Amaya, Kazuko. [LN, Sōki.]

NAME: Amaya, Kazuko.
AGE: Unknown.
GENDER: Female.
SEXUALITY: Unknown.

GENERAL APPEARANCE:


Kazuko's slender and fit body is marred by many scars and stitches, a sign of injuries sustained and crudely sewn together. She stands at around 5"9, relatively tall for a woman and weighs about 114lbs. Her hair is long and a plain but attractive brown. Once, she had soft brown eyes set in pearly white. Since the Jiongu released its full power within her body, however, these have permanently changed to much larger, bright and vivid green pupils. No longer does she have irises, simply pitch black surrounding the striking vivid green.

VILLAGE: Takigakure.
RANK: Legendary Nine.
ELEMENTS: Suiton [Water]. Granted by Jiongu (for restrictions, see below) - Doton [Earth] & Raiton [Lightning].
SPECIALTIES: Ninjutsu; Fuuinjutsu.
PRETTIEST SUNFLOWER: Jiongu [Earth Grudge Fear] - Jiongu is a Ninjutsu technique that created masses of long, dark tendrils within Kazuko. These threads can be used in a variety of ways; in combat, as medical threads, and most notably as a means of prolonging life. These dark tendrils additionally allow Kazuko to to stitch her body together and extend her limbs whenever needed. She can also extend the tendrils and use them to sew together the body parts of her comrades. With the Jiongu threads, Kazuko is able to steal the hearts of others, to extend her life and take the original owner's elemental chakra affinity.

These hearts are housed within the squirming mass of tendrils within Kazuko, and the elemental spirits take the form of masks attached to her back. The masks are also capable of being detached from Kazuko's body, to form a separate entity with the corresponding elemental affinity. There are limits to this technique however. First and foremost, Kazuko cannot control more than three elements at any one time. She may have any number of hearts housed in her body, but to gain a new elemental affinity she has to 'override' one of those she already has. Additionally, she cannot use techniques ranked higher than B if she has to tap into a housed spirit's affinity to use them.

Having recognised the power of this technique, Kazuko has since converted her own heart into a similar form to those she has stolen - housed within her, attached to multiple Jiongu threads and a mask. The only difference between the abilities and restrictions granted by regular housed entities is that her own elemental jutsu are not limited by rank. Currently, Kazuko has three hearts in total - her own and two stolen ones. This has granted her the additional affinities of Earth and Lightning. To kill Kazuko, an enemy would need to shut down every single heart residing within her body. A positive side effect of hosting the Jiongu is that their physical strength is added to the Kazuko's, giving her an unnaturally high physical strength.

LIKES: Money, being challenged, a busy schedule, acquiring knowledge, neutrality, cold weather.
DISLIKES: Those who align themselves either 'good' or 'evil', boredom, ignorance, religion (what she refers to as 'blind, stupid faith'), hot weather.
WEAKNESSES: Solitary, self-centered, generally disagreeable.
STRENGTHS: Adaptable, sharply intelligent, self-centered.
FEARS: Age, losing control, an empty life.

PERSONALITY: Kazuko is quite a serious person, her mind always on the task at hand, her senses always very much alert. She will crack a joke from time to time, but if it is not received correctly she will likely punish the listener(s). This also highlights her chaotic and unpredicatable characteristics. This makes her dangerous as both a foe and a dangerous ally. Her determination and stubborness are strong aspects of her personality, never wanting to leave a job unfinished. This is fueled by the Jiongu that resides within her, the black tendrils driving her too seek out challenges.

After following the missing-nin's path and leaving her village, she grew to be self-centred - despite once having a caring attitude. She does, oddly enough, recognize that she was once a better person. She blames her transformation entirely on the Jiongu threads that she plays host to. It is a constant battle for her to fight their overwhelming influence on her personality and actions. However, over the years she has learned to control them. Despite this, they have had a lasting impression - they have left her with a permanent self-centred, power-seeking nature. Despite her obsessive personality and almost chaotic traits, Kazuko is perhaps more cautious than it would seem at first glance. She is not arrogant and never mindlessly rushes into battle like many shinobi so frequently do. Kazuko is a quick and keen analyst as well, which is somewhat attributable to her age (her age gives her several lifetimes of battle experience).

