38 Arc 4 - Magic barriers and getting coins
"What the hell is this?!"
Ikarus breathes heavily and takes several steps back. Once he exits the tunnel the strange feeling disappears.
He braces one hand against the wall and the other against his chest.
"What was that?!" He looks inside the tunnel with fear.
`That feeling, it was like someone took all my energy away from me. Suddenly I felt as if each part of my body weighed tons, the air did not reach my lungs and-.`
He takes a few moments to calm down and goes back inside but this time he only sticks one hand inside the tunnel.
"!"
He feels as if all the strength of that hand has evaporated and its weight has increased a hundredfold.
He puts out his hand and after a few moments everything returns to normal.
He tries again with the other hand and then with each leg. And after several attempts he finally finds out what is going on.
"My chakra! There is a barrier that nullifies my chakra!" Gaze in fascination at the tunnel. "It's the same thing that kept me from climbing the wall before."
***
In the end he decides to continue his journey south after buying some supplies in a nearby town.
As much as he would like to discover the mechanism of the barrier surrounding Storms End, he doesn't have enough time. He would need at least a few days for his body to get used to the lack of chakra.
A shinobi's body is dependent on chakra like a Kryptonian's on the sun. But while a Kryptonian loses their powers and becomes vulnerable once away from the sun, a shinobi reacts in an extreme way to a lack of chakra.
The chakra circulates through every fiber of the shinobi body, it is as vital as blood. By taking away all the chakra, most shinobi die since their body is very dependent on chakra to function. Luckily for Ikarus he is a Senju, he belongs to one of the most powerful clans in the world, a clan with a vitality and strength out of the series.
When his chakra was nullified he felt a deep exhaustion and a sense of heaviness, something he can adjust to over time.
The Senju clan is not the only one with these abilities, members of other clans such as the Akimichi or the Uzumaki could also survive in this situation. On the contrary, clans whose strength is more on the yin (spiritual) side will suffer the most under such circumstances. The Uchihas and the Nara are examples of such clans. Although an exceptionally powerful Uchiha or Nara could survive as well.
***
Along the way it occurred to him that once he gets Aemon back he won't be able to part with him to get resources. He can buy supplies in towns and cities but hunting shinobi style will be out of the question for some time.
In order to support them both he will need money.
His moneybag is still quite heavy but in a couple of months the money will run out.
He has no clear plans for the future but he knows that he wants the best for the boy, maybe moving to Braavos, he thinks. Braavos is a great city with a thousand oportunities and slavery is prohibited. Another great city that would be a good option is Oldtown. The other comparable Westeros cities would be Lannisport and Kings Landing, neither of which are an option for obvious reasons.
In any case, no matter which of the cities he chooses, Ikarus will need money.
To get money he has many options, he could use the legal and slow route or the shinobi and fast route.
With no time to lose, decide on the quick option.
The shinobi option.
Steal.
`A castle. But which? It has to be in Stormlands, after I start having flashbacks of Rhaenys I don't feel comfortable stealing her mom's homeland. It has to be a relatively new House, one from the Andal era. Harrenhal didn't have any magical protection so I can assume that only houses a couple of millennia old have magical protections.`
His memories of A Song of Ice and Fire are pretty clear but he doesn't remember every house in every kingdom. He only remembers the main ones and those that had more prominence in the books and in the show.
And of Stormlands he only remembers Connington, Selmy and Dondarrion.
He will have to ask the locals and check every castle on the way.
***
His first target is House Bolt, a small house of Knights vassals of House Morrigen.
His castle is nothing compared to Storm's End. It is hardly a three-story building with a tower surrounded by a stone wall about ten meters high.
`It is the typical medieval castle, I saw dozens of them during my holidays in Germany. Europe has hundreds if not thousands of castle ruins, many of which are still standing.`
It is still night but dawn is not far away, two or three hours away. More than enough time.
Ikarus approaches the side of the castle that only has two guards and jumps over the moat, sticking to the wall and climbing it. Once on the wall he looks inside. He sees a courtyard used for guard training, some stables, and a building connected to a tower.
He walks a little closer to the guards and looks at their armor and the seal of arms of the house they serve.
A golden lightning in a black sky.
He walks away from the guard and goes down to the courtyard.
He approaches the fortress and scales its side wall to a window that overlooks a deserted hallway.
