[Kaguya Toru]

I would know him in death At the end of the world Shimizu Asuka Sourei Kobashi Shouki Kumori

It was a difficult situation with Kumori trying to thrash the hairs against the Hozuki who were in a total liquid state, wherever it was possible which meant that the hairs were not really doing much. They were grinning with their sharp teeth at all of this too - if that were really visible, except for the creases in the water. They really thought they had them... It was not really possible at their experience level to maintain the water form permanently especially since the technique itself would inevitably drain them of all the attempts...

With Kobashi and Kumori combining forces they got the very best that they could get out of a semi-bleak situation. However, Kobashi likely glugged some water into his lungs, which was not the best result since this was not regular water but rather the body parts of Hozuki that wouldn't feel good later most likely. Furthermore he would have to move through a literal field of hair spikes, which would tear at unfortified parts of his body [pick two places for medium sized wounds].

Regardless Kumori and Kobashi managed to get the last of their enemy groups and now could try to help Asuka.

--

Asuka would find that his kunai was moving through basically water, doing nothing to the Hozuki who had approached him and flung themselves on his face to drown him. His tail wouldn't quite reach comfortably to this area either, and inhaling the Hozuki was as good for the Ama as it was good for Kobashi - nobody wanted someone's body parts in their lungs.

Whether Asuka could breathe them or not, the enemies were not yet put down and were stuck on him like parasites and it was likely he would need help from the two other more offensively oriented shinobi.

SPOILER: Click to show

Posts Due: Saturday 11:50 AM December 2nd CST
Notes: Kobashi and Kumori through combined efforts manage to wipe out the rest of their opponents, however Kobashi has inhaled some nasty Hozuki water into his lungs and now has two medium sized wounds from Kumori's help on his body [select where]. Asuka's attempts to keep the opponents at bay have failed and they have attached to him like parasites trying to drown him - to no avail, however now would be a good time for Kobashi and Kumori to step in to help their ally and finish the battle[?]

OWL

[Shimizu Asuka]

All three Hozuki were trying to drown him now, and Asuka was seriously questioning their intelligence. Weren’t shinobi supposed to be smarter than this? Though he couldn’t really complain when it prevented them from doing anything more deadly. His Kunai strikes and tail lashing weren’t doing anything, so he did the next thing he could think of to potentially surprise the Hozuki. Ending his aquatic adaptation, his fish tail rapidly switched back from tail to two normal legs. With any luck, they’d think he was panicking and losing his hold on his chakra.

He couldn’t afford to waste too much more chakra, he’d already used so much.

Instead, he’d resume his skashes with his Kunai, hoping to eventually catch the Hozuki when they had to solidify. None of these seemed strong enough to be able to hold their liquid forms indefinitely… he just had to outlast them. And with the way they were acting, he didn’t think they were bright enough to outwit or outlast him. He’d be fine, so long as these Hozuki kept wasting their chakra on a fruitless endeavour. He didn’t need to be transformed to be able to breathe water, though he doubted they’d figure it out at this rate.

[Shouki Kumori]

Kumori could feel direct impact with Kobashi through his hair tendrils, and while the Hozuki enemies were a pain in his ass and everyone else’s, they managed to shake them off. That was also when Kumori witnessed Kobashi’s injuries as a result of that desperate rescue, prompting the elder to retract his hair tendrils once more. Now floating around his own form, he signaled Kobashi to seal his wound with what Asuka handed to them earlier by holding up a Blank Sealing Tag himself, since he’d already used his…

Were those guys still trying to drown Asuka? Actually, they could still do hefty damage if they caught wind of this and began filling his mouth up with themselves – in spite of their watery state, they were still human beings, and nobody liked having humans stuffed inside of them.

But based on the scene… did… did they know that? Asuka looked fine swinging his kunai at them, perhaps leading them to believe that he was struggling to breathe underwater. Worth a shot… Kumori thought to himself before moving up to the chained Shimizu, weaving two handseals and pointing his palm at the enemies surrounding Asuka.

