Starring:
Date: May 17, 2014
Summary:
Tsiro takes on the challenge of a Blood Harvest bounty, fighting for life and battlelust in Kirigakure's arena.
"Blood Harvest - Bloodfall"
Kirigakure's Dammed Arena
Meruin stands tall beside a very large steel container.
He has been silent for a small while, eyes on the people filling up the stands. They were loud, their energy high as they talk amongst themselves in anticipation of the next event scheduled to hit the arena floor. There was a distinct flavor to the air. It tasted of lightning and anxiety. It would storm tonight. And the people's hearts have some unrest as well with the enduring ails on the shinobi nations. But that was why they were here. To let loose, see something spectacular and forget for a while.
So the Mizukage's voice rose, booming.
"It is time!" he called. The cheers that arose in answer rushed over the arena like a white edged flood, the sound very nearly a tangible force. Once it died some, he continued, "One of our shinobi have stepped forward to show to you the strength of his arm and the steel of his will. Often, work is done in shadow and twilight but not today! Today, those shadows are left behind and you will share in their skill and their glory, in every bloody gash and ragged breath, all in the light of day! I call forward our Jounin, Kaguya Tsiro! Stand and salute!"
He looked towards the staging rooms to another forceful wave of ovation.
Tsiro had been waiting in the staging room for his name to be announced. There was a bit of excitement stirring within him. He was happy to return to the arena in an official capacity. It was no longer simply practicing there. As his name is called out, Tsiro steps out into the arena. He raises his hands and bones protrude from his arms upwards into the air. Though a moment ago he was Kaguya, now in this moment he was simply a fighter for his nation. These people would love him or hate him. Only time would tell.
Meruin inclined his head to Tsiro as the man stepped out into the killing grounds, the sound of anticipated cheering rising even higher at the sight of the combatant taking the stage. Rather than shouting to be heard over the tumult of the people, the Okumo pressed two fingers against his temple, brushing them across his forehead until they reached his other temple. The gesture for Greatness, traced across the span of where Kirigakure's Hitai-ite generally lies. And with that, the Mizukage vanishes to spectate from his own booth.
Leaving Tsiro alone with the metal container twice as tall as he.
It is only a moment before the sound of whipping chords can be heard by the Kiri-nin, the walls of the steel enclosure beginning to fall apart. Their journey is hastened by the knock of a giant claw — scorpion claw. The giant, armored arachnid shrugs off the corded bindings with a pair of forceful jerks, legs testing their freedom for the moment before its eyes find Tsiro. The creature lowers itself, rearing its tail that holds not a stinger but a multitude of hissing snakes.
Claws snap.
Tsiro watched as the crowd cheered. His crimson eyes found joy in their cheering. They all were so eager to watch him kill or be killed. Now they had a taste of what he went through in battle. This was his true home. A battlefield brought to the arena. Of course his attention had to go back to reality as the iron walls dropped.
Before his eyes was a giant scorpion. Everything seemed pretty normal about the giant beast except for the multitude of hissing snakes. "Thats a little different." It seemed like now he was fighting multiple people instead of simply one. It mattered not to Tsiro. He places his fingers together to focus his chakra. He had a few moments before the beast attacked.
Tsiro had time, aye, but surprisingly little, all considered. For its size, maybe nine feet at the head when standing tall, hydra tail writhing to greater heights, it moved with a searing celerity. Small quakes beneath the pounding feet, the genetically modified creature rushed towards the shinobi, closing the distance within a thought. A claw reached out to snap the Kaguya up, moving to simply toss him hard enough to send him tumbling along the dirt floor towards the stands full of people, soon chasing after.
The claw reaches Tsiro before he is able to evade. He is tossed back into the arena. He managed to catch his balance and place his feet down as he skids back. Now the creature was chasing him. Bones start to sprout from his chest and back. "My turn." Tsiro states as he dashes forward attempting to grab one of the legs and toss the creature into the wall. He was trying to show the scorpion, he wasn't the only one who was fast.
The scorpion abruptly changed direction with a stomping of the foremost legs as Tsiro abruptly dashed in towards it, showing, indeed, that the monster was not the only one who was swift. The scuttling legs danced out of reach of the man's grasp — but only once. The Kaguya's fingers took hold of a leg and the chimera was swung around, the snakes biting at the air by Tsiro's head before it was thrown bodily into the wall near the patrons, many of whom backed away with shouts of alarm. It quickly worked to get its legs under it, not appearing harmed but perhaps stunned. Surprised.
This was Tsiro's chance to try to put some damage into that armor. Maybe he could even get a leg. Tsiro twisted his body around, spinning so that the larch bones could cut into the Scorpion. He had simply hoped this creature did not get back on its feet too quickly. He had also hoped that the snakes were not in range from that angle.
