Kiba had thought his opponent was fast before he inexplicably changed. Now, he felt the need to internally redefine the term; the Scion could hardly keep up with the Kue-Jin. In fact, it was more than fair to say that he couldn't at all. It wasn't fair. He had the strength. He had the skill. He had the courage. He even had the piety. Why wasn't it good enough to take this bastard down?
Tuatha da Daanan weren't big on praying in general; while it was said their Gods cared for their people more than many pantheons seemed to, it was also understood that the Gods weren't magical wells to toss a coin into and get a wish out of. The Gods were virtues. They were ideals. They were history. Kiba didn't always fully understand that weird mystical stuff, but he knew that meant he had to make his own way in life, Lugh's son or not.
And he was going to do that here, he really was…if he could just find a way. Whether around him, inside of him, or…he felt something inside, but couldn't quite hold on to it before the damn Kue-Jin struck him with that wooden stick, red electricity jolting through him, then sped away before he could strike back again.
--
Neji refused to feel fear. He could feel caution, he could understand danger, but he would not be afraid. He was the warrior, the ideal soldier of Rome, and he would live up to that. No matter how hard the spider limbs crashing through trees whenever they missed him and spraying poisoned needles told him otherwise. There was a solution to this. Every enemy could be faced. Every monstrosity had its weakness. So what was this one's?
It wasn't the creature's skin; a strike with his spear only bounced off its hardened carapace. It wasn't the joints; they proved no softer. As Neji danced around the great tarantula-thing's attacks, he suspected that it wouldn't be the eyes either. There were so many of them that striking out a few would accomplish little. Maybe it wasn't a physical flaw to be struck, but a mental one to be exploited? He could only guess at this point, as frustrating as that may be.
--
"Moon Purview: Phase Cloak!" Shikamaru shouted in desperation, actually managing to pull off the Half-Cloak in spite of his poor mental state. She veered to the side when half of his body vanished, as he'd hoped, but still managed a gash with her talons as he leapt the other way.
--
Gaara stared at the border. Temari and Kankuro had no idea why he would be doing that, and understood it even less when he asked why the border was drawn here and not elsewhere. The geography was hardly distinct enough; why not make the river the edge, or a mountain, or where the landscape changed from forest to desert?
Kankuro eventually answered that this was where the Kings of Heroes, Blood, and Resurrections had agreed to place it at the end of the first Village War.
"And why was that?" He wondered.
"Ugh," Kankuro looked to Temari for help, which she did with a roll of her eyes.
"The Village Hidden in Legends was originally going to be divided among the Pantheons, with the Tiang Tian Zhang Fu Yuan living in the Land of Jade and the Pesedjet with us in the Land of Resurrections. When Hashirama "Brahmin" Deva, the Great God-on-Earth at the time, managed to unite the Scions together, the other Lands grew nervous. Villages' roles as independent organizations weren't well-established at the time, and the King of Blood and King of Gold were scared that the combined power of the Scions would give the King of Heroes an advantage over the other mortal rulers. The Vampires and the Dragons secretly bolstered their borders, which led to provocations, which led to violence."
"To this day we don't actually know whether the first attacks were misunderstandings that grew out of control or deliberate sabotage, but the Village Hidden in Legends ended up in a simultaneous war with Masks and Fire. Angered at Clan Pesedjet for snubbing us, and also paranoid about the power that the Hekau Purview would provide the Village, even if there was probably a bit of overestimating our own power there, the Vampires convinced us to join them. Our histories like to claim we were tricked, but that's debatable at best. Our own side's actions weren't well-received by the rest of the world, as Enlightenment, Revelations, and Dreams allied with the Scions, with Revelations' alliance of course causing Torments to join with us, the whole thing devolved into one of the bloodiest wars our world had seen thus far. The worst part, arguably, is that no one really 'won.' Borders were redrawn until a peace agreement could be made, not that that stopped another war later, but anyway that's why this is here." She shrugged. "This is where the Kings decided the land they'd win or lose was worth stopping the bloodshed."
"It wouldn't be the last time Mummies were tricked into fighting Scions," Gaara noted, causing both of the other apprentices to blanche. "Maybe we should be better this time. Maybe we could help them."
"I don't think that they really want our help right now," Kankuro pointed out.
"Some might. Some nearby, in fact." Gaara responded, staring into the trees on the Land of Heroes' side of the border. "I smell blood being spilled. It's still…appealing, but I want to treat it differently now. I want to help." With that, he started casually walking forward. The other two felt they had no choice but to follow him.
