The Bad (R 18)
They walked past bends and blind-alleys, straightened up into pedestrian zones and ducked back away into hidden paths. With every step they took the houses became less bright, in colour and architecture. Plaster started to flake, walls were crumbling, a few windows were nothing more than boarded up gaps. Everything got a touch more derelict, more drab, the few people they crossed had no joy left in them. Cole figured, after all the walking, that this must have been one of the epicenters of the Nine-Tails destruction. A look into the past and the lasting effects of the beast's rampage.
Governments loved to promise rebuilding and renewal, only to drop the projects halfway through the moment the populace's attention shifted and leave a shambled ghetto behind.
Yuya led him far into one of the many dead-ends. She turned towards a distinctly undistinctive wall and flashed hand-signs, too fast for Cole's eyes to follow, but he had an ability for that. A moment later Screen pinged back at his consciousness.
---
Ability used: Dispel Transformation Technique
Dispel a targeted Transformation Technique. Only useable when the aforementioned Transformation is known to the User.
---
In a puff of white smoke the wall disappeared and revealed a crimson bathed passage.
Cole tried to step inside but Yuya held a hand against his chest. "400 ryō."
He looked at her askance. "You tellin' me I can't choose which babe I shag, or is that the entrance fee? Both?"
"Both." She responded with the nonchalance of somebody that knew they had him beat.
Cole clicked his tongue. "Fine." Money exchanged hands and Cole was ushered in - just like that he was 400 Ryō lighter, his four remaining days of lodging turning into three.
The passage, a downwards concrete slope, was lit by humming, fluorescent tube lights running along the ceiling, casting absolutely every corner and crevice in shades of red. Yuya led him deeper inside, going straight for an entire minute, before rounding an incoming corner and walking farther into a growing racket of the red light district. He followed closely behind.
Narrow entrance opened up into a massive underground market the size of a factory hall. Cole fumbled at the sight of ninja nightlife. A tide of heady scents assaulted him; of fragrant cinnamon and zesty lemon playing nicely with flowery lavender and smells he couldn't put a name on. They invigorated his body in a single breath - intoxicating. The visuals of Konoha's sordid underbelly were the complete opposite and rattled at the constraints of his morals, screaming at him to leave this place. Gaunt, strung-out prostitutes were folded over railings and waved from their run-down brothel fronts at whoever passed. Their eyes unveiled a spirit full of avarice, molded through a lot in life they never had a choice in. Those same eyes followed Yuya and him, analytical, cold and treacherous. The men, almost all the same variant of gloom and doom, took the whores with undisguised hunger into their respective brothels. None struggled at the violent macking and let themselves get led away. You couldn't quite hear the sound of flesh slapping on wet flesh, but you almost did.
Few places stood out as well-administrated pleasure houses and all of them were neatly-tiled pagodas overflowing with light. They towered well and good, up close to the ceiling, majestic castles amid wretched shacks.
Yuya led him past these giants until they reached a dingy barrrack with a pantone pink roof smattered with wood blossoms. Here their jaunt ended. One door opened and beyond were string-curtains of pearls and coloured glass. A well-lit interior belied the rotten front.
Cole's eyes took in the flamboyant pink tones of the furniture and walls and the tasteful imagery painted on the latter: Women in the nude, twirling and dancing as a rain of petals cascaded down their naked forms. His eyes roamed across the confined lobby, stopping at passages leading further in and then finally at the front desk where a woman lounged. She was just a little shorter than himself, dressed elegantly in a violet qipao that hugged her curves tight, tighter than looked comfortable. A mane of chestnut locks fell over her shoulders, glossy hair led his gaze by the hand, down her tantalizing bust. No cleavage, what a shame. She drew on a particularly western pipe, a hazel quaver puffing like a chimney. A visible haze pooled around her form and the ceiling, the smell, cloy and slightly spicey like the red light district's air, fired up heat in his unmentionables.
Cole was received with a sultry stare of her own, full of demand and rapt creases. The green eyes of a lioness raked over his body, cataloguing every inch of his form as if he wasn't hidden underneath layers of cloth. The stare leveled out and dragged past him. He felt Yuya and the madam cross eyes before he was set upon by the same gaze again.
Tension sloughed of Yuya's shoulders and she turned towards him. "The madam will explain everything else." That was it. Not one more word wasted and her part done she slinked through one of the adjacent doors and disappeared inside.
A pregnant pause passed, where Cole used every ounce of his will not to Insight the cougar of a woman, before the madam stood up from behind the counter.
