Hidden in the Fine Print?

[Roarky]

Still counts as minor nobility. Chances of her ever having cooked for herself let alone anyone else is small. I mean it could be possible, but slim.

Click to shrink...

Oh, I wasn't disagreeing on that, just being my obnoxious, nit-picky self. If she were the daimyo's daughter, unless she had done something inexcusable in court, there's no way she would have been left in that situation.

So that we avoid the danger of not having anything decided when the time comes, I say we try to mush everything together into something of a workable plan.

[X] Dealing with the girl: Find out if she learned something or did something to displease the Grass country's Daimyo or Jounin Commander.
[X] If she learned something, offer to let her go where she will, or stay and work with you if she shares it. The implied threat being that if she doesn't, she'll be sent back to the people who were going to let her die for convenience, if not directly involved in arranging her "kidnapping." Otherwise, either release her or "recruit" her like you were, whichever seems more beneficial at the time.
[X] Dealing with our limited resources: If we learn something valuable from the girl, begin making plans involving it for the slightly longer term, but for now, it's time to have a long range team raid a caravan. Choose one without a shinobi guard if you can find one, otherwise, hit one with only a C-ranked team with it. Either way, make sure it's in a country a little ways from our borders, and preferably not one with its own shinobi village, as that could make things... complicated.
[X] Other than that, continue thinning the local bandit population, though a couple "bandit raids" may be a worthwhile venture to set up in a neighboring country. Maybe the local population, small as it is, is thinning because they're finally giving up and moving on to better pastures.

 

[Happerry]

[X] Ask the girl if she has anything she's good at.
- [X] If she answers no, find a place to put her while you have a ninja scout out grass to see if they can find any information about her and her families opinion of her.
[X] Meanwhile, you need supplies. See if you can have your Ninja raid a caravan for supplies outside the country. Preferably one not guarded by ninja.

 

[Vindictus]

[X] Right, fuck it, you needed a cook anyway. If she knows how to cook already, great, if not then she can learn. It's got to be better than where she was before, at least.

 

[Chibi-Reaper]

"So, I don't suppose you have any special skills or talents?" you finally say, after hesitating for a long time.

"I am the niece of the second son of the Daimyo of Grass." She says again, seeming to pick up a little confidence. Not much, though. Thinking about it, you faintly recall that his second son... isn't born of his wife? Though the exact details escape you.

"I am versed in the finer points of etiquette and noble duties. On my own time, I study the histories, enjoy fine art, and both study and compose poetry."

.... That all sounds like the sort of thing that could generally be expected of anyone with noble blood from anywhere, more so if not all their blood is noble... but it also sounds pretty expensive to keep going.

And not the sort of thing that you can calm down irritated and potentially murderous superhumans with as a display of making use of the situation.

You don't think that you could really consider her as even slightly useful for doing the heavy lifting that might come up...

"Could you cook or clean if, hypothetically, your life depended on it?" you ask.

She doesn't seem to know quite how to respond to that one.

.... Well, even if she's never touched a dusting rag or cooking pan, you're pretty sure she can learn along the way if required. It's not that hard.

The thing is just that you can see problems coming either way, whether you keep her around or return her, and you aren't sure how the positives of either option weigh up against them.

---

On this issue:

[ ] Keep her-
-[ ] -as a prisoner for now. You just need more time to figure out how to run with this, rather than making the decision on the spur of the moment.
-[ ] -as temporary menial labor. There's a broom around here somewhere, though it looks like it'll snap if handled too roughly. And she can cook, right? People cook food all the time.
-[ ] -as a prisoner Guest. You don't know noble things, and so if for any reason you should need that sort of information... well, less chance of it here, of course.
[ ] Deliver her-
-[ ] -to a nearby shrine. They can handle getting her back where she needs to be, or she can start a fantastic new life doing whatever it is shrine maidens do.
-[ ] -to a well-traveled trade route somewhere. People are going up and down those all the time, with some margin for error.
-[ ] -to the Grass Palace City. You won't be able to get too close, you think, but you can make sure to invent one of those symbols ninja wear on the metal plates so people know who is responsible.
[ ] This is one hundred percent absolutely not your problem. You asked for the ninja to rob rich bandits, so the ninja can figure out how to deal with this. "So what do we even need this guy for?"
[ ] ??

