"For the next match we have – Yamanaka Kiyomi, a young lady of the Yamanaka clan – one of the most honored and well-known ninja clans of our village. She validates her clan's reputation in all the right ways, controlling and toying with the minds of her enemies both using her feared clan techniques and without them. Her feats include manipulating her opponent into disqualifying their entire tag team, resulting in her winning the match all by herself without even needing to resort to her famous clan techniques!" Overseer Oke continued to hype Kiyomi up.
Kiyomi wanted to have more tangible and amazing feats attributed to her name. Her clan background demanded her having eliminated a whole bunch of people, passing the paper test all by herself and carrying her entire team on her shoulders as well as being the prodigy ninja everyone feared of facing the most. Sadly, her ability to piss people off appeared to be the only thing worth mentioning, the only thing of mention that she has accomplished. She was no prodigy, just a hustler, squiggling and crawling her way onto barely surviving this long.
"Her opponent is the freak of nature, one of few known survivors of the mysterious disappearances that have been plaguing our village. Tanko Shigin used to be the most unimpressive ninja, now, as his sensei put it – "If there is a way to injure this young man, we have not discovered it"." Oke gestured at Shigin who just lazily picked his nose before shyly chuckling after he was caught in the act and pinched the boogers away.
The audience ate him up. Why would they not have? For one – he was the underdog, everyone always cheered for the good for nothing loser when they faced off against the elite because it was the ultimate fantasy for those people in the audience. A much more sensitive reason was that he survived. So many people just disappearing without any rhyme or reason, this one not only returned but also brought back amazing abilities which inspired hope that one's own beloved ones could also make such a miraculous return from the unknown.
"Do you remember anything from what happened when you were gone?" Kiyomi quietly asked her opponent before Oke walked back and prepared to declare the beginning of the match.
"Not really. All I can remember is our mission going wrong, everyone thought I was already gone so they left me behind to lure the enemy away. From what they told me when they returned to pick my body up – I was gone. Ain't it crazy!?" Shigin laughed out as goofily as he could. "Now I got all these amazing abilities, maybe that's what's happening to everyone disappearing, they're gonna return eventually just like me?"
"He comes back completely invulnerable one day and they say that I'm the favorite and he's the underdog. Othello G was right – audiences really are crazy." Kiyomi thought to herself minding her opponent's crazy unbelievable story of obtaining his invulnerability. Granted, she had only heard of it so it may have been just a story. It would have been a very ninja thing to do to make up a story of being invulnerable but too many people who had no reason to lie also went along with it. He had to be invulnerable and no one had any explanation of just how he pulled that off, or rather, what even happened to him while he was making the disappearance without a trace statistics…
Immediately, once the match started, Kiyomi moved her hand for her back ninja pouch, removing a prepared handful of explosives before weaving hand seals. She needed to scope out and witness this invulnerability first hand before she made any big moves for her victory. She needed to see if the invulnerability was biological and passive or if an additional technique needed to be used, if it was based on the toughness of his body or a regenerative technique.
"Earth Style: Travelling Rock Pillar!" the blonde yelled out as a pillar of stone and dirt shot from underground, making the floating tiny explosive tags stick onto it and voyage at the opponent, splitting the ground beneath. Without even bothering to attempt to dodge the jutsu, Tanko waved his hands around playfully, as if he was warming up as the stone pillar smacked him right in the chest and his chin, throwing him up in the air and detonating all of the explosive tags right up in his face.
Kiyomi waited for the smoke to clear up, but, apparently, Tanko did not, as he charged out from the open with a lively punch. Kiyomi raised her hands up for a block, as expected, her well-trained arms that have blocked blows from opponents hundreds of thousands of times stronger than this punch cushioned the blow while the blonde delivered quick and sharp jabs at the tall doofus' joints, scoping if his bones were par for the invulnerability course. She needed to know it all – if her opponent had any vitals to be hit, if his joints could break and his tendons could snap.
