2025-08-28: Principal Dragon
- Log: Principal Dragon
- Cast: Shiryuu Ryouhara, Kurou Ryouhara
- Where: Kasugayama High School
- OOC Date: August 28, 2025
- IC Date: July 02, 2012
- Summary: Shiryuu checks in with Kurou about Ryouhara matters. Includes stickers, candy, and the anticipation of retribution.
<Pose Tracker> Shiryuu Ryouhara has posed.
* ryouhara kurou, please report to the principal's office. ryouhara kurou, please report to the principal's office. *
The tinny sound and the female voice is, for those with the Kasugayama near-universal condition of 'not paying attention,' effectively unhearable. But it's a little into fourth period just before lunch, and the sound does catch on. With ears well attuned to the sound of the PA, the social studies teacher looks up in a small amount of confusion, before giving leave to exit class.
He thought the principal was out today... what a hard worker.
The answer will become quickly apparent upon entering the waiting room leading to the office -- there's no one there. The door has been left tantalizingly ajar, and evidence of any woman to have actually called in the page is, sadly for most in the notoriously boy-heavy school, nonexistent. Of course, the door to the office is, while shut, entirely unlocked. Therein lies the root and explanation of the issue.
There probably are -several- other shinobi in the school, if he's here.
The older boy with the silver hair has not exactly been at the head of the clan for very long, a fact that Kurou will be all-too-aware, for at least one very important reason. As it follows, there have already been several very violent changes. Unlike the previous head Setsuya, a seldom-seen ghost whose word travelled very far from many mouths, the so-called prince of the Ryouhara was almost doggedly omnipresent, and could really show up anywhere, at any time, for whatever reason.
Accordingly, it isn't a surprise to find the young man having taken over the principal's office.
"Did you know that there's also a Kasugayama Castle?" the white-haired nin comments, conversationally and in what is quickly proving to be a habitually distracted way. He's currently sitting in the principal's chair, pointed off somewhere to the left, the aged seat rocking just a touch off of the push of one of his heels. The ninkou sword, Bankasoujin, has been unshouldered for comfort and is currently sitting crossbody under the drape of an arm, laying across his collarbone as he rocks. His bag is sitting on the desk. Still dressed up in his Ryouhara street clothes, the young man's attire looks like it might swallow him and the chair he's sitting in. Of course, given the nature of their art, it's not outside the realm of possibility, either.
"It's, mm... up north from the compound, in Niigata. Apparently used to belong to the Nagao clan. Or so I read. Apparently, it's exactly the same name. Makes you sort of wonder about the school, right?"
Shiryuu sighs lightly. This place is already rubbing him the wrong way. "...anyway. I know, I guess you're just starting out the semester, right? But how's the grades?"
<Pose Tracker> Kurou Ryouhara has posed.
As perhaps one of a small handful of students actually diligently taking notes, Kurou looks up to stare at the intercom, then to his teacher. There is only a silent nod so as not to interrupt class, regardless of how well his fellow students may already not be listening. It's all very nearly one motion: pencil rolled into cast, note journal shut, Kurou up and all studious objects taken with him.
The oddities are just the right flavor to have Kurou approach the situation with silent caution. He is soundless as he enters the waiting room, but as he presses the door open slowly as a ghost's haunting, his eyes give a flicker of awareness.
He bows as one should to a principal, but does not speak before Shiryuu does. Nor does he take initiative to sit. But that isn't too strange for Kurou, who has a tendency to exist in as much stillness as possible -- until, that is, direct action is called for.
Kasugayama Castle... "Would you like me to investigate?" Kurou asks, speaking, as ever, in polite honorifics. He may well check it out himself regardless, but there's a nuance in how much Shiryuu might want to hear about it.
Kurou reaches into his school bag and produces one of his latest scores for math. A solid 76, which might be more impressive for someone who missed a good chunk of his public education opportunity.
He looks to his own paper a moment, then takes a sticker sheet from his bag, applies a happy looking ice cream cone, and turns it back around.
