What's that? A new chapter so soon? You bet your ass it is! I hope you enjoy it!
Yuji and the others hurried towards the main building of Gessen Academy. The 5 of them remained on guard, wary of any attacks that may come their way.
FWOOOOM!
Yuji whirled around to see billowing blue flames from where they'd left Ikaruga, the young man letting out a cry of concern.
"Ikaruga! S-should we go back?" He asked in a distraught tone
"No." Yagyu replied with a shake of her head "We have to trust that she'll be fine. The sooner we end this battle, the sooner we can come back and check on her."
"Yagyu is right Yuji, let's go." Asuka said giving him a slight nudge "We'll come back for Ikaruga."
As much as he detested doing it, Yuji managed to reign in his emotions and continue forward. Heading inside, the group looked around and noticed...well, that it was a normal looking school. There were several doors leading to classrooms, stairs that lead to the upper floors and nothing else of note.
"Looks normal…" Hibari muttered "Maybe the rest of the Gessen girls aren't here?"
"I wish." Katsuragi grunted "Come on let's keep moving. I'm sure if we head upwards we'll find them."
As soon as she took a step forward, Katsuragi felt a small bit of the floor sink lower than usual, causing her to let out a curse.
"Trap! Hit the floor!"
No one argued as they all ducked without a second thought, only for a sign to drop down from the ceiling. Looking at one another confused, they all got back to their feet before reading said sign.
"Dear Hanzo Shinobi, please proceed to the gymnasium." along with that message as a crudely drawn arrow pointing straight down the hallway.
"The Gym?" Yuji muttered "Why there?"
"Not like we have much of a choice. We have to take them down, so may as well play along at least for now." Katsuragi said with a shrug
And so the group followed the signs suggestion and went towards the gymnasium. It only took a few minutes of walking before they were in a school gym that was similar in size to the one at Hanzo Academy. The only real difference is that there were bleachers that were affixed to the wall and so they couldn't be removed. However, what was more notable was the girl with blonde hair who sat atop them. She was wearing the gray uniform and currently was idly tapping away at her phone, clearly texting.
The Hanzo students all looked at her for a moment before Yagyu finally decided to make herself known.
"AHEM!" Yagyu faked coughed loudly, hoping to grab the girl's attention.
Thankfully, this did the trick as the blonde haired girl looked away from her phone and noticed the people below her.
"Oh, you're here! It's been a while Yaggy~!"
"...Yaggy?" Yuji asked
"Don't call me that." She growled, whether it was at Yuji himself or the girl, he didn't know, but he decided to shut up either way.
Leaping down from the top of the bleachers, the Blonde landed in front of them all, a smile wide on her face.
"It's good to see you all...and to see you again Yaggy!"
"Stop. Calling me. Yaggy!" Yagyu growled
"That's such an ugly face you're making Yaggy, you've got to smile more!" she said pointing at Yagyu as if she were a mother disciplining her child. "Anyway, which one of you am I taking on? I wanna finish this quick so I can rest up. The new outfits from the Hatsune brand are dropping tomorrow and I can't miss it."
At this Yuji's interest was peaked "Did you say the Hatsune brand?"
"Yeah? What would a guy like you know about it?" The girl said in a dismissive tone.
Yuji couldn't help but chuckle at the reply "Well my mom works for them for one. She does most of the designing. Though I can tell you're wearing some of their make up too. Judging by the colors...let me guess...Late Night Meetup?"
The Blonde girl couldn't help but let a look of surprise wash over her face "B-but how did you…?!"
"Like I said, my mom works for them. She talks to me about all kinds of stuff that goes on at work, makeup, clothing, perfumes, the works." He replied casually "I even have to do some fittings for the male clothing sometimes."
"You're a model!?"
"Nah, though some of my mom's coworkers joked I should give a try, but I don't have the looks for that."
The girl was silent for a moment before speaking again, a small bit of redness on her face "W-well, I wouldn't say you're bad looking...but um...just forget I said that okay?"
"Sure, I'm still flattered though." Yuji laughed "Oh yeah, pro tip: Don't bother with the clothes coming out tomorrow."