Abruptly, there was dark and viscous green blood flying into the air alongside the chunks of black chitin that Tsiro had managed to tear off of the giant scorpion-serpent crossing. A high pitched, keening whistle fled the creature as the Kaguya's bones punched through its armor, a claw slamming a huge dent into the arena wall in pain. It was only a second of contact before it managed to get its feet into a position where it could push off of the floor and wall to move away from the shinobi, the left side of its body bleeding in a few spots and missing its armor.
As it did so, creating distance, one single, powerful rotation was placed just right to hit a the joint of a leg, cutting deeply into it. It was rendered useless, leaking dark ichor and hanging by scraps of meat and chitin. Behind the front leg, it wasn't major towards movement, but it would still function at a lower capacity. It seemed a little faster, though, despite that, as the serpent tails lashed out to strike at Tsiro as the creature move to create more distance and recover. Adrenaline pumping through it must be lending it power and speed.
As the serpent heads came forward, Tsiro placed his hands out forming shields to stop them in their tracks. The bone was thick enough to prevent the poison from coming through. Tsiro had wounded the beast. It was not that it mattered to the beast. No, the act of seeing blood would drive something inside Tsiro. He then dropped the shields and attacked with his elbows, once more spinning around to tear into the creature.
Sharp and aggravated, hissing takes to the air as serpentine heads smash into raised bone shields rather than sink into pliant flesh. The retreating chimera clacks its claws, the sound near to the snapping of a whip, a warning as Tsiro approaches to press his assault. When the man attacks with the bone shards extended from his elbows, those claws raise, blocking the spinning assault as it comes. The other comes in and blocks another rotational maneuver, repelling the Kaguya. In this moment, it's direction immediately changed and it charged right at the man. Both claws came forward, open, looking to lock together through his body, scissoring him to the chorus of hissing snakes and the roaring crowd.
This was obviously a hybdrid creature of one form or another. Tsiro was not sure if this was grown in Meruin's underground lab or if he stitched two beasts together. The thing he did know was not to get got by that claw. Tsiro vanishes and appears on the other side of the creature. He had attempted to slash through the hard, armor like shell of the creature. He appears just on the other side of it.
True speed and skill.
But it was pitted against high instinct and hard armor. The scorpion creature's claws did clash together, but without the body between them it had expected and desired. Its senses telling it that Tsiro had moved in that direction, to its side had it turning and when he advanced again, the hybrid animal tensed, dipped and shifted. It wasn't nearly so fast as to avoid the attack, but it had managed to turn in a way that the blow wasn't a direct one, the Kaguya's bone blade, boucing off of the top of its chitinous body and leaving it unharmed.
Battle, though, has taken an obvious toll on the arachnid. The adrenaline seems to be wearing off, its movements not quite so swift and precise as they'd been moments before, though an inexperienced combatant wouldn't yet be able to tell. The snakes hadn't seemed to slow at all, however. Contrarily, they seem to have… sped. Grown more excited. The scorpion body shifted and the serpents let loose a sudden streaming of red-brown sludge at Tsiro, the acidic substance being shot at him potent enough to begin eating at the skin and muscle beneath should he let the abrupt assault touch him.
Once more Tsiro formed a shield to block the sprayed attack. He then discards it as if it were nothing. He looks around at the people in the stands. He could not here them. Perhaps they were not cheering. Perhaps it was his senses blocking them out. This needed to be solved.
Tsiro then reaches back to his spine. "For the finisher…" he states with a sick squishing sound, he gives a yank. Out comes the spine. It is replaced as quickly as was taken out. He then whips it forward trying to entangle the snakes. If he could do that, he could bring the giant down.
The scorpion chimera rushes, snakes hissing, towards Tsiro as the man takes the time to reach behind his back and withdraw his spine, it's acidic assault clearly ineffective. Before it got too far, however, that osseous whip lashed out with the same speed as though it were an ivory serpent itself. It caught hold of the snakes at the tail end of the creature, wrapping around many of the group, the spine within it piercing some and drawing out blood and spitting. Having them held made the creature stumble, now held on reigns by the Kaguya.
Now in control of the creature, Tsiro's other hand turns into a drill-like appendage. Many had seen this move before when he was a Chuunin fighting in this very arena. Had they seen it, then they knew what was about to happen. There was no question. Simply blood and the screams of a beast. It was always the same. Knowing this, Tsiro's appendage lurched forward towards the center of the body. It was a move with intent to kill.
And the screams came.