Setting that aside:

[ ] Rice exports a lot of food. They would barely notice if a caravan's worth of it went missing... you hope. Fuller bellies would definitely settle tempers down somewhat.
[ ] You know what Bear country has? Well, besides bears. A very strong logging industry. Steal a lumber shipment and all you need is workers to build things. Any number of improvements are eventually feasible!
[ ] What you need is money. And Fire country is rich, particularly with all the tourists that come in to play the many casinos and red-light districts. You just need to hit one tax shipment on its way from one of the tourist cities and you should be able to breathe a little easier.
[ ] ??

 

[ragoogar]

Fire Country?! Are We Insane? No no no no! No way are we Touching those Tree Huggers with any length of Pole. They're the strongest of the Big Five for a reason, and There is also a risk of Danzo hearing about us...

 

[Vindictus]

[x] Bear Country Lumber Heist

 

[inverted_helix]

[X] Keep her
--[X] -as temporary menial labor. There's a broom around here somewhere, though it looks like it'll snap if handled too roughly. And she can cook, right? People cook food all the time.

[X] Rice exports a lot of food. They would barely notice if a caravan's worth of it went missing... you hope. Fuller bellies would definitely settle tempers down somewhat.

Having a cook and cleaner is useful I think given the ninjas don't really want to do it, and who knows, maybe she will come to find it more fulfilling than being a bottom rung noble with no real prospects.

We really need food. Ugh I can't believe how worthless this land turned out to be, no food, no resources, no jobs. Ultra hard mode should have been appended to it in options.

Attacking Fire Country would give us the money we desperately need, but it would be pure suicide. Bear country for lumber is more reasonable, but until we have workers to use it there's not much point.

 

[Hymn of Ragnarok]

Fuck it, she doesn't seem worth it. I assume the ninja can make it so that she doesn't end up leading people to us.

[X] Deliver her-
-[X] -to a nearby shrine. They can handle getting her back where she needs to be, or she can start a fantastic new life doing whatever it is shrine maidens do.
[X] Rice exports a lot of food. They would barely notice if a caravan's worth of it went missing... you hope. Fuller bellies would definitely settle tempers down somewhat.

None of these are great, but Rice is the best of them. Unless the Nara can ensure we don't get caught on home turf.

As for noblewoman, she ain't interesting, and it looks like she ain't useful. So let's get her out of here where she isn't eating our food.

 

[TheOtherSandman]

She studies History, so possibly she knows more in-depth stuff about the area and their relations?
And the etiquette/noble duties could mean she could be a face for us, maybe, knows the game better than we do as well as possibly some things that are going on that maybe haven't gotten around yet?

 

[Happerry]

[X] Keep her- (As both)
-[X] -as temporary menial labor. There's a broom around here somewhere, though it looks like it'll snap if handled too roughly. And she can cook, right? People cook food all the time.
-[X] -as a prisoner Guest. You don't know noble things, and so if for any reason you should need that sort of information... well, less chance of it here, of course.

[X] Rice exports a lot of food. They would barely notice if a caravan's worth of it went missing... you hope. Fuller bellies would definitely settle tempers down somewhat.

 

[DuskAtDawn]

As tempting as Bear is, I don't want to step on Hoshi's toes. Picking a fight with them on their home turf is dangerous, while Oto isn't likely to bother with small-fry like us, if it even exists yet. Between the two, Oto is less likely to notice theft on their land, I feel.

As for princess, since nobody's going for my idea of training her in basic espionage and securing her loyalty, the next best thing is to open up communications with the locals.

[X] Deliver her-
-[X] -to a nearby shrine. They can handle getting her back where she needs to be, or she can start a fantastic new life doing whatever it is shrine maidens do.
[X] Rice exports a lot of food. They would barely notice if a caravan's worth of it went missing... you hope. Fuller bellies would definitely settle tempers down somewhat.

