Oogway's Little Owl - Chapter 27

These were unsettling times for Kamiki village.

And the rest of Japan, Mister Mikan supposed, but he only really concerned himself with this small slice of it. His entire world consisted of what he could see from the top of the Peach Tree Hill, and while the hill was mighty it wasn’t that much taller than the ones surrounding the village. Mister Mikan had been born in Kamiki and he had never seen much call to leave.

The most consideration he gave to the outside world was preparing for the traders who came in to buy their excess crops and sell goods they couldn’t make themselves. Mister Mikan was aware, of course, that those merchants must have other places they go, but he didn’t really care to ponder. He had his home, his wife, their orchard, and their neighbors.

…Fewer neighbors, now, than there should have been. Kamiki was supposed to have a healthy insect population, living in the trees and the hills. There was a small family of spiders who herded earthworms; Mister Mikan didn’t quite understand how it worked, but he knew that their work was what kept the soil fresh for their crops. There were a pair of sister beehives in the orchards who helped tend the trees. Mister Mikan and the elder of the two queens used to play board games sometimes.

Even their village priest had been a beetle, who made up for his size with sheer presence and strength of devotion to the gods. Issun had taken over the position from his grandfather not long ago, it seemed, and yet he’d carved a niche for himself such that no one in Kamiki could imagine the shrine without him there.

Except they didn’t have to imagine, because Issun was gone. And so were the others.

Mister Mikan sighed, the old monkey staring forlornly down from the hilltop. It felt like half the village was gone. It was too quiet. Sounds so soft that he’d never even noticed them were deafening in their absence. The tiny skittering of spider feet in the grass, the gentle buzzing of bees in the distance, they left the world a little quieter.

“I hope the worms don’t wander too far with the Hachiyubi gone,” he mused, to nobody. “Assuming that’s something worms do.”

The ancient tree over his head rustled in the wind.

“Yes, these are dark times indeed.”

Mister Mikan was aware that these troubles were occurring all over the greater Shinshu area and beyond, but he didn’t have a frame of reference for that, so he pushed it to the back of his mind.

A pink petal drifted down and tickled his whiskers, making him sneeze. “Right you are,” he said, to the tree. “All I can do is pray and hope things become better… Going to be hard to do that with Issun gone…” He mulled over that, then stood from the stone bench and stretched. “I’ve been shown the rites enough times, I can probably do it by myself…”

“Dear?”

Mister Mikan smiled in spite of his mood as he spotted his wife walking up the hill holding a package. “My beloved, did you come all this way for me?”

“Oh hush,” Mrs. Mikan scolded. “It’s well past noon, and you need to eat.”

“How could I ever say no to your cooking?” He accepted the bundle and unfolded the cloth covering it. He sat back down, Mrs. Mikan settling beside him, and opened the box with a grin. “Ah, my favorite. How do you do it, dear?”

She swatted him with her tail. “It’s only rice. Now eat before it gets colder.”

As if he needed to be told. Mister Mikan tore into his lunch with gusto, eager to forget his troubles long enough to enjoy a hearty meal.

After he finished, the two leaned against each other and watched the afternoon sun stream through the branches of the Sakura tree. It wasn’t yet in full bloom yet, but a few pink buds had already flowered here and there. It was a lovely sight.

Mrs. Mikan sighed. “Dear, we might need to hire help.”

“Help?”

“The fruit’s only getting heavier. We need to start picking soon.”

“But what about the bees?” Mister Mikan asked. “They’ve been helping us for years. Even when we were young we could hardly have done it by ourselves.”

“Hence the help.”

Mister Mikan grumbled. “...I don’t like the idea of bringing in outsiders on my farm.”

“You don’t have a problem offering up our home to travelers.”

“That’s different. It’s only our house. The orchard is more important.”

Mrs. Mikan gave him a sour look, not that he noticed. “Agree to disagree, dear.” She saw the look on his face and sighed again, knowing he wasn’t going to be swayed today. That was fine, the situation would hold a little longer. She had time to convince him. She turned to look back up at the tree.

She frowned. “Oh my, looks like rain.”

Mister Mikan sniffed. “Can’t be,” he denied. “Doesn’t smell like rain. And my tail feels just fine.”

“But look, the sky’s getting darker,” she said, pointing her cane at the mass of gathering on the horizon.

