With a gust of wind that picked up rubble and dust, scattering them all around in a highly organized whirlwind, Usubane vanished completely. Mana's chakra sensory registered the rabbit high above, perhaps even at the very top of the Hanada gambling house. It was a taijutsu technique that Mana was familiar with and one that was in the handbook of any Konoha ninja as much as beginning to study taijutsu.
"Leaf Shadow Dance?" Mana wondered to herself. She rushed onward at a half-assed pace just to control her movements and stay close to the rabbit in case Usubane would need to be pulled out after extending too far. "I guess living so close to Konohagakure has rubbed off on her." The magician thought to herself.
"Hot Feet!" Usubane yelled out as she took a leap of faith and extended her feet downward in a sky-splitting foot-dive, aiming to drive them right into Honda's bulky chest. The rabbit's lower legs set ablaze halfway down, it was too difficult to tell if it was a natural occurrence or one caused by ninjutsu. The attack was not just successful but frighteningly so – Usubane's feet dug inside Honda's chest cavity, making blood of a very washed out and darkened color burst from the monster's chest together with unidentifiable, bright, purplish fluid.
Honda appeared to regain consciousness out of the sheer pain of his chest cavity opening up so suddenly. This was highly unlike any reaction Mana had witnessed before. The monster appeared an unstoppable juggernaut the entire time and simple taijutsu attacks should not have harmed him this much, not those ranked as low as Usubane's.
The frightening part was that the pain from the previous kick to the jaw had already forced Mana's novice illusion to be canceled. There was absolutely no effect on Honda's chakra network or his mental state and yet a simple stomp managed to do this much damage.
The force of the impact caused the giant's body to bounce off the ground and float weightlessly for just a moment but that moment was enough. Usubane's hands and her ears delivered a blinding combination of blows all over the monster's body, leaving nasty looking bumps in Honda's flesh similar to those that cookie dough had when someone punched them. The bumps also took a longer while to fill up and fix.
This time Usubane's body did not light up with flames but Mana did sense chakra at play. It was a very specific kind of sense where one's body lit up with pulses and signals of various sorts, chakra signatures always appeared like lights, flames or entire stars, depending on their size and when chakra was in play the burning or shining processes were drastically escalated. It was not something a novice sensor would pick up but Mana had advanced to the point where she could, most of the time.
The chakra augmentations Usubane used made her body tough, similarly to how chakra augmentations protected a body from taking too much damage every time one was hit by those unnaturally strong blows. Except Usubane appeared to use these endurance augmentations offensively, to stiffen up her blows and harden her body while she was on the offensive and not being hit, which additionally stressed out her system. It was relatively smart as this way of using these types of augmentations reduced the risk of ruining one's chakra network as it was nowhere near as stressful as coating oneself while one was being hit.
Usubane managed to send Honda shooting skyward, the rabbit, using her amazingly powerful lower body, followed up on her airborne opponent. Mana would not have risked it with this kind of pursuit, she made sure to use her Mystical Wings Jutsu to follow her rabbit partner in case she needed to be pulled out as the kunoichi expected Honda to just spontaneously pop back into his senses any time now.
This was especially likely now, when both combatants were airborne and dodging in close distance was near-impossible without some sort of ninjutsu technique to aid one with propelling themselves aside, like Mana's Mystical Wings may have, however this particular jutsu may have been too slow to help Mana evade Honda in time if such a need ever arose.
"Rabbit F.U. Combo!" Usubane yelled out while still in the middle of delivering her combination of strikes from her hands, her feet, and her stiffened ears as she was buzzing by and around the dazed monster, the force of impact and the wide coverage of Usubane's combination attack caused Honda to smash into the Hanada's gambling house.
Mana cursed to herself as she had lost visual of her partner and she quickened her own ascension to catch up to the hole those two had made. Her technique could not yet race even with the lower body strength of the B-Rank ninja rabbits so far. Then again, Mana would not have chosen this particular manner of assault so this weakness in aerial combat was not much of a hassle to her.