Kazuko is both a greedy and a miserly individual, often arranging goals in terms of the highest profit she can gain from them, and is often unwilling to involve herself in something unless there is considerable gain on her part. She has learned to rely on money and only money. As a member of the Legendary Nine, she has a more mercenary-like attitude than her peers, often requiring a price for serving a village in need. She attributes this to the need for the organization to have funds to maintain its status and existence, though many privately believe it to simply be her greed and money-reliancy, as she often gets a slightly larger cut for the negotiation work she completes.

FAMILY: What few family members she had are now dead. Most of them died of old age, Kazuko herself being able to extend her life indefinitely and is now at least a century or two old, outlasting all of her small family.

RP SAMPLE: As the manager took his place behind the bar, the two figures of Kagura and Kensei strolled into the small building. Kensei had a look of curiosity on his face, his gaze directed at the Yamanaka. In response, the kunoichi merely smiled slyly, deciding to reveal nothing about herself just yet. Kensei was now smiling confidently, but she detected his slight quizzicalness.

The man had introduced himself as an Uchiha, which quite frankly told Kagura all she needed to know about him. The Uchiha were often quietly confident and proud. They were no laughing matter in battle and the ex-ANBU had never taken them lightly. Still, Kensei seemed a little more overt about his confidence than the average Uchiha, which at least made a change than the usual broody type. When he continued to his 'nickname', the Leaf Handsome Devil, Kagura merely raised and eyebrow before sitting herself down at the bar. She knew that her nickname was far more businesslike and less pretentious, but she didn't like to reveal it unless asked.

Sake was on the menu, it seemed, as Kensei ordered an entire bottle between the two of them. The kunoichi wasn't complaining at all, she rather liked the drink. The manager was still under the effect of the Yamanaka's technique, though it wouldn't last for much longer. Her companion seemed intent on exploiting this however, and explained that the drunkard at the other end of the bar was paying. After a relatively long pause while the manager processed Kensei's words, he wordlessly walked over and took some money from the unconscious man's coat pocket.

As the dazed man proceeded to reach for the sake and glasses, Kagura turned to her companion. "So what brings a man such as yourself to a place like this?" Before the alcohol began to work on her mind, she was running the names of all the Uchiha she knew through her head. By her reckoning, this man was not currently of Konohagakure. He seemed unthreatening however, and the kunoichi decided to leave the matter. The sake and glasses appeared before the pair as the manager walked off to the back of the bar. Kagura poured herself and Kensei a drink, promptly drinking hers a one go and refilling.

---

RP EXPERIENCE: A couple of years.
ANYTHING ELSE: Not much to tell, sorry.

HISTORY:



Though the exact date of Kazuko's birth is unknown, it is clear that she was born in Takigakure no Sato well over two centuries ago. From the very start of life, Kazuko was hindered with ill-fate, her mother not surviving the long and drawn-out birth. Of course, the medical system in those days was not nearly as advanced as it is now; though that did not stop Kazuko resenting the hospital staff in later years when she discovered the truth. And so, Kazuko was brought up by her father. A single parent who worked as a shinobi for the village, he had precious little time to spend with his daughter. It was perhaps this period of time that, subconsiously, Kazuko learned that she had to primarly take care of herself, forsaking others. Though the young girl did yearn for more attention, she dearly looked up to her father, wanting to be as strong as he was one day.

After three or so years, her father had earned enough trust and respect amongst the elders of the village that he could step down as a shinobi and join the Takigakure council instead. At last, Kazuko had someone who would be able to spend time with her and teach her about the world. Of course, being somewhere between three and four years old, Kazuko was perhaps not so consciously aware of this change, but she was clearly much happier when her father was around more often. At the age of seven, the young girl expressed a desire to learn more about the world of the shinobi, one which she had coveted for some time. Her father was happy to teach her some of the basic things he himself had learned, and before long she was admitted into the academy.



It seemed Kazuko had indeed learned to fend for herself in those early years without her father, her classmates and peers clearly far less important than her progression in the academy teachings. She made few friends, though some did stick by her despite her solitary nature. Kazuko never really gave them the appreciation they deserved, but was glad that she was not enitrely alone. Her teachers were rather taken aback with how hard the young girl worked at her studies, practicing more regularly than most of the other students. However, it became apparent that Kazuko's beliefs in 'looking out for only herself' had developed into something less pleasant. When faced with a problem she found difficult to overcome, she often stole the work of others to present as her own. In practical skills this was impossible to do, but she generally excelled in that area. Paperwork was easy to take from someone though, and Kazuko had no inhibitions whatsoever about doing just that.

