Rei looked at the twenty-four Claymores in front of him, the prevalent majority of them exhausted, some injured by what would be definitely crippling injury for life among ninjas but none of them dead.
It was honestly curious.
These Claymores, even the weak ones, could regenerate lost limbs whereas in the Elemental Nations, despite the advances in medical ninjutsu, this was still considered impossible by most. Yet, these backward warriors who barely had any proper technique could do it.
"Well, would you look at that? You all survived! Isn't that just wonderful?" Rei cheerily clapped his hands, eliciting helpless and tired looks of cowed anger from some of the women while others were either in too much pain to react or too exhausted they didn't have the energy to muster a reaction.
"What are you going to do with us?" Miria hollowly asked, not in the mood for games so she got straight to the point.
She was not injured but deciding the fate of herself and her comrades in the face of this monster was mentally and emotionally exhausting. When she saw how he chopped the Yomas against whom they struggled to survive to pieces without even leaving his place... it just made her that more assured there will be no backing off from this deal.
Rei lifted his eyebrow at her and looked over at the group of exhausted women who watched him with worry and almost scared expectations again.
"As I said, you are now mine. I will take you to my village and-" Rei stopped when he noticed the eyes of the girls abruptly widened in fright and their jaws dropped. "What?" He frowned.
"There is an entire village of..." Miria trailed off, gulping nervously as the horror settled in.
The situation was worse than she thought! A village full of Yomas!? And he expected them to come there with him!?
Miria had no idea how to react to that.
Rei got an inkling suspicion there was some misunderstanding going on from the looks he was receiving but he couldn't seem to figure it out. Instead, he just curtly nodded, "Yes. My village."
Miria was too shocked to speak and so, Flora decided to ask the next question, "And what are we supposed to do in this village of yours?"
Rei looked at the small woman with wavy blond hair and tried to reassuringly smile, "It won't be all that different from what you do now. Many in my village are mercenaries-"
'A village full of mercenary Yomas!?' Miria almost choked at that, having to take a few deep breaths to calm herself.
But she wasn't discarding this chance in her mind. The Organization wanted them dead and this might very well be their only way to survive. It stung her pride and went against everything she was raised to believe by the Organization but joining this blond man might not be such a bad idea at the moment.
"-and you will be provided training and resources to improve your strength before joining the ranks of the village as its warriors. The work is similar but of course, we don't have ridiculous rules like not harming humans. I'd like to believe what I offer you is better than your current situation if only because I actually plan to make you strong enough to survive your future tasks." Rei shrugged casually, reminding them they were still on a clear suicide mission.
Which worked quite well if the mutinous and dissatisfied looks of the Claymores were any indications.
When the initial wave of disgruntlement at their predicament faded, the only emotion left in the Claymores was slight depression and unease. This was, surprisingly enough, broken by Helen.
"Sign me up. If you plan to train us so we can survive then I will fight for you. Not like there is a better option anyway." Helen light-heartedly spoke in a boisterous way, giving a clear direction for the Claymores.
Now most of them stopped being so 'lost' and started focusing on the chance to become stronger so they could protect themselves. This mission of theirs no doubt showed all of them how easy it would have been for them to die.
"I agree." Flora said, more towards other Claymores than Rei, "Even if he is a Yoma-"
'A what now?' Rei lifted his eyebrow at her in speechless disbelief, the gears in his head instantly starting to turn in overdrive.
"- he still saved us. Do you want to end up in a similar situation later on? In similar despair?" Flora finished and while her voice was soft, the effect it had on the Claymores was staggering as soft muttering was heard from the group, and the mistrust and small hostility some individuals were previously showing Rei lessened by a great deal.
Rei had to admit the woman was a natural leader.
Unlike Miria who was more of a fighter than a leader, Flora was capable of turning the opinion of the crowd with her words and natural charisma. A charisma that was not due to her status as a single-digit Claymore.
And the girl was apparently self-taught in this skill too. She didn't seem to have much idea what she was doing and about the small mistakes she was making. For Rei, it felt more as if she was put into leadership positions in the past and somewhere along the line realized what worked and what did not and now was using it to her benefit.
Miria was much the same but she lacked Flora's natural grace and was much more rigid.
Rei remembered it was also Flora who first engaged the scout Yoma during the very first fights, not letting it have a free hand while the other Claymores fought the other two Yomas.
That was a good call. The Yoma obviously wanted to sneakily take down Claymores from the behind and its ability to control the Yoki of others would prove disastrous for the Claymores if it wasn't engaged in a fight.
Flora more than likely saved all of them by breaking the ranks and interrupting the Yoma.
While Miria was undoubtedly stronger, Rei was more interested in Flora. Miria was at best jonin level, her afterimages caused by her movement technique rather than her sheer speed. There were many jonins in his village that could be more than her match even without using ninjutsu and genjutsu.
Her strength in this group was irrelevant. It didn't matter that she was one of the top dogs here. In his village, she was average at best.
But people like Flora with a natural aptitude for leadership and a good head on her shoulders... now these would be always in demand. Strength could be trained but natural charisma was hard to cultivate.
While the women were having their hushed talks, Rei was thinking about their apparent false perception of him. They thought he was Yoma? He couldn't understand how they got to that conclusion but the sooner he broke them out of it, the better.
"Before this discussion can go on, I think we have something to clear up." He said and silence suddenly descended on the town square. "I am not a Yoma." He bluntly spoke, causing the Claymores to look at him in incomprehension.
Deneve was the first to recollect her cool and carefully asked, "You are... not?"
From her tone it was obvious she didn't believe him, a sentiment shared by most of the Claymores, but Rei just plainly shook his head.
"No."
It didn't matter to him if they believed him or not but he had to say it. They would eventually realize the truth even if they currently didn't believe him so trying to prove himself was just wasted effort.
"But... men can not be so strong!" A burly girl full of muscles with two swords on her back, Undine, exclaimed and Rei involuntarily snorted.
He looked at Undine, causing her to defiantly stare at him with threatening body language... but her eyes were completely full of fright. It was hilarious, seeing that girl play tough. Especially when Rei knew all these muscles were just a Yoki manipulation technique. He could quite easily sense her real body shape and she was actually even tinier than Flora who was the most petite Claymore in the group!
"Girl," Rei drawled with amusement written in his expression, "I think you are misunderstanding something here. Your worldview doesn't matter. You are just a weak experiment living on a backwater island. You don't have any idea what is possible in this world."
And while his words were harsh, they were spoken jovially. It took a while for the muscled Claymore to understand Rei insulted her.
But Flora showed her leadership qualities again and put a hand on Undine's... forearm, since she would have to reach up if she wanted to put it on her shoulder, and broke Undine's rising indignation.
It was so easy to forget the man in front of them was dangerous enough to wipe them all out instantly if provoked. His behavior was just so disarming that Flora had a hard time keeping her vigilance around him.
"Then, what are you if not Yoma?" She asked.
Rei smirked, happy the woman was not arrogant enough to assume there are only Yomas and Claymores in the world.
"Me?" Rei nonchalantly pointed at himself, "I am a ninja."
Needless to say, that told the Claymores exactly nothing.
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