"What a dry dump…" Hanshin remarked, his eyes carefully fenced around the interior of the Eternal Fire, poking with a glance at every single nook and cranny while remaining mostly unimpressed by the bright, sandy interior.
"Yeah, but why is it like a desert though?" Meiko nodded her head to the side as if changing the degree from which she perceived the room would have changed the way that the room looked or the general amount of sense that the decorations made.
Meiko's generalization was not too far off, the inner great hall of the Eternal Fire was covered in sand with an occasional sandstone rock erected where tables and stands should have been. What may have served as a distraction of the dry and dusty air inside of the structure, now only served as an unpleasant reminder of it.
"The sand is really hot. What genius decided that pouring a bunch of sand into a bunch of heated, metal tubes was a good idea?" Kiyomi whined while she kicked her sandals about like a wayward mare. With each kick, each gesture of struggle she shook out handfuls of sand from inside her sandals only for the torrid hindrance seep back into her shoe once the young woman set her foot back down.
"That is not what Hanshin meant. The interior is a fascinating artistic statement, it is the parched air that will inevitably ruin Hanshin's hair and skin…" the special jounin lamented. "The sand is supposed to boil one's feet so that the politicians and councilmen did not tap around and made up their damn minds for once."
"I see…" Meiko nodded with childish enthusiasm a pair of times.
"Whatever you say… I need to find a place to insulate my feet in. I refuse to keep them augmented the whole time." Kiyomi grumbled. She turned around only to meet a three-meter tall man with a hairdo that suggested that the man had literally torn most of his excess hair out before deciding it hurt too much and abandoning the venture half-way.
Without making the stupid mistake of talking before the kill, the giant swung a pickaxe about his size and twice his width in an attempt to impale the Konoha kunoichi on it. It was easy to figure out that the man intended to murder Kiyomi silently from behind and the only reason why the Yamanaka had noticed him in the first place was that she had decided to turn around at the most inopportune moment for the massive miner.
Kiyomi did not appear to be that easily done in, even with her injuries she vaulted backward and followed the blade of the oversized picking tool nearly scratch her eye out while she did so. The Yamanaka stumbled on her feet, feeling a bit woozy from all the blood she's lost and the pressure around the bags on her eyes and her nose suggested that if she strained herself some more, another vessel may have burst and reset her nasty nosebleed.
"How awesome is that pickaxe!?" Meiko screamed out like a schoolgirl upon the sight of a family of wild, newborn kittens being tended to by their mother. "I bet it can pick as well as a diamond drill can, except with the added benefit of using your muscles more and putting your back to it!"
"Indeed, the prospect of unnecessary workout routines does sound alluring. We shall deal with who loots this pickaxe later." Hanshin agreed with the blacksmith on one of the few rare occasions.
"Drats, it appears that I have been unsuccessful at nabbing these scoundrels." The pickaxe-wielding redneck cursed in an oddly intelligible manner uttered in an almost childish-tone. It served as a grotesque contrast to the man's naturally ugly façade and disastrous hair situation. Just as Meiko suggested previously, however, both the central body and the man's arms were very well trained, as evidenced by the amazing speed at which the attacked swung his mighty tool. "Nevertheless, the trap my comrade has laid shall obliterate you, cretins…"
Kiyomi's eyebrow rose almost out of instinct. Her back foot quivered just by an inch before an explosion resonated through one of the larger halls of the Eternal Fire where the confrontation between Konoha's and Iwagakure's parties was taking place. An effect of a compact mine of white clay, carefully detonated when the Yamanaka was as close to it as possible after she dodged the initial strike and positioned herself by the mine.
"It appears to be a coincidence, although, with superior intellect, such as my own, coincidence is an animadversion of imprudence!" the pickaxe-wielding giant declared with his squeaky voice, managing to hold his comprehensive tool in just one hand while the other made a raised fist gesture to congratulate him and his comrades with their great success.
Meiko took one step forward before hitting an invisible wall that made her face misshape as if she had hit a glass door by mistake while entering the shop. It was much harder than a glass door, Meiko would have walked right through something as elementary as that…
"Don't rush things ahead," Hanshin warned the redhead. "That explosive comrade is just waiting for an opening to exploit. If you open up just for a moment, you'll meet the fate of your friend."
Aggravated by Hanshin's confirmation of something bad having happened to Kiyomi, Meiko just got more pissed off but her expression of rage, sufficient to bash the redneck's head in with her bare hands eased up somewhat after it was revealed that Kiyomi was no longer where the mine detonated but instead stood atop of the sandstone platform with a sharp corner of the platform missing, or rather, lying utterly blown up in Kiyomi's place after a successful Substitution Technique.
"Don't walk around the sand too much," Kiyomi warned the team through her thoughts, having decided to initiate the mental link rather than risk the absence of effective inner communication between the team hindering their chances. It was a hard trade to make given that the relatively tired young woman would have to constantly strain herself to keep the mental link up but it was a necessary one, given the intensity of the enemy actions inside this structure.
"We should have let Mana tell us how many assailants there were before we got inside…" Meiko grinned with her usual, simian smile.