"... The teachers do not supply them here."
They wouldn't. It's high school.
<Pose Tracker> Shiryuu Ryouhara has posed.
He rocks a little more, suppressing a cold thread of annoyance bordering on an anxious urge to knock the entire school over and put it back together. The white crow is less discomfit with the show of deference or anything else from the younger kouhai than the fact the chair is audibly creaking every time he moves. It's a small, tiny sound, borne of a chair spent overlong without replacement, kept in good maintenance but simply too old. Takeshi would probably have something smart to say about that notion. Even so, the muted sound is grating, no matter how hard he tries to stay calm about it.
It just makes him want to rearrange everything in the office. No big deal.
"Well." The temptation and curiosity almost has the young man send Kurou on a wild goose chase then and there. But luckily Shiryuu is not a cat, and cooler heads prevail. "No, it's fine. Haven't heard about any demons coming from there. Too far out from any of the known spots. Weird, is all. Thought you might like to have something to chat up the toughs about." Instead, the nineteen year old soothes himself with the ideal, leaning back and trying not to engage the chair's hinges too hard, absently running fingertips along the black textured hilt of his sword. It almost looks like he's tuning a shamisen with the motion. It stops when the boy reaches into his school bag, a little pensive off-eyed glance turning to the rest as he sets the paper down.
Shiryuu is pleased by the ice cream sticker. He can't explain why.
He is less pleased to hear that it's not standard in Kasugayama High.
"No? What kind of no-rent school did we send you to...?" Shiryuu wonders openly, turning away as if in abject disapproval of the very idea. He wouldn't actually know one way or another -- Shiryuu was privately tutored in Akita for the entirety of his life, and his only frame of reference in the day to day is their intelligence reports and Takeshi's anecdotes about the old days. But it definitely is reason enough to send him into a mildly contrary rocking spree with regards to a school he already dislikes. It does not help.
"Ugh. Anyway. As expected of one of ours," Shiryuu muses, finally finding cause to look back slyly at the page. "It's not quite Bakudan Corps level," he surmises, "but you'd make it out with most of your fingers intact. Work on it. Get in a fight yet?"
The subject change is swift, a pretense for the boy to lean over, bracing his sword on the desk as he sets it down by the saya, keeping the obi wrapped around his wrist. He fiddles with his bag on the desk for a few minutes, unfolding a pocket and going through it. The crinkle of a plastic bag sounds, and by the time he's done, the onmitsu contractor rewards the grade with a few patters of pre-wrapped candy across the desk, a little handful of colorful dried jellies, one of which Shiryuu is drowning out the sounds of his chair in unwrapping. Misuzuame. It's a Nagano local favorite.
"Know why I'm here?"
<Pose Tracker> Kurou Ryouhara has posed.
Kurou isn't unaware of the creaking, but if he has any irritation with the repetition, it does not show. Very little shows on his face, granted, but in this case his personal math is determining how much this might effect the chair's stability and reliability if, in some future incident, he had to swing it over someone's head.
It's not the kind of math that helps him on tests.
At the well, Kurou's miraculously manages to scrounge up a few more centimeters of height as he straightens beyond his already rigid posture. He is not a dog, but there's something here like expecting a tennis ball to be thrown. In the end, it isn't.
"Thank you. I do require conversational topics." Yeah, that's probably not hard to imagine. His overly polite way of speaking isn't doing him any favors in the standard Kasu social circles. Maybe the unnerving way he does not blink enough and doesn't know where eye contact should go -- or stop -- isn't helping, either.
"It an issue of my incomplete academic record. This establishment is one of the few that does not reliably vet submissions."
He says this completely neutrally, and like that's not another reason this place is a disaster. Creak creak creak goes the chair.
Kurou looks over his fingers, wriggling them, considering which ones might be easier or more difficult to lose. He looks back to Shiryuu with a single, determined nod. "Yes." He looks to the sticker sheet again, pointing to a smiling mochi. "... I will earn this one."
Well, at least he has a system.