So far, the answer was frustratingly negative as Kiyomi's two fingers merely dipped into the fleshy skin of her opponent without hitting any bone or inner resistance. Quickly, the Team Hokage leader flipped back into safety and outside the close-range distance. It did not look like her opponent was willing to let her go, however, as having just giggled at her attempts to hurt him, Shigin bounced like his heels were made of jelly strings right after Kiyomi, throwing flappy smacks and kicks using his wrists and feet. Her clothes and elbow managed to slightly dip into one of the acid pools which annoyed and distracted the girl for just long enough, requiring additional chakra for the environmental hazard to be neutralized. Shigin was all up in her face once she was done, even if it only took half of a moment.
This was so bad! No damage he took did anything other than amuse him, the worst of all was that now he trapped Kiyomi into a ceaseless dance of him trying to chase her down and hit her. Eventually, her defenses would lower, even if she was superior to him in terms of taijutsu skill, it would not matter if she could not fight back. From close range, she could not even rely on her hijutsu…
A flabby kick made Kiyomi cough up with blood as she rolled back and stretched out in the frozen dirt and snow. Her opponent leaped up in the air, not satisfied with just this much damage as he threw his feet forward in a barrage of similarly stringy and flappy stomps. Kiyomi tried to shield her head and whatever areas the stomps targeted but her opponent's strikes were just too quick – it was like the boy's body didn't weigh absolutely anything and the air around him offered no resistance. Like his blows were launched from a slingshot…
After Shigin's stamping combination satisfied him, the goofy young man just landed besides Kiyomi before kicking her aside in the gut. Worn out by Shigin's endless attacks, the blonde covered up her face and skipped a very light but quick flappy smack of the opponent's foot right at her abdomen that lifted her body up in the air and sent her tumbling back. Once again she slid over the surface of another pool of acid, splashing some of it all over herself and having to stress her chakra network to fix the acid before it even took effect. Not only did it strain Kiyomi's chakra network, but thinking and reacting so fast pelted at her mind as well.
Even after this, her opponent did not let up, he pressed on, charging at Kiyomi and forcing the Yamanaka to fight for her space to breathe. It was like this goofball did not even had lungs to draw breath in and like he functioned completely by some miracle of nature alone. The Yamanaka heiress delivered a fast and deafeningly loud slap before detonating the explosive tag that was in her palm, sending both her and her opponent tumbling back from the concussive force.
Feeling the ache all around her body and her ribs just burning up, Kiyomi quickly hustled her way back on her feet before raising her hands up. She wanted to find out if her opponent was truly invulnerable and how it worked, she had achieved one of those things. Understanding something that smarter people than her failed to do would have absolutely killed her, she needed to work this fight through instinct and gamble her victory. That was the only way she could have possibly won.
The ends of Kiyomi's lips lightly twisted upward, she was the absolute worst opponent for Shigin. She, similarly to Mana, did not even attempt to match her opponent's speed or power. Kiyomi was a different category of ninja entirely and a physical fight was her backup plan, unlike the most ninja. She had obtained plenty of knowledge of her opponent in these painful exchanges of blows. Kiyomi knew how her opponent fought now, he arrogantly placed his trust in his invincibility and that would be his downfall.
The Yamanaka threw her hand back, stroking through her rich and thick bright locks before working through a collection of hand seals. Her opponent charged at her again but, at that point, it was too late, her ninjutsu was ready.
Shigin charged through an empty cloud of dust, trying to wail his stringy flaps he called blows all around but to no avail as his opponent appeared to have disappeared completely.
"Earth Style: Submarine Voyage!" Kiyomi yelled out delivering a powerful strike from underground, it was like whatever Shigin's flesh was made of wrapped around Kiyomi's punch, as if his each cell moved away and shifted around her attack and her punch just punched a handful of hit resistant rubber. Still, her intent was not to punch her opponent into submission…
Shigin's powerful spin kick smacked Kiyomi right in the face, sending her sliding back, after the girl moved away her hands from cover she saw her relentless stamina monster of an opponent right up in her face again. This time she was ready, the girl lifted two of her fingers up in a hand seal position.