 

[Biigoh]

[X] Plan H for Happerry

 

[fitzgerald]

[X] Keep her- (As both)
-[X] -as temporary menial labor. There's a broom around here somewhere, though it looks like it'll snap if handled too roughly. And she can cook, right? People cook food all the time.
-[X] -as a prisoner Guest. You don't know noble things, and so if for any reason you should need that sort of information... well, less chance of it here, of course.

[X] Rice exports a lot of food. They would barely notice if a caravan's worth of it went missing... you hope. Fuller bellies would definitely settle tempers down somewhat.

 

[Lement]

She studies History, so possibly she knows more in-depth stuff about the area and their relations?
And the etiquette/noble duties could mean she could be a face for us, maybe, knows the game better than we do as well as possibly some things that are going on that maybe haven't gotten around yet?

Click to shrink...

Particularly important in diplomacy standard(how does a noble hire ninja anyway?) for jobs.

As for cooking...The ninja have been doing it, so far. I assume PC can somewhat do it too. I'd assume that the first few meals she prepares needs coaching and go to waste.

[X] Keep her
-[X] -as a prisoner Guest. You don't know noble things, and so if for any reason you should need that sort of information... well, less chance of it here, of course.

[X] Rice exports a lot of food. They would barely notice if a caravan's worth of it went missing... you hope. Fuller bellies would definitely settle tempers down somewhat.

Food first. Then construction. Then riches. Work that pyramid.

Anyway, I think this is a fine location. Sure, the country is a fixer-upper, but I've seen so many cases of (justified) paranoia resulting in panicking (ex. if we had been in rivers or somewhere (with a ninja village in-country or nearby)). Lack of worrying about it is refreshing.

 

[Winged One]

[X] Keep her- (As both)
-[X] -as temporary menial labor. There's a broom around here somewhere, though it looks like it'll snap if handled too roughly. And she can cook, right? People cook food all the time.
-[X] -as aprisonerGuest. You don't know noble things, and so if for any reason you should need that sort of information... well, less chance of it here, of course.

[X] Rice exports a lot of food. They would barely notice if a caravan's worth of it went missing... you hope. Fuller bellies would definitely settle tempers down somewhat.

"'Hypothetically' is just something people say to fill silence, by the way."
"Hey, remember what I said about not committing brigandry? That doesn't seem to be working out."

 

[The Nobody]

Hah! This here quest is something I've been wanting to participate in for a while, but didn't want to start one myself. All I want now is a PC game about managing a ninja country. With jutsu, bloodlines, weapon techniques and contracted animals.

[X] Keep her as both
- [X] a guest. Proper protocol will come in handy when/if you want to establish diplomatic relations with any Daimyo, and she can teach us.
- [X] a caretaker. I'm sorry, ma'am, but when superpowered killers demand that you earn your food, it's hard to say no.

[X] Get rice.

To clarify - yes, as Happerry suggested.

 

[Chibi-Reaper]

"Well, you'll learn." you conclude. "Unfortunately, as this is still the early and introductory period, I'm afraid we're low on manpower, and I'm informed that cleaning and repair are traditionally jobs to foist off on the young up-and-comers. Even then, it's not taken gracefully."

"You... You would have me work as a cleaning lady?" the noblewoman says, slightly aghast.

"Don't misunderstand." you say. "Noble etiquette, or a respectable grasp of history, those may well be useful in the future. Clearing out the wreckage and making this place presentable is something useful you can do right now."

Her teeth grit slightly, and it's clear that she's never been forced to do peasant work in her entire life.

Still, it's not your problem, and Axe's hand clamping down on her shoulder in an unfriendly way cuts short any thought of objection.

"So that's that, right? Got lots of filth for you to scrub and dust to sweep out, so you'd better hop to it, right?"

In the face of a crystalline moment of clarity, understanding the clear threat to her life if she is to refuse, the noblewoman swallows her pride and nods.