His intention? To manipulate the water and force it off of his teammate – while Kumori’s Water Release Techniques were majorly destructive, much to his chagrin in this scenario, there was a Jutsu that granted him a manipulatable object of water – the Advanced Water Clone Technique. While the Hozuki were transformed into water, he’d use that strength of theirs as the basis of his Advanced Water Clone that would try to form next to Asuka and him, potentially trapping the enemies inside of a human-shaped cage unless they solidified themselves immediately.

Which he waited for.

SPOILER: Click to show

NAME: Jōkyū Mizu Kurōn [Advanced Water Clone]
RANK: B
CHAKRA USAGE: Medium
CLASSIFICATION: Ninjutsu
ELEMENT: Suiton
HANDSEALS: 2
DESCRIPTION:
A simple two seals for a strong support. A clone made up of a stronger concentrated and highly packed amount of water. This offers both a great durability/defense and an incredible offense. It can take a few punches and kicks. Anything stronger than it's own composition will force it to explode though. A large wave of water will emit to throw back anyone close, a large puddle reaching 10 meters will rest in it's place. Bruising can be caused in point blank range. The clone can't perform any elemental jutsu other than it's own element; suiton. Though it's limited to a medium amount of chakra; it's own composure. Once that amount is drained, it'll disperse without an explosion; a dud.

[Kaguya Toru]

I would know him in death At the end of the world Shouki Kumori Sourei Kobashi Shimizu Asuka

It was an extremely awkward situation but the way that Kumori detached the Hozuki from Asuka worked even if a little strangely, all three of them fell away like slimy eels and were quite confused as to why they had been forced apart, solidifying and stumbling one of them as a blob had gotten a cut on his thigh from Asuka's attempts to slice into them as this happened, but this also likely meant the clone sustained some damage.

Regardless they in their irritation redirected their attention towards Kumori - the man who looked the most like the clone - and they bum rushed him, Hozuki water bullets flying towards the man at a range and then them doubling down to try and grab onto him and drown HIM. They were a bit aggravated, that was for sure and they wanted to really kill them all. But it wasn't working the way they had intended these enemies were skilled and it was totally throwing off their plans!

Not to mention the sudden silence elsewhere on the rooftop was not giving them a good feeling about what was going on overall, they hoped that this attack could at least help them take out the man that was giving them the most issue in the moment.

SPOILER: Click to show

Posts Due: 11:50PM Sunday December 3rd

Notes: Kobashi missed rotation, sustains medium damage to thigh and his side/abdomen. Kumori manages to get the Hozuki off of Asuka and they turn attention on him, shooting some water bullets and then trying to jump on him to drown him.

OWL

[Sourei Kobashi]

The opportunity Kobashi had been waited for did indeed finally come along, allowing the jounin to escape his Hozuki attackers. Regrettably the tough and sharpened hair strands did manage to catch both the back of his scalp and the back of his left arm from the mid-forearm to the upper part of his hand. Blood seeped down from the back of his head, quickly staining the clothing he was wearing.

While part of him considered trying to save the medical tag that Asuka had placed on him earlier, Kobashi in the end decided it was better to make use of it rather than potentially getting himself killed because the wounds hampered him at some critical moment. With a pulse of chakra into the tag, the small water octopus sprouted forth and attached itself to Kobashi's left shoulder were it started tending to the wounds on his left arm and the back of his head. The sensation was always an odd one, the natural feelings of muscle and skin moving back together which normally take weeks being unnaturally hastened to the point of becoming unnatural.

As the wounds were repaired Kobashi took the time to sheath the ninjato again and hooked the Shibuki to a catch on his back designed for it. Once the weapons were out of the way for the moment he began to render a few hand seals while feigning being crouched over in pain. The Hozuki seemed to be giving him breathing space for the moment, maybe with the severity of a head wound looking worse than it typically was had made them believe he was no longer much of a threat? Regardless of the reason he planned to make use of the time and as soon as Kumori managed to push the Hozuki off of Asuka then Kobashi moved to follow it up.

Raising his hands with a held seal, specifically a triangle with both his hands so the finger tips as the apex and two thumbs acting as foundation with the three Hozuki blobbed together focused in a hollow point within the middle. In a bright flash and roar of sound a simple, but effective *Lightning Bolt would arc towards the blob.

Made by Riley at THQ!

