A young man with iris-colored hair reaching up to his shoulders dashed for his life while a blue flame threatened to burn down the whole section of the arena that he was in. His hair dangled entirely behind him while his comfy cargo shorts supported the monumental task of outrunning a mad Cursed Warrior monster determined to burn down as many weak-looking combatants as possible. Kaefer's panicking expression shifted to a bit of exasperation when he began growing sick of running, with no sort of returning fire on his part.
Thrusting the other end of his net, the Taser Ball ace vaulted himself forward and thrust his feet into the tiles, dragging his right foot in a half-circle while turning around and lobbing the electrified taser ball straight at the condor-shaped Cursed Warrior soaring above him. The hi-tech spherical thunderball sparkled with cerulean electric flashes, blinking between light and shadow. Kaefer's face twisted with a neat smirk. That was before he heard a clear clang right in front of him.
The taser ball fell to the ground and was rolling toward him. The colossal condor blew a stream of blue flames while flapping its wings and dispersing the powerful, concentrated beam of destructive energy into a widespread calamity that sent burnt Kaefer soaring and splashing into the lake outside of the arena bounds. Jumping into their float, the residential healers of the arena hurried to scoop the young man from the water, but light blue lightning bolts shot out from the water's surface.
Staggering back and struggling to maintain their balance because of the suddenness of the electric outbreak, the healers tried wrapping their heads around what might have been the reason for this sudden lightning shock that befell the entire lake surrounding more than half of the area outside the arena bounds. One of the shrouded healers pointed to a remote spot where the sparkling was the most intense. A few of the healers nodded in unison, realizing that Kaefer's taser ball unfortunately fell into the water in a different location.
This proved to be perilous to the young taser ball ace. Even if he survived the absurd initial shock because of his affinity for taser ball, a game where players often received shock treatment for their failed plays, his survival became less and less likely the more time they spent trying to scoop him out. In addition, the acting-out gadget threatened to harm any other injured and eliminated competitors, prompting the healers to signal to the support staff to drain the lake so that they could remove young Kaefer and the troublesome taser ball.
"Whoa! What's going on there!? The Cursed Warrior Batsudoru eliminated the taser baller Kaefer Farfaello, but something's off with the water and the healers can't pull him out! Please… Let's hurry and get that young boy out of the water, will ya?" the announcer awkwardly pulled the long collar of his vest to the side while sweating from his forehead. "It's a real good thing that this lake drains and floods according to our need because otherwise, we'd have to stop this tournament until that sparking techno do-hickey is out of the water! That'd be a really sucky ending to such a prolonged blood fest with so many memorable and outlandish moments, don't you guys think?"
The announcer's babble distracted the audience long enough from their objections until the lake drained out. It seemed like the scene even slowed down the fighting in the arena too, with the more sensible warriors glancing behind them occasionally, fearing the shock of flopping into the lake that was sparkling with a constant over-the-top jolt of Kaefer's taser ball. With water's natural properties, it would take no time at all for the wetness to soak and transfer the electric charge all over and fry anyone unlucky enough to fall inside.
With the bustling healers securing the taser ball with Kaefer's own net that they passed around from the other side of the arena between one another and the burnt, bruised, and unconscious young man himself, the audience had an excuse to breathe out a calmer breath. Rushing, the shrouded healers brought away Kaefer, laid out on stretchers in the infirmary.
"What's this? Oh, man… Young Kaefer doesn't seem to be in good shape at all. He's still alive, and that's something to be thankful for, but from what news I'm getting, it will be a fight every step of the way to pull the youngster from the jaws of death. Let's wish him the best of luck recovering!" the announcer waved his hand in the air as the healers and the support staff coordinated a swift re-flooding of the lake outside of bounds.
A steampunk construct with a bloated, mushroom-shaped head that seemed to inflate and deflate as if regulating the Exterminator's breathing floated on top of a spinning UFO plate. The Exterminator turned its head off to the side. Despite having nothing resembling a pair of eyes, it seemed to be capable of tracing the thunderbolt that arced in an unnatural curve and raced straight for it.
The UFO that the Exterminator seemed to float on stopped spinning, slipping out a pair of webbed arms and feet for limbs while sticking out a remotely humanoid head defined by a sharp, bone beak, resembling that of a snapping turtle. Outpacing the snapping beak of the emerging robotic Kappa monster, the arcing thunderbolt smacked straight into the beast's center, which the cybernetic Kappa pointed to protect the Exterminator riding its back.
