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[Eric]

Current Rules as of 08-30-14 Subject to revision


ºHow to declare a winnerº
The battle commences with the initial post & terminates once either combatant is unable to continue. Such a feat can result in several ways, including knock-outs (concussions, etc.), full paralysis, almost-fatal wounds & so forth. So long both parties declare it plausible & understand the longevity/risk of the claim, it's considered eligible for use. However, things can, of course, become debatable in attempt to reach such a goal & in doing so arguments are bound to commence. If need be, either party can have onlookers & such /dis/agree with the action until a verdict is reached. If desired, either party can have other hosts or officials of sorts represent them for a more "legitimized" (as some have called it) reasoning or "Back-up".

ºRulesº
Like any other zone fight, rules are established as support for completing the quarrel without need for troubles to arise. Those basic rules are also adopted into host-challenges. The rules are as follows [unless agreed upon both parties (with proof) to be something otherwise]

ºNo Auto-Hittingº
Auto-Hitting is recognized as being a direct action following through without consent of the opposing party.

ºNo God-Moddingº
God-Modding has been recognized as an incorrect claim of one or more super-powers incapable of one's possession or against what one's character establishes. Several other things have been regarded God-Modding such as dodging every attack, extreme maneuvers & such. If God-Modding should occur, the opposing party will object to it & things can be negotiated from there.

Special rules

-The match is to be 1v1, though summons and the like are permitted.

-Victory for the challenger is the defeat of the host through any means necessary, and vice versa. Death in the fight does not equate to death IC.

-Skills acquired during an OOC match are not carried over IC.

-Is willing to fight either at SL or on the SL forum, the latter option most useful for fights where long periods of time may pass between postings (and also serves as a record of the fight's progress for other challengers)

- Friday, Saturday, and Sunday are the preferred days for zoning. Times vary by week, so see host for details.


If you wish to make a challenge, post below stating the name of your in-game character, compliance or wish to negotiate with the above stipulations from the host, and preferred zone. After that, communication will mostly be in private messages through a necessary medium.

Any questions or concerns should be directed in PM's as to avoid cluttering unnecessarily this thread. Thanks in advance.

Negotiations via PM

As my rules state, I only do OOC matches; you can claim whatever powers that you want, within reason (no natural Rinnegan and sage mode at the same time kind of thing). Deaths do not stick.

Kamui also is to be our appointed judge for said fight, which will take place on the forums

If the challenger agrees to the above or wishes to clarify/add something, now is the time to do it. Otherwise, post acceptance of the above.

Once that is done, Seraph, as challenger in my fight, you may have the first entry post. No others are to be posting in this thread except for Kamui, and that is only to give a ruling if necessary.

[Darkshinobi]

I do hereby accept all above terms.
Since we're speaking now on the forums, I have two further questions:
1. Is there an absolute time limit for each person to post -- i.e. two weeks?
2. To which setting would you most prefer? I'd appreciate something that provides no elemental advantage for either of us, such as the plains. I'll go into further detail with my first post, of course.

[Eric]

1) This is forum and OOC, there is no need for an absolute time limit (plus there is like, only one other person in line) imho, but just to be on the safe side, 2 weeks sounds good.

2) I agree with plains zone with preferably fair weather to start.

[Darkshinobi]

The sun stood high above the battlefield, glaring down like the eye of a judgmental god.
It was midsummer, and temperatures had climbed to an agonizing triple digits in fahrenheit; birds squawked lazily, too tired to leave their nests until night fell. The star, some several million miles away, would not be denied its wrath: the world waited, hoping that relief came, and soon.
But for now, it didn't. The only blessing were the short squalls of wind that tore through the area aimlessly, as though they too had nowhere to be and nothing to do. The shade of far trees provided some solace for those critters in the forests beyond the great plains, but here in the open there was nowhere to hide from the heat.
Seraph, of course, neglected it entirely.
He stood staring across the plains, his six senses thrown into concentration; the warrior felt with his soul a great presence approaching -- an entity that chance alone allowed him to wander across.
He knew the Kokuo's presence anywhere.
Its owner was another Akatsuki member, of course -- most Jinchuuriki were, these days. Seraph had once crossed blades with his son, though the Sound Sannin had been under a different name then.  Bocchiere's presence prevented him from striking out against the owner of the great Gobi; the rogue had goals that needed to be accomplished.
But the leader of the Akatsuki wasn't here.
Seraph stopped some several hundred meters from the edge of the forest, his back to the trees. Where, exactly, was Eric now? He closed his eyes in preparation, his traveler's cloak billowing in the breeze; he silently sought out the man's sheer spirit...

