Random Outing

Koudo breathed in deeply, inhaling the smell of Valparaiso and feeling more at home during his visit to the Veritas than he ever had. Valparaiso had, in large part, been the only place that Koudo had willingly chosen to live in. He had only abandoned it when Priere went on her rampage, threatened his life, and forced him to withdraw from the Veritas in its entirety for the safety of his family. It wasn't long after that the Veritas was sacked by the tyrannical Maze and crew and replaced with the weak Moirai.

This... particular area that Chita had dropped them in didn't look much like he remembered, but the feeling was the same. A land of scavengers that benefited from the scraps of other civilizations to build itself up. He had to agree that this area looked a lot like the Dusk, but he assumed it was only because they had gotten their hands on some primo Dusk tech, advanced or not, and used it to build the city up as best they could.

Koudo stepped forward from the side of Chita, mesmerized by the nostalgia that shined in his eyes. He opened his arms, outstretching them to all of Valparaiso before him and screamed, "Home!The prodigal son, Koudo, returns!" He wasn't sure how much it had changed, whether the people he remembered were preserved with the Veritas's universal migration or if they were cast out into Vescrutia's wilds in the universe he'd come from. Either way, time and space had probably replaced them with near perfect replicas as he knew they had him.

Koudo stood there, with his arms outstretched and eyes closed, basking in the atmosphere for a small amount longer. Truthfully, he was waiting for someone to yell for him to clam it, and that would be what would really make this moment all the more special, but he figured that would be asking too much. He rather not keep Chita waiting either.

She raised another interesting point though, however, and that was the fact that she didn't really know the new terrain. If he assumed that it was because she hadn't been here in a while, but her last visit was more recent than his own, then he wouldn't really know how things had changed either. If that were the case, then they'd just be roaming around aimlessly, trying to find something to do, and Koudo really wasn't too keen on doing such a thing.

He lowered his arms, as he opened his eyes, and turned his head to looking his shoulder at Chita with a smirk, "Not a problem." He turned to face forward again and slammed his hands together, clapping loudly, invoking his Sage Transformation. While Koudo had mitigated the need to stand still in order to absorb natural energy and transform, and could passively absorb natural energy, he had stepped it up past that and was always in a state where he had enough natural energy flowing in and out of his body to invoke the transformation at will. It was the first steps towards perpetually being in the state; The state becoming his base form, instead of a transformation.

A swipe of blue tribal markings spread across Koudo's eyes and under his lip. "I can get a decent look at what the terrain looks like." He assured Chita as he knelt and touched the ground with one of his index figures. What he wasn't telling her however, was that he in this state he wasn't only getting a clear mental map of the area, but he was sending out a sort of energy radar that would alert him to anyone with energy that felt familiar to him. Chita was the real deal, but there were other hits that he got. One and then two, then five and then fifteen. He smiled. With that many pings, it meant something spectacular.

He stood up after a couple of seconds and allowed the Sage Transformation to leave him, and then he put his hand to his mouth and whistled. It was a specific melody with lots of sounds that the human ear couldn't naturally register mixed with sounds that could be heard. Once it was done, he folded his arms.

A strange feeling accompanied by a strange noise echoed throughout the land. There was silence for a while, longer than what one would expect, but sooner or later the sound of clamoring and rather aggressive and unsettled Denizens could be heard rising up in the streets.

"Whuzzat?!" someone shouted, "Someone out here in dese streets?!" The slang was heavy on the tongue, as was the blatant irritation. "Maybe someone needs to be taught a lesson 'round here, yeah!?!?" More voices could be heard joining in agreement, as a crowd of fifteen made their way to where they heard the noise, and the stronger of them could feel the presence of a powerhouse. "Must not know where they at..."

Once Chita opened her mouth to speak, Koudo rose his hand to quiet her. These people showing up weren't a coincidence. It was obvious that they would since he and Chita were both standing in the middle of town and didn't look like they were from around here at all. Koudo used to fit in because he had his sweet ass duster and everyone could always see his piece, now he just looked like a man from some tribe or a monk. Chitas all demin outfit wasn't quite tattered enough either.

However, she needed be uneasy. While he had identified these 15 people, for sure, and many others, they weren't the energies that he had counted out specifically in his head. NONE of these people looked familiar to him, and so their energy signatures were not energy signatures that he would recognize. It was really as simple as that when it came to Koudo's Energy Perception.

