"I thought your snake would not attack me", Kiyomi twisted her lips upward in a deceitful display of discontent. Truthfully, she just needed some time to relieve the strain of the Substitution Jutsu, a technique that allows a person to replace themselves with an object around them, allowing that object to take the damage even thought for a moment it'd appear that the person was damaged.
It was a commonly used and an incredibly useful technique but it was no panacea to any manner of attack. First of all, it only worked on physical or material attacks, taijutsu and ninjutsu were fair enough but illusions couldn't have been substituted out of. Secondly, it was useless against an opponent with a greatly higher amount of speed as such an enemy would've seen through it and possibly intercepted it. Third, the object needed to be focused on, similarly to how Academy instructors told students to keep their eyes on the target when they threw knives at it.
The object needed to be clearly thought of and it needed to become the sole, dominant thought to focus the entire body's effort into the technique. Then finally, after the boost of speed and replacement transpired, the user was left strained, usually it doesn't really impact other techniques like ninjutsu and the sort but it makes the body completely numbed when performing speedy or overly acrobatic techniques such as the Body Flicker Jutsu and others.
"I told you already, Anaron will attack when he acts as a part of the ring. Dahomey Eyes is a taijutsu technique that involves the ring corner, tossing the opponent into the air making them land and smash their head right in the ring corner. Anaron's tackle was fair game", Othello G stretched himself out as he continued to nimbly move around the ring, never stopping in one place and allowing Kiyomi to take target for her signature clan hijutsu.
Finally remembering that she was in the middle of a wrestling ring, Kiyomi timed her movements to perfectly mirror Othello's, moving around the ring in a perfectly opposite angle before dashing back, heading for the Anaron's extended body for a bounce off of the elastic flesh and skin of the reptile. Just as predicted, it appeared that Anaron had read Kiyomi's intentions and relaxed its body allowing the girl to bounce off of it as if its body were actual ring ropes, maybe even softer. The Yamanaka felt the surge of speed gained from the bouncing movement as she headed towards her opponent who proceeded to bounce off of the opposite side and come at her.
"Uranus Uppercut"! Othello G yelled as he threw his fist, forearm and the entire hand up to the shoulder up trying to dig it under Kiyomi's chin. However all that Othello's uppercut hit was just a surge of air as the blonde dove under him with a sliding movement before pushing her upper body off the rock with her palms shoving herself upwards while she positioned her right leg vertically upwards in a knockout sky kick aimed, similarly to her opponent, under Othello G's chin.
The resistance that Kiyomi's foot encountered after her foot slammed into the middle-aged wrestler's lower chin was intense. Almost matching that of trying to kick a small planetoid away but with a strong intensified flow of chakra in her lower area Kiyomi managed to make her force move things up a bit by tossing her opponent into the air from the force in her kick.
Focusing a strong flow of chakra into her lower legs and her thighs Kiyomi froze momentarily before freezing the intensified masses of chakra in her feet. Then, in one motion, she forced it all out of her feet, creating another miniature circle of chakra flow in her legs before her body fired off after her opponent in a pursuing dash upwards. The girl's hands firmly locked around the wrist of her airborne and still dazed opponent before flipping the man over her shoulder in a powerful throw down, however she didn't let go of the man's hand. While Kiyomi risked a possible recovery and counterattack, the young woman chose to instead of finish her over the shoulder throw right before hitting the ground so that the force behind the throw as well as behind both their falls was focused on her opponent's back.
The gamble paid off!
Othello G yelled out in pain and confusion after his body smashed into the hardened underground minerals and endless layers of rock. The sheer intensity and force of the impact made the ground where he hit the floor crack and scatter, forcing Anaron to intervene and cover up the rocks that collapsed with its body while pulling its summoner's body out and placing it back onto its own coiled back, still seemingly lifeless. The sound of bones cracking and twisting deafened by the thunderous crack that the conclusion of the throw made upon its climax.
Just as Kiyomi wondered if her opponent was out she paid for the mistake of lowering her guard. Within, seemingly, an instant a grip locked around her own wrist, lifting her hand horizontally to her side as her large opponent picked himself up and quickly pulled Kiyomi in to his own side before falling on his back. The backwards fall with Kiyomi's dominant arm locked in an iron grip made the girl's head smash into the Anaron's body, which, wonder of wonders, toughened up right before the impact.
"One-Lock Demonic Down Technique!" Othello yelled out after he bounced back on his feet and stretched his aching back and shoulders out. Kiyomi writhed on the ground for a while before she heard a loud thudding noise – a signal for her to move. Only due to a roll aside did she avoid a backdrop of her lightning fast and deadly strong opponent.
Kiyomi tasted blood in her mouth and felt the warm sensation of a small drop running down her forehead in several places. It was no simple grab and drop, chakra augmentation was involved and yet…
"You could've torn my limbs apart, you had your hands on me. With your strength this battle should've ended then and there. I can't use Substitution Jutsu for a while after using it once", Kiyomi wiped the blood off her lip and the burning spot on her forehead.