But there is further reward awaiting. Kurou's pupils dilate. He picks up one of the candies delicately between his fingers. His face does not change, but the way he turns it in his grasp suggests veneration in his inspection, as does his reluctance to look away from it when Shiryuu asks him a question.
"Not with any certainty, but I suspected you might have a task for me."
<Pose Tracker> Shiryuu Ryouhara has posed.
Were it Setsuya, the gesture would have been rooted in some sort of psychosubliminal garbage based off of obedience theory or something similarly asinine, but Shiryuu is hardly in the mood for Pavlov or all that goings-on. He just really wants to have some candy and isn't, fundamentally, a cruel person.
Even if cruelty is sometimes required.
There are plenty of very audible thoughts not put to tongue as the boy nods, as Shiryuu closes his pack back up, as he stares for a breath or two across the table. Though it would be a mistake and a foolishness to describe the young contractor as 'anxious,' there is a curled, unrealized energy in him in the quiet, and the torential sense of a rhythm about him. In that sense, a beatis plainly missed as the silver-haired boy rests his knuckles loosely on the desk in an open gesture, rolling the idea of Kurou earning further rewards. The fact that they're still talking about stickers is a detail almost entirely lost in the subtext.
Every so often, it is clear that Shiryuu hasn't entirely made up his mind on several, very sharp subjects.
Decision comes -fast- with him though. "Good!" the prince snaps, suddenly jolting into motion as he leans back in the chair to unwrap his candy, the saya secured tov his wrist tugged after to rest on the crook between his thigh and the chair. Kurou's gotten into a few tussles? "It's one of the few things this school is good at. Keep up your taijutsu. Maybe you'll find one of those kids from the occult clubs by accident. Don't kill anyone. We don't want to have to forge papers for you."
Whether or not he means to imply that Kurou should earn the mochi by fighting school toughniks, or where he should stick such a sticker, is another matter entirely.
A moment turns and Kurou's guess is confirmed nonverbally, as the boy nods slowly. For one blissful moment, he can not pay attention to the chair as he pops the jelly into his mouth, working it to chewiness with his back molars like a particularly bossy gum. Sweet flavor follows. "Mm. Well, right in one. There's a few people we need tracked, first. And there is a mission all of our shinobi are currently on that you're going to help with."
<Pose Tracker> Kurou Ryouhara has posed.
They say still waters run deep -- whoever they are -- and Kurou has his own reasons for his loyalty. There was much to be found wanting in the methods of the past. Candy being candy is not in any way foundational, but we would be remiss not to acknowledge it plays its own part.
Kurou watches Shiryuu in those passing breaths. He is, himself, comfortable with long stretches of silence, a quality he has yet to learn can also be considered off putting. But there is a pleasantness in decisiveness as well, and when Shiryuu moves, it's like Kurou remembers time itself exists.
He grabs the twists of the plastic on both ends, palms pressed together at the pinky, and pulls, easily freeing the prize. In a blink, it's already gone as if swiping treats were so well practiced that their abrupt vanishing had become unconscious habit.
Mouth (not so secretly) occupied despite his stillness, Kurou nods along with Shiryuu's instruction. It'll be a lot easier if a fight here and there. Easier still to think of it as doubling for reconnaissance. But don't kill anyone. Kurou's eyes side glance a moment before he nods again.
This means he probably won't get the mochi if he kills anyone.
But his guess is correct, and moreover, it didn't turn out to be one of those questions he wasn't supposed to try answering. Those are the trickiest kind.
"Understood," Kurou says, once his teeth are clean of the evidence. He waits for Shiryuu to elaborate with no shortage of patience.
<Pose Tracker> Shiryuu Ryouhara has posed.
Needless to say, Shiryuu isn't the type to hold a grudge at least. At least, that's what the presumption, as the onmitsu seems to relax just a touch, allowing himself to be idly soothed. Imagine that the one truth shared between Nagano and Akita sects could be 'an appreciation for the candies of home.' Loyalties are a good start, and Kurou has passed enough of his share to be avoid the sword. After all, no matter what, the younger Ryouhara is -too- young to be considered for the sins of others.