The bolt collided with the beast's metallic spaceship-like shell with a deafening krakoom. The zone of collision radiated a field of static electricity before revealing Yoibetsu-N, the Kumogakure ninja utilizing Lightning Armor coating over his entire body to fight. The resulting clash sent both warriors spinning out of control in opposing directions. While the steampunk Kappa struggled to correct its trajectory, Yoibetsu-N crossed his arms and burst with blue Lightning Armor sparkles.
"Lightning Cross-Arm Rush!" Yoibetsu chanted out while flashing forward at unbelievable speed, emitting a vocal sonic boom while crossing the Kappa monster with a glowing X-shaped mark splitting it into four equal parts.
With a vocal crack and then a myriad of meek metallic clicks, the gasping and shrieking Kappa burst into a combination of pickled biological organs and metallic parts. Having successfully completed his powerful charge that demolished the armor UFO Kappa, Yoibetsu-N completed his front flip and landed on the edge of the arena before turning around to search for his opponent. After all, the Exterminator used the blind spot of hiding behind the experimental Kappa to give him the slip, since all that Yoibetsu-N crushed was the monster that the Exterminator used to float around the fighting ring.
"That is a most unusual method of fighting for one of your faction," Yoibetsu-N observed with a reserved smile while scratching his cheek and walking toward the center of the arena and away from where he might be knocked out of bounds by a surprise attack. "I thought your kind takes pride in fighting monsters, not creating them. Then again, if your masterminds create the same monsters you fight, that would make the mother of all hustles."
By the time Yoibetsu-N noticed that the ground was simply too sticky, it was too late. His sandals ended up stepping into some sort of fungal entrapment that wrapped up the floor like a web and stuck the feet of the unlucky traveler still. That was one way to neutralize Yoibetsu's speedy and hard-hitting Lightning Armor.
"We do not merely slay monsters and demons, ninja," the Exterminator revealed himself, vaulting from a nearby ruin of a fallen and still smoldering Cursed Warrior to land directly in front of where Yoibetsu-N found himself webbed up by almost invisible, hair-thin fungus. "Our organization strives to understand monsters and explain how they fit into their respective ecosystem. For that reason, we attempt to capture monsters that we can subdue and bring them back for studying. A single captive monster provides many ideas for potential Exterminator projects that make our collective more effective in the long run."
"I see. You're some sort of weakling, compared even to your peers, so you don't have any advanced weapons to bring to the table. You instead employ captive and experimental remnants of the monsters you've captured," Yoibetsu-N cruelly teased his opponent with a cheerful smile while appearing fully entrapped.
"That's some mighty posturing from someone at my mercy! Exterminators rarely encounter ninja in the field. Our interests match and never do they clash. That makes this encounter a valuable experience that will make future generations of Exterminators more effective at fending off ninja if conflict ever occurs," the mushroom-headed Exterminator extended its arms out and zipped its bodysuit open to reveal a round pustule undulating inside an artificial membrane that burst on command and erupted with a roaring fireball.
Without skipping as much as a beat, Yoibetsu-N crackled with a pulse of electricity, becoming surrounded by yellow sparkles that burnt the fungal web that kept him entrapped and grounded. This burst let him vanish from the location where he would have surely faced incineration. Having quickly positioned himself in the air, Yoibetsu-N encased himself with full-power Lightning Armor: Level One, preparing to use the opening after the Exterminator's fireball missed.
Much to the Kumogakure ninja's chagrin, the fireball burst and revealed a coiled and rolling salamander monster, clad with artificial metallic armor and armed with spiky metallic clawed gauntlets and a helmet that introduced two more pairs of elongated synthetic horns. Unlike the outlandish, fabled ability of the salamander to survive the kiss of flames, this salamander seemed to be well-armed to breathe some of its own with the highest-grade military flamethrowers that an overpaid, clandestine military organization could arm a captured and dissected monster with.
Because of the salamander beast's sudden emergence, Yoibetsu-N ended up in mid-air, facing off against it and about to end up in the beast's jaws as it reeled out to gobble him up whole and fry him up long before he reached the monster's stomach. That was one advantage of being armed head-to-toe with fire-sparking mechanisms. Yoibetsu-N dashed away so fast that it seemed he became living electricity, being forced to skid across the tile set of the ring to stop himself from dashing out of bounds as he prepared for his counterattack.