Mister Mikan squinted, standing up. He adjusted his glasses and tried to peek through the branches blocking their view. “...Are you sure that’s a cloud? It’s moving… oddly.”

Mrs. Mikan rolled her eyes. Of course it was, what else could it be? Before she could say as such, her husband dropped a hand on her shoulder. “Dear?”

Something in his tone made her worried. “...Yes?”

“What’s that… sound?”

Mrs. Mikan tilted her head and listened. Her ears weren’t what they used to be, but they weren’t gone yet. All she heard was the swaying of the tree leaves, but--no, wait, there was something. Low… constant… getting louder?

She looked at the ‘clouds’ again.

No. Getting closer.

Mister Mikan pulled her to her feet and they started running down the hill, just as the buzzing became clear for what it was.

They reached the stairs down into the village properly, and their old knees forced them to slow down to descend. Mister Mikan made the mistake of looking over his shoulder, and his face went as sheet-white as his fur.

The sky was turning black.

-----------------

There was something surreal about the situation. The people of Kamiki were closer-knit than many with their arthropod neighbors. Most of the bugs descending on the village now were strangers, but they still wore familiar clothes and held familiar shapes. Buzzing wings and scuttling legs were nothing strange to Kamiki. If they had been in a different frame of mind, they would have been able to see what was wrong with them; the distant, unfocused eyes, the uncanny coordination despite the eerie silence, the lack of something, a spark so ubiquitous that they would never have known it was there if they weren’t being shown what its absence looked like right now. They would have been able to see the tragedy unfolding and mourned for what had become of these people.

Unfortunately, Kamiki had other things on their mind at the moment.

“The trees! They’re destroying the trees!”

“Save the harvest!”

“How are we supposed to do that?!”

“Agh! My dress!”

“I told you the fruit pattern was hideous!”

“NOT NOW!”

“Oh gods, they’re in my mouth!”

“MY LEG!!!”

The Mikans came to a stop at the bottom of the stairs and looked on in dismay as they passed under the gate. Pandemonium reigned, and no one knew what to do.

The rice paddies were being ravaged. The orchards were being plundered. The decorative oranges on the Mikan household were bitten into, found to be statues, and thrown to the ground to shatter.

“No! They’ve gotten to the brewery!”

A wail of despair went up at that. A few villagers attempted to fight back, but how were you supposed to fight a monster that broke apart around your blows? Only one resident had any type of weapon training, and he didn’t even have a real sword; his wooden training weapon was eaten down to the hilt mid-swing, and the poor boar ran for his life in response.

Mister Mikan fell to his knees as his own orange trees were ripped down to the wood and raised his hands to the heavens.

“Please, help us! Inari, Raijin, anyone! Save us!”

A boom cut through the buzz, and the swarm seemed to pause, confused.

Then a hole was blown through the black, and their saviors appeared.

Mikan blinked, disbelieving that his prayers were answered so promptly.

The mighty shelled warrior swung his fists and entire chunks of the horde were swept into the sky. A small, dark blur bounced around, throwing knives and knocking fruit out of the insects’ grasp. Golden light cascaded across the valley, and everywhere it touched the swarm broke away in a panic.

And panic they did, as a particular piece of the swarm tried to flee, ramming into the gate above the Mikans. Though the individual bugs were small, sheer quantity granted them the mass to splinter it. The wooden arch dropped towards them, and Mikan threw himself over his wife.

And then… they were clear.

The gate crashed behind them, but they were perfectly safe. Mister and Mrs. Mikan raised their heads to see what happened, and came face-to-snout with a large reptile.

“You guys okay?” he asked. They nodded, and he grinned with many teeth. “Great. Sit tight, Fung’ll take care of this!”

The crocodile sped off, leaving the elderly monkeys to watch.

-----------------------

Fung spun his halberd, reaching inside himself to find the spark the old fox had given him, and spun it even faster. He thought ‘wind’ and a breeze followed behind him.

“Ha HA! Well done, Fung!” Tsuyoi cheered, flashing a thumbs up. “Very cool!”

“You ain’t seen nothing yet!”