[Eric]

A tragedy indeed that Bocchiere was not here. Eric probably would have had that man deal with his fight instead, for he was not excessively keen on this fight. However, his Akatsuki cloak billowing in the ample winds, the Nara had to fight this fight in order to hold onto his tailed beast. It was a part of the job, whether he or Kokuo liked it or not.

He was swordless, but not unarmed. His spiky black hair provided some level of shade, though none that could equal the relief of the straw hat on his head, its wide brim reaching out to the point where he could at least tip his hat in the direction of his quarry if he so chose. It shaded his form, keeping him cooler than one without, and for reasons to be later revealed, he even had on this particular cloak a hood, as if he expected it to rain at some point.

No, he had spotted his opponent across the field, and though he wanted to wave in greeting, he refrained. Thirty meters was all he had, but it was a fair distance. It would establish some level of starting ground, for the grass reached nigh to his waist; he would not need to cut down any of this grass anytime soon. The heat had made its presence known, though the dry grass seemed ready to set ablaze at the first indication of gunpowder and spark.

A giant tinder field really, but Eric did not care. His weapons tools and pouches, on his hip and rear, did cause this particular Akatsuki cloak to have to have a full zipper; at this point it was fully unzipped, as to give ease of access to these pouches. His green flak jacket, chainmail armor, and blue pants might would be a subtle remainder of the man's origin, Konohagakure.

Two scrolls in particular were within one of the pouches, but such would not be visible to the naked eye. They held chakra within them, a signature similar to that of some of the kunai and other too in the man's current employ. Granted, to the naked eye or a weak sensor, this would go unnoticed.

At last, fluff all aside, the man took a single step forward, his ring flashing briefly as the man tipped his hat towards Seraph in acknowledgement that he may have the first move. The wispy clouds above were hardly thick enough to shield from the sunlight, but it made shadows very crisp, clear, and defined; the very grass at their feet cast a blanket shadow of sorts, though not of the kind that could be immediately usable, particularly at this range.

In anticipation, Eric awaited his opponent's first move.


*Edit: Removed unecessary description regarding the rays of the sun, as the hat shade states better. And to add edit footnote.

Also, added garments underneath cloak.

[Darkshinobi]

Seraph's eyes unclosed to reveal crimson irises staring implacably at his fellow rogue; the hexagram that  evidenced an eternal power spun slowly in its circuit, and to the warrior the world was suddenly an open book:
He could calculate the breeze with a glance, the brush blowing gently in the wind, and knew the impact nature would have on any particular projectile. He saw the assassin's armament; Seraph's suspicious eyes paused for a moment both at his hood and at the pouches on his side -- they were an unknown quantity.
Seraph was not an unskilled sensor; he had served directly under two Otokage, and indirectly under another. The wise knew that knowledge was the most important asset of any war, and Seraph was a warrior. The residual energy residing in Eric's possessions didn't go unnoticed; he retained the information for further use.
The younger Akatsuki held more than a few curious accessories on his body; his cloak was imprinted in what seemed to be a seal of some sort, and two twin pouches at his waist contained strange, glowing marbles and what seemed to be seeds, respectively -- though neither were visible to the naked eye. An additional pouch rested on his lower leg, containing several scrolls of his own. Beneath the traveler's cloak and sealed from view was simple leather armor; it wouldn't protect against such heavy attacks as he was sure to face here, but minor kunai to the chest were no more than an inconvenience to he.
Lastly and perhaps most peculiarly, a flute sat, nestled comfortably in his back pocket.

He had gathered as much intelligence as he could before the fight; the two were of a kind: Eric Nara was a Sannin who turned traitor to his village; Seraph was the same. His foe was a tricky, clever creature whose greatest gift was in outsmarting others; he wasn't the leader of the Nara without reason. The grass itself could be a threat here.
Seraph stood, facing perhaps one of the most dangerous men he'd ever meet in mortal combat...And smiled.

It was time to get started.

With a flash of fingers, the rogue burst into action: chakra exploded into his esophagus, and an instant later he released an extremity of ice from his lips. The object exploded into two dozen frozen birds, which shot towards the awaiting rogue with fervor. (Hyōton: Tsubame Fubuki)


The birds arranged in an arc, spreading out as they flew; four darted straight towards the warrior, their exceptionally-sharp blades slicing through the grass as easily as if it didn't exist and sending the stuff flying everywhere behind them; the additional twenty arced so that they fell from above, the side, and a few even from the rear -- the strike was timed so that there was no room to dodge, and an attack aiming forward couldn't possibly hit all the swallows in time. They moved at nearly sixty miles per hour -- at a distance of roughly ninety-eight feet, they took just over a second to reach their target; the birds aimed to eviscerate him from all directions simultaneously.