The young academy student of Takigakure became known as somewhat of a prodigy amongst her elder peers, most namely her teachers. They were not aware of how little paperwork she actually did, and were mostly impressed by her practical skills - the one area of her study that was indeed her own work. Kazuko found herself in a comfortable position in the academy, favoured by her peers and developing quickly. She still lacked social skills however, now left with only a couple of friends - the others had drifted away as her personality became more and more egotistic. It didn't really bother the young girl, especially as the exams were fast approaching. When the day arrived, Kazuko more or less walked the exams and graduated with ease.



Though the outlook had been bright for Kazuko as she left the academy, it began to turn bleak and downright stormy over the course of the next few years. She found that what she had learned in the academy meant very little in the real world - the pressures and the situtations were completely alien to her. Of course, the other academy students were just as maladjusted to this new challenge as Kazuko, so she didn't fall behind. It felt like a failure to her though, that all her hard work had been for very little because the wide outside world held so much that was simply beyond her capacity. Kazuko vowed to one day understand the workings of every single thing that was at this time out of her grasp. She did so with some, admittedly little, comprehension of the gravity of such a promise.

Initiation into her four-man team was not particularly pleasant for the young kunoichi either. Not only did she find herself well outmatched by her sensei, which was galling in itself, but her teammates were neither clever nor particularly talented. The answer as to how they managed to graduate the academy escaped Kazuko. At home she turned to her father for support, assuming that when she explained her plight he would take the same view. However, she was quite wrong. He sat her down and began to talk to her about his worries over her growing nature. An egotistical, unsympathetic and angry young woman was how he described her, or at least what she was becoming. This was the first of a series of events that created the rift between the father and daughter.

After what seemed like the longest two years of Kazuko's life, she was submitted as a candidate for the Chuunin exams. Her bad personality traits had grown even more prominent, Kazuko now positively hateful of her incompetent teammates and most other people besides. It was this that had stayed her sensei's hand when he was choosing whether or not to submit her for examination the year before, but this second time he could no longer ignore her ever growing talent - despite his reservations about her attitude. If he had been honest, her skills now far exceeded that of the Genin ranks. The tests the shinobi had to undergo at first were team-based tasks, on which Kazuko's team nearly failed because of what she termed 'partner incompetence'. However, when it came to the individual rounds she was finally able to shine, her skills outclassing those she faced until she had secured a place in the finals.

The opportunity was of great importance to the young kunoichi, but she had yet more problems at home to deal with before she could turn her attention to the exams. Her father had witnessed her matches and progression in the tournament and was gravely concerned about her attitude. He worried that his daughter would seriously injure one of the other participants, perhaps permanently damaging them. She argued that the Genin knew what to expect in the exams and she could not be held responsible for their useless combatative attempts. After she elaborated, her father fully understood what Kazuko was capable of and chose to lock her in her room for both that night and the next day, hoping she would miss her fight.

This did not have the desired effect. Instead of restricting Kazuko, it simply made her furious with rage and desire to escape. For a shinobi such as she, this wasn't difficult and she headed into town to vent her frustration. After much public property damage, she was apprehended and taken to the elders. She was reprimanded and assured that her father would receive a bill for the damages. When she was released, the idea of how to repay the elders for their scorn, to spit in their faces, soon came to her. While still in the administrative building, she broke into a high-security storage facility, where she found a number of forbidden scrolls. One in particular caught her eye. Held fast by a physical lock and a number of seals, it took Kazuko hours to open. When she finally did, she perfomred the technique the scroll listed - Jiongu. A mass of black tendrils escaped the scroll, which had now turned blank, and rammed themselves down the Genin's throat. Seconds later, the young kunoichi hit the floor, gagging and gasping for breath.

When she finally returned home, Kazuko did not feel well at all. She could feel the tendrils inside her, weaving their way around her body. Occasionally, one or two felt like they would burst out from beneath her skin. That night, Kazuko got very little sleep indeed, which is in fact a contributing factor to the events that followed. Using the same method to escape in the morning, the young Genin made it to her fight in the finals. However, with little sleep she became very angry very quickly, her opponent taunting her after mere moments of combat. The anger welled up inside of her and she released it in a strangled cry, for at that moment the masses of black tendrils burst from her body, piercing the skin and flowing freely from her mouth. They lashed out at her opponent, grasping his body and strangling him to near-death. With the boy's crumpled body now lying on the floor, the tendrils receded and Kazuko calmed down.