--
As Supernatural Men, Naruto and Sakura had both dealt with their fair share of enemies with strength and speed above that of a human's. This guy was something else. It wasn't that he was stronger or faster, though he was certainly impressive in both of those areas, as that his speed and strength were complemented by a level of finesse that should have been reduced by his equally brutal savagery, but it wasn't.
There was no way to get a proper strike in without a bone stabbing into one's torso or arms or legs or somewhere. Even fighting defensively, as both Scions were forced to do at this point, evading the weapons growing from every inch of his body was taking all of their mental energy.
It didn't help that the first punctures he managed with his bone spears did something to both of them. Sakura felt it; pain was radiating outward from the wound he had left, getting worse and worse as time passed. "Health Purview: Assess Health," she barely managed to intone while Kimmimaro was focusing on Naruto, and was distraught by what she saw.
Poison, unnatural and dark, was circulating through her body, not just killing her but transforming her; she understood that she'd become a zombie immediately upon death with whatever the thing had done to them. Dying here didn't just mean dying; it meant becoming a hindrance to her allies. Gulping, she did her best to ensure that that only made her more determined.
Naruto felt weirdly good. The freak he was fighting had managed to puncture him with one of the bone spears coming out everywhere, and some kind of energy was emanating from it. Whatever it was, Mikaboshi seemed to love it. He has infected you with Darkness itself. He has infected you with death and Darkness!
With that sudden message from Naruto's lifelong companion processed, he started to wonder. He could control Darkness, kind of. Could he control this?
--
The weirdest part about the girl Shikamaru was currently fighting did not happen to be the bird or snake features; that only made her as abnormal as the average Titanspawn. No, it was the fact that she could still apparently play a flute without human hands or movable lips. He really didn't get how she did it, but the flute's music played once more the second he was out of her sight, and the armies of snakes and hummingbirds continued their assault.
Far more aggressively this time, he felt. He was getting nicked, and bitten, and it was making him sluggish. He was still certain that he was doing well; most would have been far more damaged by the sheer numbers of foes, but technically doing better than others in a theoretically similar situation would not keep him alive. He needed to do better.
Unfortunately, all of his planning, all of the purported genius everyone claimed he had, was coming up blank. All the planning skills in the world meant nothing when he had no plan.
He could try infecting her with Lunacy and then possessing her. It had worked for a second on that Dragon, and while he would need more than a second with this girl, surely she couldn't be stronger than a Full Manifestation, could she?
Striking and dodging to get around as many of the snakes and hummingbirds as he could without being ripped apart, Shikamaru stepped out into the open field, deliberately placing himself where the Beastmaster could find him…sure enough, the snake-hummingbird-eagle monstrosity swooped down, right where he was pulling out a mirror…she got a talon against his stomach before he could properly use it (this form made her fast), but as she pushed him to the ground, wasting a precious second to glare at her prize before she ripped him apart, he was able to shout "Moon Purview: Mirror of Lunacy!"
Had this been when she was flying above, he would have scored a major viciory; as it was, this merely sent her into a frenzy, ripping into him as she had already planned, her crazed expression hardly different from what she'd shown before. Bleeding, probably missing an important organ, Shikarmaru barely managed "Cheval Purview: Horse."
It had worked; he was now looking down on his broken, bleeding body. He was in control of this girl and her animal physique…at least until he bled out. While he had command of her body, his real body was in too poor a state for him to simply fly her out of there and wake up. Even if he managed to kill her somehow, he might just croak as soon as he became himself again. Or even before. That was an unpleasant thought to consider.
It had happened to Loa Scions before; when one died while in another's body, one was ejected from the possessed body and sent on to the appropriate afterlife. She'd still win if he didn't do something to save himself. But what?
--
When Neji once more managed to barely dodge an attack that once more downed a tree when the poor plant took the brunt of the strike instead, a family of birds was apparently inconvenienced. That shouldn't have been a big deal to him, considering everything else going on at the time, but the Scion noticed the gigantic Tarantula-man rearing back far more than he needed to, then squatting down as the birds flew over him. He was almost reverent toward them.
No, Neji realized, as ridiculous as it was, the monstrosity reacted with fear to the tiny little birds. That was the weakness; as the two returned to their game of dodging and striking around one another, Neji knew he had an angle. He was still trying to figure out how he would exploit that angle, but there was a move here. He could turn this fight around.
--
Kiba was pissed off. Really pissed off. He wasn't going to give in. This fight was a matter of dignity. No, it was a matter of Courage, Piety, and Expression. Even admitting that Intellect was the worst of his Enech values, he knew that the other three were well within his grasp. He wouldn't go down here. There had to be something here that he could do to turn things around.