Most flamethrowers equipped with the gigantic bipedal salamander monstrosity hurled flames at the same time. Instead of aiming its heavy gear at Yoibetsu-N, the blazing amphibian aimed them wildly into the air, turning its head, elbows, tail, and knees and turning them against the sky. Instead of directing the scorching jets of immolation in focused streams, this peculiar method of using the devastating weaponry made a swirling firestorm above the raging titanic salamander.
Growling, the beast turned around on one foot, spinning with its flappy, muscular arms, adding its heavyweight tail to the spin. The rotation forced the static, raging firestorm to descend as a firenado that enveloped the gigantic salamander monster like hellish armor. Yoibetsu-N seemed undaunted by this development. Whether it was because his unruly speed made him incapable of perceiving anything between the moment when his attack started, all the way to when it hit or missed his opponent, or because he thought little of his opponent's "Fire Armor" remained unknown in the beginning.
Roaring and thrashing, the fire-encased experimental salamander monster rampaged around, smashing the ground with wild hammering fists and whipping its gigantic tail. The fiery armor around it granted explosive and destructive qualities far surpassing mere colossal slams and thwacks. Despite that, Yoibetsu-N moved like living electricity itself, he vanished from the location where the titanic monster attacked long before the attack reached him.
After a handful of moments of carefully dancing and fighting the salamander for proper positioning, Yoibetsu-N found himself directly in front of the salamander and saw an opening in its raging fire armor. In a blink, his electric aura vanished, and he charged forth with a roundhouse kick that connected with a concussive crack and sent the beast stumbling forward and out of balance. The Kumogakure ninja corrected his position in the air into a horizontal twirl and slammed a horizontal spinning kick that flattened the salamander with a kick lashed straight into its back.
Having knocked the fiery experimental monster down without even engaging his Lightning Armor, Yoibetsu-N positioned himself in front of the beast's soft snout in front. "Lightning Armor: Level One!" Yoibetsu-N muttered to his own, barely flapping his lips while focusing on his chakra kneading instead of glaring at his loopy opponent. "Cobra Punch!" Yoibetsu-N called out his attack right before vanishing and becoming a horizontal, raging yellow thunder wave that knocked straight into the snout of the salamander beast and sent it flying straight toward the protective wall out of bounds.
Not only did Yoibetsu-N's attack ring the salamander out, sending him flying like a ball after the slam of a cricket hammer, but the youth also spilled chemicals and unidentifiable bio-fluids from the beast while shattering plenty of fire-spitting and armor technology that kept the dissected and forcefully resurrected beast together, flopping its room-sized, cubical fillet outside of bounds. After being liberated from its metallic frame, the dissected gigantic salamander parts dissolved into wet and mushy goop, spreading the combined stench of rotten fish and dead viscera all around.
"Hmm… The ease with which you disposed of the experimental monsters is troublesome. However, the data gathered from these test runs will help us update them in the future. Perhaps I should be thankful to you instead?" the Exterminator employing the slain and stitched back together beasts grabbed the open lapels of its bodysuit, forcefully tearing the upper section apart and exposing a body of dark brass plates with fetus-sized biological pustules that were filled with unclear bioluminescent pus that made them undulate, pulse and twitch.
Having been exposed to the elements and freed from the bodysuit, the Exterminator's body stumbled and flopped on its front. The weight of the disgusting growths all over its modified body dragged the artificial, puppeteer'd corpse down and forced it to crawl and drag its body when it needed movement.
"What's wrong?" the Exterminator wondered, noting Yoibetsu-N's silence and lack of response to this repulsive revelation. "Has this sight robbed you of the gift of speech or are you about to go into some sort of speech about the ethical implications of what our employers are doing?"
"Not at all," Yoibetsu-N shrugged. "It's just that I don't feel any particular way about you shedding your overalls. I don't much care about what is done with dead bodies, either. If someone is weak enough to die, they don't deserve a say about what is done to their remains and one abandons their ability to exact their strength to change things when they die. The dead are the weakest creatures of all, lacking even the most puny strength of the living weak. They are no better than furniture. If it helps you become strong, stitch yourself together with as many dead things as you can. In fact, as someone who cannot gain strength this way, I'm a little jealous."
"Hmph… I haven't met or fought many ninja. It is refreshing to talk to someone who understands. Your disposition makes me think of nothing but respect for your faction, young man. It seems that ninja understand the desperation, and the need to do what has to be done in order to slay monsters. When human lives and entire settlements depend on our ability to eliminate beasts, no means are too lowly. Not even employing other, upgraded, dead beasts to fight their living peers!" the Exterminator proclaimed. The scientifically altered corpse flopped on its belly, exposing a growing pustule on its back that grew to almost half of the Exterminator's torso in size.