"Lion Barrage!" Mana heard Usubane almost scream out while loud rumble, smoke, and debris shot out from the building as the rabbit continuously kicked the monster through every floor until he slammed into the ground of the bottom floor with a thunderous thud. Mana swooped down. She canceled her technique to start her fall and then initiated it again to pick up the pace once she reached the state of terminal velocity to save any bystanders still dumb enough to approach anywhere near the Hanada gambling house.
Usubane appeared to have complete control over the battle, at least looking at it from the purely physical aspect but Mana sensed the disturbance in her spiritual and chakra network aspects. The rabbit had thrown everything she had, strained her body even past her previously known limits as she continued to exert more and more on it and deliver blow after blow. Just like a blazing flame attempting to reach the sky to join the scorching stars above, Usubane found herself out of fuel and therefore her state dwindled down to a fraction of her usual capabilities.
Still, the rabbit was clever. She took great care in increasing her distance from the downed monster once her onslaught was completed. Had Honda just spontaneously hopped into action or brushed off Bane's blows without flinching, the rabbit would have been too invested into her offense to survive the counterattack or respond to it in any meaningful way. Mana took a mad dive through a busted window and canceled her Mystical Wings only to complete the flip in mid-air and land beside Usubane.
"I know… You told me to wait for an opening but…" Usubane huffed before grinning like a child that ate all the cookies giving their parents their most dirtied with chocolate stains smile and not regretting a single thing in the world.
"It was a great combination. I would not have advised attacking Honda this way but it showed me something interesting." Mana brushed it off.
"A weakness?" Usubane wondered with childish glee in her voice. She must have truly loved seeing Mana strategize and overcome opponents that were completely outside her pay grade just like Little Honda.
"Perhaps, it is too early to be certain so just stay focused for now," Mana warned Usubane as Honda's hand just swiped left and right grabbing at air. Without a doubt, the monster had intended Usubane to be somewhere nearby when he recovered, so that he could counterattack but his reflexes and return to form took quadruple the time Mana recalled it taking from the cheap shots she took at the monster before.
Honda snarled and growled like an animal. His eyes screamed for bloody murder while unidentifiable goop dripped in unremarkable yet consistent amounts from his open mouth. Mana, as someone with a little martial arts training, could identify the movements of someone with busted bones, someone with internal injuries clutching and protecting the injured sides ever so slightly.
When Honda charged forward after roaring out just to expel the nastiness present within his chest given birth from his burning, monstrous rage, there was none of that. The lab-made horror did not protect himself in any way, he completely threw defenses out the window and just tried to kill. Mana cried out for Usubane to be careful as she read the incoming attack before it even happened – that was the only way for efficient evasive action but it was too late.
Honda's foot blasted Usubane aside. The lifeless sack of the rabbit's body shot through the building and busted through countless more in a straight line before it stopped carrying nearly as much weight and simply collapsed into dust. The curious bystanders that would have observed the rabbit's lifeless body at the end of her trip would not have found a rabbit to have demolished dozens of buildings in a straight line but instead just a piece of a steel beam.
Mana's feet landed firmly on a wall, as the Mystical Wings Jutsu dissolved it emitted a weak pulse of Wind Release chakra. Usubane blinked a pair of times before looking up and at Mana who panted moderately. This may have been one of the more stressful dodges that the girl had initiated, not to mention the fact that she had to close so much distance at speeds far surpassing her own.
"Y-You used Substitution Jutsu… For me." Usubane muttered while sticking to the same wall. She was so taken aback by Mana breaking her own imposed rule on the way she fought that the bunny could not be bothered to check on the confused Honda who just kept looking around, desperately trying to find the magician girl and the irksome rabbit that had delivered a beatdown on him before. Evidently, the rabbit was aware of Mana's original jutsu policy and was taken aback by the magician's non-hesitation to break it to pull her out of harm's way.
"I need you to hit him with your strongest shot, right now. Look for an opening and then give him everything you have. I know you're tired, I know your chakra is extremely low but you should be able to pull off one more best shot. Can you do it for me?" Mana said bluntly.