Fung scanned the area, finding the densest swarm point he could. Unsurprisingly, to Fung, they were centering around the sake brewer’s hut. Fung jumped up on the roof and pushed the idea of wind into his weapon--

It was like a tornado sprang forth from his halberd. The blade sang as it cut through the air, twisting and turning so fast Fung was scared he’d lose his grip and it would go flying. That couldn’t happen! Someone could get hurt!

Someone other than these bandits, anyway. The swarm caught in the gale lost cohesion, breaking apart as bugs were tossed this way and that, pulled higher and higher until they reached the apex of the whirlwind and were spread far and wide across the horizon.

Tsuyoi jogged over, whistling. “Most impressive! And clever, too! You were wasted as a mere mercenary, Fung!”

“You think so?” Fung asked, smirking. Then he faltered. “Wait, aren’t we mercenaries now, too?”

“We are heroes!” the turtle denied. “And now that you’ve scattered the bulk of the attackers, it’s time to clean up. Do that again!”

Fung shrugged, and did so. It wasn’t as strong this time--Fung sank to one knee as he felt something drain out of him--but it didn’t need to be as Tsuyoi’s junior ninjas showed up. Mai hopped in one place, excited, while the cat kid whose name he hadn’t heard yet took a deep breath.

He let it out, and an inferno emerged directly into Fung’s twister. A pillar of fire rose into the sky, and all the remaining insects froze mid-flight.

“Begone, thieves!” Tsuyoi boomed, standing in front of the blaze, uncaring of the heat. “There is nothing here for you!”

The swarm hung in the air for a frozen moment. Then they turned and fled in all directions, desperate to get away from the flames.

Once they were clearly leaving, Fung stopped, panting from the exertion. When Tsuyoi clapped him on the back it knocked him over.

“Ha! Looks like you’re doing too much too fast, friend!”

Fung wheezed. “...Looked pretty cool, though, right?”

The cat kid nodded. “The coolest,” he said gravely.

Mai clapped. “I didn’t even know you could do that, Mr. Fung!”

“Well,” Fung rubbed his neck sheepishly as he rose to his feet. “I’ve got the benefit of seeing masters in action before. I dunno if they were chi tricks--sorry, chakra tricks,” he corrected when Mai looked confused, “but they’re good for inspiration. I saw Master Crane kick up a whirlwind once, so…” He trailed off with a shrug.

Tsuyoi looked around, pondering the knocked out bugs strewn about. “It’s odd, though. They vanish, only to reappear now…?” He shook his head. “No matter. Master Shibata will be looking forward to this report. A rousing success, and on your first mission, too!”

Fung beamed, looking over his victory with hands on hips. “Yeah, it was… wasn’t it?” He sounded uncertain towards the end there. “Are the farmers going to be okay?”

Tsuyoi frowned, but it was the cat who spoke. “They’ll be fine, sir. And besides, they know better than us how to get started fixing things. We’d only get in the way.”

…Something about that felt wrong, but Fung shook the thought away. He’d won! He’d done something good, and played an instrumental part in a major victory! That was all that mattered, right?

“Let’s go home, yes?” Tsuyoi declared.

…

…

…When the heroes left, Mister Mikan looked over Kamiki Village. The fields were ruined. It would take longer to fix them than was left in the season. And the orchards…

Oh gods, the orchards. Mikan almost wanted to cry at the sight. “My poor oranges…”

Throughout the village, similar realizations were occurring. Some swiftly moved on to acceptance, trawling through the mess for any food that wasn’t successfully stolen; they’d need all they can get. The swordsman mourned his trusted tool, and all the village looked to the brewery with sorrow.

Mrs. Mikan held her husband close and politely pretended not to notice the shaking.

It would take a miracle for them to fix everything, and here they were without a priest to help them pray.

“And to make things worse,” Mister Mikan said once he’d gotten control of himself, “I could have sworn…”

“...Yes, dear?”

“I could have sworn I saw Issun in that mess.”

--------------------------------

[Yōsai Village]

When Shifu started training her, it was the hardest, most painful thing Taylor had ever experienced. She was more of a scholar by nature--or, if she was more honest with herself, a nerd--and while she was never unfit, she was in no way prepared for the crap he put her through. For what must have been months, she rose with the sun, was put through hell, and then collapsed after the sun’s light faded. Muscles she didn’t know she had burned and protested every movement; granted, that was mostly because of transformation reasons than anything else, but whatever.