... It's not like you don't understand how she feels about that, given your own situation, but it seems like everything will work out. Saying that, though...

"One more thing." you say, as the noblewoman weakly excuses herself. "You're correct that looting bandit camps hasn't had the results I'd hoped for. I focused on the fact that such brigands target wealth, and disregarded the fact that they still eat and spend money themselves, in ways that often don't result in goods that can be seized. I wanted to avoid stepping on toes too quickly if it was possible, but the way things are going we're going to run out of ration supplies in the near future. Even with the occasional sack of food here and bottle of wine there, it doesn't make up the current needs."

"So, you've got something that'll work, then?" Axe asks, pointedly.

"First. I'm told that shinobi are able to seal large items into small scrolls, for ease of transport. How many of our current forces can do this?" you ask.

"All of them. You don't escape your first village as a genin, no matter what your superiors have done. Not if you want to live long after the defection. And if you haven't learned how to use sealing scrolls by the time you make Chunin level, that's the first thing that gets drummed into your head." Axe answers.

"Good. The baker's dozen have returned from their reconaissance, so I want you to lead them on this mission. The land of Rice exports food caravans all year around, and there's a large surplus of grain. You will select a caravan with no shinobi guards, disguise yourselves as bandits, and take it."

"No ninja? Are you joking? If there's no ninja, then I can take a bunch of traders and a few guards on my own, you know." Axe says, displeased with the instruction.

"Yes, you could. However, even if there are no survivors..." and you cringe a little inside to realize that you may be ordering an unknown number of innocent traders and guards to die with this, but continue on. "... if just one person massacres the whole convoy, then the evidence left behind won't fit with it being overcome by a bandit force. It's necessary to have a number of 'bandits' that all fight at least a little differently."

Axe sighs slowly, disgruntledly exhaling.

"Yeah, yeah. If you say so, 'Leader'." she says, making a half-hearted sort of salute.

"I'll leave it to your discretion whether to target a caravan early into their circuit, full up on food supplies, or to target something later into it and starting to swing back with money and other things. But above all else, keep in mind that this is a stealth operation. There can't be any links to us, and so if your disguise is seen through... you'll have to resolve that problem immediately. Try to avoid shinobi, but if it turns out that there's guards in disguise, then don't give them a chance to realize what's going on."

"There's the spirit!" Axe says, seeming more pleased with the orders.

"Also. Keep in mind your cover as bandits. Even if you could abscond with everything in the wagons and the wagons themselves, ordinary brigands couldn't. So the aftermath will have to be staged. Leave some of the goods in the wagons and fire them. There should still be traces of what they were carrying left behind, but it will be almost impossible to tell how much was taken and how much was maliciously destroyed."

"Gotcha. I'll round up the maggots and head off, then."

....

You have other reasons to put such a comparatively large force into this, too. If they're off elsewhere, then they can't run back here every time they want to eat, and will have to scrounge up meals in the field. That means fourteen fewer mouths to feed from the dwindling ration stockpiles, which in turn extends them for a while no matter how successful the mission is.

For now... you'll just put your faith in the ability of your forces.

---

By the time Axe returns, savage grin crossing her entire face and twisting finely-cut red lines, most of the broken buildings have been torn all the way down as the hazards they are. Some things can be scavenged from the wreckage, but not much. Enough to determine that at least one of them was a kind of monk dormitory and another was a mess hall. You can probably build new ones in those spots, sooner or later.

There's little room on this plateau for much more, so once you have to expand beyond that, you'll need rope bridges to link the cliffs together.

Of the baker's dozen, several seem to have taken small injuries and a couple are being hauled back by the more fit ones. It doesn't take a genius to tell that something went very wrong on this mission, though at the least it seems like they succeeded in meeting the goal. Barrels and barrels of rice are stacked on each other in a pile, along with kegs of wine, and a smaller number of highly decorated but more diminutive barrels. Nine in total.

Nara argues with Axe in the distance, then starts prying the lids off of those. A great deal of steam comes out, as he looks inside and then orders the rest opened.

Then he comes to fetch you.