"Your teammate is smart. She would not have hurried us up unless the odds were fair. It is safe to say we're looking at two or three ninja, not more. Given the ninja still working at the top with the Yordalarian politicians as well as the pair working on the distraction and the one outside, any more spies would have been too cumbersome of a group." Hanshin let his thoughts be known in a collected manner.
"Well then…" Meiko grinned while sliding her hand through the upper areas of her back she could reach. It was an odd gesture that left plenty of openings in the stance of the young woman but it was temporary and necessary so that the blacksmith could unseal a nimble bow she had sealed inside her armor pieces. "It's a good thing I have a method to attack these guys without opening myself up for an attack or setting off any more mines."
Lightning passed through the wood of Meiko's bow as well as the string, for something sparking so violently and looking so supercharged with energy, the coating in no way damaged the graceful materials of the bow or its simple yet elegant and masterful craftsmanship. The redhead appeared to have moved on since the time she still required arrows, the lightning coating simply molded into an arrow-shaped construct that was easily a dozen times the size of an arrow.
Without waiting around, Meiko fired the arrow before quickly generating another, then firing it again, repeating the quick succession of long-range attacks and arrow creation. The brutish Iwagakure spy deflected the arrows with a moderate effort from his part by smacking at them with his pickaxe. He did not coat the weapon in chakra nor did it appear that he needed to as there was no damage from the weapon hitting a construct of solid Lightning Release chakra. A testament for the fine materials used in making such a simplistic weapon.
"I thought you supported the magician's side on not killing more people than needed…" Hanshin taunted Meiko, referencing how inefficient her method of attack was and for how long she would require to attack this way to achieve the necessary degree of success.
"I'm not working with infinite chakra here…" the ends of Meiko's lips tipped slightly.
"Can you fire them in a wider spread? Your arrows appear to do a decent job at keeping this creep in place." Kiyomi's thoughts resonated through Meiko's mind. "Also, nice work mixing in telepathic communication with verbal, you two. It will help us mask the fact we're exchanging ideas mentally from the enemy."
"Of course," Hanshin's thoughts spread like wildfire. The physically impressive individual simply had the sort of gravitas to his tone and voice, a certain conviction in his own righteousness that made his thoughts absolutely dominating. "It only seemed elementary, given the technique's abilities."
Kiyomi bit her tongue in bitterness, she was glad that Hanshin could not see her regretful thoughts of only having realized how useful such a mixed method of communication was for confusing the enemy now. This should have been something that her more experienced clan members taught her, instead of the dreadful thought of learning it from this man…
"I'll try…" Meiko replied mentally while coating her bow again. Before arrows could form at the center of her bow, however, a rumbling sound distracted the Konoha ninja. A shocking sensation of ground shifting beneath their very feet, sending shockwaves through the metallic walls that made them ring like bells and paralyzing anyone that was unfortunate enough to stay on the ground once the attack hit to stay grounded.
Before the blacksmith could react in any meaningful way, a shockwave splitting the floor hit her right in the dead-center and blasted the young woman off her feet. The poor kunoichi let out a gruesome grunt that suggested greater damage than it could have expected from such a low-scale attack, the semi-conscious blacksmith just dragged across the sandy surface of the Eternal Fire where the force of the quake sent her, setting off multiple of the hidden mines in her path.
"Meiko!" Kiyomi screamed out in desperation. This was no joking matter! The blacksmith was seriously banged up from multiple fights before, her chakra levels must have been well below the comfortable levels meaning that there was little that the redhead could have done in this situation in terms of toughening herself up for the upcoming blows.
"Hmph… A third ally…" Hanshin muttered. The gruesome fate of his fellow Konohagakure ninja appeared to bother the special jounin very little.
"You should have helped her, you were closer to her, you should have grabbed her or blocked the shockwave!" Kiyomi sent thoughts of escalating amounts of animosity toward the way of the special jounin's mind but they only hit the brick wall of his indifference.
"And risked setting off the mines myself? Hanshin would rather not. Don't even think about checking up on her. Your beloved looked tougher than to let something like this do her in, don't count on her staying in the fight though…" Hanshin replied.
"Did you legitimately cerebrate that my collaborators would tolerate such a primitive stratagem? To ground me while the Yamanaka entered my mind… I envisage not!" the pickaxe-wielding, squeaking redneck swung his lumbering weapon about before positioning it on his shoulder, as if showing off his bulk and physical strength to the Konoha ninja who were now on the back foot after having one of them taken out of commission.
"Well… At least he didn't hog the spotlight to himself again." A voice came from the northern part of the floor, signaling the location of another Iwagakure ninja – a decently overweight man in a red, sleeveless bodysuit that appeared to be a custom tailor based on the Iwagakure ninja uniform, modified for the size and mass of the wearer as well as his particular tastes.
And this spy was a man of exquisite tastes, as demonstrated by his garish hairdo of a mohawk on the front and center that grew into a ponytail at the back end.
"Still, for someone saved from humiliation he's quite chipper." The third voice, one of the ninja that used the ground shockwave ninjutsu which threw Meiko off balance and sent her sliding and crashing through the mines earlier, became clear from the darker corners of the northern side of the room.
