"Hey… You're the Sorceress girl from Konoha, right?!" the old captain pulled his bubbling pipe out and leaned up closer to the magician to eye her better. While the man had both eyes, one of them stayed close for some reason, so he might have been struggling with the fidelity of his vision.
"Yes, sir…" Mana nodded while hiding her hands behind her back and weaving them together. It felt embarrassing having someone make the same scene that she'd have been over the clouds about in the past. It was like she was technically still "that Sorceress girl from Konoha" but in name only. Mana didn't feel like there was anything magical about her life left.
"I see you're taking up after me. Too bad, it ain't the type of thing you want to see happen to a young lady such as yourself…" the old man tapped his right foot, showing off a pair of iron rods that merged by a rubbery clog at the bottom and stretched out from his right knee all the way to the clog that acted like a boot for the metal rod calves.
"I wouldn't have chosen it if I had the choice…" Mana tried making light of it though her voice shook and her eyebrows waved over her eyes. She wondered why no one pestered the old captain about the ship and why they just let her talk to him alone and browse through the backpack of emotional baggage that came along with it.
"Heh, ain't that the truth? Still, the village will probably outfit you with something better than a stool's leg, so you probably will only miss it in the evenings," the old man waved it off. Gasco stood by Mana's side and waited patiently for the old man to return to him as the first thing they did when the party entered was press hands.
"These ninja need to rent a vessel to Land of Lightning," Gasco finally spoke up when the old man had enough of Mana awkwardly bowing her head and faking a smile while she was dying a little more with each word exchanged inside.
"That's too bad. What with all of those scary crustacean sea-titans roaming about the Stone Gulf, the sailors don't sail during misty nights and they've already set sails for today. They won't be back until the evening and…" the sea captain began slowly shaking his head and throwing his hands about in apology while scanning every Allied Ninja and recruit in sight.
"Let me guess, the forecast for tonight is a misty night?" Shige-H grumbled and rolled her eyes. The lips of the sea captain stretched out from one ear to the other while his eyes made an apologetic glisten. He didn't need to say anything more than that.
"Well, in that case, this may just be your lucky night, for we have taken care of your scary crustacean sea-titan problem for you guys. It's safe to sail during misty nights again," Asuka crossed her arms and pointed her nose up high, looking mighty proud of a battle that she had no role fighting in.
"Oh, really?! You've taken care of those!? That's amazing! Spectacular, really fantastic!" the sea captain nodded his head some fifty-thousand times though the voice of his response carried a hint of sarcasm in it. Then again, seamen were staunch folk that have seen pretty much everything in life sailing the high seas and working in a world routinely inhabited by ninja, samurai, and pirates and living a life where sea-titan crustaceans and aquatic Tailed Beasts were a genuine worry they had to plan around. "It's too bad that the other captains are probably not going to bet their vessels and livelihoods on your word alone, missy. No offense, I'm sure you're an honest and capable young lady!"
"She is, maybe, one of those things…" Endo grumbled, having retreated to his own cradle of grumpiness.
"What about you?" Shige-H wondered. "You're a captain, aren't you? Won't you take us up on our word that we've taken care of the rogue ninja plaguing the seas? Even when their group was active, they plagued the Stone Gulf, so they would have never roamed anywhere near the Dream Sea."
"Oh, I ain't like those guys, missy. I don't sail on my own ship. I'm more like a… Captain of captains, if you will. I manage the harbor. If I sail off, this'll leave the harbor on its own," the old man croaked.
"I guess we'll have to stay the night somewhere," Mana sighed. "The good news is that you won't stand out all that much in Getsugakure. From what I recall, locals go for the fabulous and flashy…" she smiled at Gwirlon, who looked down to answer Mana's glare. Initially, the giant looked confused, but seeing Mana smiling made his lips wave in something resembling a smirk too.
"It would be an honor to see you perform in Getsugakure," Gasco proposed. "I'm sure that it won't pose any problem at all for you to find a place to stretch your legs in but you have a chance to provide one-of-a-kind entertainment to the locals while making more than enough for either a vessel or a place to spend your days in Getsugakure."
"Why would Mana want to spend her days in Getsugakure?" Endo squinted, confronting the bald, chain-headed goliath. "She's sailing to the Land of Lightning with us, she's still an… You know…" Endo remembered that throwing the title of Allied Ninja around the locals wasn't the best of ideas, so the words got stuck in his throat.
"Just a feeling…" Gasco shrugged.
"I agree with Endo…" Mana replied in a meek tone. "It's really a bad idea for me to perform right now. I… I don't know how I'll be able to perform at all for a while. Maybe I can manifest my missing limb with armor ninjutsu but then I'll need to stay focused on it and it will limit my performance… Plus, we sailed off without performing in Iwagakure so it'll be a vulgar gesture if I perform in Getsugakure."