It was too late, that damage had been done. Though the boy was still alive, the crowd around her had begun to call down, 'monster' prominent amongst their cries. It took a score of Chuunin guards to subdue Kazuko and remove her from the vicinity - she herself stood helpless as the Jiongu fought back of its own accord. The elders summoned her father and discussed the girl's future. They had little option and by law, had to exile Kazuko for her crimes. Her father's disappointment hurt the girl more than any punishment however, his simple "Look at what you've made of yourself," was enough to bring Kazuko to her knees. On that day, when her outburst had nearly killed and man and revealed what she had done in the night, Kazuko Amaya became an outcast. Although it was put into the lists that she was a missing-nin, it would be a number of years before she truly grew into that title.



The life of an outcast was particularly hard for Kazuko to adjust to. Having little to no control over the powerful dark technique that resided within her, she could never stay in one place too long, or be around too many people at a time. This was not a choice to preserve lives, but merely to avoid drawing attention to herself. After all, she was classified as a missing-nin - there was a price on her head and a number of people keeping an eye out for her. The occasional incident was inevitable though, and from time to time the still young kunoichi was forced to flee from her crimes. It would take anything from a few hours to a week or two to throw off her pursuers, so life was particularly miserable after one of these 'incidents'.

Despite all of this, Kazuko never once found herself missing her home of Takigakure, or the people she had left behind. Indeed, she was far too busy trying to contain the Jiongu that raged within. On a weekly basis it would burst free, tearing the kunoichi's skin and causing her great pain and trauma. For two years the girl sought medical attention every time that this happened, which often led to her identity being revealed and her having to flee the town as soon as she was patched up. The threads bursting from just underneath her skin, her vital organs were never damaged and the scars were ultimately superficial. After these long two years, Kazuko made a breakthrough with her efforts to contain the Jiongu - she discovered that she could, in fact, control the threads.

This development came about when, for the first time in two years, Kazuko was cornered by a small number of local shinobi. It had been her own foolishness that had led to this, and she knew she would have to fight to regain her freedom. However, the Jiongu chose that particular moment to put in an appearance, and Kazuko was brought to her knees as she struggled to contain it. The shinobi saw this as a sign of weakness and approached the fallen kunoichi. Still struggling, Kazuko managed to extend a hand in protest as if warding them off would stop their advances. Quite suddenly, the convulsions stopped and the Jiongu no longer felt like an alien presence within the kunoichi. A small splutter came from one of the surrounding shinobi. Kazuko's hand was gripped tight around his throat, her forearm having detached from her body and being controlled by black threads that led from it to the girl's arm.

The hand jerked to one side and the man slumped quietly to the floor, unconscious. The girl spat out a little blood and looked up at her attackers. The threads were protruding just beyond her mouth, hanging over her lips and creating a menacing look. Her eyes had changed drastically too. No longer were they soft brown pupils and white membrane. Her pupils were much larger and bright, vivid green. The rest of her eyes was pitch black, the same colour as the threads. Before her attackers had much longer to marvel at the transformation, Kazuko's other hand burst from under the ground below the two other shinobi. It too was being controlled by the threads. Her hand grabbed the katana from the first and used the hilt to knock him unconscious. Seeing this, the first one rushed into Kazuko, who had one arm plunged into the ground and the other free but still extended. The opening was clear, and he stabbed a kunai straight into the kunoichi's chest area, where her heart was located.

And then, something near-miraculous happened. Kazuko could feel the Jiongu responding to her need for aid, and she felt their movements around her heart. When she realised what was about to happen, she braced herself. It didn't stop her crying out in pain as the threads infiltrated her heart, stopping the blood loss. They also wrapped themselves around it, pumping it themselves. In the weeks to come, they would eventually be able to stop this, but would forever be connected to the core of the young kunoichi. As for the final shinobi, the Jiongu took care of him on their own accord. The threads in Kazuko's mouth shot out and plunged into the man's chest. In little more than a second, they ripped the still beating heart from his chest, shattering the ribs with a crunch as they pulled away. As the man collapsed, the threads receded into the girl's mouth, pulling the heart down with them - forcing it down her throat and into her body.