"Yamanaka Hair-Trap!" she chanted out as her opponent's eyes shot out wide and his body tumbled lifelessly on the ground, locked firmly in the winding up for a punch position that he held before being completely stunned and frozen in place. Like a fallen statue…
"Impressed?" Kiyomi winked at her writhing and wheezing opponent, she remembered Yushijin's mistake and she would not make the same one – she needed to make sure that the Ninja Council knew exactly how badass she was and how successful her training with her clan elders and servants was. "It's the famous Yamanaka Hair-Trap, you're now completely at my mercy and this is no illusion – you're completely frozen in place".
Shigin chuckled, "Oh yeah? We're both trapped here, there is nothing you can do to me in this state, or any other, that will hurt me!"
"You see, normally I would have required a string of hair to connect me to you, using that hair to channel my chakra, similarly to the Nara clan hijutsu and how it needs shadows to connect", Kiyomi continued her victory speech, ignoring her opponent's taunts. "However, I have gone far past that, as you can see by my rich and untrimmed amounts of flowing hair… All I need to set this jutsu off now is for one hair of mine to be present on your body, your shoulders, your hands, your clothes, it doesn't matter."
"T-That underground punch…" Shigin grunted as while he clearly could not feel pain, the experience of being brought down to his knees and completely frozen in place was a humiliating one, without a doubt.
"That's right, it's when I planted my hair I have carefully removed beforehand on to your damaged clothes. In addition, your previous assessment was incorrect as well – I do have a handful of ways to defeat you, ways without directly hurting you. I am a Yamanaka, the natural counter to an invulnerable ninja like you!" Kiyomi declared before placing her hands forward. Now, with her opponent completely frozen in place, she was free to enter and take over his mind as she saw fit – her victory was all but assured from this point on.
"Mind Body Switch Jutsu!" Kiyomi yelled out as a loud and ghastly howl followed her apparition-like mind leaving her own body and ramming into that of her opponent's. Once Kiyomi's mind left her body, the hold that she had on her enemy faded but the fraction of a moment of freedom was not enough for the stunned and still confused invulnerable genin to move out of the way of his opponent's jutsu, let alone concentrate on something hard enough to substitute with it.
Shigin's face hit the dirt, the young man began screaming in pain and scratching at his own temples but his elusive jelly skin eluded damage, instead of allowing the fingers to leave temporary grooves that soon filled up with whatever liquid filled his body from inside. Kiyomi's collapsed body suddenly sprung to live and crawled backward in fear.
"What are you!? What's wrong with your mind?" She kept on muttering. The boy's mind was completely messed up. Controlling it or even treading its grounds was like to read hieroglyphs of an alien language scribbled on each grain of sand in a beach. Shigin had no mind to grasp control over, it was like his entire body was composed of miniature organisms, parasites with each one carrying a mind of its own. As someone who has fought a mercenary that has replaced most of his body with technology, this young man was the least alive and soul possessing ninja Kiyomi had ever faced.
"I guess you can't control my mind, huh?" Shigin chuckled like an idiot before taking an offensive stance and preparing to charge at Kiyomi. There it was – his unavoidable and ceaseless barrage of attacks!
Shigin charged out at Kiyomi, throwing fists left and right. Kiyomi dashed back, pushing his rubbery flaps away or trying to trap them before the young man forced the Yamanaka to let go or manipulated his body in the strangest ways. He was no rubber man, Shigin was more of a slug – whenever one mass of his body elongated, the others needed to reduce proportionately but when he swung his body around it certainly seemed like he was swinging rubbery fists.
