[Benihime x Youko Gaiden] The Crimson Kunoichi & The White Ronin

[Apollymi]

Benihime found herself chuckling again. She knew full well, nothing she said was ever truly helpful, especially when it came to herself. But it seemed with this the conversation was dropped and she followed the white haired young man on the fastest route out of the palace towards the guest house they'd be occupying. As she moved her eyes caught that fur which trailed along behind him, and she fought with herself over the desire to touch it. If he already found her confusing, randomly touching him probably wouldn't help him work it out. Besides in her own mind she shouldn't really care. 'Why does it look so soft?' she questioned. 'It's divine... I just really wa~' the young woman's distracted thoughts came to an end because this male spoke to her and she'd only barely heard it. Luckily enough even her distracted mental rambling wasn't enough for her to completely lose track of someone speaking to her. They were in front of this guest house but he was asking her a question about the nature of her use of jutsu. Her eyes shifted in his direction and she became suspicious, but not enough to feel immediately murderous. "Fire release is what I tend to use primarily... why?" she asked the suspicion of this question allowing her to clear her head of the desire to touch the fur attached to this young man. She supposed most wouldn't realize everything that made her a proper kunoichi made her not really want to answer the question. What if she needed it at random against him later. But she was trying to break the habit of thinking like that, in this moment because he seemed to be about his word to say the least.

[Bloodedge]

"Sugoi!" Suddenly, Youko seemed to be excited. A one in five chance placed most shinobi with an affinity for a certain nature transformation for their chakra, and the one sent here happened to be capable of using the element he needed. She hadn't even agreed to do what he wanted yet, as he had yet to ask, but there was at least a chance already. Since she'd said yes to possessing Katon skills, he veered off the given path, leading the way toward a stone pit just outside of a closed stable. Only then did he answer her question. "Would you mind helping me with something? I wander around a lot, so I smith in exchange for food and shelter. I never took the time to pick up fire, but... I need these coals hotter than hell. The atmosphere in this area isn't very good for the kind of flame I feel comfortable working with, and I hate to make shoddy equipment. So, since we can't kiss on our deal, how about a trade instead? You keep me from getting rusty, and I'll make something that'll really help you out later."

[Apollymi]

The answered the rather sketchy question presented to her by this white haired man, and he immediately seemed to be excited. Her eyes widened in this moment, because she hadn't expected this sort of reaction from him. She hadn't actually said anything other than that she was capable of using Fire Release. It seemed an explanation would soon be coming so, Benihime followed the man around the back of the building and saw before her a pit before a closed off stable. Her left brow rose as this man explained what he needed of her, and it was well within her skill set to provide it to him. If he was at all concerned that she wouldn't do this there was no need to be, she found the idea of a blacksmith rather interesting, she actually didn't know any personally. "Ara, never met a blacksmith before," she said looking at the dead pit. The air around this place wasn't really conducive to keeping flames, she understood that, and as such she stood back. Her tiny hands rather nimbly strung together a series of seven hand seals, all while inside her body she kneaded chakra from the depth of her belly, soon enough she held up her left hand to her mouth and exhaled a stream of fire along with the name of the jutsu. "Katon: Gōka Messhitsu," the stream of condensed flames danced over the coals, and she managed to keep this entire thing confined to the size of the pit, though the pyromaniac within the young woman wanted to watch more than just the bit burn. At the end of the jutsu the coals would burn brightly. "Will that work for ya?" she asked as the temperature around this fire pit rose to levels most would find sweltering at best, but she didn't seem to care very much.

[Bloodedge]

There wasn't much hesitation from Benihime after hearing his reason for the previous question. She rather quickly decided to utilize a fire technique that ignited the coals of Youko's makeshift forge. When he saw the flaming coals after the woman's funneled technique, his eyes were alight as well. As for whether this quality of flame would work or not, he could only say that it most certainly would. Immediately, he moved toward a large sack nearby, emptying it of steel slabs and a rather high-quality set of blacksmith's tools. "Sugoi, sugoi! This might be the best flame I've ever seen in a forge! This'll keep me busy for a couple of hours. Arigatou!" Without further ado, he lined up the tools and materials he would be needing, and decided he would be performing this task in a way he felt most comfortable. As such, he formed a strange hand seal consisting of his right hand being cupped over his left fist. "Guess I'll see you tomorrow then. I'll have something for you at that point," he said before moving along, channeling his chakra through his hair - of all places - to grow it to its former length. Once he was comfortable with that, he pulled his kimono away from his torso, revealing that the same markings that were on his face were also present on his lean, yet oddly muscular, arms and torso - even on his lower abdomen. He suddenly felt perfectly comfortable in front of the burning coals, so he proceeded to pick up he first slab of steel with a pair of blacksmith's tongs, and held it over the open flame.

[Apollymi]

After she used her jutsu Benihime was left standing with one hand on her hip and the other on her head. For some very strange reason, she managed to look a bit abashed with her head turned slightly left as she shrugged off the praise this man gave her about the state of his makeshift forge. "There isn't a need to thank me or anything... you already did me a favor any way," she managed aloud. 'A couple depending on how you wanna look at it...' she thought with a gentle red tint that spread to the tip of her ears. Regardless she soon enough found herself watching this man without making any real moves to remove herself from the place she was standing. Moreover the young man was using some sort of strange hand seal, and even going past that to regrow his hair much to the young woman's surprise. 'Sugei!' she thought with no idea as to why she should care about it. Soon enough Youko removed his kimono and prepared to begin working. His entire upper body now exposed he somehow seemed more comfortable, and Benihime found herself staring rather blatantly and she couldn't even begin to understand why. 'Is he covered in tattoos that would be strange....' she thought absently. She could rather suddenly feel her heart beating in her chest as she watched him begin to heat the metals he would be using. Strangely enough the young woman didn't feel like leaving right just now and she couldn't really explain it. "Um, I'm actually a bit curious now... you mind if I stay and watch for a while?" she asked this question because she was a bit unsure of what his answer would be, but knew that she didn't want to leave for whatever reason.