Yoibetsu-N curiously observed as the pustule burst with moss-colored, mint-smelling thick pus hurling everywhere. The most curious experimental monstrosity emerged from within. A large toad with a dome-shaped metallic attached to its back that had polearms sticking out from it that whirled like helicopter blades upon the toad's command. Flapping its long, sticky tongue, the toad lashed it out to catch Yoibetsu-N as the first thing it did during its conscious moments of life.
The wart-infested tongue only wrapped around empty air as the Kumogakure ninja was no longer where the toad intended to catch him. "Lightning Armor: Level Two!" Yoibetsu-N chanted after picking up the pace of his breathing and bursting with a visible blue aura of Lightning Release chakra that made his nostrils let out tiny black clouds of vapor as the Kumogakure ninja breathed out.
The giant toad bent and twisted its head exactly like only something that had its head cut off and re-attached could, employing an almost full turn before snapping its fatty jaws open and shooting off not one thick and sticky tongue but two from its mouth. Instead of trying to compete with Yoibetsu-N's speed, they stuck to the wings of Batsudoru the Cursed Warrior as it soared through and pulled itself toward the Kumogakure ninja by dragging its body up and rearing its metallic dome to spin the handful of polearms attached to its back like helicopter blades.
Rolling through the air like a buzzing, electric Yo-Yo, Yoibetsu-N completed his offensive acrobatic roll with a stomp of his foot that utterly decimated the toad's metallic dome and smashed the house-sized brain that was protected within it. The absolutely overwhelming shock of impact sent the giant toad shooting down as if a down-aiming cannon had just fired its broken body into the ground. The devastating impact splattered the toad's body parts and the artificial, robotic attachments that the sick and twisted scientific minds of the Exterminator organization implanted onto this Ogama beast.
"Hmm…" Yoibetsu-N muttered after landing on the ground after absolutely smashing the titanic toad to bits. While he landed with his back turned to the stunned Exterminator, Yoibetsu-N turned his head with a stone-cold stare that chilled even the long-dead Exterminator to the elementary metallic frame structure that passed for a skeleton inside its repulsive true shape. "I've come to realize something," Yoibetsu-N added.
"W-What's that?" the Exterminator wondered, figuring that keeping the ridiculously strong young man talking was the only way to postpone his participation in this competition for as long as possible.
"If all that you can do is fling revived dead bodies at me, you're weak too. You can do whatever you want to a dead body. It won't remove the stench of weakness from it. I was wrong in thinking that by challenging one of you, I would test my skills and prove myself to a Konoha Sannin. I believe that the Konoha Sannin didn't really stress himself against one of your kind either back then. I've wasted time and stamina here…" Yoibetsu-N turned around and began digging through his hair while shifting his face to extreme frustration that resembled a childish fit.
"What's that? Smacked a few monsters around and think you're all that!? I've killed a hundred and a half of them!" the Exterminator tried to downplay Yoibetsu-N's skill before Yoibetsu-N suddenly straightened himself out and closed his eyes, calming his heart down.
"Oh well, nothing to do now but to take care of you as quickly as I can… Lightning Armor: Level Two!" Yoibetsu-N burst with blue-colored electricity all around that spiked his hair up and began violently jerking and flapping his clothes as if the youth found himself inside a wicked typhoon. "Double Uraken!" Yoibetsu-N exclaimed. By the time that sound escaped his mouth, Yoibetsu-N had slammed into his opponent's face, caving it in and splattering green embalming fluid all over the place while he sent the demolished wreckage flying out of bounds like a busted rag doll.
"It's over! Yoibetsu-N managed to soundly defeat the Exterminator Model: Monster Summoner! While the ninja are still in the danger zone with only two remaining competitors, this elimination leaves the Exterminators with just one competitor left! Meanwhile, both ninja have made very hefty statements about how difficult they'd be to eliminate!" the announcer ruled in the Exterminator's elimination with a raised hand and a roar and a series of cheering waves from the audience.
"Hmm… Using Level Two so often sure broke a sweat, but it has to be less tiring than struggling in a prolonged battle using Level One…" Yoibetsu-N scratched the back of his head, finding a sweet break to disable his Lightning Armor while he sought future opponents.