Kazuko was gagging as the heart forced its way into her body. She had lost control, and now a man was dead. As the threads took control of the heart as they had done Kazuko's, she felt this time a strange sensation on her back. When she felt her back, something thin and hard had manifested. Later, when inspecting her body in a mirror, she saw that a blue mask had grown. How this had happened she had no clue, but it seemed to be linked with the second heart now pumping blood throuh her body. As she stared at the mask in the mirror, she could have sworn she saw a faint spark crackle across its wooden surface. Confused at first, it didn't take the young woman long to realise what had happened. Now, for the first time, she fully understood the power of the Jiongu and what it could offer her. Extended life and more power than any other could rival. Much as it excited her, the thought terrified her even more. She took little pleasure from the horrors the Jiongu seemed to unleash on people.

At just nineteen, Kazuko became a wanted shinobi in the bingo book. It seemed that every step she took, assassins, shinobi and guards were trying capture her. Though they were all unsuccessful, it began to become a significant inconvenience for the missing-nin. This was what ultimately led her to develop a Fuuinjutsu technique named 'Dai Henge'. It was a more complete and sustainable version of the Ninjutsu technique 'Henge'. Using Dai Henge, she found she could exist within society for longer periods of time and the number of encounters she had with pursuers was greatly reduced. Every once in a while of course, when she was caught trying to steal something or murder someone, her cover would be broken and she would often be forced to flee to another town or village.

In actuality, when Kazuko worked on the Dai Henge, she sparked her own interest in the Fuuinjutsu arts. The complexity of their creation did not unnerve the kunoichi, and she simply chose to devote herself to learning them alongside the mastery of her Jiongu. For an unaccountable number of years, she devoted herself to the discovery and creation of new techniques, trying to improve her arsenal as best she could. All of this was in the pursuit of knowledge and power, which Kazuko was proving at an increasingly impressive rate, that she most certainly possessed.

After many decades of this, she decided that to increase her arsenal further, she would need the power granted when the Jiongu assimilated another's heart. She had only taken one heart since that day when she gained control of the Jiongi, so long ago. That one time had been simply to replace the first heart she had stolen with a stronger one. She had been forced, as an act of self defence, to kill her attacker. It was not Kazuko but the Jiongu chose to assimilate the heart. She thought it best to take the heart of an undeserving person, a corrupt leader. Part of her wished to prove her superiority too, that no shinobi could match her. Either way, it was a challenge that Kazuko became obsessed with. It took many years of planning, but she eventually engineered an opportunity to attack the leader of her previous village, Takigakure. She saw what he had done to her once precious home, and was incensed. Kazuko managed to orchestrate a situation where he was barely protected - only one guard. Disposing of the guard was child's play for the powerful missing-nin, and a great battle between the leader and herself soon followed.

Kazuko was taken aback by the skill and strength of her opponent, and was forced to her limit to win the battle. Win it she did, however, and as the sky overhead clouded and began a torrential downpour, Kazuko ripped the beating heart from the evil man's body. She commanded the threads, and they took the heart into her body as they had before. Feeling more empowered than ever before, Kazuko fled from Takigakure and left its citizens to pick up the pieces. She was awash with shame and guilt for what she had done, only now the gravity of it only penetrating her determined mind. Though she did not know it, her assassination of this man would, in years to come, spark a great war between the shinobi nations - one that Kazuko herself would be deeply involved in.



It was not until decades later that Kazuko joined the organization known as The Legendary Nine. During that time, over a number of years tension had risen between the nation of Takigakure and all other nations and villages that were thought could be linked to the murder of their leader. He had of course been replaced by this time, but the matter of his assassin was not yet resolved. The village citizens were far happier now that their cruel leader was dead, but it was diplomacy that drived a retaliation. Over the following years, villages sent various spies and tactical subterfuge, as if they all knew it would eventually escalate and were getting what information they could in advance. Indeed, some two or three years later, almost all countries went to war. Waterfall and its allies fought against the other nations and it was not long before the entire shinobi world was engulfed by a great war.

For Kazuko, life actually became a little more profitable. After swearing to always remain impartial in relation to the villages, she began working as a mercenary for whoever provided her with the most attractive offer. Her character still showing signs of being affected by the darkness within. She built a small fortune of her own during this war and, amidst the furious skirmishes, her bounty was forgotten. Though the war was short lived, lasting no longer than a year, it had got Kazuko thinking about how she had benefitted from the strife she herself had sown. The war had affected others in a similar way, some pledging justice to the world, some pledging peace others pledging a fair and even hand. As if it were their destiny, these shinobi all found each other in their travels, and thus The Legendary Nine were born.

JUTSU:

Basic Techniques:

Spoiler:

Jiongu Techniques:

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Ninjutsu Techniques:

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Finished, at last.