Unable to maneuver well due to the tether around its tail, the creature was nigh helpless to defend itself and the Kaguya's drill soon punched through its shell above its head, sending a spray of that thick, dark green blood into the air and over the attacker. That shrill, shrieking whistle once more filled the air before the agony was drowned out by the sound of the crowd's roar, the creature's legs jerking in staccato panic. It wasn't long before it collapsed, not longer owning the strength to hold up its heavy weight. It was clear that Tsiro's kill strike had been successful in rending the life from the scorpion.
The chitin along its back burst apart. But this wasn't from the Jounin's assault — nay, this was the doing of the serpent half. The snakes writhed from the grasp of the ensnaring spinal whip, leaving the scorpion form like a shed skin. The each of them were maybe eight feet in length, numbers about twenty, and they swiftly surrounded the Kaguya. They rushed in with poisoned bites to steal the life from him, a flurry of swift strikes from all sides.
The separation of the snakes was a nice touch. Tsiro had not expected that, yet with his feelings of fatigue figured it might be enough to drive him back. With each attempted bite, Tsiro waves a bone first to knock them off course. The spine in his hand straightened much like a jagged blade. Tsiro vanished and appeared on the other side of the snakes. He was simply aiming to hit something. Once that was taken care of he'd figure out a way to recover from the unanticipated attacks.
And in that moment, the snake's population had been cut by a third. As Tsiro came back into visibility, some of the serpents along his path found themselves lacking heads, cut in half, or otherwise granted a death sentence. The rest, however, rushed onwards towards the Kaguya once more, simply set on swarming him and making the kill. Celerity in the movements, many of the snakes bit at him as they moved past, a pair simply launching at his face. Some of those near the rear spat out thin streams of that muddy-red acid coat and kill the man.
Once more Tsiro finds himself under and onslaught of the snakes. He used the bones to form a thin layer of disposable skin on his back and his fists once more to knock off the attacks. These creatures did not want to die for some reason. Tsiro backs away from them and raises his fingers, drilling bullets shoot outwards towards the creatures. It was enough to try to keep them at bay a little longer.
The snakes were long but they were swift and in constant motion, their sinuous bodies curling around the bone bullets shot out towards them, the Kaguya's counter assault reaching only earth. Their own attacks were endlessly deflected by the man's bone-protected parries of the body, leaving their attempts at a kill just as fruitless as his had been in that moment. Their movements were growing more sluggish, however. The still lunged and bit, some still sent streams of occasional acid but nothing was done as swiftly as it had been before. They were growing fatigued. Shouts of "SMASH 'EM!" and "RIP THEM APART!" began to filter from the watching crowd as their desire to see more carnage continued.
The assault of the snakes continued. Tsiro managed to fend off most of it, although another bite got through. He felt the venom coursing through his veins. With a quick burst of speed, he moved forward with his arms out. He used them like a clothesline to whip the snakes towards the wall of the arena. This fight was coming to an end. That whats the crowd wanted. Tsiro had not ended it yet, but now there was a push from the fans for it.
There was an abrupt flurry about the battlefield as Tsiro put on a burst of speed to rush after the harrying serpents, beginning to scoop them up and send them crashing into the wall of the arena. The snakes writhed, survival instincts pushing them to attempt to escape or to sink their fangs into him, but the man proved too swift and in the span of two seconds, the bodies of those thirteen snakes bounced off of the wall with stunning force, the first ones beginning to make their way away, albeit sluggishly.
Once more Tsiro attempted to line up with the snakes. He was running out of stamina for this match. He vanishes from his position and appears on the other side of them with a blade out stretched as if he had just attacked. He turns to make sure they all died. He did not want the fight to continue any longer. However he was not going to use anything more powerful to end it.
A crimson wave of blood burst from the acid spewing serpents as Tsiro burst through them, not one of them managing to have moved swiftly enough to escape the blade. That blood fell down on the pile of writhing snake halves, filling the furrow in the ground made by the slicing bone. The battle was won and Kirigakure cheered its champion, exalting in the blood spilled and the prowess of the man who'd caused it, covered, himself, in green and red ichor.
It was now that Meruin appeared once more on the arena floor, looking towards Tsiro. Calm eyes filled with bloody mists, he traced a line from temple to temple yet again in honor of the man's victory and then he looked to the people in the crowd, simply gesturing to him and bellowing out the name "KAGUYA TSIRO!" The fervor grew louder, the name picking up as a chant among the people. The Mizukage nodded, simply looking to the spectators and waiting for them to quiet long enough to speak.
Today's festivities were over, despite the way the blood still sang in the veins.
The blood spewed from the severed necks light fountains. The fans cheered and the enemy was dead. Life was good. Tsiro biggest problem now was remaining on his feet. He turns and waves to the crowd before working his way to the exit. Another day he'd be back to fight yet another beast.