The sins that cause the onmitsu to, every so often, touch the neckband collar cinched around his neck.
A swallow. Shiryuu is not as concerned with evidence as the keen Ryouhara hound across from him -- but the effect is the same, an instinctive urge to avoid leaving traces. Call it an aversion to sloppy work. That same instinct leads the crumple of cellophane to be muffled in a fist, secreted away in some inner fold of his haori, never to be heard from again. The extras -- two, three, perhaps, if you count the one that landed behind the stapler -- on the desk were obviously left for Kurou to do with as he sees fit, but the onmitsu doesn't call any further attention to them, his mind trained on other moments.
The sword is lifted on the end of his wrist, until the boy can rest his fingertips on the kashira, the endcap's fittings idly thumbed beneath thoughtful fingertips.
"Her name is Yoko. I'm told you've had contact."
In this case, there is no accusation of anything in the onmitsu's voice, those subtle social cues hardly present in his voice on a good day, let alone now. "My source tells me she's important to our bloodline ... and may be pivotal in getting us around the occult blockades keeping us from our goals in this region." The old man was -never- anything less than completely opaque and cryptic in what he's said, and it means Shiryuu has to be slightly less than clear, himself. It's annoying. But useful. "I need you to keep an eye on her. Test her. Feel her out. Find out what her deal is. More members of the police are aware of the dark powers underneath the underneath now, and that means we're going to need to be more audacious in our moves." By now, the shinobi is thumbing his hair aside, to scratch a spot just over his eyebrow with his thumb. It gives 'annoyed' vibes, but that doesn't translate to his words.
"She's going to end up as a tool used by them if we don't figure it out and exfiltrate. There's a lot of people loitering around the edges that could be a problem in the future if the police get their hooks in. There's a konbini worker, too. She's a hot mess, but she's supposed to be getting information for me. If she looks to be getting too friendly with that no-account Suou, I need to know about that too. She might need to be gently reminded, but not him. I'm going to kick him in his f--" Shiryuu catches himself. He's in a school.
"--...funny looking face if he gets in our way." He didn't even explain who Suou is, or which Suou, honestly. He just definitely doesn't like him.
The thumb scratch translates into a handful of his hair taken up, and smoothed all the way back behind his head. "Ugh. Anyway. Watch those two. I'm going to leave the details up to Kiria in the field, if you need to put someone in the hurt locker. There's another person, as well, but you're not going to know them at a glance."
<Pose Tracker> Kurou Ryouhara has posed.
That lack of grudge is another important piece of loyalty. Well, one presumes the dead cannot be loyal, which would be most of the logic. But even so, it is not a chance taken for granted. There is little that could be asked of him that would protest -- there has not been enough proving for that, in his own eyes.
... And sometimes the idea of proving does not even factor, because they are all simply the ingrained defaults of the unique pressure that produced a shinobi like Kurou. The plastic doesn't even crinkle when he plucks it from behind the stapler, nor does the stapler displace a single fraction.
"Yoko," Kurou repeats, letting himself feel the name in his mouth in case that may stir a memory. In a rare motion, he taps his painted finger to his lip. He does not recall: there was no introduction of names, but a name now will be all he needs to piece together the information he needs to recognize her at glance. Kurou's gaze relaxes back on Shiryuu to see that unspoken annoyance starting to form. A silent note is made to ask his mother to keep an ear out, if this is a problem that's going to start forming.
But recognition finally lights in his eyes at the description of a hot mess konbini worker, which frankly, Kurou, is kind of rude. And it should be plainly obvious which Suou she needs to be reminded not to be friendly with: the one with the funny looking face.
(This is also rude.)
"Understood," he says again. "I will keep an eye on them both, and I will leave Suou to you." Yoko, especially, seems to warrant a great deal of attention. Such a bloodline and destiny... She must be a very dangerous person.