An attack from an outstretched arm from the Kue-Jin went for Fionnadh Dearg while the other arm stretched itself far enough to strike at himself. Ignoring the latter, he leapt to his dog's rescue, ultimately just taking both of them. Tumbling to the ground, he understood something through his rage. He had just kept to his Geas at great personal cost, and was still showing the courage to fight directly against a far superior opponent. With that, something of his heritage bled through. Something distinctly Irish. It wasn't from Lugh, or rather not directly, but from another man important to the Tuatha da Danaan, one who also held a Geas related to dogs that he'd been forced to break.
Kiba had barely put any effort into learning the War Purview, even though he had a Birthright for it, but now he understood one of its more complicated abilities, one hidden by his Clan from the rest of the Village. It was the special War Boon of Cu Chulain. And now he felt he could use it, based solely on instinct and desire. "War Purview: Riastradth!"
For this particular Boon, instinct and desire proved sufficient.
Sakon and Udon were perhaps having too much fun with the silly little Scion, but Being One brought out both the best and the worst in them.
Still, they had a vague memory of complaining that their compatriots had wasted too much time playing with their food and letting the interlopers get past, and realized that maybe they should put some effort into avoiding the same mistakes.
Far enough away from the Scion that the beastly boy couldn't immediately strike at him (the fight had gone on long enough for him to assess the brat's speed and strength well enough for that), he channeled his Yin Chi, calling on the Death Sight.
He even allowed himself a perhaps foolish moment or two to reminisce about his early days as a Haimen, too shortly undead to be recognized as a proper citizen, when he had first learned about harnessing Chi to enhance his sights of life and death.
At the time he had been shocked to learn about how Yin could not only be used to see ghosts and recognize the terminally ill, but also the weakest point, the point where one could strike and do the most damage. He had thought it to be the most powerful of abilities at the time. His old mentor had laughed; it was useful, certainly, but it took too much time standing still and concentrating to be used in the heat of battle. It was a tool for assassinations, not combat, and the latter was what he was trained in as he advanced in his Dharma. He was more inclined to Yang anyways.
It was clear to him now that that instructor had never bothered to combine the waiting time with the speed enhancement of Black Wind, or rather hadn't mastered Cultivation enough to use Black Wind without risk. Regardless, he saw the point where he could ram his staff, right into where it would kill the boy…had he remained a boy.
Rather than simply running forward again, the Scion had shouted out some Supernatural Power's name without Sakon listening, and began warping and twisting, his muscles expanding and neck bulging. Before the Kue-Jin's eyes, the once well-built teenager (but only well-built by a teenager's standards) grew almost as tall as the nearby cliff-face, and his width didn't grow my much less. Had he encountered him in this form, Sakon would have assumed it to be some form of monster. The monstrous new shape raged and screamed, charging forward with a fraction of the skill displayed earlier but with each step making the ground tremor, and it was very clear that getting hit by this thing was a far larger concern than it had been at any earlier portion of their conflict.
None of which changed Sakon's objective, nor his plan. While dimmer, the weakest point was still visible, right below his chest, if he could only hit it…"Flesh Shintai Art: Long Neck!" He screamed, sending his arms forward, spear in hand. It struck.
The Scion had what should have been a lethal wound as the staff pierced his flesh and made its way to his heart, meaning that the boy would collapse just as soon as the mindless rage from his transformation was finished. Sakon had not counted on that last factor as the boy-monster grabbed him, ignoring the wound in its chest and slamming the Kue-Jin into the ground over and over again, so hard even his undead flesh was starting to rip apart.
--
In his quest to kill the Scion, the spider-Deviant had completely ignored Remus Bane. As far as he was concerned, that piece had been neutralized and could be safely ignored for the rest of the game. That, in the end, turned out to be his biggest mistake, and one he really shouldn't have made in the first place. What kind of player didn't keep track of all the pieces that were still on the board?
Alas, he thought that the wolf couldn't bite, and so the wolf couldn't fight. He didn't remember that wolves were one of the more dangerous beasts of the forest, and that othere animals would recognize that. Most didn't have the intellect to understand what having a mouth covered in webbing meant. They just knew that there was a dangerous wolf on the prowl, and fled from it.
Neji remembered, but only because of how desperate he was getting. It shamed him how much his companion proved to be an afterthought. "Animal (wolf) Purview: Animal Communication," he muttered while continuing his dance against the great tarantula man. He then let Remus Bane know his plan.