"I told you already – this is a wrestling match. I'm not gonna just tear your limbs off, I'm gonna wrestle. That's my Ninja Way, fangirl", Othello G raised his hands up as if flaunting his well-built physique and showing off his physical superiority even if he was the one who took by far more damage in that last exchange of blows.
"The audience is getting a bit bored, what do you say about kicking it up a notch"? The oversized wrestler taunted Kiyomi by flexing his biceps which almost made the girl throw up seeing the amount of bush coming out from his untrimmed ever since he was born armpits.
"Audience"? Kiyomi wondered.
Othello G's body blurred once more as the mirage of his immense movement speed made his proportions appear contorted and almost snake-like. In a dark brown blur, matching the color of the man's dark complexion, blur Othello G drove his elbow and the lower arm right into Kiyomi's chest but it was no augmented strike. Any semblance of force was sacrificed for overwhelming speed so that the push and shove effort connected.
The Yamanaka took almost no damage from that impact, yet she felt stupid having wasted some chakra investing into augmentation, expecting a more powerful hit. The blonde imagined a clothesline or a lariat with the power to split even the most colossal mountain in two and what hit her was just a strong push, essentially. As the air whizzed past her and fondled her hair, the Yamanaka wondered just what technique could this have been. Just as Anaron's tail bounced her back, as ring ropes would have if she was a normal wrestler, did she realize what was coming her way.
"Liwui Backdrop"! Othello G yelled out simultaneously as Kiyomi's racing mind identified the move in her mind. This was bad, at this point most of the setup for the technique was already done, without Substitution Jutsu there was little to nothing Kiyomi could've done!
As the blonde's body bounced off of the tail of the massive summoned snake and flew right at Othello G, the wrestler once again focused all of his physical might into another shove. This time, however, Kiyomi got tossed upwards, as high as the cave would let her however hitting the ceiling of the cave with her head was the last of the girl's concerns. It was the painful backdrop that troubled her. The entire move sequence kept replaying again and again in Kiyomi's mind, a flow of pictures in her wrestling journals with numbers by them and a painful sounding description of the move.
Othello's large frame dashed upwards, losing none of his incredible speed as he buzzed right up to airborne Kiyomi and grabbed her by the abdomen with a single hand. His wrist somehow, just barely, managed to cover the girl's entire body as the wrestler turned around his axis in the air before simply lobbing the girl from her airborne position back down into the "ring".
For a brief second there Kiyomi blacked out before hitting Anaron's body from up above. She was tremendously lucky that they were in a cave and not outdoors where only Othello's own imagination limited the height of his throw move. Due to the amazing luck of blacking out she couldn't feel her organs shifting and her bones struggling not to shatter upon the massive impact surpassing many times the force of being hit by an actual asteroid. Frankly, for a moment, seeing the rocky ground just whizz right at one's face may have reminded of such a sight…
Dizziness couldn't go away, popping in her ears didn't let her hear a single thing while the Yamanaka tried to at the very least show a single sign of being alive. She couldn't have been out, for a moment she thought she was nearing it as blacking out was only substituted by shrieking sensation of white sparks that erupted out of nowhere waking the girl up before disappearing again. Finally, Kiyomi's eyes snapped back open, only to see her opponent showing off to the non-existent audience as if he was actually in the middle of a match. She was lucky he wasn't punching her face off this very second and was wasting time on his showy gimmick.
"Move"! Kiyomi kept ordering herself mentally. Her mind kept bringing up the images of Chestnut Hanasaku and her encouraging gestures. Failing here, after all that time of being forced to skip the exam, would only kill her momentum. How would Hanasaku-sensei ever feel like Kiyomi was ready for another go if she failed now.
"Mana is already out, don't go to sleep now"! Kiyomi ordered herself again remembering everything that the girls had went through up to now. Every battle and every moment of pain and struggle they went through leading up to this peculiar wrestling match.
"You're the team leader, damn it. You wouldn't pull this shit on Meiko, you wouldn't pass out making her fail for no reason! Move, damn it"! Kiyomi kept thinking as she writhed on the ground before finally managing to peel her bleeding face off the ground and pick herself back up. She was stumbling and twitching in the bleeding and injured spots but upright which was a thousand times better than what she had before.
"You're up"? Othello wondered as he restarted his default stance of taking a wide and open position while dashing around the ring, trying to push Kiyomi into the middle of a circle so he could control the "ropes" and the outer part of the "ring".
"I could go for two or three more of these, can you"? Kiyomi taunted her opponent as she wiped the blood off her lip and her right eye. Right as the blood was wiped off her busted forehead fired off more. That was bad, it meant that Kiyomi had to keep her right eye closed due to the blood.
"Just how large is your chakra pool, you're no ordinary genin"? Othello G exclaimed in surprise. He had expected his opponent to either be out or be really softened up for his finishing move, seeing Kiyomi in semi-fighting condition greatly surprised him.