"Relax," he said to Chita with the utmost calm, "CROWS! SCATTER!" He screamed, using chakra to carry his shout farther than it otherwise would have gone.

He stepped backwards, just a few steps, as the shadows began to congregate over the mob that manifested itself before him and Chita. If she cared to look up, or any one for that matter, it was already too late because the information gathering group that Koudo had put together during his time as a mercenary in Valparaiso had already descended.

The Crows were dressed from head to toe in dark blue, to better blend with the night sky, with armor made of translucent metal and more advanced technology than the the buildings that surrounded him and Chita. All of them except for their leader who was a woman with chocolate colored skin, strawberry blond hair and long ears that identified her as some sort of elf. She was dressed in purple, without the technological armaments but traditional armor. Not only were The Crows exceptional information gatherers, they were all trained assassins with enhanced combat prowess do to their technological upgrades. They descended with daggers, coated in poison, to snuff out the group that arrived to assault our heroes: Koudo and Chita.

The job was quick and clean, and the fifteen Crows knelt before Koudo with their heads hung low, save for their leader. She was knelt but she looked at Koudo with a hand placed across her chest and on her heart.

Mei: "You do not look familiar, but you knew the Call. We are The Crows."

Koudo whistled at the display of brutal precision and scratched behind his head with the group of men and women knelt at his and Chita's feet. "Yeeeah, I figured you wouldn't recognize me." He definitely didn't definitively recognize their leader, but she shared some facial features with the leader he remembered. He turned to Chita instead.

"See, I had it. Those dudes were just looking for some trouble because you look like such a preppy city slicker." He joked.

With a quick, clean cut, the unsuspecting Valparaiso Denizens not of the man's creed would be blindly snuffed out; nigh stabbed in the back and throats slit from behind, offing the all of them.

... Or, so it would seem.

"Yeh... seems like ya got the 'backstabbin' parta this town down..." the apparent leader would say, rising back up, looking sort of haggard. Behind him, about 5 or 6 of his men got up. The rest did not. "... Unfortunately, not alluvus are 'alive,' see..." The man's eye fell out of his head, and he gave a crooked smirk. It was clear that the ones that hadn't died and were not effected by the poison were, in fact, zombies, as some Valparaiso Denizens were.


When the souls rose up from the actual living members that were both killed and poisoned, the zombie members would snatch them up and consume them, growing substantially in power on the spot. Still, the name of 'the Crows' seemed to not only ring a bell, but also bring a hint of terror to the still remaining eye in his head. "Yech, I knew them Crows were no good rats..." No matter how secret the faction, word always got out around this place, through the grapevine, especially if it were a sellsword or a mercenary; hired hand or henchman. Talk got out, and nearly nothing was sacred nor secret, even if everyone pretended they didn't know to keep up appearances for themselves alone. Whispers were heavier in Valparaiso than actual words were.

"Eat this!" When he opened his mouth and exhaled sharply, a vicious poisonous Miasma wheezed out of his decrepit lungs, only for his men to join in with him. It was not only toxic to breathe and be exposed to, but also served as a smokescreen that completely filled up the street, removing visibility with the hazardous haze.

There was no surprise on Koudo's face. He didn't even grace the remaining beings with a glance at all and looked from Chita to Mei, sot that he may continue with what he was doing. He had lived in Valparaiso for years, so zombies were not surprising, neither was the fact that they could "pretend" to have vital signs. It was impossible to trick Koudo's Energy Perception, but the amount of natural energy in the area was practically non-existent. Not that it really mattered since his body always held a sufficient amount to remain balanced with his Physical and Spiritual Energies.

He said what he said to Chita to piss her off on purpose because he knew that a few of the assailants would rise. Moving on, he didn't say anything to Mei and the rest of The Crows. In the few Milliseconds between when Chita spoke to him and then charged in, Koudo blinked Morse Code to Mei before The Crows scattered again and Koudo tucked something into the fur drape around his waist.

"Feel better?" He said to Chita, finally stepping forward, though not very much time had passed at all.

Without much extra effort, the lowly Valparaiso Denizens had been snuffed out by the fiery blast, leaving only their souls behind.

Yet, this did not go unnoticed in the streets.