For all her sashaying hips and waist, she had a subtle limp, though it didn't diminish from the ingrained, sensual beauty of her every move.
"Well, good evening, stranger," she said in a throaty purr, that carried through the loud row from outside, then somewhat spoiled the sultry effect by coughing. Her voice was deeper than her face let on. And each of her words was accentuated by a growl-ish rasp, which said she'd been at the pipe steadily over the years. A dainty hand landed on his chest, fingers, with nails too sharp for his liking, traced over his formless robe. "The Dancing Cherry Blossom welcomes you. And while we do appreciate the mysterious and unknown, a delectable spice in the right hands and circumstances, you will need to show your face before tasting one of our girls. We don't want our customers to ruin the pretty ladies and get away scot-free, now that won't do. If you do value your privacy over your privates, you can leave. The money we'll keep." She smiled thinly at him. She took another long, slow drag, and very pointedly blew it in a thin stream at him. Her eyes were waiting.
Cole loosened the cowl and scarf, pulling at the stretch of rags, taking his time. Insight was invoked.
---
Name: Janaka
Sex: Female
Age: 32
Level: 18 (-)
Health: 150/150 (-)
Vitality: 15 (-)
Ailments: Lung fibrosis (Worsening), Misaligned hip joint (Right, Stabilised), Echinaroot addiction (Temporarily Alleviated)
Emotions: Intrigued, Aroused (!), Confident
---
From her decreasing total health to the crowded list of ailments, a lot of things felt wrong about her status. It gave off the same sickly sweet scent as the billowing, blue-hued smoke she was inhaling and it was present in absolutely everything that made Janaka who she was. 'Echinaroot'. Cole belatedly realised that her full-blooded movements and undisguised horniness did not stem from him being a stud of a man, but long-time exposure to a mind-altering drug. The same drug that pervaded every iota of this place.
"So?" The vowel was dragged over her tongue like candy. Janaka's green eyes had lost their lustful glimmer and only looked wild and dangerous now.
Cole pulled his hat and shawl off in one fluid motion, focusing intently on the hand that was set against his robe. Repose activated and in that second he delved into his imagination. He became a cleric. A man representing divine principality, on a pilgrimage to the farthest reaches of the world. His mission was single-minded: to cleanse where cleansing needs doing; to relieve pain and suffering; to rid the world of its wrongfullness and banish the darkness; to unmake disease; to shepherd the lost and return what was taken. A grand undertaking and even grander aspirations. And they all had a start, his was here. The bells toiled and Cole channeled his thoughts, directed at the worst of the affliction. The thread of power hummed an angel's hymn and blazed with deific light.
Lay on Hands!
Silver tongues flared around her. They were bands of celestial energy that latched onto her skin like grafts and sank unopposed into her flesh. Janaka straightened up and suddenly was eagle-eyed and holding a wicked looking needle to his throat, which was a lot more impressive than all her afore seductive posturing, because Cole legitimately couldn't conceive of where she'd been keeping that implement.
"You whore son, cocksu-…" She trailed off, eyes going wide. Her hands instinctively twitch and then stop, as she wanted to reach for her throat. A harmful proposition, with a glowing pipe in one and her hiltless poniard in the other hand. However, an understandable reflex; now that the woman spoke every word - albeit colourful curses - like she was singing an aria, with no trace at all of the smoker's rasp.
Her chest heaved slowly as she gulped in the fetid air of the room in a drawn breath, then she breathed out, and back in again, and back out again. Her expression twisted, more and more with the rythm of her breaths; from something furious and ferocious, into disbelief, bewilderment and lastly amazement. She inhaled twice more with ease, Cole suspected the first breaths in years that allowed as such, but kept her eyes trained on him the whole time. The woman stared, genuinely drinking in Cole's face for the first time, locking eyes, and coming to grips with what he had done.
"What did you do that for?" She asked in clipped tones. "I never asked for this."
Cole shrugged slowly, painfully aware of the weapon that was still hovering close to his jugular. What did he do that for? "I heal people, that's what I do." That was the half-truth he decided to go with.
Not yet absolved of suspicion she regarded him with a bitter smile. "Though I do appreciate what you did, a trained medical-nin would never offer his services to people like us, without first bleeding us out for every ryō we have. You didn't, not yet. The question then is, what is your angle?"
He raised his hands defensively. "I didn't do it for money, no angle there." Apart from grinding his healing skills, obviously.