"I've skipped several Chuunin Exams already, one because me and my team were away on a mission when it happened, another one because I had no team at that moment. Me and the other two members of my team have long since surpassed any genin, we've faced plenty of hardships and streaks of bad luck in this exam and it's only due to our larger than the genin standard strength and chakra pools that we managed to get by. You're an amazing wrestler, my idol, that being said, you're my target which means I'll use all of my advantage and all of my skill and strength to beat you", Kiyomi calmly declared before charging at the physically stronger and much larger opponent which confused the man for a moment.
Othello leaned in for a move involving Kiyomi's legs, no doubt. It was an uncharacteristic behavior for him, which was why similar moves blasted Kiyomi, someone who knew well about her idol's moveset out of the water. Othello G never behaved this way against physically lesser opponents, he only went for the lower body against stronger and larger enemies. And yet Kiyomi was ready, her tremendous, for a genin, chakra network flow accelerated granting her perception and reaction time infinitely surpassing that of normal humans assisting her in her flip over her opponent's body.
The girl landed right on Anaron's body, the ropes of the ring, with a jumping turn she kicked her opponent right in the jaw the same moment he turned around to try and catch her. The impact thundered throughout the cave system, the huge lump of flesh staggered back and forwards as Kiyomi's kick hit him in the ear causing great damage to the more sensitive parts of his inner ear as well as his brain.
Kiyomi leaped off of the ropes trying to lock her legs around the opponent. Her intent was to throw her unbalanced opponent over using all of her force to bend the neck and then, once the enemy is down, beat on him until he can't move. That didn't quite work out as Othello G locked his wrists around Kiyomi's leg instantly bringing her plan to a threat of a sudden and painful close.
A quick barrage of elbow strikes to his forehead, busting his pink shades to tiny pieces and cracking Othello G's forehead open made him stagger but then Kiyomi felt a powerful thud in her back. She felt her overflowing chakra surging out, realizing that her body instinctually augmented itself to withstand a crushing blow that'd have broken all of her ribs and her back, instantly killing her. It was that blasted snake again, still, Kiyomi was at the corner of the ring which meant that Anaron could butt in as the ring corner.
An asphyxiating influx of air caressed her hair throwing them into her breathing tract through her gapping mouth as Kiyomi got dazed herself in the wild painful ride to take her opponent down. Othello G was running with Kiyomi in hand, looking to slam her in the center of the ring. He'd likely leap up high and use immense elevation again to further chip at Kiyomi's stamina and chakra pool. That was bad…
With a quick pair of jabs Kiyomi thrust a pair of fingers into her opponent's wrists that held her thighs as firmly as bridges of titanium built around them would. Hit at the pressure point the wrist weakened allowing Kiyomi to pull her thighs out and jump off of her opponent. She wasn't just planning to escape however, right as the Yamanaka's feet touched the ground, her own grip tightened around the massive numbed wrist of her opponent before Kiyomi pulled and turned it forcing her opponent to flip over and smash against the snake's body. After the throw was completed, with a sharp and swift kick to the back lower neck area Kiyomi sent her large opponent rolling aside.
Just as she had suspected, at the moment when Othello G would've hit a ring corner in an actual ring, Anaron's head smashed into the giant lump of muscle crushing him under it in between the snake's massive snout and its body. It appeared that Othello G was playing fair – he was utilizing Anaron as an actual ring, it was just that Kiyomi didn't think utilizing her environment until now for extra damage.
Just as the blonde started feeling confident about her chances and thanked for all the times she overtrained thinking these Exams would just be a breeze with enough training, Anaron's titanic head started twitching and lifting off. With massive effort Othello G forced the head off of himself and after being pushed for a sufficient amount of time the snake gave in and raised its head off of its summoner taking a position of a neutral spectator from above once more.
"Not bad… But you won't beat me like this", Othello grinned with a smile that demonstrated him missing a tooth, a thin red streak of blood burst from the giant's mouth the moment the toothless smile was revealed from the damaged gum.
Kiyomi had in mind what her opponent was saying. Othello G's finisher move, the one no wrestler ever stood up after, one of the most protected finishers in all of CWF if not the entire industry was the "What-What" move. A seemingly out of nowhere counter that had a summoned snake wrap around the enemy in an instant and break most of their bones at their joints, cracks and other weakspots. Seeing how it's a counter move, timing was everything and sufficiently weakening the opponent and their bones also had to be done. Timing was what separated a one hundred percent KO move from a whiff and opponent's counter-counterattack.
While the Yamanaka wished to give her idol wrestler no openings for a "What-What", she couldn't really help it. Her physical might was insufficient to put Othello G down quickly and her Yamanaka hijutsu were either missing or inefficient.
"You're right, it seems I'd be pummeling you for days on end before you'd stay down. I may just need to take some serious risks and get really unsafe", Kiyomi sighed with some worry in her voice. She didn't like taking risks but she had neither time nor the luxury to jump around her enemy. Othello G was stronger than her physically, he was far more meaty and could take more punishment than even Meiko. Punching him down was out of the question, sadly.
Kiyomi may just need to get creative if she was to eliminate her target and keep Team Hokage in the competition.