"Why not?"
"That's just some regular stuff dropping, nothing too amazing really. The really good stuff is coming a few days after that. The Hatsune brand is trying out the idea of stealth dropping some new releases here and there."
"Are you serious?!" she nearly shouted
"100%. I even know what stores are getting them."
Before he could say anything more, the blonde haired girl was up in his face with her phone in her hand. "Phone number! Now!"
"Oh uh...sure?" The boy was so caught off guard by her words that he traded contact info with her without a second thought. Looking down at the name, he finally knew what to call her: 'Shiki'.
"Great! Yuji, we're gonna meet up in a few days for shopping. You've gotta help me and my friends look our best!"
"I uh...sure thing Shiki." He said still a bit confused at how things had reached this point. All he did was talk about some fashion topics and give her a good tip.
"Are you two finished?" Asuka sighed
"Huh? Oh yeah, Shiki and I just-"
"Good." Asuka said rudely cutting him off and taking his arm "We're going on ahead then." she began to drag him away. "Hey Shiki, which way do we go next?"
"Right out that door to the back, it leads to another area!" Shiki replied "See ya soon Yuji!"
"Y-yeah, see ya in a few-ack! Asuka, stop! You're choking me! What's wrong?!"
Shiki watched as the group left, happy to have met a person who was also knowledgeable about the fashion world.
"Oh crap...I just let the enemy go!" Shiki groaned as the realization dawned on her "I-I gotta go after them!"
"No need." Came a voice from behind her as she had started to run off after Yuji and the others, turning around, she saw that it was Yagyu, who was standing there with her umbrella drawn.
"Yaggy! Oh okay, this works! I'll totally take you on again!"
"Tch, it'll do so good for me to beat you. Maybe then you'll stop with that obnoxious nickname."
"It's not obnoxious. It's cute! All of my nicknames are cute!"
Yagyu rolled her eyes, taking out her transformation scroll "I'm through speaking with you. From this point forward, our skills as shinobi will do the talking."
"Well that's fine with me Yaggy, but you should be careful, I may just end up killing you!" Shiki replied with a wide smile, despite how cheerfully she said that, Yagyu couldn't help but notice the venom that was hidden underneath it.
"Kill me? Better shinobi have tried."she replied, engulfing herself in light as her transformation took place. When it was finished Yagyu was wearing a pale brown jacket over a white school shirt, red plaid skirt, brown loafers, and calf-high black stockings. Around her shoulders is a black mantle like cape and in her hands she held an oil-paper umbrella, though if one looked closely they could see that the tips were bladed and quite sharp at that.
"Wow, that's actually pretty cute Yaggy. Your outfit goes well with your eyepatch!" Shiki said with a giggle, "Buuuut, I think I can do one better~!"
Taking out a transformation scroll of her own, Shiki engulfed herself in light, when it ended she was now wearing a black bustier suit outfit, with heeled black boots, and shoulder-long black gloves. Her outfit revealed both her cleavage and the sides of her breasts and had a skull encrusted peace sign-like buckle attached right above a rivet, that held her breast straps in place. Like Yagyu, she had a cape as well, though it was a darker shade of black than Yagyu's. The most notable thing about Shiki's shinobi garb though was the large black hat she wore. It was similar to what a witch from a western fairy tale would wear, with the biggest difference being that a pair of bat wings were on the sides. As Shiki winked at Yagyu, her hat did the same. And in her hands she held a double-bladed scythe
"So what do you think Yaggy?" Shiki giggled
Yagyu looked the girl over for a moment and saw just how scantily clad. That sort of outfit would have even put Haruka to shame.
"I'm thankful Yuji isn't here. He'd be probably be looking at you from several different angles all at once."
"YuYu is a perv?!" Shiki exclaimed in shock
"...Not necessarily." Yagyu replied, it was odd, she had thought she didn't care all that much about Yuji, but seeing Shiki jump to that conclusion rubbed her the wrong way and so she spoke up.
"It's not really his fault. Katsuragi tends to tease him by harassing us and making him watch. Not to mention he's a guy, it's only natural."