He picks up his dagger and channeling chakra into it increases its sharpness.
`A trick I learned in one of Riku's memories.`
He runs the dagger through the window frame on all four sides, and then puts his hand on the glass. He channels chakra into his palm and withdraws his hand, the window stuck against his hand.
`Breaking the glass to get in would make too much noise.`
He enters through the hole and leaves the window on the ground
He transforms into one of the guards he studied earlier and starts moving around the castle. The floor is made of stone covered by a black carpet with yellow borders. The walls are sparsely decorated, they only have torches and the occasional tapestry with the coat of arms of this house.
`Let's see what I learned in castles 101: Normally the lords kept their treasures in the sublevels. The basement`
He goes down some stone stairs and hears footsteps on the lowest level.
He sees a guard move towards a room. Luckily the armor of the guard in which he is transformed has a helmet.
`It would be awkward if he says something like: Sam what are you doing here, shouldn't you be watching the gates?` He smiles slightly.
With the helmet on all the guards are practically identical. But it's not like there are many, at the moment he only counts five guards.
`It's a small House, having a dozen guards is quite something. I remember in the books some Knights Houses with only 2 or 3 guards`
After walking around the ground floor of the building for a while, he finds some stairs that lead to the basement.
There he sees a corridor that goes in two directions. On one side there are several doors.
`The servants' rooms`
He walks in the other direction and sees another door, this one is bigger. The wood is reinforced with iron. He pushes her forward and to his surprise the door swings open.
`What kind of idiot leaves the door of his treasury open?`
He goes down the stairs. It is a somewhat narrow section, two men walking side by side would not fit.
`Ah, so he is not an idiot`
When he reaches the last step he sees a small corridor that leads to another door. In front of the door there is an armed guard.
Ikarus places a hand on the hilt of his dagger and walks over to the guard.
`Things we do for love` he thinks with a wry smile, identical to the smile of another man: a man who condemned his honor killing for his beliefs and then lost his soul at the hands of a cruel and selfish woman.
The guard didn't have a chance. Before he could say anything Ikarus's dagger was stuck in his neck.
`The armor does protect its user but it has weak points, the joints and the neck are the most obvious`
He grabs the body of the dying guard and gently lowers it to the ground, not wanting to make a sound.
The treasury door is locked and the guard dont have the key. That does not surprise him.
Ikarus uses the same trick he used to disassemble the window to disassemble the door.
`Kicking it open will wake up the entire castle. I am a Itachi-type shinobi not a Deidara-type aka the noisy type`
It's something that always amazed him in his past life. Shinobi are supposed to be artists of deception and misdirection, stealthy and deadly as the night. But the protagonist is the complete opposite, not only him but most of the really powerful shinobi practically don't give a shit about stealth.
`Perhaps they are so strong that they know that most do not even dare to cross their path`
The treasury, if you can call it that, is a very small room - it's only about three meters long and two meters wide.
It has two steel armors in good condition and a few chests.
He opens each chest using the same trick and discovers that most of them have items that are useless to him.
What can he do with silk fabrics?
Or with the set of silver plates and cups with the Bolt emblem?
At the end he leaves the treasury with a small chest full of coins. He also got a short sword to replace his worn out one, a new dagger, a cloak, and a new set of clothes.
`Seriously, who keeps his clothes in his treasury?`
But seeing the quality does not surprise him that much, they must have cost a lot.
The shirt is golden like the sun, its texture is soft and silky. The doublet is black with patterns spun with gold. The pants are black and the boots are of a type of leather that he has never seen before. It has intricate scale patterns. The cloak is also black with the inside yellow and definitely of an expensive material, is heavy and has a texture similar to leather in the outside but soft and comfy in the inside.
***
He came out of House Bolt's castle with new clothes, new weapons, 230 golden dragons and 408 silver stags.
"Not bad for my first robbery. Let's see how many strongholds I come across on my way to Dorne."
***
NOTE: I read lots of crossovers Naruto/GoT. Many times Tobi sends Naruto to Westeros to get rid of him and such. In those stories Naruto still has his chakra yet he struggles a lot to get by. He is a shinobi why dont steal the coins he need? Same with other people of other fandoms with powers that would allow them to steal without being caught from any House. Why dont do it? Morals?