"So it's for one of my girls. Is that it? Taken a liking to one of mine?" She spat back. The needle trembled against his skin, from rage or wavering resolve, he couldn't tell. He had blundered again and failed his gambit. He took up the guise of unsung hero, without thinking for a single second how people would perceive his 'charity'. Running a business like this demanded a shrewd and sharp mind, here, suspicion was everyone's modus operandi. For all the clergyman persona he wanted to play, people like Janaka would never accept his alms without also inspecting him for the dagger he was hiding, for the exploitation that would follow. What he had to do, was change the situation from: 'Altruistic handout' to 'a transaction they could both partake in'.
"No, neither," Now he knew how Yuya felt. "I- I'm short on cash and got no place to stay, so..." He trailed off and let Janaka fill in the gaps.
At last the needle-point blade was lowered, though it never left her hand. She limped back to her desk, falling into the cushioned chair, before looking back up at him again. She looked resigned. "Got a good eye over the years, seen people like you. Men too kind for their own good. Now, how many times can you do... that?" She gestured through the empty air.
Cole kept quiet for a moment and let her statement linger. The thread was resonating with barely contained fervor and topped up with as much energy as it could fit.
"A dozen times perhaps? Depends on the... severity of the issue." That was his entire deck of cards unveiled and Cole shuddered to think what might happen now. As he hoped, his honesty was finally rewarded.
The madam rose up smoothly and imposing. "I don't know what other kind of tricks you have, but mark me: if you harm any of my girls, I'll make sure you suffer for it."
"No one will be harmed unless they offer me harm first." He answered back, remaining as stoic as he could.
She smiled, turned and marched through one of the doors. "Follow me. Yuya, desk duty." They met the former, masked scout - a pretty girl with big, blue eyes and pastel pink robes - but Cole ignored her to the best of his ability.
"Are you okay? Your... your voice is..."
Janaka tapped her nose with the pipe. "We'll talk later about this." Yuya nodded and Janaka and him proceeded in lockstep into the bowels of the brothel. She walked with a habitual sway and Cole did his best to keep his eyes level to the back of her head, not that he didn't appreciate the gratuitious gesture, he just couldn't risk getting knifed so close to his goal because he was distracted.
The main passage, with its dozen closed doors to either side, made a turn. Janaka keyed a secured metal door, marked as employee restricted, and led him into a common room coupled with a kitchen, full of scantily clad woman, either coming and going, or passed out like cats over tables and chairs, drawing on cigarettes, pipes or drinks; their breasts and thighs spilling underneath their loose robes. They eyed him and the madam curiously but knew better than to intercept the proprietess. Deeper they went, to the end of the back room, until they came upon another locked door.
"If you want to heal," she said quietly, "if you really want to heal, this is the place to start." With these ominous words, and the now openly gawking stares of the prositutes, she turned the latch, shoved the door open, and stepped inside the utter darkness. "Shut it after you."
Cole didn't let her tell him twice and closed the door with a soft click. Light sputtered on and dispelled the encroaching shadows. The room was a cramped, if glorified, cubbyhole, with six beds side to side like sardines in a can and likewise occupied. A young woman stood up in alarm from the bedside; she wore the same skimpy gown like the women outside, only less nude underneath and less ruffled, suggesting that this was her day off. She wrung her hands on a bloody towel, kneading out the foul liquid over a washing basin. Cole looked past her and to the girl that was being administered treatment.
Her face… was a mess. There was a distinct split in her swollen lips, that rose from chin to cheek in a terrible, jagged line - overcrusted and purple on its edges. It looked as if it had only recently stopped bleeding; indeed, the basin of water on the bedstand was alarmingly pink, as were the sheets the girl lied on. Her chin was set too far to the side, entirely blue and black, broken teeth showing through the split lip. One eye was so badly bruised it looked as if her skull around the socket had been distened and broken. Her nose was definitely broken. The short, chopped throes of her labored breathing filled the room painfully. And she was only one of many.
Cole drew a shaky breath through his teeth, ice crawling along his spine - he was glad he hadn't eaten yet. The girl was so badly beaten, he wasn't sure how much longer she would make it. And with that thought the ice was traded for gluttonous wroth that made his scalp tingle.
The girl with the towel turned towards Janaka, questions on her mind, but the madam silenced her with a single gesture. She turned towards him and he spoke involuntarily.
"Who did this?"
Janaka's face crumpled into a scowl full of pain and surrender. He felt her bite the snark back before she responded.
"Some Shinobi bastard. Fine man in the first hour and suddenly he starts whailing on her. Full of sadistic glee as he beat little Rui half to death. Barely managed to get him off her before he disappeared. Couldn't stop the cocksucker even if we tried. If it went my way he'd be trying to put his gut back into his insides. Monsters, the lot of 'em and a perennial plague to boot."
