the person we were always meant to meet."
"Yeah!" Shige-H nodded with closed, parallel lines of closed eyes and a satisfied curve upward to her lips. "The progress that Mana has made is astounding! I think that I've finally helped one Star…"
"What are you talking about? You barely did anything…" Endo squinted at the team leader. "Didn't you just piss Mana off by trying to manipulate Tomi before?"
Endo leaned back in terror as Shige-H clenched her fists tightly without dropping her satisfied smirk, becoming even more chilling because of it. Mana soon returned to join back with the group. Her hands were open with her right, holding the approved permit for entry.
"We've got plenty of time to settle our request with Lord Seventh!" Mana said. "Work comes before play. What do you guys think?"
Author's Note: Sorry for not posting a chapter on Tuesday. Had the most nightmarish week though luckily it's all over now. Should be able to keep a consistent schedule for a little while now.