"Not necessarily…" Asuka shrugged. "Think about it, you gave that fucker in the cell a piece of your mind. It's now no mystery where you stand politically in terms of the Coltan Conflict. It might be a cool political gesture if you skip Iwagakure and perform in Getsugakure."
"As long as you don't perform in Kumogakure either, I guess…" Shige-H shrugged. "Either way, the Supreme Leader would be more mellow about the whole thing if we spent less on a mission and brought a fortune back with us to bolster the organization's funds. Plus, don't you think it'd be a delightful distraction for everyone? You deserve a bit of entertainment yourself with all that's happened…"
"I don't have a routine ready…" Mana looked away, trying to flick her head at an angle that'd help her curly hair flop over her face and hide her shame. The last thing she wanted was to stand in front of an audience with her disability.
"Really? You didn't have a routine ready for a tour in Iwagakure? You're bullshitting, sister…" Asuka squinted her left eye, casting a thrust of a verbal spear that seemed to penetrate just about any barrier Mana might have wanted to build in front of her.
"Fine…" Mana snarled. A repugnant thought spawned in her head that suggested that Mana bombed harder than she had ever bombed. Give a performance so stinky that no one ever gave her as much as a cardboard box to stand on. In the end, she could attribute it all to missing a leg, having lackluster balance, or not being able to focus or something.
Although… A spark shined through the rot like a beacon. Mana was genuinely curious about how much of her performance remained in her. Maybe she still had a life as a stage magician after retiring? She's tried that life before when she lost her chakra manipulation ability, but this time it was different. This time Mana knew well that her issue was psychosomatic, so she'll stay in line and stop looking for her life back.
"That is a lot of pants for someone with one leg…" Mana pouted her lips while lifting a pair of baggy silken trousers off the bed and staring at them. Truth be told, she actually liked how baggy these trousers were. This way, she could almost feel safe enough from being noticed. The much more curious affair was feeling embarrassed about the gold-trimmed sleeveless vest of indigo-colored silks. Mana has never had a problem exposing skin before, but somehow even showing her face unshrouded to the public made her feel dizzy.
"Pinch your ears," Gwirlon extended his healthy arm and opened his hand to reveal a pair of thick golden rings. Imagining them piercing her ears hurt just by thinking. They may have had subtler ways of connecting to Mana's ears, but just the sight of them made it feel like they'd rip her ears clean off just by their weight alone.
"Seriously…" Mana sighed, wobbling to the giant on one leg and taking the massive hoop earrings off of him. "Don't you think they gave those to you?"
"No, bunny girl the pretty one. Gwirlon only sticks blades in his body to be useful," Gwirlon said with a straight face. Mana's expression softened, and she leaned over his massive head, pinching the earrings to the strip of flesh that was neither occupied with some sort of tool that some scoundrel somewhere wanted Gwirlon to use on command nor did it look too painful. With a look of bafflement, Gwirlon shook his head, hearing rattling, but because of having only a single functional hand that sometimes had problems retracting some of his tools, he couldn't quite relieve himself of this pair of jewelry.
"As good of a time to start looking handsome as any…" Mana stroked the man's chin softly before sitting down by the way too fancy mirror and sighing. It wasn't like Gwirlon knew how to do hair or that it would've been a good idea to entrust him with it if he knew about it.
Judging from everyone's looks, they were getting a little sick and tired of waiting for Mana to prepare. All it took was the paltriest of door rubs for everyone to turn around at Mana. The magician stepped out, stretching the tight corset that squeezed her lower body, though her efforts to loosen it up didn't work too well.
"Finally, how come you let that oversized nitwit into the room and kept all of us waiting outside?" Endo pushed his lips out into a vexed pout. People were gathering around the small house, growing curious about the group of ninja that looked like they came from all around the world waiting outside of a house in the middle of Getsugakure. Gasco didn't help things by acting outside of his comfort zone and constantly inviting people to come closer and wait for a show of a lifetime.
"Jealous that Gwirlon gets to take a peek?" Asuka taunted the swordsman, who became flustered and worked up, turning his back to the entire party while this forced him to look at the gathered rabble he usually couldn't stand.
"Obviously not, am I the only one who still remembers that it was that numbskull that maimed Mana in the first place?" Endo got grumpy, though he mumbled it all mostly to himself.
"You didn't, by any means, try to paint your face so that nobody recognized you?" Asuka teased Mana's abundance of make-up. From what she saw amongst the tools given to her and recalled from Stea's appearance, Getsugakure women often confused the concepts of face paint and make-up, and Mana wanted to give that look a shot too. When in Getsugakure…
"Cut it out. She looks great. Is there anything else you need?" Gasco turned to Mana. "I know you're used to performing in venues and that you don't just step up on a stage and do your thing but…"
"Actually… That's exactly how I started out. It will only be fitting if I end my career the same way it started…" Mana exhaled a hot load of air from her chest and stretched her neck and her knuckles in preparation. "Wow, you really attracted a bunch of people in such a short time…"
"Getsugakure has become the heart of the northern seas. Plenty of people ended up stuck here just like all of you have," Gasco pointed out. "Though they might start asking questions if something doesn't magically appear from somewhere…"
"You know, I could transform into you and do this for you if you don't feel right about this," Shige-H reached out and placed her hand on Mana's shoulder but the magician just closed her eyes, breathed in and out a couple of times and shook her head.