"Reporting. That meat-head... hasn't completely fucked things up on this one, but we've got problems." he says, shortly.

"Go on?" you ask, allowing yourself to be led down to the courtyard because the other option is to be picked up and physically moved there.

"To start there's the obvious." Nara grunts. "Things went really bad, fast... that meat-head managed to pick a caravan where half the people running it had to be undercover ninja, and so things turned shitty really quickly. In the end, everyone had to go and I'm not convinced the 'bandit' story is going to hold up because of it. There's no proof about who did it, though, so we're in the clear. More importantly, we've got a couple of serious injuries to deal with. As a rogue, you pick up basic field medicine and wound care really quickly, but there's only so far that can go. The injuries a couple of the chunin have taken... they have a little while, but pinning it shut, slapping bandages and salve on, that's not going to cut it. With no medical attention, their odds of pulling through aren't great. If infection sets in, it drops to nearly nothing."

So... you have to put some amount of priority on setting up a medical system if you don't want to just write them off. At least a doctor of some kind.

"Saying that, we've got bigger problems. That being why there were so many undercover ninja in a trading caravan." Nara continues, dragging your attention to one of those small barrels.

You peek in, and at first you think you're looking at a travesty, a small corpse packaged into a container that barely fits, curled up. Then it becomes clear that the figure is still breathing... very slowly and steadily, eyes shut as though asleep.

"What is this... slave trading?" you ask, straightening yourself up again.

"Maybe. I'm not sure. A couple of them visibly look like they have a bloodline, so there's more options than that... could actually be someone's charity effort, smuggling known or suspected bloodline children out of someplace that doesn't appreciate them existing. Mist hasn't had a wide-scale purge lately, but they start up a new round of genocide at the drop of a hat. More likely... there's a lot of reasons to kidnap bloodlines, and not many of them are good. What I can confirm is that these containers are almost made completely out of seals to keep the contents in a quiet state of almost suspended animation."

He shakes his head as boxes of trade goods and small chests of money are piled up neatly as well, all being prepared to be moved inside with the rest of the stores. A quick glance at that plunder shows it to be more than the sum total of village funds at the moment by a large amount. With an influx like that, you should actually be able to hire people to do things here, and maybe finish some new construction.

"I can say this. Whatever the person who arranged this was planning, he's not going to appreciate a slip-up like this at all." Nara says, though he doesn't need to state the obvious at you. "So... you're the Leader. Make a judgement call about this."

---

Gains:

[Noble Maid?]
[Ten Turns worth of food. (Total: 12)]
[Luxury trade goods: 6 units]
[20K Ryo (total: 23600)]

Loss:

[Chunin x2]: Taken heavy injuries, recovery time: UNKNOWN.

-

On the spot decision regarding the unexpected kidnapping?

[ ] ??

-

Actions: 1.

[ ] Construct: simple Barracks. (Cost 15K Ryo, build communal shelter. Morale -, Discipline and Camaraderie +)
[ ] Construct: Mess Hall. (Cost 18K Ryo, requires dedicated cooking staff. Morale +, food used more efficiently.)
[ ] Search: for Medical Specialists. (Mission: select ninja to deploy.)
[ ] Restore: Temple Altar, Shrine, and Offertory Chest.
[ ] Meet: with nearby temple representatives. (Mission: Select personal guard.)
[ ] ??

(I'm also accepting image suggestions for how Leader-ccountant appears. Won't be a vote, but I might like one and pick it!)

 

[ward201]

[X] More grunts for grunt work

[X] Search: for Medical Specialists. (B-Rank Jounin: 3
C-Rank Chunin: 6)

3 teams of three tell them to split up? I don't know.

Woo hoo! Bloodline Brarts! gonna bring so much shit down on our heads

 

[Biigoh]

Fascinating.... anyone got ideas on what to do?

 

[angelofwhim]

[x] Wake the 9 sealed people, individually, interview them. Recruit or die.

[X] Search: for Medical Specialists. (B-Rank Jounin: 3 C-Rank Chunin: 6)

 

[Lon]

Fascinating.... anyone got ideas on what to do?