Cole kneeled at the bedside under the wary gaze of the madam and the other girl. "Likes and dislikes? Name of her friends and family?" He was already drawing on thoughts of divine intervention, fey sorcery abundant with miracles and thaumaturgic energy. Both regarded him with a raised eyebrow, something Cole didn't need now. "Humor me.", he snapped.
The girl to his side was about to whip him with words but Janaka lifted a commanding hand again. "Rui loves plum candy, the fullmoon and men that shave. She hates liquorice, winter and... ninjas. She's friends with Yuya, girl you saw, and Nino here. No family as far as I know. Anything else?"
"No." He responded drily and used Insight, his hand rested on the girl's.
---
Name: Rui
Sex: Female
Age: 17
Level: 4 (-)
Health: 9/40 (-)
Vitality: 4 (-)
Strength: 2 (-)
Agility: 1 (-)
Perception: 0 (!)
Ailments: Fractured Skull (Critical), Internal Hemorrhage (Worsening), Fever (Worsening), Fractured Ribs (Stabilised), Broken Jaw (Stabilised), Severe Bruising (Stabilised), Lacerations (Stabilised), Comatose
Emotions: N/A
---
'My God...She's barely alive.'
Cole wasted no more time and let loose the channeled Lay on Hands.
The flare of silver was blinding in the confined space; the incandescent tongues preceding a golden corona that spun down the length of his arm and into Rui's broken body. Her face rippled and shone. Bones reset beneath glowing skin and the lumpy flesh evened out into a placid, restless expression. The light of healing dawned intensely but sputtered out too soon and Cole knew it wasn't enough. Her fractured skull had been healed, one of eight debilitations, and her health ticked one point down.
Coming into this place Cole knew what to expect, a night of nightmares and sanity-draining work; good, honest work, but terrible just the same. What he wasn't prepared for was the immediate need for his ace.
Janaka and Nino rubbed the stars from their eyes and Cole used this moment to imbue the dying girl with his own strength. Lay on Hands' third skill activated.
The thread within him burned brilliant. Golden fire blazed and licked over his flesh, spurred by the relentless energy of the thread into a roaring inferno. The flames tore through his heart and devoured pieces of it, using his vitality as fuel. They grew into a conflagration he couldn't contain and burst free from the palm of his hand, painfully.
Cole screamed in tandem with the crackling of the fire, his very lifeforce ripped from him in a gilden whirlwind.
[Lay on Hands' Level increased by 1!]
[Vitality increased by 1!]
He ignored the notices and craddled his swooning head. The pulsating headache left him sore and feeling raw. Even without using Insight his own body pinged back a missing total of 20 HP. A fifth of his life had been immolated for the sake of a stranger. Cole felt many, different ways about it, but decided that it felt good in the end. Naturally, he couldn't use his ability consecutively and he desperately hoped he wouldn't need to. The girl stirred weakly and Cole immediately shifted his head away at the revelation of pale skin underneath the sheets. He used Insight on the restored form of Rui.
---
Name: Rui
Sex: Female
Age: 17
Level: 9 (-)
Health: 64/80 (-)
Vitality: 8 (-)
Strength: 6 (-)
Agility: 5 (-)
Perception: 0 (!)
Ailments: Fractured Ribs (Stabilised), Broken Jaw (Stabilised), Severe Bruising (Stabilised), Lacerations (Stabilised), Fever (Recovering), Unconsciousness
Emotions: N/A
---
A great part of strength had returned to the girl and Cole pat his back for a job well done. However, his night was not over yet. Many patients needed attending to and many levels needed to be ground.
After finishing up with Rui, under the watchful eye of Janaka and Nino, Cole continued his ministrations on the other residents.
Word spread, attributed to the commotion of flashing lights and bewildered exclamations, and suddenly a small, adoring crowd hang around him like a grapevine. Healing those with cuffmarks and bruises around suggestive places made him especially popular. After a stern tongue-lashing by their madam the women left him to his devices - a good thing too, because invoking the clergyman persona was difficult with hot, tender skin pressing all over him and beauties moaning sweet nothings into his ears. The tittering group disbanded, Cole could refocus on the shivering form before him.
Ichika, a girl just treading the line between kid and teenager, had nothing obviously wrong with her. "You did... you can heal things you can't see, right?" Janaka had asked him with the worry of a mother, hovering protectively around the sweating girl. She told him they had tried everything they could, but her body wouldn't recover.