Meanwhile, the cloud of grass that had been catapulted into the air served to separate the two from sight; Seraph took the moment to strafe rapidly to his left-- staying in one place was tantamount to suicide --  and relied instead on his exceptional ears and Eric's own chakra signature to paint a perfect picture of what was happening. The former Sannin of Otogakure could comprehend sound even more powerfully than his eyes could light; though he had no view of Eric in this moment, he knew exactly what was happening.



Fixed a few grammar errors; probably a few more I missed.

[Eric]

So his foe indeed made the first move, his rapid movements not going unnoticed by Eric's trained eye. Granted, while he would not visually keep pace with the individual handsigns, the man immediately covered himself in his own shadow. Granted, this would be relatively easy and quick, for already his large brimmed hat cast a shadow over most of his body; the top of the hat itself really was the main outlier in that regard, his lower regions covered in the shadow of the grass around him, which in turn became his shadow as well. This would, in effect, make the shadow of the vast grassland far more useful to the shinobi.

Already then, the man would have been set up to prepare for his first strike, but as fate would have it, swallows of ice emerged instead of a bullet of wind or something else to that sort. Thinking quickly, the man put an incredible amount of faith in his shadows and brought his hands together in the rat seal, for just as it seemed that he would be completely overtaken for his seemingly foolish standing, the swallows would seemingly merge into the shadows, swallowed if you will by the shadow of the man.

Fūinjutsu: Kage Naraku Rō; Sealing Technique: Shadow Hell Prison

No, not merely swallowed, but sealed; for by covering himself in his shadow, the dififculty and effort of which greatly minimized by his attire, he became capable of not just sensing anything around him, but outright acting upon it nigh at will, in this particular case, sealing the twenty-four swallows into his shadow. No doubt his opponent would be mildly surprised, even as an extra mark appeared on his lower neck labelled "shadow seal".

With that completed, the man formed his hands into yet another handsign, this time acting on the surrounding grass. His chakra would seem to possess the grass in a fashion akin to the leaves of the Nara Forest, manipulating them and sending them into the air. For now, this is all that he would do, for within moments a leaf storm would cover much of the battle area so far expended, with the intent on completely blocking his target's vision, hindering his movements, and even putting his quarry in a state of alarm.

Konoha no jutsu; Hidden in the Leaves Technique

For he had already shown that he could do with shadows; presuming he completed this technique, the leaves would produce a pseduo-canopy of shadows and grass blades. Since Eric had sensory connection to his shadow, and by extension any shadows connected to it, he would be able to detect actions across much of the plains without having to witness it with his own two eyes. 

In case the description is not entirely clear, this is somewhat the Leaf equivalent of the Hidden in the Mist technique, if that provides a proper visual aide.

Did he expect a rebuttal from his quarry? Well, he doubted truly that he would stand still and allow the zone to be overtaken without a fight. Even with sound regulating earbuds granted by the Fourth Hokage himself, Eric still had to be quite wary of long range sneak attacks before the completion of this technique.

As he had seen with the swallows, his opponent was capable of using ice release; that meant that they also had the capability of using wind style. As his primary element, he knew very much of the long and short range cutting capabilities that it possessed. Combined with fire, the traditional counter to this technique, it would prove detrimental if he did not at least include that possible counter in his thinking, not wanting to miss a beat of the fight, nor surrender to his opponent reasonable pacing for the fight.

[Darkshinobi]

The world was in an uproar immediately following Seraph's assault.

As the cloud of grass prohibited their view of the other, the demon didn't see Eric's energy manifest; he did, however, feel the force of the manifestation and the sudden disappearance of the demonic doves immediately after -- it didn't take a genius to understand the implication. To underestimate the Sannin's skills would be a costly mistake; this defense could either be Fuinjutsu or Jikukan...Or both. Seraph, of course, knew not the exact details regarding Eric's abilities, but at this stage it was folly to write anything out.
And as the Nara's power permeated forth from him, the rogue pivoted, turning towards his next tactic.

The grass itself was wrested under the creature's control; he was rather obviously attempting to attain control over the area -- if the assassin allowed him to sew his shadows over the entire battlefield, there'd be no place for him to hide; he'd have no means or manner of defense.
But a Katon attack was almost too straightforward; the obvious answer was rarely the best one. A veteran such as he had seen so many zealous shinobi charge to their deaths at the hands of a cunning fox -- and Eric was, at least, that.
So instead of attacking, the rogue unopened his eyes; his senses sang, and power poured forth from him.
Trees formed from the earth, growing from a sapling into an ancient, tough bulwark in an instant; they expanded further outwards, a forest blooming from nothingness in a matter of moments. The trees both rose above the growing grass storm and burrowed their roots deep into the earth; a vast, living network of interconnected trees soon stood in what had before been the clearing.