Push-ups, hanging crunches, balancing on poles, those godforsaken stairs--Shifu made her initial stay at the Jade Palace hurt.

After a while, the pain became less pronounced and the burn became pleasant, and she started seeing results from all that exercise. She was a three foot tall bundle of feathers and probably weighed less than ten pounds, but she was able to lift weights that her old human self would’ve been crushed underneath. Shifu’s training was tough, but it worked, and that went a long way to forgiving him.

Okibo’s training was easier than Shifu’s, just as Taylor expected. However, even though it had felt like it at times, at no point had Shifu actually been trying to kill her.

“Hah! Hoh! Look out, haha! On your left!”

Taylor glanced to her left, then shrieked as a kunai whistled from the right and took a few of her facial feathers off.

Okibo laughed remorselessly. “Oops! I meant my left, not yours!”

She hopped from one pole to another, desperately avoiding blades of all shapes and sizes as they whizzed by from all directions. It wasn’t the training she expected from a shinobi, but the bear’s logic made sense: eventually, at some point in every shinobi’s career, they get caught and have to abandon stealth to make an escape. Therefore, dodge training came before sneak training.

It was sound reasoning. It was deeply annoying, and not a little terrifying.

“Oh no! Chicklet! The flamethrowers are broken!” Okibo said, flipping the switch to turn on the flamethrowers and forcing Taylor to take flight to avoid the gouts of burning oil.

“How often do you run into fire hazards, exactly?” Eiko asked curiously from where she was watching. In the spirit of solidarity, she was also training, although the one-handed handstand on a thin coil of barbed wire looked much less stressful than what Taylor was being put through.

“Never, not once,” Chiyome said pleasantly. “But you never know.”

Taylor, of course, heard this aside and made a strangled noise in response, which turned into a startled hoot as a goddamn guillotine blade suddenly dropped down an inch from her beak. “What the fuck?!”

Okibo looked up. He blinked at the massive blade embedded in the ground now, and looked up. “Saki!”

Taylor followed his gaze and saw the hawk kid from before perched on a pole higher up, trying to look innocent. “Mmmmmyes, Okibo-sensei?”

“Did you drop that?”

“Mmmmmmaybe?”

Okibo grinned. “Good job! Keeping her on her toes!” He pulled a rope he was standing next to and a bucket of water dropped down.

“You have got to be kidding me--Ack!”

Turns out the water and the still-burning oil didn’t mix well.

-----------------------------

Eiko winced. “Good grief, Yome, can’t you ease up just a little bit?”

Chiyome snorted. “Ease up? Ease up? Just like the demon spider is going to ease up, I shouldn’t think.”

Eiko flipped off the wire and back onto the ground. “I shouldn’t be surprised you know about that.”

“I know everything.” Chiyome poked the fox in the side, and Eiko growled and swatted the hand away with her tail. Chiyome pulled it away before the tail could touch her. “And you’re not going to get me with that.”

“I’m not going to curse you just for touching me,” Eiko said testily. “Unlike some people, I have a sense of fair play.”

“Hn.” Chiyome pulled a shuriken from a hidden pocket in her kimono and tossed it into the training field. The owl managed to avoid it, then looked confused as to what she’d just dodged, which distracted her enough to not avoid the swinging log Okibo sent her way. “Anyway, the point is that the owlet doesn’t need stealth training right now, she needs something that can help her in a fight.”

“I’m surprised at you for saying that,” Eiko said. “You know better than me how effective hiding in the shadows can be in battle.”

“Against a normal person, definitely. But you know better than me that demons and spirits aren’t normal.” Chiyome turned to give Eiko her full attention. “I bet you were planning to just take the three of you directly to the demon and try to fight it all by yourselves.”

Eiko scoffed. “Please, between me and Master Oogway we could handle it.”

Chiyome hummed, unconvinced. “And Tailei? You can build a wall as sturdy as you please, but if your bricks are made of sandstone it’s going to fall sooner or later.”

“I’m sure she’d be fine. I saw her deal with Genji and Tsume.” Eiko scowled. “Sandstone? What does that even--”

“Bah.” Chiyome waved a hand dismissively. She whistled. “Okibo! She looks like her wings are about to fall off! That’s enough for now!”

The bear waved as Tailei collapsed on the spot.