"No, I need this for myself," she said in return.
This time, there couldn't have been any rabbits doing her show for her. This was as much about entertaining people as it was a test of Mana's skill. The determining factor of how much of her life she could still salvage and where she'd stand from this point on as a handicapped person. The opening started out great. Mana stood behind a table, though she needed an opening that would leave a dazzling impact that would last throughout the show.
In Mana's experience, everything was in the opening. A good opening made a sealing impression that would prevent anyone from simply walking away. By the time Mana started performing in overstuffed halls, she could've stopped relying on grand openings to tie the ribbon between her and the audience since they've paid to be there already. They wouldn't leave until they felt they had their money's worth. Performing on the streets was different. As a performer, you were only as alive as your act and your act lasted for as long as it kept people mystified. Despite this cruel law of nature, a good opening established a connection between the audience that was tough to sever prematurely.
That was why Mana cast the hook by playing with her hands, shuffling eye-catching golden coins in between her fingers. People loved gold, they attributed it to happiness and fulfillment in their lives, so the moment anything golden flashed before their eyes–that was where they'd be looking. This was not to be a mere coin trick. Coin tricks were cool filler material, a nice connective tissue between separate parts of the performance, and a nice way to carry things forward, but they were too meek to serve as an opener.
These people may have felt more fulfilled than the usual civilians Mana entertained, but they still gasped and began scratching their eyes when the entire stage began disappearing around them. By focusing only on the coins dancing and shuffling in between Mana's fingers, they failed to notice Mana's illusion. A medium of the reflection of light on the face of the coin, though she could've used just about any medium: a snap of her fingers, the hum of her voice, they'd have eaten anything up wanting to see those coins dance. And yet, seeing everything except the audience and the performer vanish from sight while a lone blossom tree sprinkled lovely petals off-season to provide background to the show while buildings, mountains, and walls vanished in a mystifying shroud before their eyes like a mirage left the audience sealed to this show.
This was as successful of an opener as any. The only way Mana could've scored better was if she literally sold her soul for the act. Most importantly–by asking the audience to focus on Mana's hands, she could guide their gazes away from her concealed stump, which she tried to hide inside of baggy Getsugakure style trousers and a rough-looking knot at the end.
Still, there was only so far that Mana could go by standing behind her table of salvation. The audience wanted to see some movement and while one could've crafted a billion spectacular illusions with their hands, eventually people wanted to see some motion in an act. It didn't matter how much Mana begged the audience to buy her act, how she dazzled them with illusions of goldfishes turning into golden ryo that shined like a diamond from the bottom of an aquarium. Gold, sparkles, the fanciest smoke, and mirrors couldn't have held this audience together if Mana didn't step out from that damned table. The magician tried to ignore Asuka's brash pointing at her feet from the stage as the immense trust she's established with the audience was dwindling.
Just a few more stale flashes of repeated brilliance and someone might have begun to look the other way and wonder what else they could entertain themselves with. It was time to put herself out there. To romp or to bomb. With a trembling voice, Mana invited someone on to the stage and laid on top of the very table that she wanted to stay hidden behind, asking that they showed her some magic in return. Mana could hear the audience rustling and she could've sworn hearing a few gasps when she rolled over the table's surface, flashing her stump while her volunteer had as good of a view of the knot over the calf and the missing foot as he wanted to have. Still, when they scanned through Mana with their hands, mumbling some bogus magic words, Mana levitated off of the table while the whole damn thing busted down.
With just a twitch of Mana's thumb and a strand of steel wire, the whole thing that had been put together to disassemble quickly and neatly enough to serve as its own decent trick fell apart and flopped into a pile while Mana remained afloat and even began flexing in mid-air. The magician wondered if the audience would accept the illusion that she was a fully-fledged human being if Mana acted like she still had both legs and just flopped in mid-air as if she was always whole, to begin with.
Given how they've swallowed the illusion of an entire village disappearing from view, goldfish turning into coins that shined like diamonds and cast rays of sparkling sunlight from their aquariums and then turning back in a snap, various toys and balls appearing and vanishing as Mana pleased them to appear and vanish, people they thought they knew standing by their side turning into different-looking people without their notice, the same box that Mana hid behind being both easily moved by a modest young child and impossible to budge by a local strongman at the same time, they agreed to act like Mana was a capable person just like them.
In fact, Mana never noticed that last illusion disappearing from their faces even long after the show had stopped and the magician resorted to the requested encores of the public's favorites. The audience refused to scatter even after the evening shroud wrapped over the sky.