[Bloodedge]

"Not used to taking praise, I take it..." he commented. Whatever the case, Youko was already beginning to immerse himself in his work. Benihime, in the same respect, was apparently content to stay and watch this task he'd chosen to take on. He wasn't quite sure why she asked if he minded, but of course, he replied immediately with a chuckle. "As you like. I don't think I've ever had an audience before; this is usually pretty lonely work. Actually... since you're here, do you have an empty scroll I could borrow? I could use a full one here in a bit." As Youko shared words with the redhead, the steel he tempered reached a golden-orange hue. His hammer was to come next, first with powerful strikes to knock off excess metal, then with weaker, more precise strikes meant to shape the small slab which remained afterwards as he removed it from the heat. "Just so you know... you won't be getting a scroll back if you give me one."

[Apollymi]

Benihime had no response to not being used to taking praise. The fact is, she was so used to not getting praised at all, it was always really strange for her when people recognized her abilities. That being said, surprisingly enough the blacksmith didn't seem to mind of she stayed and watched him work for a while. This was of course, a relief to the redhead, because she didn't really want to have to go full ninja and try and hide herself properly from a sensor, especially one possessing a doujutsu, just to sate her curiosity. That being said his agreement came with the idea that he could use a scroll. The young woman reached into the frills of the outfit she wore and removed a small scroll opening it and pressing her hand to it, to grab another empty one. She brought a great deal of things she thought she might need with her in this way. "Here, empty scroll. And don't worry, I don't need one back, I have a shit ton of them," she said in reply to his last statement.

She held this scroll in her hand while returning the other one to the place on her person she'd taken it from and after she was done, she got to hear the sound of hammer striking metal and get a very nice and unabashed look at Youko while he worked. It wasn't just the metal work which was interesting to the young woman, but the movements of the marks on his skin, of his randomly muscled features and of that long white hair trailing down his back. 'Sugei! He's so interesting to look at,' she thought, feeling a knot at the pit of her stomach. Her eyes hadn't left this man at all, but unlike earlier she wasn't at all thinking of killing him, she was simply genuinely curious. She'd never physically appraised a young man the way she was looking at Youko presently. Her eyes traveled over his body, over the markings on his torso... seemingly without shame.

[Bloodedge]

"Arigatou! If you don't mind, could you just leave that next to my bag over there?" he asked as one final favor, addressing the sack he'd originally taken his steel and tools from, which sat upon a long, stone table. "Funny thing, someone used to work in this area to make horseshoes. By the time I got here, the forge had been all but torn apart, but everything else was still here. I tried my best to put it back together, but it wouldn't be worth much salt without this fire of yours. Must be why it was taken apart in the first place." Youko's speech at this point was nothing more than a bit of small talk to pass the time as he worked. He'd really never had anyone in the vicinity while he worked a forge; most of his patrons tended to send him on his way until the work was done. Now, he was content, but without much knowledge for what to say. So, he merely said whatever came to mind while chiseling the heated steel down to the size of what seemed to be a large, misshapen kunai of sorts, with a blade far too wide for functionality.

[Apollymi]

Soon enough Benihime's concentration was broken by Youko's voice. For a man who normally worked completely alone, he seemed to talk quite a bit. The crimson haired lass had no problem with this of course, and found him to be rather interesting, even if the current subjects weren't really ones she could contribute information for. "Hai," she said of the final favor asked of her. She left the empty scroll on the stone table only letting the young man leave her sight for a few seconds. But in the moments of making the short trek to the table she decided it had just as good a view as her standing position, as such she took a seat at the far end of it, leaving Youko's bag, with the scroll beside it to the far left while she herself sat lightly atop the far right corner, one knee pulled up to her chest so her chin could rest upon it while she watched the man work. "Well, if there was a guy working it as a horseshoe forge it probably just closed up because he stopped doing it. I can't say I've seen any horses or anything... but it's good to make use of things like this," she said finding a bit of happiness in the extra resourcefulness of this blacksmith and somehow being a bit proud that she could help. She also felt a bit strange just watching, but given Youko's own sentences apparently it wouldn't break his concentration if she continued talking. So, she did, but similar to the man, she also didn't really know what to say and found herself commenting on the thing which was most curious to her. "So, is your whole body just covered in seals?" she asked quite curious about it. She had a few herself, a couple of her own creation, and one which was made by Machi and slightly modified by her a while afterwards. But only the two on her arm were ever really visible.

[Bloodedge]

Eventually, Youko was applying a finer chisel to the tool he was crafting, turning its singular blade into three separate prongs, much like a "webbed" trident in kunai form. "I think it's a little wasteful to tear down a perfectly good structure just because it isn't being used for its original purpose. At this point, why didn't they take down the stables as well? You'll just end up with horses that have naked hooves, otherwise," he chimed. This was about the limit of his small talk, especially considering the fact that he did not know the young woman he was conversing with. Soon enough, though, she brought to the proverbial table a topic of her own: the markings Youko bore. A moment of hesitation followed, but the silence was eventually filled with his answer. "... Yeah. They're all seals."