At the mention of Kiria, Kurou absently touches one of the blue streaks in his hair. Neon... He nods again. Kiria and Kurou share certain fashion sensibilities, but their demeanors could not be more different.
"Another?"
<Pose Tracker> Shiryuu Ryouhara has posed.
It's kind of weird, being understood implicitly.
It's sort of one of the reasons why a few of the Nagano Ryouhara -- at least, the ones loyal to the previous mizugarasu -- avoided the purge. Tenzen, it could be argued, was always on his own side. But the likes of Zakuro, and even Kurou's own mother understood things on the kind of raw, basic level that Setsuya's ideological converts never really could. The rhythm of things has changed.
At any rate, the rapport both ill-fits and pleases Shiryuu at once, if that sort of thing could be understood. But the onmitsu is notoriously finicky about these sorts of things, and any gild of being uncomfortable with the crown can be safely ignored as lingering remnants of stupid cops with even stupider Persona. The sword is lifted between fingertips, the end of the saya rapped twice against the ground as a gesture to close the door on the subject. "Perfect," he decides, and that's that.
The bag slowly slides off of the desk, with only the slow sound of leather on wood to accompany it, and not a single clink or shift to betray what's inside. He doesn't seem as well trained or committed as his younger kouhai, here, ever the soldier. As a creature of sound, Shiryuu has a different approach to stealth -- to leave no sound and no trace works where the enemy will never suspect you. But a hole in the sky is jarring to a man, and in some cases it is better to be a bird. The onmitsu is already packing up, three steps ahead, as he loosens the sword's obi just enough to slide the entire saya and sword into a velvet bag, then tying the obi to his shoulder bag, and pulls the whole affair over a shoulder.
"It's important we play out our hand with our allies for the time being. But the key to seizing control of all of what is ours is to crack the legacy of the mizugarasu. In that vein, we are looking for the source of the kotodama that gave us the leash to Shinigami itself. A secret that is not recorded even in the Renkouki, a secret that died with the traitor, Setsuya Ryouhara. The original source of that kotodama is one of the people outside of our clan who knows our secrets. That person ... must die."
'hup.' The gravity of what he says dilutes when the young man lifts himself up out of the chair, shouldering the bag and bundle at his back just so. It's part of his ninjutsu style -- a lightning fast sword draw from the shoulder, with no space given to breathe, and even less when his 'eye' is active. But it's not now, and the shirogarasu gets his load balanced just right before glancing over at Kurou.
"....yeah.." he says. "Another. A rumormonger, well dressed, tends to hang out around the Cardboard Dragon. But I don't know how low they end up trawling around here. At any rate... they're working on 'who' for us. In the meantime, every able blade at our charge will find all of the people responsible for hoarding information in Sumaru, and make each one of them talk. We'll find out who spread the original rumor, follow it back to its source. Then...."
The shinobi's hand lowers to his hip, the sleeve of his haori dropping over it.
"...we unwind the legacy that ties our hands, and take hold of the future. That's all for now."
<Pose Tracker> Kurou Ryouhara has posed.
Perfect. There is nothing more to say. Kurou has his tasks, and he will see them done to the utmost. His eyes idly follow along with Shiryuu's sword because it's the thing that's moving. But this meeting appears to be soon over, and Kurou mentally prepares himself for a return to class. Or maybe it's lunch by now. He is never fully relaxed, but nor could he be described as tense. In some ways, this is his element: receiving missions he can then follow through on.
Until --
The original source of that kotodama.
Kurou's amber eyes burn. There is a twitch of a muscle at his brow that threatens to bring some change to his face. Words are like sound through water. Cardboard Dragon. Rumormonger. These are all concepts that will swim back to Kurou's mind much later, after the fire has cooled. With a long, slow breath out, he forcibly relaxes his fingers from his fist, leaving crescent grooves in his flesh.
"... For now," he repeats, trying to remember where he is and who he is with.
There's candy. There's mochi stickers. But both of those pale in comparison to what awaits at the end of this mission's success.
"Thank you. I will see these assignments done."