"He ogles all of you?!"
"No, just Asuka, though she doesn't realize it."
"Oh...oh my god, they're dating?!"
"No, but sooner or later something is going to give. Katsuragi has a bet going on which of the two is gonna cave first."
"Who ya bettin' on Yaggy?"
"Asuka. Yuji's not gonna notice fast enough."
"Interesting...I wonder how true that is. Aw well, I can ask Yuji later when we go shopping, after I beat you!"
The air instantly grew more tense as the two young shinobi got into combat stances. It wasn't too long before Shiki was the one to attack first. She didn't want to give Yagyu any chances to get an attack in and so the Gessen elite closed the distance with ease. Notable in that it wasn't just her running, but instead she'd turned into a swarm of fast moving bats and made her way to Yagyu, reforming before attacking her head on. Yagyu blocked the attack with ease, quickly spinning her umbrella so that Shiki became off-balance. Seeing this chance, Yagyu was able to land a solid kick to Shiki's stomach, causing the girl to grunt as she was knocked back.
"Guh, that hurt Yaggy!" Shiki whined as she rubbed her stomach
"Good." Yagyu curtly replied
Not wanting to give the blonde any chance to counterattack, Yagyu pointed her umbrella towards her before quickly firing several rounds of black projectiles at Shiki. A small usage of her guardian animal's abilities, the ink shots that Yagyu used were good for dealing damage and also blinding or slowing down an opponent.
"Like, no you don't Yaggy!"
Shiki quickly began using both sides of her scythe to block and deflect the shots that were coming towards her. It was frustrating for Yagyu, since Shiki was faster than she appeared and was able to perfectly deflect her attack. Deciding that it was useless, Yagyuu instead closed the distance on Shiki, just as the blonde had done to her and began to swing her umbrella at her. She took a few swipes with it, managing to angle it in such a way that the blades would scratch against Shiki's scythe, however, making use of her weapons unique capabilities, she was able to once again circumvent her defenses and catch off guard, slashing Shiki several times with her umbrella and shredding some of her clothing.
"Ugh! Dammit Yaggy, you're ruining my outfit!"
"Not like there's much to ruin…"
Shiki let out an uncharacteristic snarl before once again becoming a group of flying bats, flying towards Yagyu, but this time rotating herself so that she'd become a literal spinning ball of death. Yagyu, only barely dodged the attack, some of her jacket becoming ripped and outright torn in some places.
"Tch, you're irritating." Yagyu grunted
"You're not bad yourself Yaggy. I don't get why you'd associate with a bunch of evil ninja."
"You know of…? It doesn't matter, what happened in Kyoto was necessary for everyone's survival...and loath as I am to admit it, Haruka is Hibari's friend and I would never hurt a friend of Hibari's."
"You're friends with an evil shinobi too?!"
"No, but I can at the very least tolerate her...for a while at least."
"That's...that's no good Yaggy! She's a bad guy!"
"And from where I'm standing you're a worse guy." Yagyu deadpanned
"What?!"
There! Yagyu's words had had the desired effect: They distracted Shiki long enough for her to dart in close and attack her. "Ninja art, Sweeping Legs!"
In an instant, a translucent blue squid appeared above her umbrella. Yagyu quickly spun her umbrella like before, the tentacles spinning as well and hitting shiki several times in quick succession, causing more rips and tears to appear on her outfit. Now one of the straps of her dress had been destroyed leaving one of her breasts hanging free.
"G-gah! That hurts!"
"The intended effect." Yagyu curtly replied
"Well I can do that too! Ninja art, Shiki Soku ZX!"
"Shiki soku what?"
Yagyu got her answer as red mist and numerous bats appeared around Shiki, she sat upon them almost as if they were a chair, tossing her scythe so that the bats caught and held the bladed ends for her before they rushed towards Yagyu. It was almost like the blonde was in a chariot as it rammed into her knocking her back as at the same time Shiki took her scythe and threw it towards Yagyu, the blades catching her and slicing up her clothing even more revealing her pink bra underneath.