((Mokuton: Yangotonai Kyuuketsu; Wood Release: Esteemed Palace)

As the entire network contained his chakra signature, this defense prevented the Nara from obtaining ubiquity. Despite their seeming origins, Mokuton wasn't exceptionally flammable and indeed served as one of the greater defenses in the realms.
This alone, however, wasn't Seraph's goal. Before the shadows overcame him, he stepped back and melded into one of his own trees. With his power, he could flow freely through its network -- and couldn't be pinpointed by any such sensing prowess.
In an instant, he was gone from his former location, having disappeared into the grid itself. 

(Mokuton: Yangotonai Shisha; Wood Release: Esteemed Emissary)

The trees continued to expand for the moment; due to the sheer speed of this technique, it wouldn't take long for them to reach Eric's position. If they did, the branches sought not only to extend past him but ensnare and encapsulate the entity from all sides, such as before. Meanwhile, Seraph's own senses expanded through the trees themselves, allowing him greater insight into the immediate area.

[Eric]

Eric was not playing around, and it seemed neither was his opponent. For soon after setting up his leaves technique, via sensory connection with his shadow, he began to detect a strange anamloy. Or, what WOULD be strange if the man was not a native Leaf shinobi. Excited, almost happy really, had his quarry any idea of his excitement to battle in a forest of trees, then he would have thought twice about the fire style counter idea.

For with every thick grove of trees, there is a grand canopy; and with every canopy there was a network of shadows. Capturing deer in such an environment had been pitifully easy; naturally, his quarry was no deer, but he was subject all the same to the threat that he himself had created.

Nonetheless, the man wasted no time, as time was of the essence. The moment the trees began sprouting, and thoroughly covered portions of the battlefield with his earlier leaf attack active, Eric proceeding to surge his chakra into the shadow of these emerging trees. He would, in effect, curse the entire network of shadows manifesting from this canopy, allowing him to freely manipulate their shadows as if they were his own. 

Kagemane no noroi; Shadow Manipulation Curse

He needed to apply it only to a single shadow connected to the trees, and it would be complete. Any shadows that were created from these shadows, such as the branching of the trees or the creation of clones within the canopy would be subject to this control, the only way to remove of which (without knowing shadow manipulation) would be to remove whatever was generating this vast network of shadows. The trees themselves, what grass remained on the battlefield, and of course, the leaves of the trees.

In this way, Eric did not surrender his intended control of the battlefield, but in fact enhanced it. For his opponent had merged into the trees; though Eric did not know where his opponent was now, if he was anywhere within the canopy, connected to the trees, then he would be in a forced stalemate of sorts, unable to leave the safety of the tree or risk almost immediately being defeated.

While Seraph would be able to sense the tingle of chakra, he would not per say know what was going on, unless of course he had had many discussion with Bocc, who is the only person IC to have ever been subjected to this curse in all of Akatsuki, and thus both know how to get rid of it and to have experienced first-hand just how pesky it can be.

Anyways, though control of the battlefield was wrested, he still had to deal with the physical threat of the trees; and the fact that he needed his opponent to come out in order to efficiently take them down. For while he might could just shadow hell the entire forest, that would take literally all of his chakra if the forest was indeed as large as Seraph had intended, to cover the entirety of the battlefield. And all his foe needed to do was to surprise him and that would be a great waste of strength.


So what was he to do? These wooden tendrils were an issue that would not go away simply by using force. The mot efficient way to deal with them was not to destroy them, for more would only sprout in their place.

It was more efficient to fight his opponent tit for tat. For before the wooden tendrils could completely ensnare him, it seemed that the man had vanished, the wood closing in on nothing. Eric had merged into the shadow to enter the Nara pocket dimension, for he had no need to stay in harm's way as long as his opponent was in such a mood as to hide from him.

Gate of Shadows

Not that it would do him in any good, in hindsight. Presuming he had merged with the trees and not gone to a different dimension of his own, then even were he to remove all of the trees and such foliage, if this struck true, then it would be too late; and this battle, in theory, would be set for Gumbi. Eric had more than enough time on his hands, and he was the hunted, or the challenged rather; he did not need to kill his opponent to win, he merely needed to keep him from getting his tailed beast or declaring victory. A declaration of defeat would suite him just fine, if such could be forced.

[Eric]

Two weeks has passed since the last post. Seraph defaults, Eric claims victory.

[Darkshinobi]

I accept this default by timeout and acknowledge that I cannot request another replacement on the challenge list for at least a week.
This topic can be locked and unstickied.