Cole nodded curtly and began his spiel of '21 Questions'.
Through Insight he was told the girl was suffering from a lethal case of 'Widowers Rot'. The name told him nothing but the infection let Ichika teeter dangerously between 1 and 2 HP, out of 10. Healing her took a lot out of him and was the second time he made use of his self-immolating heal.
She wasn't the only girl with non-superficial afflictions, but she was the worst case out of all. A day or two later and they wouldd have had to find a coffin her size.
That was his routine for the following hours. Treating women keen to be free of their pangs - their incredible pain threshold burgeoning deep respect in him -, resting when his brain was about to well from his ears and gorging on plates upon plates of food they served him. It didn't end until midday of the following day was well underway. For his troubles he was given a room to board in, a bright thing with a sprawling bed crowded in fluffy pillows; but he couldn't sleep, didn't want to sleep. Cole's mind was awash and reeling and burned out. Images of scabs and raw flesh and thick blood and wailing women played over his eyes in an endless circle. For all its beauty portrayed through the anime, the world of Naruto was build upon violence and strength, the law of the jungle made manifest, and Cole never felt it deeper in his bones than in those crawling, agonising hours.
That Lay on Hands leaped to level 4 was a small reprieve. Over the night of toiling it came easier and easier to him and its potency increased manifold. If it hadn't, he'd still have the women ingratiate themselves with him.
Cole worked the kincks out of his neck with a mighty groan when a knock came from the door. Janaka sauntered in, closing the door with a flourish of her hips. With her health restored the woman's countenance has truly become a sight to behold, moreso with the snug robes she wore that parted above a mesmerizing cleavage; she flashed pearly white teeth in a salacious smile. Cole's heart pound against his chest.
Janaka balanced a tray on her hands with a bulbous tokkuri and two shallow bowls on top. She set the salver on a nightstand, grabbed the bowls and fingered the tokkuri by its neck and nestled by his side.
Cole had doffed the stuffy robes in favor of his breathable modern wear, and was now acutely aware of the soft curves pressed around his arm.
Janaka kept her eyes on him, even as she handed him a cup and topped it with clear and fragrant sake. Her gaze burned into his cheek and when he finally began cracking under the pressure, she let loose with a tinkling laughter and Cole joined in. Between the giggles she threw her head back and downed the contents of her own cup in one gulp. Cole supped his own drink cautiously. He'd much rather eye the spectacle that was Janaka's undulating body and the swallowing ripples of her throat. He watched a drop spill from her full lips, tracing past her jaw and down her neckline, vanishing in the valley of her décolleté. Her nose flared with a content exhale; she reached for the bottle again.
"Thank you." she said through the refill. "Truly, thank you." Over the rim of his cup he regarded the coy madam, he let her speak.
"We can never pay you back for what you did today. You should know that your... service is worth much more than a grimy little room in a down on its luck brothel, right?" Something warred with the curiosity and sympathy in her eyes, alas, he had no energy left to spare for an Insight.
He chuckled. "Not often a brothel's gotta pay its customers, ay?"
Janaka smiled ruefully. "You don't understand. You," she interrupted herself and quirked an eyebrow at him. "How should I call you?"
The question was so banal and left-field, Cole spilled his drink with a peal of laughter. His body shook a few times before he had himself under control. "Damn, woman! You come into my room, while weak old me is all defenseless, try to get me sloshed and only then got the nerve to ask me for my name? You naughty little thing." He wagged a finger.
Janaka playfully slapped his accusing finger away and pouted demurely. The look fit her even at her age. "Come on, tell me." She cooed softly.
He grinned. "It's Cole. Cole Marin. Call me however."
Janaka's ears perked and she tasted his name, rolling it over her tongue in contemplation before smiling mischievously.
"So, Mr. Marin," she purred and suddenly straddled him, and he let her. She was hot, literally and figuratively, raking her fingers up and down his neck. "My girls are very thankful for your help, as am I. My only question now is," Her face cheeked his, lips and teeth daintily nibbled on his ear. Everything felt wet and warm. "Why shouldn't I keep you to myself... Why shouldn't I make you my toy and have you healing my girls, forever." Instead of caressing her nails now dug into his skin, her eyes glinted with thinly veiled malice. Cole smiled at the lukewarm threat and took her hands in his.
"Because, silly, I believe in the goodness of your heart and will heal you guys' anyway, as long as I'm not out and away on some week-long mission. I'm just that nice."
(The next chapter can be skipped as it is entirely NSFW and contains explicit, pornographic content. Be warned and have a good day.)