“And anyway, don’t preach to me about how great she is,” Chiyome said, turning to go. “I doubt you know much more about her than I do. Oogway is wise, yes, but despite appearances he’s still mortal.” Chiyome speared Eiko with a look. “And even immortals can make a mistake, as you well know.”

Eiko bristled, but without a rebuttal, she just folded her arms and turned away.

As Chiyome left, Okibo walked over with Tailei in his arms. He dropped the owl at Eiko’s feet, where she collapsed with a painful groan.

“Get some rest, girl,” he growled. “Next time you’ll be fighting Tsume at the same time.”

Tailei groaned louder.

Eiko watched him walk off, impassive. Then she leaned down and flipped Tailei so she was on her back instead of her stomach. “How are you doing?”

“Do I have to answer?”

Eiko smirked. She took a seat on the ground next to her with legs folded. “Still trust Oogway on this?”

Tailei’s face hardened. “Shifu… was tougher,” she insisted. With a great deal of effort, she sat up and looked around. “Speaking of, where is Oogway?”

“Preparing for the favor Yome asked of him,” Eiko said. She shrugged. “I don’t know the details, because I didn’t ask. He’ll turn up.”

“I wonder how exactly he knows the old lady.” Tailei frowned, thinking. “Actually, how do you know her?”

Eiko’s face went blank. “What do you mean?”

“I heard you talking. It’s pretty obvious you know each other, but you didn’t know where the village was or that she was here--”

“I knew she was here,” Eiko correctly absently. “I knew the moment Tsume declared herself as part of the Yōsai clan.” She considered for a moment. “Can you keep a secret?”

“Of course?”

Eiko looked around, then realized the only ones who could overhear would be the shinobi, who already knew, and sighed. “I’m not a normal fox.”

“Yes, you’re a kitsune,” Tailei said. She shifted into a more comfortable position.

Eiko’s jaw dropped. “What?! You knew?”

“It was a secret?” Tailei tilted her head and looked at Eiko like she was simple. “You literally introduced yourself as ‘Kitsune Eiko.’ What else was I supposed to think?”

“I-It could have just been a name!”

Tailei didn’t respond to that beyond staring with half-lidded eyes.

Eiko slumped. “Alright, fine. I’m mostly surprised you know what a kitsune is, foreigner.”

“Of course I do. My hometown had a lot of Japanese immigrants.” Tailei sighed and stretched out her wings, wincing as something popped.

“Your home--” Eiko started to ask, then pushed the question away. “Anyway,” she said, dispelling the illusion hiding her other two tails, “The point I was trying to make is that, yes, I’m a kitsune and so I’m older than I look.”

Tailei looked her up and down. “I figured that out when you said you were Oogway’s student seventy years ago.”

“Eighty.” Eiko coughed. “I’m just under two hundred years old, but I haven’t really aged much since I turned twenty.”

“Okay.”

Eiko waited, but Tailei just sat there expectantly. “...Does anything surprise you, at all?”

“Last year started with me getting turned--I mean, pulled into a different hemisphere by a magic, elderly tortoise,” Tailei said. shrugging. “And then the rest of the year kinda kept the momentum going. At this point I try to just take things as they come.” She stood with a grunt, taking a moment to work the aches out of her legs.

“Huh. Fair enough.” Eiko took a moment to shuffle around her opinions and expectations of Oogway’s newest student. “Right. Well, the reason Chiyome and I know each other is because, we grew up together in the same village.”

Tailei hummed. “So you were close friends when you were children, but as you grew up you took very different paths in life that drove a wedge between you, which turned into resentment as you stayed young while Miss Chiyome got older, and I’m going to guess that one day she just up and vanished and you never figured out what happened until one day when she was hired to kill you.” Tailei rubbed her chin. “I’m going to guess, again, that she spared your life then in deference to your old friendship, and likes to hold it over you?”

Eiko’s mouth flapped like a fish. “I. Uh. You. How?”

Tailei smiled. “Am I close? It’s just that that’s how I’d do it if I was writing the story. Sorry, I’m still wiped from that death course.”

Eiko closed her jaw with a click. “Huh. That book you’re writing, can you send me a copy when you get it published? Sounds like you’ve got some… good ideas.”

“Sure!”