Without uttering any more words, Kiyomi continued to stare at Meiko's body, still and lifeless with branches of blood accumulating and running down the sand. It wasn't like the blacksmith to stay down for so long, Meiko never simulated death to lower the guards of the enemy, that was more Mana's forte. She could not have learned that from Hanasaku either…
"You wish to hurt them for hurting your beloved, don't you?" Hanshin asked Kiyomi out loud with a voice toned almost like a taunt. "What are you waiting for? Show them what you're capable of. Use the rage to numb the pain and fatigue, explode!"
Kiyomi expected the special jounin to try and reason with her, attempt to keep her back so that no more mines were set-off and nobody got any more injuries than they should have. Being called out like that and almost challenged to let loose made the blonde feel ashamed that she did not from the get-go. The Yamanaka heiress flashed through a pair of hand seals and punched the ground beneath her feet, busting through solid sandstone as effortlessly as she'd have dug through sand if the rocks weren't there at all.
A dust-filled storm rose up, caused entirely by the Yamanaka's movements and intensity picking up sand and small specks as far as it reached. Once the spiraling twister of dirt settled down, the Yamanaka was nowhere in sight.
"Where'd she go?" the overweight spy with the oddest hairdo began glancing up, waiting for an attack from above. It would have been the most reasonable thing to do, however, it would be a slower as well as a risky method of attack as well. Arguably less risky than just dashing through the field, hoping not to set-off any hidden traps.
Kiyomi's body burst from underground right up in the face of the giant, pickaxe-using Iwagakure ninja with an uppercut to blow the man's jaw off, not unlike the manner which has created another one of their comrades from the earlier back. The first crashed into the man's jaw with a sound only to be compared with the crashing of a meteor and violently jerked the man's head back, a reaction so fast that it would not have been unreasonable to fear for the snapping of the man's neck just from the movement back. Fortunately for the Yamanaka, nobody expected her to sneak up underneath the active minefield instead of above it, otherwise she'd have been stopped in her tracks.
"Earth Style: Hidden Mole Jutsu!" Kiyomi yelled out, her body frozen in mid-air, still stuck in the position of a completed uppercut motion while her hand reached out for her weapon pouch. The pickaxe-wielding spy attempted a comeback at the Yamanaka heiress by swinging his mighty weapon but his effort was halted by Kiyomi's foot landing on top of the middle of the joint of his swinging arm while her hand tossed a yellow marble-sized orb into the air.
As fast as it took for the emphatic popping sound of the orb's explosion to spread, a flash of light covered the entire room of the Eternal Fire, sinking it all in blinding light that forced every ninja present to grunt in pain and cover their eyes. As a sign of rebell,ion Kiyomi didn't bother to even warn Hanshin about the move she was about to pull though she did not let it bother her now. It was all or back to square one now…
First thing upon landing on her feet, Kiyomi kneeled on one knee and threw her hands out in the Yamanaka hijutsu seal position. Now that all three of the opponents were temporarily blinded by the light bomb she used, she had a decent chance at hitting her hijutsu.
"Mind Body Switch!" Kiyomi chanted, followed by a ghastly howl of her consciousness leaving her body and hurrying to the large target of the explosive-using Iwagakure ninja. A nasty smile covered the face of her opponent who then just turned sideways and allowed the avatar of Kiyomi's consciousness slip by. He chose to dodge without actually seeing the jutsu and managed to pull it off, his call was the right one – it didn't matter where or in which angle he moved in, all that mattered was that he moved away drastically enough to avoid getting hit.
"Curse you!" the giant pickaxe-using Iwagakure spy threw a push kick forward, he did not see his opponent either but, given the short span of time between she punched him in the face and stopped his dominant hand from swinging the weapon and used her clan hijutsu, it was more than just a fair call that she was right in front of him. The man was far too dazed still to hit his kick, the move slipped just an inch above Kiyomi's shoulder and just barely nixed her cheek and bruised her trapezius.
The first thing that Kiyomi witnessed upon her consciousness returning to her body after a short lag was the Black Vicious completely formed around Hanshin's body, posing together with its master, or rather, the master posing together with the gruesome scene that his armor depicted, his body bent and turned in awkward angles that almost made Kiyomi's own joints hurt when gazing at the perfectly defined muscles of her superior.
"That was fun, Hanshin would have loved to have seen some of it…" the special jounin cracked a grin before all of the multiple hands covering Black Vicious and attempting to peel the armor away, while, ironically, comprising the chains of the armor at the same time, pointed their palms at the ground. "Black Vicious: Freeze Frame!"
Focused streams of wind started blowing from exposed palms of Black Vicious, the winds were decorated with visible, almost ethereal white lines that, despite their soul-like appearance, appeared to snuff out all that was living by freezing the object in its own humidity. In a little more than a blink of an eye, the entire sandy battlefield got frozen solid except for a small region around incapacitated Meiko that bundled with soft snow and hid the blacksmith under its embrace.
The terrifying trap of the minefield was issued a temporary moratorium of an icy nature.