Growling at her clothing being ripped to shreds and knowing that her stamina was getting lower. She again fired more ink shots at Shiki as she closed the distance to attack. Once she got in close she thrust her umbrella towards Shiki's exposed stomach hitting her, but not letting up and instead following up with an overhead smash that nearly caused Shiki to hit the ground face first. However, she powered through the pain, and focused enough to have her bats catch her fall, but also to move her just far enough away that she dodged another attack from Yagyu. Instead using the surprise from her sudden movement to her advantage, and with a quick twirl delivering another slash across Yagyu's midsection destroying even more of her outfit. She was now all but topless and Shiki could tell that the prodigy was getting tired.
Of course, the same could be said about her. Her outfit was in ruins and she could feel tiredness catching up with her. She had to end this quickly before she got completely worn out. She once again decided to ride the momentum she'd gotten and attack Yagyu again, slashing at her several times, twisting and twirling her body to avoid any attacks that came her way. Yagyu was barely keeping up, managing to block some attacks with her umbrella, spinning it when she could to disorient Shiki and trying her best to get some hits in on the blonde. The problem is that Yagyu was in a worse state than Shiki and due to this, several of Shiki's hits connected. The result was Yagyu now bleeding in several places and she was wincing from the pain.
"C-can't let this stop me…" Yagyu grunted as she got to her feet
"I gotta say...you're way better than I thought Yaggy...you're still standing after all that." Shiki said with genuine surprise.
"It'll take more than that to beat me, I've suffered far worse!"
"I fully believe you now. Hey Yaggy...Yagyu, I have question, do you mind?"
"That being?"
"If we weren't in this situation...this whole everything…" She said giving small wave of her hands "Could we have been friends? Like...go shopping and stuff?"
Yagyu had to pause for a moment. It was a strange question given the current situation, but after thinking for a few moments Yagyu let out a sigh "We could have. Shopping sounds fun...do you like aquariums?"
"I've never been to one."
"Then we could have gone to one of those two. There are many beautiful animals there."
"Hehe, that actually sounds nice."
"It does. Perhaps in another world this could have happened. But for now…" Yagyu said, her voice taking a cold edge "I'm putting an end to this!"
Jumping in to the air, Yagyu made several hand signs. As she descended a giant squid appeared beneath her. Landing on its head, Yagyu began channeling her power into the squid as it began shooting chunks of ice all over the room.
"Ninja Art, Ice Feet!" shouted, more and more ice being shot all over in Shiki's general direction
"W-whoa!" Shiki shouted as she dodged as best as she could. The ice chunks were so large that they were actually freezing the room wherever they ended up landing. One flew by Shiki's leg, grazing her ever so slightly, but even that was enough to allow small bits of ice to slowly begin to form around her body. She had to end this fast before she completely froze over.
"Ninja art, Kū Soku ZIX!" Shiki shouted tossing her hat into the air, What came next caught Yagyu completely by surprise as Shiki's hat grew to a large size and begin jutting out reddish-black smoke towards her.
Only It wasn't smoke...no, it was actually a swarm of bats so numerous that it looked like a cloud of smoke that was heading towards her. She had to move, but she was a sitting duck for the most part during the duration of her ninja art, since her squid couldn't really move too well on the ground. Even with this, Yagyu tried in vain to move out of the way of the attack, but it was to no avail as she was hit by dozens upon dozens of bats, all of them flying into her bashing right into her as well as outright biting her if they could. The force of the attack was more than Yagyu could take and she was knocked off of her squid summon which disappeared in short order. The bats hung around her body nipping and biting at her as much as they could before returning to Shiki's hat as Yagyu lay motionless in the middle of the gym.
Shiki let out a long sigh, it was only now that she realized that she was pretty much out of energy. Slumping to the ground Shiki let out another small sigh.
"Damn Yagyu...you're way better than I thought. I got lucky in the end." she muttered to herself
Getting back to her feet, she walked carefully over to Yagyu, her guard still up in case of any surprise attacks, though she knew it'd not do her much good, if Yagyu got up and pressed her even more, she'd end up losing. To that end, she was relieved to see that Yagyu was completely out cold. She was bleeding here and there with numerous bat bites, but that would heal with time. Shiki sidled up next to Yagyu, looking at the passed out girl.