“You got one detail wrong, though,” Eiko said. “She didn’t spare me. I spared her. I won that fight, and refused to kill her even though the price for failure in the old Yōsai clan was death. And the old Yōsai didn’t kill disappointments quickly.” She sighed. “It worked out for her in the end, since she took over the clan after that and she’s done well for herself, but she’s still never forgiven me for essentially consigning her to being tortured to death.”

“Even though it didn’t happen?”

“Even though it didn’t happen.”

“Huh.” Tailei leaned back, thinking. “So Miss Chiyome is actually better than the old shinobi?”

“If you can believe it,” Eiko muttered. “But I think I’m done talking about this for now.”

“Okay.”

“Instead, let’s talk about something more useful. Like your chakra.”

Tailei stopped her stretches to look at her, smiling. “You mean ‘chi’?”

Eiko rolled her eyes. “Same thing. Now, I heard you have something about music? Mine is more visual, which helps with my illusions. I’m not very musical myself, but I do know theater, so let’s see what we can do with that…”

-----------------------

Oogway dozed lightly in the falling sun, seated in a lotus position. His body, limp but perfectly balanced, staying upright solely because of equilibrium.

Someone else was in the building, walking around and cleaning. Then they slipped on a puddle. They caught themselves, but they hit the wall just hard enough that the vibration throughout the structure upset his balance.

Bit by bit he began tipping.

Oogway’s eyes flickered open as he snapped awake and caught himself, the old tortoise taking a moment to get his bearings, before remembering that he was still in Lady Chiyome’s side room. A small shrine to a god he didn’t recognize, an old faded banner depicting a turtle shell, a painting of a small village from a flower-strewn clifftop, a few other trinkets--all things that didn’t have anywhere else in the house to go.

“...I fell asleep.”

He felt… tired, still. He’d almost forgotten what that felt like. He wondered why. When had it started?

…Oogway frowned. He had been an old man for a long long time, and he knew that his final days were approaching. Perhaps he was simply finally starting to feel his age? Was this what being old felt like?

“Hmph.” No matter. Whatever the cause of this exhaustion was, he had a job to do. He just needed to keep meditating to ready himself.

…Before he fell asleep, he thought he felt something, on the edge of his senses. Something familiar. It was almost like--

Someone knocked on the door as he got himself settled again, and Chiyome walked in.

“Are you ready yet?” she asked harshly.

“Soon,” he said truthfully. “If this warrior is as strong as you say, I will need all of my strength.”

She snorted. “I wouldn’t worry too much. He’s strong but he’s got nothing on your skill.”

Oogway opened one eye. “A berserker.”

“He isn’t unskilled,” she clarified. “But he tends to rely on his physical might too much. But that’s not why I’m here.” She pulled a scroll out of her sleeve and waved it at him. “One of my scouts returned after investigating the insect attack. Kamiki Village is going to have an uphill battle recovering. You might want to ply your and Eiko’s services fixing their fields with your fancy chakra tricks.”

“Why Chiyome, I’m shocked! Is that concern for your fellow man I detect?”

“Ha!” She grinned. “Kamiki makes some of the best sake in the country, not to mention their fruit. Ensuring they can still supply their neighbors will earn me more than a few favors with the Suzume.”

Oogway snorted. His expression sobered as he craned his neck to face her. “Did your scout manage to follow the swarm?”

“I wish. Those idiots scattered them every which way; it was impossible to tell where they came from. All we can do is, ha, hope they attack somewhere else.”

“What a thing to hope for,” Oogway mused.

“And another thing,” Chiyome said, but Oogway interrupted her.

“They were being controlled.”

The turtle gave him the stink eye. “I was going to say that Jinzo thinks they were under some kind of influence. It could easily be drugs.”

He shook his head. “Who could possibly be able to drug that many people all at once? No, I believe Eiko’s theory is correct. The demon is behind this.”

“The Jorogumo you’re after?”

“Eiko found it stealing food from travelers. Then it vanished, and all the bugs disappeared. Now they’re back, and they’re stealing food.”

“That could be a coincidence,” Chiyome said, folding her arms.

“There’s no such thing,” he said simply. “If we find the swarm, we will find the monster.”

Chiyome’s eyes narrowed. “...I hope so. My best spies are among the vanished.”

Oogway smiled. “There’s that heart again.”

“Shut up.” Chiyome threw something at him, and he calmly allowed the shuriken to ping off his shell. “When do you plan on leaving?”