"Is this about the weakness you thought you found?" Usubane got hyped up. Her hands moved slower, her voice sounded huskier due to the difficulty breathing that the rabbit had as she had expended most of her stamina already. Mana was not doing all too hot herself but she would have to manage… Somehow.
"Yeah. If you hit him your hardest, you can break him." Mana nodded. She made sure to look into Usubane's remaining chakra resources so that the summoned animal was not too taxed and did not end up dying because of her request – it should have worked like Mana had planned.
"Alright, I'll look for the chance and then go, just like you asked me, Mana-san!" Usubane declared loudly enough for Honda to catch a glimpse of the two withdrawn combatants and launch his body like a cannonball at them.
Mana pushed Usubane away from harm while Honda's bodyslam splattered her in a shower of blood-red all over the gambling house, however, before the spray of red could even touch the floor it turned into flower petals and dissolved away in a gentle, scattering dance. Honda slammed his body against the wall so hard that he busted through and out.
The deluge of flower petals gathered into a humanoid shape that revealed itself to be Mana's true body, right in front of Honda's sneering scowl. The magician dashed back into the building, the last thing she wanted was to take the battle elsewhere, somewhere where innocent people could have gotten hurt. While the Hanada gambling house had taken plenty of punishment, it also was one of the sturdiest buildings in the village as well as being relatively empty and self-contained.
Honda did not wait for the encouragement to rush after Mana. The magician cried out in pain as the monster drove his feet in a mad foot dive in her back, stomping her to the ground. Something of such colossal force would have killed her instantly, no matter how much the magician tried augmenting her body, however, Mana's body once more dissolved into flower petals and reformed just a little bit further from Honda's rampage-led landing.
The monster howled into the air wildly, emitting a powerful air pressure shock from his chest that paralyzed all within the distance but it was not a manner of attack, it was merely an expulsion of the ceaseless bitterness building up in his heart. Not the cool kind of outburst-type rage but more of a pitiful, resenting kind. One that made Mana's heart burn in regret of having to go all-out against this monster like this, even having all that he had done that day in mind.
This was Usubane's opening, the monster was slightly winded after rampaging about and a bit out of breath from all the temper tantrums he threw. Mana did not have to request Usubane to attack, the rabbit's fighting instincts were just fine.
Like a fiery javelin, Usubane dug her elbow into the insides of the enemy, distorting and misshaping the fleshy lump that was Honda's body and forcing bursts of bio-organic goop to push its way through every crevice or every patched up cut on Honda's body. The teen rabbit truly was putting all of her remaining chakra into this one attack, just like Mana asked.
It was a relatively new feeling – to have one's judgment trusted and unquestioned in its entirety but it also felt bitter, knowing that Mana was tricking the rabbit for her own selfish ends.
The force generated by Usubane's elbow strike was sufficient to cause even Honda's giant body lift off the ground. A motion that was enforced by a barrage of Usubane's taijutsu strikes and kicks at various areas of the opponent's body within her reach. With every strike and kick the rabbit forced out a flare of Fire Release chakra through her pores creating a very visually appealing and immensely hot visual of Usubane's beatdown appearing as flaming as it was crushing.
"Hot Rabbit Combo!" Usubane roared out, just to keep her fighting spirit alive and burning in mid-air. It was evident from the slower and weightier movements of the rabbit's strikes that her limbs felt numb as if filled with lead and yet she delivered this combination through willpower and devotion to Mana. Once again, the blaze of regret over her words to the rabbit consumed taller and taller heights in Mana's chest, threatening to spill out into the open vocally.
An impressive overhead kick sent Honda crashing back down into the crater of his own creation, deepening it almost twice since the time that the monster first crashed there a pair of moments earlier. Usubane landed on her knees, she could not stand up anymore, hyperventilating on all fours with sweat dripping from her furry body. The following sight would hunt Mana for a long time to come and the magician knew it.