Koudo shrugged and shook his head. There were so many gangs in Valparaiso and so many shifting alliances and hostile takeovers that it was impossible to tell. The only group that had any organization and loyalty to anyone, as far as Koudo knew, were The Crows. These specific groups wasn't his Crows, but they belonged to someone like him because he knew The Call. He could only assume that this universes version of him had established The Crows at some point in their life.

He dropped his arms and reached into the fur drape around his waist. "Beats me. Never seen them before in my life." He seen zombies around, gotten hired to take care of a few before Priere forced him out of the Veritas with her threats of violence against him while she was influenced by the Tensei Curse. At that time, while there were many gangs that had beef with each other, they all paid respect to various Warlords of the area. Koudo assumed that had changed with the Universal shift. He'd have to look into it.

"Sector V, Section 274 and 362. Good, they still use the grid system and the club hasn't moved." Koudo whispered to himself before looking towards the east. "You got two choices. Fight Club or Dance Club." Either way, Koudo could get a drink so he didn't really care.

Koudo already assumed her answer was gonna be fight club, she was just that type of girl, which meant that they had to go to Section 362. He was... alright with that. Back in the day the Warlord of that Section was some chick with golden hair who practically lived in the fight club. She was their star attraction. He never, personally, ran into her or did any work for her, but it was rumored that she was a Witchling and an Amazon. He wondered if she got carried over, but he doubted it. Most of the residents of Valparaiso that had exceptional talent seemed to have been left behind. May be she was replaced by an alternate version of herself. They'd find out.

He was also okay with going to the fight club because there was a chance that his best buddy Ace was there. He doubted this Ace would recognize him, but it wouldn't take long to explain the situation and make a friend. From there, he could gather info on his own alternate self with Ace and with The Crows figure out what the deal was with Valparaiso. He didn't have any intention of staying in the Veritas, but if he ultimately did, then he'd prefer to become a Warlord in Valparaiso rather than submit to fighting someone else's battles for the rest of his life.

He continued looking East, pointing in that direction with his thumb. "We got about a mile walk from here. Place called Champion, ever heard of it?" Even if she didn't frequent Valparaiso as much as he did, especially with her new job and all, he figured Chita would have at least heard the name in passing considering how much she loved fighting in her... younger years. Hell, if she listened to the right students' conversation at her new job there were chances someone would be chatting about it as well.

Koudo supposed that, in the grand scheme of things, it didn't really matter if Chita had heard of the place or not. He assumed that she only ever came to Valparaiso, the limited times she had, looking for brawls on the street though. It was common enough, so it made sense to him. It got him to thinking that maybe he was the only person that really saw the charm in this place and actually liked hanging out here.

"I wouldn't know that." He replied, looking up to survey the rooftops. "There could be anyone in the cage tonight. There could be no one in the cage tonight." Though he doubted that possibility. There was always someone looking for a tussle in the cage. "Telling you about it would ruin the surprise." Chita wouldn't get, like, a title match or anything. She was new blood, especially since she'd never been to, or even heard of, the place before. She wouldn't even get the chance to be in the same section of Champion as their top dogs, but it was likely that she might find someone out of all the other new blood that would have her number. Someone that was just as tenacious, just as hungry.

He started moving first, jumping to the top of one of the buildings and heading eastward. On foot, if they were hoofing it through the streets, it would take them about a mile to get where they needed to be. Traveling across rooftops, as he knew both him and Chita were capable of, it would take a shorter amount of time and, ultimately, the distance they needed to travel would be shorter as well. On the rooftops as well, they'd be less likely to run into another group of thugs. It wasn't exactly a zero percent chance, but it was close. He could also look at the information Mei had given him without the peering eyes of street rats.

Usually Koudo took portals and what not to get to where he needed to go. As of late, on Vescrutia, there was never any reason to move around unnecessarily with the Horsemen around. When he moved, he moved decisively and usually teleported to whoever he was trying to get to contact with. It was safer, it was easier, and it left little room for interloping. He did miss being able to move about freely though, so he could agree with Chita's apparent exhilaration, even if he didn't show it himself.

Koudo reached into the fur drape around his waist as they moved and pulled out a slip of paper that Mei passed to him before The Crows dispersed. He was glad that The Call had been the same, and that they still used the same grid layout he used when ever he needed to get somewhere in Valparaiso. The group was smaller than he expected, but he never kept many Crows in Valparaiso either and the ones he did were always the most loyal. It was easier to keep secrets secret that way, and prevent them from being seduced by the wealthy.

