Rika, whose headache had required Rin to briefly use her healing arts, was quiet in a corner.
"We found the codebook and some ledgers I'll go over later," said Rin. "Naruto found a masterwork level knife that Gato apparently kept in his bedrooom as a weapon of last resort. Also three decent weapons, fairly well maintained. The vast majority of weapons were of average make, pretty much junk. Not counting these three swords."
"I see," said Kakashi, turning his visible eye away from the three swords that had been laid out on a table away from everything else. "Why didn't you inform me you were going?"
"I wrote you a note, AFTER I tried to talk to you directly and you just said 'meh whatever' - honestly the book can't be THAT good," complained Rin.
"I'm sorry, you were saying?"
"There was also these two..." Rin paused as she tried to find a term that didn't sound too bad.
"Recently acquired sex slaves," said Rika.
Kakashi wondered if Sakura realized she'd put herself directly between the two and Sasuke and kept ending up there. Probably an unconscious thing on her part. Probably.
"Why are you here anyway?" asked Kakashi.
"To stomp around on Gato's dead body, get whatever share of loot I can, and then try to forget this ever happened," said Rika. "I expect that to take awhile."
"Where else can we go?" asked the other, looking as if she were about to pass out at any moment. "Besides, I'm hoping one of you can spare a few pointers. I think I need to learn to fight a bit better."
"So... the three swords?" asked Sasuke.
"Three ancient weapons taking the form of swords," said Naruto. "Old. Very old. Very powerful, but not able to use all that power unless they synch up with the wielder and they're used for the right cause."
"What does a weapon care about the reason it is used?" asked Sasuke.
"These do," said Naruto. He passed a hand over one after the other of the weapons. "Each has a single concept that they-"
Naruto was silent for a few seconds as he tried to work something out. Sasuke finally prompted him. "Concept?"
"That's not quite it," said Naruto, sounding a bit frustrated. "It's more than that, but these sort of take an idea and champion that cause? No, that's not quite it either. Embody a concept and stuff?"
"What concepts?" asked Kakashi, seeing Naruto's frustration mount. Obviously Naruto was dealing with something beyond his vocabulary and not able to put it all in simple terms.
"Faith. Love. Hope," said Naruto, pointing to each weapon in turn.
"How can a sword have anything to do with 'faith'?" asked Rika. "As for 'love' - hah. No such thing."
"You could have faith it's going to cut something?" asked Sakura.
"I noticed you never handled any of the weapons directly, you used those tongs from the fireplace," noted Sasuke. "Poison or something?"
"These are REALLY powerful," said Naruto. "Even locked up mostly. And watching us."
"How can a SWORD watch anything? No eyes," noted Sakura.
"Whatever, can we get to splitting the loot now?" asked Rika.
Rin sighed, went through the pile of things, and tossed a small bag to Rika. "Take this and take care. That should be enough to get you situated in a small village or something."
Rika caught it, weighed the bag for a moment, before nodding and leaving.
Everyone glanced at the girl who'd been chained to a wall, but who was currently passed out asleep.
"Okay, safest thing to do is to leave the swords behind," said Kakashi. "Bury them or something."
"Right," said Sakura, though her glance went to the sword that had been named as "love" as if considering it.
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(Posted Thu, 10 Oct 2013 17:02)
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