Hoshi no Guu (Star Piece Quest) (M)

[Guu]

Guu made her way through the hospital. It was kind of freaky, about one-third of the people here didn’t pick-up on her senses. It wasn’t too shocking considering ninja village but it was kind of odd to have so many invisible people in one place. She could tell her eyes were going to be an asset here.

Pushing her way out the front doors, she stepped out into the city. The entire place looked like it was taken straight from some samurai film, or at least chinatown. Buildings were adorned with clay roof tiles coming in a variety of earthy-tones, and the rest was a nice mixture of painted and non-painted wood. She seemed to have been dumped off in a marketplace with shops sprawling down the entire street. Each one had signs with chinese letters, which thankfully she could read.

Much to her internal delight, she saw one of the merchants selling Dame fruit as well as a number of other exoctic fruits only grown at her principality on display. Even saw a merchant selling meat of Pokute. Ambrosia’s influence spread even to here. Though, not shocked that they only sold the ears and legs of the pokute, she could imagine those not accustomed to their human-like face couldn’t really get past it.

She walked up to the shop with the meat.

“Are the pokute caught wild or raised?” She asked.

The shopkeep was leaning back in his chair. Judging by how few people were in the market at the moment, it must be a really slow day. The man, who wore robes, had a balding head and a tiny tiny brown beard on the tip of his chin, barely looked up from his newspaper to answer.

“Raised. Pokute aren’t indigenous in these-” His eyes opened wide in shock as he tumbled backwards in his chair. He fumbled to climb back to his feet, staring wildly at the little princess. “Lady Guu! I heard rumors you were in town! Welcome!”

Guu was still not used to being recognized by strangers. She looked around and noticed that many of the civilians were looking at her, whispering to each other. She was kind of easy to identify.

Choosing to ignore it, she turned to the shopkeep.

“Two pokute ears.” She said, placing a Om coin on the wood grained countertop.

“Yes your highness!” He said nervously. He pulled out two long wiggly noodle things that were two inches thick and five inches in length. They were reminiscent of Guu’s arms, but tinted in easter colors. The man fried up the pair and wrapped them in a white paper and handed them to the princess. “Here you go! It was an honor to be of your service!”

“Thank you.” She said, giving a little wave as she walked away.

She was curious if Ninja raised pokute tasted different from Ambrosian pokute. However, she wasn’t the best judge. She needed to find Pitchen, he needed to try this and tell her how it was.

But before she could get very far, she heard a familiar voice.

“Long time no see, Guu!”

She turned around quickly. There stood a man with long silver hair that styled in a way to defied gravity. He had a long red scarf, wore baggy black pants, and had a sleeveless shirt of some kind. He had long pointy ears and his arms were taped up from top to bottom. After a second of staring at his doofy smile-adorned face, it finally hit her.

“Chuck? Chuck the Ninja?” She asked.

“Yep! It’s been a long while, hasn’t it?”

“Yeah, I haven’t seen you since before Ambrosia… Hell, before Langweilig.” Guu said.

“I know right? It’s crazy how much has happened since then!”

The pair began to walked together as they continued the conversation.

“Are you still working for Mao?” Guu asked.

“Naw, he kind of dropped off the face of the Earth. No one knows what happened to him. I heard he pissed off Dracula or something, but I don’t know for sure.” Chuck explained casually.

“Oh, I’m sorry for your loss.” She responded, not even questioning the apparent existence of Dracula in this world.

“Oh, I don’t care. I was an undercover operative sent to spy on him. My true loyalty is Mokugakure.”

“Ah, I see. What are you up to know?” She asked.

“Well, my most recent mission was… Well… It was to spy on you.”

Guu didn’t show any emotions, nor did she really feel any. She can’t fault him for sticking to his orders, even if their one day friendship was on the line.

“Well, you must have done a good job, I didn’t detect you at all.” She stated.

“Aww, shucks.” He said bashfully, rubbing the back of his head. He continued. “Anyways, yeah, after you fell asleep, I had you transported here. Thought it would be safer.”

“Wouldn’t you get in trouble though?” She asked. “I mean, you brought an outsider here and revealed to me your mission.”

“Oh no, I got an okay from the higher ups. The head honcho wants to meet you.”

“Head honcho?” Now that she thought about it, she never did learn who lead Mokugakure. It’s probably good she was learning about her neighbors.

“Lady Tsunade.” He said, a hint of pride in his voice. “She’s a masterful ninja, a force to be reckoned with. She works out of the top of the tree in the middle of town.”

Guu looked once again at the tree. She saw it briefly from the window of the hospital, but she didn’t take in how ridiculously large the thing was. She also noticed they were walking straight for it.

“Ah, so we weren’t just walking in a random direction.”

“That’s correct your highness!”

The pair approached the tree and started to climb a long spiralling set of steps around the stump. As she got higher up into the foliage, she got a much better view of the city. The buildings spread out for miles, but on the border was a large wall. She considered how Ambrosia would look with a wall, but before she could worry about what it should look like, she saw smoke rising up from the edge of town.

She couldn’t quite make it out, but it looked like a battle had occurred there. It was both relieving and disheartening to see that other cities had problems like Ambrosia. Relieving in the sense that it wasn’t just them, but disheartening that the Tangled is just that dangerous.

If only there was a way to make the verse safer than it was.

The pair made their way to the top where they reach a door to an office.

“Go in, she’s waiting for you, Guu.”