jigokucho | video; un: TIGER-STRIPED, LOCKED TO SHUTEN CLAN

[ The shot is Toraguma's desk. His sunglasses are on, so his expression is difficult to read, but the way he puffs on his cigar... kind of suggests what's going on.

On the desk in front of him is the remains of some sort of device, likely recovered from the explosion. Jiro is there as well, obviously having done his best to piece it back together and identify what it was, but it seems a conclusion has been reached... ]

The fox... She's a clever bitch, as always. She thought she could throw me off by having a mechanical bomb instead of a mystic one...

[ Toraguma gestured to Jiro, who nervously stepped forward and set down what appeared to be a ruptured container of some kind. ]

"B-but, well... she works with what she has, and it seems they used a combustion relic to cause the actual ignition. But it was tampered with. The seal on it shortened the fuse time, so..."

[ Toraguma cut him off, leaning forward ]

The fox has a spy in her house. So for now... I'm gonna let her put out her own damn fires and get my payback on this later. I don't want any of you losing track of what's ahead of us.

[ Jiro visibly swallows, stepping back and ducking his head, because he knows what's coming next. ]

"Iron Bear" is Kaneguma... my kyoudai... That means no matter what money is on the line, no matter who that Ringo girl is, it's our responsibility as the Shuten Clan to go out there and stop him. No matter what, we take care of him first... I'll deal with the fox bitch after that.

Listen up!

We've got a primary vehicle, but anyone that can ride, you're with us. We head out in two weeks. You have that much time to get ready. If you need to stay behind... so be it. But we're taking this war to Kaneguma.

[ Toraguma leaned back in his chair, once more and just... let out a heavy sigh. ]

And I'll deal with him myself. No one else touches him. Got it?

[[ooc: Characters are free to thread among themselves here. Toraguma will likely not respond unless directly addressed. Jiro may respond, as well. ]]

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[ Jiro pops in here, carefully holding the remains in question with his gloved hand. ]

Well, unless you want to spend years learning onmyoudo, I'm not sure what you'd be able to get from this. Even I only have extremely basic knowledge... I don't think I could make something this complex.

[ He adjusts his goggles a bit, chuckling slightly. ]

I can say with full confidence, though, this is the work of Old Kinsei down in Tamamo. That guy's a genius, but whoever tampered with his work knows what they're doing, too...

You and the rest of the engineering guys can study this, but I'm not sure it'll tell us who tampered with Tamamo's bomb aside from "as good at onmyoudo as Old Kinsei" and that's...

[ His smile fades some. ]

Well that's a worrying prospect, I guess.

I have no idea what onmyoudo is, but hell, even the basics could give me something to look off of.

[Darin considers this information.]

You think Kinsei would be willing to answer questions? I can't imagine they'd be happy if someone was tampering with his work. Especially if you were able to identify it like that.

So, why's this such a bad thing?

Well... [ Jiro hums, leaning back a little and scratching at his temple. ]

I guess the dumbest and easiest way to explain it is that Onmyoudo is magic. It's based on cosmology and yin and yang and wuxing and all that. I know only just enough to create some mystical weapons, but I couldn't make anything like this. Not even close...

[ Which, given Jiro's reputation, was saying a lot. ]

I wouldn't put any bets on Kinsei, or anyone over at Tamamo, willing to talk to us, since it seems the whole plan was to slow down our operation by taking out one of our supply stores, though.

[ And as for the other thing... ]

If there's a rogue element out there that's a practiced enough onmyouji to be comparable to Old Kinsei, then they're someone with access to a *lot* of power...

...Alright, so here's a hypothetical.

How many people out there would be able to identify these bombs as Kinsei's work? And how many of those people would be able to recognize they've been tampered with by someone as skilled in Onmyoudo?

Because my first guess is someone's trying to screw with us.

Yeah, that's the worrying thing, for sure. Very few people have this skill level, outside of Tamamo, and...

[ Another hum, a huff. A grumble. ]

I just don't think the foxes would sabotage their OWN bomb just to throw us off. Especially since, as you saw, the boss isn't budging. He's going after Iron Bear, no matter what...

There are no onmyouji of this level in our own clan. Most of them are in Tamamo. Maybe some in Sutoku or the Enma? But it's hard to find a motive right now outside of what you just said, screwing with us.

Hell, it could have been one of Iron Bear's own, but that's... a rough prospect.

[ Their enemy suddenly became a lot more dangerous. ]

No, that doesn't seem likely. There's better ways to make a show of force than this. My thought is that this was done to put eyes on Tamamo.

...This is all a distraction. There's too many things that are just so...glaringly obvious. The kidnapping and Iron Bear...it's all too...public. Impossible to ignore.

It's a smokescreen...at least that's what I think. I'm new here and I'm still piecing together how things work but...

[He huffs and crosses his arms.]

...Rather than figuring out motive, maybe we can try and narrow the scope of how. I mean, as a blacksmith, I always make sure to engrave my crest somewhere on my piece. It's a quirk that a lot of craftsmen I know follow, even when it's something like a modification. A sort of symbol that says 'I worked on this.'

I wonder if this mystery tinkerer does something similar...Maybe there's something on some of the surviving bomb pieces recovered.

[Barring that, he does know a couple of people in Tamamo...he could always make some calls.]

Ah, sorry...just thinking out loud. I feel like there's a thread that needs to be pulled but I haven't found it yet.

No no, don't apologize! I do that all the time, ha ha! [ Jiro chuckles, rubbing the back of his head. ]

Tell you what. I'll get permission from the big guy to bring this down to the main shop. You, Hizen, all the other engineers can get a thorough look at it. But...

[ A clearing of his throat. ]

Obviously keep anything you find under your hat. And don't lose focus on our other weapon orders. We got a whole warehouse of goods to replace now, so... Yeah.

[ Which brings him to... ]

The big guy has a lot of history with Iron Bear that I can't pretend I understand, but I know settling this is more important to him than anything else. So it's gonna fall on someone else to figure out what's going on with this bomb while his eyes are locked on dealing with his kyoudai.

That'd be great! And don't worry about the other orders, I'm great at multi-tasking. I just need to get a look at it so I can puzzle it out while my hands are busy with other things. I really appreciate it!

[That said, that last bit catches his attention.]

So...then would it be safe to say that this Iron Bear stuff has put the blinders on the big guy?

...How many people out there know their history?

video; un: TIGER-STRIPED, LOCKED TO SHUTEN CLAN

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