Oogway frowned, thinking. “I might want to wait until the Jorogumo is dealt with. If I understand the situation, your lost one is safe where he is, but the controlled insects very much are not.”

Chiyome growled. “...If you were anyone else, I would think you were going back on our deal, you realize.”

“Of course.” He paused. “How is Taylor’s training going?”

Chiyome tilted her head. “You mean the training she started earlier today? She survived, I suppose. We’ll see how well she’s doing in a few weeks.”

Oogway walked to the window and opened the blinds. “You should give her a chance. She will surprise you.”

“We’ll see about that.”

--------------------------------

[Hidden Village]

Fung stood in the center of the village, fists raised as he soaked in the adulations of his fellow ninja.

No one had ever looked at him like this. Usually it was disgust, anger, fear sometimes… pity… but not here.

“And then he twirled his weapon like a windmill, and a tornado appeared!” Mai said excitedly. “It was the coolest thing I’ve ever seen! Oh man, imagine what it would do if we combined our moves… A whirling maelstrom of weapons…” She trailed off, eyes distant and a huge grin spreading across her face.

“It’s a meteoric improvement in so little time!” Tsuyoi agreed, clapping a hand on Fung’s back and not knocking him over, which Fung was a little proud of. “All he needs to do is work on his stamina and he’ll be one to fear!”

That was another thing. People were hyping him up. He didn’t even have to do his own bragging! Not that he usually had much to brag about, but wow!

Fung elbowed Zhu next him. “Isn’t this great, man?”

Zhu shrugged. “It’s alright. Wish I’d gotten to go a’fightin’, but it’s all good.”

“C’mon, Zhu, can’t you be supportive like Gary?”

Fung pointed out over the crowd, and both of them saw Gah-ri, who had acquired a market stall and, inexplicably, a bunch of shirts with a croc-scale pattern sewed into them. And wood carvings of Fung’s face.

Fung and Zhu blinked. “Uh. Actually, maybe I don’t need that much support…”

“You’ve got plenty of people cheering you on right now,” Zhu pointed out. “Someone has to keep you humble,” he finished with a cheeky grin.

Fung shoved him, laughing. “Maaan, c’mon!”

“Mister Fung! Mister Fung!” some random duck civilian shouted, pushing through the crowd. “Can you show us? The tornado?”

“Well, I dunno,” Fung said, rubbing his neck. “I don’t want to cause any damage to the village.”

“Worry not, friend Fung!” Tsuyoi assured him. “Buildings falling over is just a consequence of being a ninja village, aha! Rebuilding them is good training.”

“Well, if you insist. Back up everyone!”

Zhu and Tsuyoi pushed the crowd back so that Fung could properly spin his halberd. It was suitably impressive, and tore a number of streamers from their hooks and up into the air. The crowd cheered, and Fung just beamed.

Zhu rolled his eyes fondly. “Can’t believe Jiang is missing this.”

----------------

Michi didn’t like this place. Being a courier in a country on the brink of civil war just ready to turn distinctly uncivil, she had developed an instinct for dangerous people. A lot of warlords were the type to kill the messenger, after all, and Michi was way too young to die.

This village was full of dangerous people. Fung was too distracted by his fanclub to notice, but not every eye in this place was friendly. The others tended to stay in the shadows, watching from a distance, and Michi was sure there were more she wasn’t skilled enough to see. Everyone knew that there was never just one ninja, and that rule still applied in a whole crowd of them.

Plus, the village itself was weird. The buildings were built wrong and poorly-maintained. Tsuyoi claimed it was because they kept knocking them down and so didn’t see a point in building them good, just fast, but that explanation didn’t hold water anymore than the shingles kept it out.

And that was on the main road and its immediate side streets. The hidden village was much larger than its actual population required, and the further out she explored, the more everything seemed… fake.

The street she was on right now consisted of single-story boxes with a two-story facade nailed to the front.

It was all just theatre. This was an off-road trading post playacting at a bustling town. But why?

Michi felt the hair on the back of her neck rise up, and she pivoted to see what was behind her. She saw nothing. But her ears twitched, and she followed her instincts to a darker alley that, surprisingly for this far out, seemed to have actually seen some use. There were half-full garbage cans and dirt footprints leading inside.