"Don't worry Yaggy...I'll stay here till you wake up. Yumi shouldn't mind me doing that much at least."
The Gessen elite took one last look at the wrecked gym that had patches of ice littering the floor as well as several deep impact marks along with the bits of blood that were dotted around the area as well.
"Yeah...this'll definitely help get school closed for a few days." she thought to herself with a wide grin.
-000-
Naraku had followed behind the others and played witness to the fight between Yagyu and Shiki. Naraku had to admit that she was surprised to see Yagyu ultimately lose the fight. The girl is a very competent shinobi and no pushover in a fight. These Gessen girls were shaping up to be pretty impressive in their own right, they were giving the students of Hanzo a good run for their money and this fight showed that. Yagyu wasn't too good at handling all of the bats that the blonde girl could summon.
"I'd better move in and save her…" Naraku muttered before stopping herself as she witnessed Shiki sidle up next to Yagyu, it didn't look to out of the ordinary, but Naraku could tell that Shiki was being...protective? The blonde sat there but Naraku could see her scanning the room and idly twirling her scythe in case anything or anyone got close.
"That's cute." Naraku muttered, chuckling silently at the display, Yagyu's safety was assured and if any stray yoma appeared, then she should be fine. With that being the case, Naraku backed away from the door she'd been peeping through and exited out of a window, following the rest of the Hanzo group that way. With the way the battles were going, it was becoming more and more likely that yoma could appear and that was...a double-edged sword as far as Naraku was concerned. On the one hand the yoma appearing could lead to her friends as well as the Gessen shinobi getting badly injured or even killed and since they were already worn down from fighting the idea of them dying in battle was far more likely. The idea of that brought back memories of Kyoto and Naraku couldn't help but let out a sigh of shame as she remembered the part she played in it. On the other hand, if yoma did appear then it could lead to her having an idea of what was going on with that boy Yuji. He didn't seem to strike Naraku as someone who had dealings with yoma, She'd seen what that was like with that man Dogen, while Yuji seemed to be a normal boy. But then she wasn't like Kagura. Kagura was really in tune with yoma so to speak, being able to detect them fairly easily a large majority of the time. Even at their new home and work she'd already caught onto and killed at least a dozen.
"Forgive me Kagura-sama...but I really hope you're wrong about Yuji." Naraku muttered as she continued along.
If it turned out Yuji really was colluding with yoma to inflict harm on people, especially people Kagura considered friends then she could only maybe hopefully convince her to make the boy's death quick and painless or at the very least kill him somewhere that Asuka wouldn't be present. She could see from their interactions during the talk with Shiki that she was clearly fond of the boy and that they were good friends. She also noticed that Yuji kept stealing glances at her, not unlike how Hanzo had done with herself and Kagura when he was helping them.
She just hoped that Yuji was slower than that old man for Asuka's sake so that she could deliver some divine punishment on him. Naraku recalled how she'd tried that with Hanzo when he'd felt her up and how he easily dodged all of her efforts to grab or attack him and then tied her up in rope. Rope that accentuated certain parts of the body and dug into them too.
Naraku had small blush on her face as she remembered that...mostly because a part of her had actually ended up liking it.
That was a secret that Naraku was going to take to the grave and that absolutely no one could ever know about! Not even Kagura could ever know!
The green haired shinobi shook the thoughts from her mind and continued onward, it was time to see what would happen next.
You know I've always thought Shiki has probably one of the coolest aesthetics in the Senran Kagura series. I dunno, I just find her use of bats and her scythe pretty cool. It helps that Shiki is generally a total sweetheart too. One of the best Gessen girls in my opinion. That said I hope you all enjoyed this chapter. Again, I don't think I'm the best at long drawn out fight scenes, but I'm still gonna give it a shot. And yes, Yuji just scored a date. Well...kind of. It certainly looks that way to Asuka anyway.