He looked at the paper, "Oh, a prize?" He asked, thinking on it for a small amount of time. "New blood doesn't make much, the top dogs make the big money. Usually, if you impress, you can get job offers from some big wigs around the way, who do most of their business in Val, to be a bodyguard or something. Or the club will take you on as a prized fighter and they'll pay you for fighting." It wasn't unheard of for new blood to get job offers too, nor for them to be taken on immediately by Champion, but it wasn't very common. If a new blood got too cock, they'd get challenged by a rookie crusher and put in their place. Rookie crushers, if they weren't already gang leaders, usually went on to succeed the head of a gang they were heavily affiliated with or create a crew for themselves.

He looked up from the paper Mei had given him and tucked it back into his belt, "But the real money is made in the way that you're probably thinking about. Betting." If a prized fighter could stand to make more money if they lost, then they'd take a dive and collect the profit. It also benefited them for the next match against the person they lost too because they'd be favored to win. Koudo's view of Val wasn't all rose tinted glasses, he knew of the seedy underbelly as well. Champion might have been the place where the big wigs gathered, but that was because it was there that they stood to make, and lose, the most money.

Things could have changed though. This wasn't, necessarily, the same Valparaiso that he remembered. Weapon dealers, drug pushers and information brokers were a dime a dozen, he could bet on that, but he needed to see if the Warlords were still a thing, or if that too had been left behind.

Koudo already understood how excited she was, and he didn't dare to put her expectations in check. He wasn't exactly as excited as she was because he was too worried about gathering all the information that he could. Not every move that Koudo made was calculated to the letters, but information was always his first love and it helped him to better understand the situation of Valparaiso.

So they traveled in silence, Koudo not really having anything to say, and when he took a glance at Chita she seemed to be in her own world as well. He thought it best not to interrupt, and pulled the paper out of his belt again to glance over the location data that Mei had presented him, as well as the names she had given him too. They weren't the names of the ruling parties in Valparaiso or anything like that, but the names of the people we ran the particular clubs he had asked for information about. Thankfully, they seemed to still be the same people. He couldn't ask Mei flat out about how The Crows were formed however, because he was sure she was instructed to kill the questioner and/or herself to prevent that information from leaking. Though that was only if his other self had been the one to create the group in the first place, which he was close to a 100% sure was the case.

It wouldn't be too much longer now until they arrived at their destination.

Tifa remained in her thought for a while, carrying on without noticing. She wondered about many things, as she often did, despite what seemed like a one-track mind relatively always. Even though it seemed like she wasn't paying attention, naturally, she was still quite perceptive of what was going on around her, especially with the fact that Koudo had stopped talking. Something must have been on his mind, or something, just like Tifa. Strange. She probably wouldn't have thought about it so much if she were thinking about only her own problems at that point, as she definitely also often did. Of course, this was only natural to her, considering that she spend most of her time isolated in a void all her own, independent from and generated at all times by her power. That was exactly what Rita was, but now, as Tifa had that sort of gap filled, she was suddenly more concerned about others. Weird.

"... Uh." Already awkward, because the silence was broken.

"..." Once again silent.

"... So how about those Anbu, huh?" she couldn't help but to ask, for some reason almost bashfully. "I mean. Vescrutia's still... Thery're not just like, dead, are they?" Tifa honestly did not care if they were dead or not, clearly never, but it was just something that seemed like something decent to talk about, since all the two of them really had to talk about was Tifa and whatever Koudo was up to. That was her way of attempting to see what he was up to in his everyday life, since they only spoke a bit about it before with his family. Though, after what happened with the Tensei, she also realized that... It might seem kinda weird and out of character that, number one, she was even interested in that shitty asscrack of a planet. Two, that she would even bring something like it up. Third, that she would even pay attention to it at all. Yet, because Koudo still had stuff going on there, or from what it sounded like before, she figured that she might as well make some smalltalk on the way to the Fight Club.

Besides that, Koudo didn't seem at all willing to talk much about it on his own. Perhaps because he was in his own head, or something? It was hard to tell if he was just as antisocial as Tifa was or if it had just been a while, but naturally, there had to be a large gap between the two of them because of what had been going on respectively in either of their lives in two different worlds that were once connected to each other and now separated by an entire void which was the two of them being distant, itself. It was a lot to process on the spot, but the more they didn't talk about it, the more clear it started to become, for some reason. Surely, Tifa would think of something eventually, if this convo went south. Maybe she was thinking too much about it.