Click to shrink...

Well, there are three things we could do.

1. Kill them, No gain. But technically, no loss either. We'd just have to worry about the person who was in charge of the smuggling in the first place. But the trail should go cold if we take care of it.
2. Sell them, bloodlines are ridiculous force modifiers. So we probably could get a lot from trading them off to big villages like Lightning who are desperate for bloodlines. As long as we take care not be betrayed and get the bloodlines taken away from us by force.
3. Indoctrinate them. High risk, High reward. Bloodlines are ridiculous force modifiers, and if we can pull an Orochimaru, depending on the bloodlines we get, we'd have vastly improved our fighting force. Well, also the fact that we got a new genin force. Even if we have to have more mouths to feed.

Course, the Orochimaru route is pretty dangerous. First, I think we need to determine somehow whether the people who were smuggling them were the kid's saviors or kidnappers. If they were bad guys, we can try and spin it into us saving them. If the caravan were smuggling them to safety though, we can bring up that we either saved them from people who killed their original helpers. Or we're the destination that the caravan was smuggling them towards.

Course, if people have a better idea. I'd be all ears. Really would like to recruit them if possible.

Edit: Also, it might be a good idea to leave them in stasis for a bit if we're keeping them. At least until we can get some housing fixed up and our ninja's healed. Living in poverty is bad for child growth after all.

 

[inverted_helix]

We should definitely keep them in stasis regardless of what we choose. As long as we safely can at least.

We need more facilities to train and house them if we want to use them, and not having them from the start wouldn't be that great.

If we want to sell them there's no point in waking them early as that just makes it harder to move them.

 

[angelofwhim]

Are all the bloodliners children?

 

[Guile]

[X] Holy crap, we are so fucked. Who the hell in Rice even has the stones to pull something like this off? They don't have a ninja village!
-[X] That said, this is potentially... well, enormous. Have the Nara pick out one kid and give it a trial run; we can't just slot in 9 dangerous bloodline kids into our operation. Try and add them into our forces as a mentor-apprentice thing. If possible, claim that you guys humanitarianly rescued them from either their previous situation or the guy looking to steal them (whichever seems likely to work)... but as humanitarian as you are, you'd like to be repaid a little for your good deeds...

[X] Search: for medical specialists (shouldn't require much for an acupuncturist or other mundane practitioner; send a couple chuunin)

I really want that mess hall, but losing two chuunin when we could totally save them would be a goddamn shame. We need these ninja.

 

[Winged One]

So... how many Chuunin should we send on the search? I'm thinking maybe one of our B-rank Jonin to supervise as well, but recruiting doesn't take that much skill. It's not like we need a medic-nin; a civilian doctor will be fine for convalescents.

 

[Frakir's brother]

[X]Guile

 

[Outoftheinferno]

Great. We just stole a bunch of bloodlines from Orochimaru. That's going to end so well.


i say kill the kids quick, then pretend we didn't see anything. Any bloodlines coming out of Rice are going to be controlled in some way by the sannin whether its seals, drugs or plain old emotional manipulation. We don't need spies and saboteurs this early dammit!

 

[Frakir's brother]

Great. We just stole a bunch of bloodlines from Orochimaru. That's going to end so well.


i say kill the kids quick, then pretend we didn't see anything. Any bloodlines coming out of Rice are going to be controlled in some way by the sannin whether its seals, drugs or plain old emotional manipulation. We don't need spies and saboteurs this early dammit!

Click to shrink...

The risk is worth it. Bloodlines, this early. Worth it.

 

[inverted_helix]

Any bloodlines coming out of Rice

Click to shrink...

They weren't from Rice, they were going there I think. Orochimaru doesn't export bloodlines after all, he imports them.

 

[Guile]

They weren't from Rice, they were going there I think. Orochimaru doesn't export bloodlines after all, he imports them.

Click to shrink...

I mean, he theoretically could, but why would he ever let those lovely bloodlines out of his research labs hands?