Michi had a moment of clarity where she realized that walking into a dark alley in a strange place was just asking to get messily killed, but then she heard the voice of one of the crocs.

“...just doesn’t make sense to me is all. Why are you giving away power like this? I’d be keeping it all to myself.”

A light chuckle. “We are of a kind, you and I, Jiang.”

Michi’s eyes widened, and she crept closer. That was the old fox’s voice…!

She peeked out from behind a stack of crates. The two of them were standing in a small square of alleyway dominated by one large tree. Shibata sat underneath the tree on a crooked root, while Jiang stood facing him, his back facing Michi’s hiding spot.

Shibata’s tail lashed back and forth. “The truth is, I once thought as you did, my boy,” the fox admitted. “When I was younger I sought power incessantly, believing it was all that mattered. But then I grew old and realized that my pursuits had led me to nothing.”

Jiang folded his arms, looking bored. “Really. So what brought you to this, then?”

“I met Tsuyoi,” Shibata explained. “And I learned the value of sharing strength. Together, we become more than the sum of our parts. I am powerful of spirit, but my body is not as strong as it once was. By giving of my spirit to others, I can give them a boost that they can use to achieve ever greater heights.”

Jiang rubbed his chin. “...I kinda get it. I didn’t join up with Dirk’s gang because I liked anyone there, I did it because I couldn’t make it on my own.”

“You do understand.” Shibata shook his head, amused. “I give my power away because if my strength is their strength, then so too is their strength mine. And it can be yours, too.”

“I don’t know if I like the idea of someone else’s soul attaching itself to mine.”

Michi took a step, and her tail knocked over a bottle. The squirrel froze when the glass shattered on the ground.

Jiang looked over his shoulder, but she was hidden behind the crate from his vantage point. “Ugh. Your guys are way too rowdy.”

“The ones you’ve met, yes.” Shibata tapped his nose, smiling. “There’s two kinds of people who come here to join. One like Tsuyoi and Fung, who want to be heroes… and ones like you, who want power.”

“I don’t want power, I want to be rich.”

“Bah.” Shibata flapped a paw dismissively. “There’s money in this business too, but to get it you need to be strong, and to keep it you need to get stronger. And you my friend could be very strong indeed.”

Jiang hesitated. “...Yeah?”

“Oh yes. You and your friends are from… I believe it was called the Valley of Peace?” Shibata’s grin widened. “A very spiritual place, the Valley. Anyone who lives there has a head start already. With my own leg-up added on, well. Young Fung is quite impressive already.”

Jiang thought about that. “...You know, he wasn’t even born in the Valley, he just moved there when he was little. I’ve lived there longer than he has.”

“So you’ll consider it?”

“Yeah, sure,” Jiang said noncommittally. “I think I want to see just what Fung’s gotten up to first. Just to see what I’m getting into.”

“Of course, of course. Very diligent of you.”

Jiang took his leave after that, and Michi held her breath and plastered herself against the wall of the alley. He passed her by without so much as a glance, so she let out a quiet sigh of relief. She watched him until he reached the mouth of the alley and walked out of sight.

Behind her, Shibata mused to himself. “It is, perhaps, ironic given I’ve styled this project as a ninja village,” he said--

--and then Michi was grabbed by the neck by what might as well have been a rope of iron as she was dragged into the secluded square. A snake, not much longer than Michi herself but far stronger than she could hope to be, had melted out of the shade and wrapped around her like shackles.

“But I’m not fond of people sneaking around like this,” Shibata finished, staring her down. “Don’t you know it’s rude to eavesdrop?”

“I was--urk!--just l-lost!” Michi objected, struggling.

“Lost.” Shibata scoffed. “As if the daughter of Inari’s favored courier would ever be lost.”

Michi gasped.

“Mamushi,” the fox said, addressing the snake. “Our guest has been quite impolite. I don’t think she’s impressed by the amenities available to the public.”

“Perhapsss,” the snake hissed, “she would find the private ssssuite more ssssuitable.”

“I like the way you think, Mamushi,” Shibata said. “Dear Michi, I am so glad you’ve decided to extend your stay.”

“You--!” Michi shouted, only for Mamushi to adjust his coils to bind her mouth.

“Get her situated,” Shibata ordered, as any remaining facsimile of friendliness was wiped off his face. “It’s time I reward the hero of the hour.”