Koudo was in his mind: organizing all the information that Mei had given him, devising strategies for working the room if things happened to get out of hand, and just generally planning. There were always deep formulations running in the back of Koudo's mind while he seemingly operated on blind instinct. With the unison of his dragon and Tamurai heritages, Koudo had gotten much better at doing both at the same time.

He heard Chita though. Koudo's scheming never had him so far gone that he couldn't pay expert attention to his surrounds. It was all second nature, and main bulk of scheme was done in the back of his mind. He rose an eyebrow, "What? The ANBU? I wouldn't know. I rose above that station way before you last visited me on Vescrutia for my birthday a couple years back." He cracked a smile, and laughed a little bit as well, thoroughly amused at Chita's attempt at small talk. It came off terribly awkward, and kinda forced, but he supposed that was his fault. Usually, around friends, he was the chatty one and Chita only seemed really talkative when she was deep into battle and heavily fired up.

Koudo hadn't paid the silence any real mind until Chita spoke up, and he turned around to face her while they still traveled forwards. He was actively choosing to show off a bit, moving from rooftop to rooftop with his back turned, but it was all in good fun and so that he could actually engage Chita in conversation.

He locked his fingers behind his head, "To really answer your question though. No. We are not all dead. Vescrutia is still striving towards a victory against the Horsemen. She took a heavy blow when the Tensei were lost, but it was a necessary course of action for both her and your family." He paused there, hoping he had chosen his words carefully enough. He didn't want to sound too callous about that, especially with what he was about to follow up with. "Your uncle, along with his band of misfits, took control of the land the Veritas used to have staked claim to and to everyone's knowledge Shinta absorbed you all and Khrona activated a last self destruct mechanism, I'm assuming that's the rumor they're telling to save face." Though, with everything that Koudo had been seeing and experience while he was here, he was thinking there was a shift in reality somewhere that allowed that, and the Veritas being transported to it's own universe, to occur simultaneously. He couldn't be sure yet though.

"If that is the case, then Maze and Hakku 'saved' the country, then he tried erecting a civilization." Koudo folded his arms, "He's a hack and a lame duck leader, so he and Hakku failed miserably. Not before Chroma's best friend, Aura, was given the reins of the security force there though and couldn't control one of her hounds." He was speaking, of course about Gig. He didn't truly understand the situation, but assumed that Aura was supposed to be the person in command of their police force since she was Maze's daughter and, from the little he actually knew about her, she seemed to have a very strong sense of Justice, if nothing else appealing. Gig just seemed like a guy that was in it for the violence. There was... probably a third, but she was so forgettable he wasn't even sure if he'd ever actually seen her.

He smirked, then laughed, "They actually threw me in their jail for a little vandalism and harmless espionage. Can you believe that? It was a joke of a prison though, I could have broken out where ever I wanted, but I enjoyed the vacation. Ultimately it showed me that I wasn't welcome there and I wouldn't endanger the life of my daughter by sending her there for studying."

"Uh huh." She didn't really recall, but things like that were irrelevant and didn't actually need any form of validation, so she didn't really pay it much mind. Listening to the actual story, itself, is its own independent thing entirely. "I don't know what happened, I just know that whatever happened, it definitely did happen." Clearly, since she was still alive and they were talking about the actual Vescrutia and the actual Veritas that they both lived on, separately, across a void. "I'm sure Rita would know, though." Tifa shrugged her shoulders as she looked on at Koudo begin to freestyle and give a crooked smirk, "Hell, Khrona would know." She rolled her eyes, then scowled. "Hell, Tear would probably honestly know every last fucking detail..." Tifa sighed heavily, hair flaring with frustration at the huff.

Her next step was heavier than the last, and one of the buildings was destroyed under her feet as she stamped and kicked off of it, almost exactly as she'd done before, except with more force behind it in her actual frustration. "... Tch."' Everyone except the one that wasn't already a Tensei to begin with, and reincarnated into one all 'Disgaea' style. "... I bet any of them know something. Every one EXCEPT me, probably." Thinking about these things and realizing them all at once was actually irritating her. Fortunately, they were already on their way to go to a Fight Club and snatch some money out of some people's pockets and whatever. "... Yeah, let's just hurry up and get to the damn Fight Club." Her attempt at doing things differently soured as deeply as her face, and her eyebrow twitched a bit.