It was quite simple, really. The wolf hunted down any nearby bird life, and then threatened it as a predator would until it attempted to flee in the direction of Neji and Kidimaro's fight. That was, of course, the hard part, as Kidimaro was currently far more terrifying than a wolf, but the birds in question quickly found that Remus Bane was right there and the tarantula-monster was a future problem, and they tended to be creatures than focused on the here and now.
By the time the terrified little critters running away from the wolf realized what they were running toward, there were many of them, all panicked and flustered, and found it difficult to fly away. Not in the long run, it probably didn't even take a full minute, but more than long enough for Kidimaro to react.
Birds. The Predator. The Threat. Must be safe. The amount of power Kidimaro was taking from the Scars in his soul meant that he couldn't do anything about the irrational thoughts that also flowed from them.
The original, quite mundane spider that had been used to replace the missing gaps in his soul had good reason to fear these beings, so he was cursed to feel that fear while it made no sense. In short, he was terrified.
The man wouldn't have been scared of the things even if they weren't so tiny, but unlike most Deviants he had actually chosen to stop being a man, and here were the consequences, staring at the flock of feathered rats and cradling himself to make sure the bad men went away as if his mommy was going to come fix it.
It wouldn't have lasted long; the birds were just as scared of him, and were soon flying away, but it lasted long enough for Neji to run, slam his sword into his best approximation of the thing's chest, and shout "War Purview: Mortal Stroke!"
Thanks to his Strength Knacks, the gladium barely managed to pierce the tarantula-man's thick, armored hide, and thanks to his Boon that was enough to make the otherwise small wound rip the monster's heart apart. It, unfortunately, also left him right below the man's mouth and its outsized fangs, which apparently had the reach to stab into him in the unnatural being's death throes. This is…not good.
--
Had Naruto been more academically inclined, he might have noted that the Darkness Purview affecting Yin Chi would have been discovered at some point. Kue-Jin had, at different wars in the Middle-World's history, been both allies and enemies of the Village Hidden in Legends, and such a glaring potential weakness would have been noted, exploited, and taught in classes on the Darkness Purview.
Naruto was not academically inclined, and hadn't been allowed to take those classes anyways. He focused on the random thoughts Mikaboshi had spat out while happy about the influx of twisted Chi, and tried to infuse it with his Ichor.
"Darkness Purview: Shadow Refuge," he intoned, in spite of standing directly in the sun. Sure enough, the Yin Chi he had been infected with reacted…for a second, before he blinked back into visibility. But there had been something there, something that he might have been able to cultivate if he weren't immediately set upon by the skeleton-freak again.
He did everything he could to dodge about, still getting small cuts and pokes in spite of his best efforts, but he felt more of the Yin Chi, felt more of Mikaboshi's happiness, and tried something he had only seen done in theory.
"Darkness Purview: Shadow Construct!" Naruto tried to copy Kakashi's trick from their first test with him, turning the black energy dripping from this guy's bones into some sort of net to entrap him, but it barely formed some kind of indistinct mass before immediately fading away. Even had he been using actual darkness, Naruto realized that this ability required more finesse than he had on hand at the moment.
In spite of his failure, the enemy screamed in fear for some reason. It gave Sakura just enough time to charge forward, her spear at the ready, and try "Health Purview: Inflict Wound" again. Once more, the enemy was screeching.
Kimmimaru was, much to his shock, genuinely afraid. Not of dying itself, as death was almost a welcome relief at this point, but dying before he had the opportunity to properly serve his master. These two Scions had lucked into the apparent perfect set of abilities to exploit his weakness, that accursed tainted chi that ripped him apart from the inside even as it preserved his unlife, and as such they proved to be threats far above their strength.
"Bone Shintai Art: Five Poison Cloud!" He shouted, over and over and over again. He realized that he was draining Yin Chi at an alarming rate, but it didn't matter as long as Lord Orochimaru received his sacrifice. So long as this fight lasted long enough for the chosen vessel to make it past their ability to follow, he could meet final death in peace. While he hadn't properly followed the Song of Shadows for a while, it had once been something he'd been taught to accept and even honor, after all.
Just as he had planned, the multiple clouds of deadly poison forced the Scions to move in sync, acting predictably, giving them a limited range…he rushed them, the spears of bone covering his body giving him the weapons he needed to strike now that they were stuck where he wanted them…he had gotten two nasty cuts into the Scions, not fatal by themselves but loaded with the unnatural poison of the Ch'ing Shih.
That should take the girl down, at least, and bring her back as a mindless zombie to harrow the boy, regardless of what happened to Kimmimaru. His goal was complete, he had finished things before his own end…or would have, if the earth beneath him had not burst.