Shigin was wrong, his mind was not invincible, as his body was, it was merely very complicated. His was the being summed up of millions if not billions of organisms all living in one body. What he did not know was that these minds were remarkably simple and incredibly alike one to another. The only reason why Kiyomi had failed before was because she was not prepared and used to controlling such a weird mind. This granted her a degree of surprise before her next attack. The blonde kicked Shigin right in the groin after using her foot to push the flesh around his groin and thighs away from it, as if she intended to hit the boy's core all the way from that embarrassing vital area. As expected there was no response…
"Give up, you can't hurt me!" Shigin laughed confidently while rubbing his nose.
Kiyomi's hands laid raised and extended in the Yamanaka hijutsu hand seal position and right up at Shigin's face once he opened his eyes from his cocky expression.
"Mind Clone Switch!" Kiyomi yelled out, preparing for the massive strain of splitting her mind into billions of smallest parts. Had Shigin hosted the minds of more than a dozen or two of different minds, it may have been outside Kiyomi's immediate ability to occupy all of them but given how lacking in personality and anything but elementary hive mind these souls were – she could do it. The Yamanaka heiress knew she could!
Shigin's hand raised up in the air. The boy's head was sunken to the ground and the raised arm was the only body part displaying some sort of signs of life.
"I surrender!" He declared firmly and willingly.
"W-What are you doing, examinee?" Overseer Oke stumbled backward before squinting at Shigin's direction.
"What do you mean?" Shigin freaked out in a manner more akin to Kiyomi's mannerisms than the goofy and laid-back nature of the invulnerable one. "I'm giving up, Yamanaka Kiyomi is the greatest kunoichi of all time, needless to say, the prettiest as well! She has smitten me with her untold skill and beauty and I therefore surrender!"
"Where did you get the idea that surrender was a valid way of ending the match?" Overseer Oke sighed, "Plus, you can cut it out with the theatrics, I can clearly see your body limply laid out on your knees right there, examinee Kiyomi."
"Drats! It has never occurred to me!" Shigin, still hosting Kiyomi's mind, freaked out. Then, the young man just snapped back and started darting for the corridor before dashing his way through the labyrinth of the arena's tunnels and corridors to the outside area.
Kiyomi's consciousness returned back to her mind as she stumbled forward but her hand managed to stop her fall before she could plant her face into the snowy dirt. The young Yamanaka pushed herself back on her feet before gesturing overseer Oke a peace sign before turning at the Ninja Council's observatory area.
A deafening battlecry made the audience cover their ears as a blob of flesh and skin split the skies and smashed itself right onto one of the acid pools before crawling out of it and straightening himself out. Shigin took a fighting stance one more but overseer Oke placed his hand in his way to stop him.
"Now that's better. I did say that a plausible way to win a match was battlefield removal and technically Shigin did leave the arena." The overseer ruled, raising his hand up in the air.
"Wait, that doesn't make any sense! I came back, didn't I!?" Shigin began arguing but Oke's mind did not budge.
"No, even if you only lost for a brief moment, before removing the loss condition, technically, you still lost the match." Oke argued before gesturing for Shigin to remove himself from the arena. As she was declared the winner, Kiyomi leaped up and down in joy.
She did it – she justified all those hopes and all that pressure, she validated all that training she did for five grueling weeks and even if her originally concocted plan to force a surrender out of her opponent did not quite work out – it all turned out just fine in the end.
Irradiating with glee, Kiyomi jumped and cheerfully skipped back to the corridors where Mana and Meiko were waiting for her, ever since the Yamanaka's victory was declared. The blacksmith extended her hand for Kiyomi but this moment was too happy to restrain herself like that – Kiyomi just jumped into the redhead's embrace, shoving her chest all over the blacksmith's face and almost bullying the blacksmith into manhandling her down and off of her. She was so happy!
A rough voice cleared his throat, the three girls turned to the mysterious young man standing by the corner and awkwardly pressing a pair of shades by his chest and Kiyomi decided to grab hold of Meiko's hand, beginning to drag the confused and vocally complaining of her teammate's behavior blacksmith aside.
"Mana, we need to talk", Kouta uttered revealing to the still recovering and confused magician just who this raspy and tired voice belonged to.