The rabbit raised her head horrified and looked at the magician with betrayal screaming from the bunny's eyes whereas her mouth remained open yet silent. She must have realized that trick that Mana pulled on her but could not wrap her head around the reason why Mana would lie to the rabbit about the exact amount of chakra she had left.
"W-Why?" was all she uttered before she poofed away into smoke back to the safety of the Rabbit Caves.
Mana closed her eyes so that tears did not run down her face. "We both know there's nothing we can do at this point. No one else will get hurt because of me," she uttered before turning back to Honda, who was rising from the crater again, his chakra slightly dipped from the point it was previously but his body had completely recovered from all damage delivered to him that day.
"Magic girl, where did the rabbit go!?" Honda yelled out. "I will eat the rabbit for this before I play with the machines."
"She used too much chakra and was forced back to the Rabbit Caves. We're all alone now." Mana replied to the monster, wondering just how much of this did Honda understand and to what extent was he truly just going along the circumstances around him. "It's time you go to sleep."
"No!" Honda yelled out before charging at Mana. His speed was as unbelievable as the magician expected it to be, he moved near instantaneously and his fingers cut through even augmented human flesh like hot knives through butter, tearing Mana's body apart with a mere swipe of his hand. Blood and gore turned to flower petals of the same color and in a swirling vortex of flora revealed Mana's true position compared to the illusionary body that was just destroyed.
Mana's own chakra was running dangerously low, mostly because of the insane amount of times she had used Flower Petal Sanctuary in quick succession. It was almost the only technique that the magician managed to squeeze into this fight – all she could do was bargain for more time and do her best to hide and not die. What other options did she have? Honda was just as fast, if not getting faster, than he was when he started whereas Mana was beginning to grow weary, get a bit drowsy and felt the pressure of blood building up in bags under her eyes. The trademark symptoms of chakra approaching critical levels.
Honda threw his body in a mad flip, there was no point or grace to his movement, he merely wished to be where Mana was so he could smash her with a hammer-arm strike and so he simply chugged his meaty body at her like a ragdoll. The magician's body splattered like a tomato under Honda's fist while flower petals once more revealed Mana to have hidden even farther aside during the delay between the two attacks.
"Stand still!" Honda roared out. "This isn't fair!"
"Can't get the ticket, if you can't whack the mole." Mana taunted the monster even more. She wasn't sure if it was wise but she did not particularly care. She had maybe one more yank out of danger left in her before she hits the dry land and has to accept her own mortality and the absolute difference in power between her and Honda. Even now, the magician was being drawn to the floor like a guard after multiple all-nighter shifts. She'd likely pass out immediately after the next illusion so she most likely won't even feel anything when the time comes…
Honda's body disappeared again. He had made a mistake – he jumped up instead of coming right at Mana, perhaps the illusionary route was not necessary to dodge this attack? With an impressive effort, likely learned from watching television, Honda repurposed the force of his landing into a charging lariat that carried Mana off and through another support column and threw her illusionary body out of the building, this time in slightly better condition before it dissolved once more.
This time, however, Honda had smashed one pillar too many. The thunderous rumble from above approached the ground floor in escalating speed, the entire floor sunk in a grey cloud of dust while sharp and heavy rubble bashed against anyone foolish enough to have remained in one of the toughest and likely safest buildings in the entire world. The mighty and shiny Hanada gambling house was now just a two-floor tall size of steel beams and a concrete pyramid of rubble.
Concrete rubble the size of a caravan rolled aside and were thrown up by an immense force as Honda emerged unscathed from under the rubble. His eyes racing across the empty village looking for the next bloody murder or thing to do, scanning the environment for that pesky raven-haired fairy to re-emerge so that Honda could finally squish her but as more and more time passed he saw nothing but dust getting scattered in the wind and deadly silence.
Humanity returned back to Honda's eyes as the monster pulled out a torn rag from underneath the rubble, rolling himself up in it like a child tucking himself in and wandered off for the next thing to catch his attention.