[Shouki Kumori]

The fact that it worked was something Kumori would remember for the rest of his remaining years or minutes. That Hozuki’s Hydrification Technique really did grant them all the properties of pure water, to the extent where they also inherited all the exploitable weaknesses of water beyond just a vulnerability to electricity. The fact that Water Release Jutsus could use their hydrificated bodies as a base was… intriguing.

The Advanced Water Clone wasn’t really planned for Kumori to be used in any other way, so the damage it sustained was acceptable. If anything, now the Clone temporarily acted as a bullseye before dissipating upon the unleashing Hozuki members – the Hozuki quickly tried shooting him down with that signature Water Bullet Technique of theirs, but Kumori didn’t plan to end up in Asuka’s previous position. Weaving one handseal, Kumori immediately planned to make a distance away from them in a flash with the Body Flicker Technique, noticing Kobashi’s upcoming Jutsu. If Kobashi needed them to be left open, Kumori could prove the narrow window with his flickering disappearance – the Hozuki enemies were visibly annoyed to the limit, and that was only a detriment in the midst of combat.

While attempting to evade the water bullets with the Body Flicker, he still tried to move away from their charge. However, one couldn’t immediately follow up after a Body Flicker, so we’ll see what happened.

SPOILER: Click to show

NAME: Shunshin no Jutsu [Body Flicker Technique]
RANK: D
CHAKRA USAGE: Low
CLASSIFICATION: Ninjutsu [General]
ELEMENT: None
HANDSEALS: 1
DESCRIPTION:
By invigorating one's entire body with chakra, a shinobi can seemingly disappear and reappear in another location faster than most people can see. Often times one's movements are disguised with the use of an extra element, be it a smoke bomb, leaves, water, sand, etc. in order to hide the user's trajectory from those with skilled eyes. Though it mimics teleportation, it is important to remember this jutsu merely boosts the agility of its user. As useful as this technique is, it can only be used 4 times in a battle thread, compounding in exertion and difficulty each time. with any more usages beyond that result in muscle tears in the legs from overexertion. The hand seal for this technique must be held until the shinobi reaches their destination, making it impossible to utilize other techniques regardless of any preparation.

[Shimizu Asuka]

Hozuki really were a menace, but Asuka was finally free to move. As the Hozuki let them go and bum rushed Kumori, he took a second just to breathe and pull himself his feet. He should consider picking up some Raiton for use against this clan in the future, really. He wouldn’t be able to avoid being in the field at all times, and this incident was just one way that proved it.

Adjusting his grip on the kunai, he knew he wasn’t going to be able to do much to help Kumori with his meager array of offensive techniques. The Hozuki seemed visibly annoyed, but he wasn’t certain they’d get sloppy enough for him to stab them or injure them in any way, really. Though, now that he wasn’t using so much chakra, he could probably outlast the remains of the Hozuki’s chakra stores if he really tried hard enough.

But his teammates had this, he felt. He watched Kumori flickering away from them, and Kobashi’s lightning bolt streak towards them in a deadly flash. And he spotted the water jellyfish on both of his teammates, so they’d both heeded his advice to use the sealings tags in a sticky situation. Good, that was very good.

[Kaguya Toru]

I would know him in death At the end of the world Shouki Kumori Sourei Kobashi Shimizu Asuka

The Hozuki were truly not paying any attention to Kobashi they were all zeroed in on Kumori trying to drown him. They jumped into the air leaving them vulnerable in that moment just as Kumori body flickered out of the way, they could not change their trajectory and yet had already liquified partially which meant when Kobashi focused the powerful raiton into their bodies that would cause a bright flashing light to all that were in the air. For Kumori the sizzle and crack would likely be extra loud and might even cause a ringing noise in his ears for the time being. The enemies collided into the ground, grumbling and groaning but ultimately very much out of commission. For any sensory individual they would be able to tell that their chakra signatures would have significantly dimmed at this junction. Killing all of the fallen Hozuki would be easy now but there was really hardly any point in it now since they were just laying around stunned blobs. A few were dead, yes, but the majority just out of commission.

The world grew still for a moment, and the jounin would get but a small moment of reprieve, but an extremely small one.

OWL