Shark Bait [Private]

The first two tiger sharks moved in tandem, swooping in to try to take her out, one going high, the other going low. Each was more than capable of taking a chunk out of her, even if she enhanced her durability, so she would need to find a way to kill them without getting bit. The first step was to eliminate their teamwork. As they move in for the kill, Midori flattened, making the top one unable to attack, and then rolled as the second one moved to thrash her and pushed a Chakra Ball into its eye, killing it instantly.

The second tiger spun around and charged, and it was ended with a point blank Chakra Blast directly into its mouth. Horribly predictable these creatures; she spun to see the jaws of the Great White almost upon her. Her hands snatched upwards, one grabbing each jaw and holding it open to ensure she didn’t get her fingers bitten off while the sheer mass of the shark made her skid backwards through the sand and kicking it up through the water, but she did eventually stop regardless of the thrashing of the beast. Unable to attack with her hands, she did the only thing she could think of and opened the maw of the shark wider, and wider, until there was a sickening pop as the jaw broke in half and died.

It had taken a substantial amount of effort to do, and she was tapped out on breath, so she pushed the sharks towards the shore and swam upwards, climbing on top of the water. She needed to make it more difficult for the orca’s she was sensing now… and needed to catch her breath. Hopefully being out of the water would buy her a little time as she panted, trying to re-oxygenate herself with deep intakes of air.

[13]

Satori watched the orca approaching as she dealt with the sharks… and he eyed them quietly as they kept their distance. They weren't like the sharks. Intelligent. Careful. Tactical. Glancing down at Midori as she burst from the surface he grunted once.

“Do you want help?” he inquired simply as they began to slowly approach, until the sharks however they didn’t go near the shore. Instead they began to taunt her. Flipping backwards through the water and flicking their tails at her. Chattering as if laughing at her as the corpses of the sharks floated through the air.

He sank to his heels in the water and watched. They wanted her to come to them. They weren’t going anywhere. It wasn’t needed but they’d stop any other sharks that came near for the scents of food. To top it off, three orca were worth two to three great whites a piece as far as nutrition went. It was a damn good haul… if Midori could do it.

The massive Midori heard his request and shook her head side to side, indicating that she didn’t want help. Sure, the great white had been a challenge, but her blood was on fire with the desire to fight, to win, to kill. She wouldn’t let him swoop in and take her fun away from her, not while she was in the thick of it… she couldn’t and wouldn’t let that happen. She knew that the chakra was making her like this… or perhaps it was simply unearthing something that was always there that she stamped down. Either way, she was having legitimate fun and looking towards the taunting orcas, she grinned viciously.

She charged in a sudden movement, and prepared to change her power to enhance her durability; she already knew she wouldn’t get out of this unscathed, and she simply didn’t care at the moment. These were big fish, and exactly what she needed in order to truly test herself. These beasts were smart and would use true teamwork where the sharks were just being idiots… and they were far stronger than the sharks were, albeit a bit slower. She reached the first one that had been taunting her and grabbed it’s powerful tail, standing on the water and fighting against the thrashing beast as it dragged her around on the surface a bit before she truly strengthened the chakra keeping her afloat and dug her fingernails into the beast and chucked it as hard as she could towards the shore.

Have fun catching that one Satori.

It had gotten off a few squeals of panic though, and the other two were moving in, not for a moment considering she could have thrown it out of the water. That strength though quickly ebbed from her as she shifted it to the durability with the prepared change, her skin growing harder as the scales deepened across her skin. She saw them approach, one coming at her like a shark on the horizontal axis while the other moved quickly from below. The one coming for her side was faster, and she pivoted and spun, putting a Chakra Blast through it’s eye and killing it without mercy.

And then she felt the pain surge through her leg as the second orca clamped down. If she hadn’t shifted her bloodline, she knew it would be gone now, but those teeth were not small and the pain was nearly blinding as they dug into flesh and muscle. If she wasn’t so quick to react, no doubt the beast would have started thrashing and taken her leg from her, but Midori was not done yet. Yelling in fury and pain, she put another Chakra Ball and reached down, shoving it in the creatures nose and detonating it. It wasn’t enough to kill it, but stunned, the creature released her, and she drove the next one in the gaping hole she left behind, killing it and exploding it’s skull. Grabbing the carcasses, she limped to the shore, determination still on her face to do this alone.

Once on shore, she dropped the whales for him to take and all but fell next to the smaller tiger shark from before and reached over, extending her hand towards it. From her hand a small jet black needle erupted and stabbed into the shark, and within seconds it looked as though it was deflating, shrinking like a balloon that was popped. Continuing to shrivel up, her wounds rapidly healed, and soon the shark was gone, and Midori was whole again. Shrinking as her bloodline expended, she collapsed on the sand and breathed heavily, trying to catch her breath.

[14]

The first orca that went flying through the air caused his gaze to snap upward toward it before his hand opened. Claws lashing out as it flew through the air to rake it’s throat open in-passing so it simply smashed into the shore and twitched only a few moments before dying. After this he simply waited, and watched.

Even when Midori was bitten by the porpoise, Satori didn’t lunge in to help. She’d asked for him not to interfere, and so he wouldn’t unless he had no choice. Even as blood flooded the water from the bite, he remained where he was watching quietly with narrowed eyes. As the fight finished however Satori reached down and firmly grasped her arm as she began to stumble out of the water to ensure she didn’t fall.

Once she had settled he released her so she could regain herself, and waited while she absorbed the sharks flesh quickly. Grunting once she finally finished, he rested his chin in his palm.

“Better, but you left yourself open again. You’re too focused on durability and power. Streamlining your body to adapt to the water and relying on your smaller size and mobility would have let you end that without taking a hit,” he commented idly while examining her leg once, nodding. Satisfied that she was whole as he straightened and began gathering the other orca carcasses.

Midori was slowly getting her breathing back under control when she heard his assessment and nodded. “If I use full release… I cannot change my size. Only with partial release do I choose… Don’t think that would have been enough against them.” That was her honest assessment, as she was restricted to using just her bloodline for the purpose of this training. Still, she had cleared out the orca’s, and they were all bleeding out and attracting more sharks and such… and slowly Midori sat herself upright.

She could take them on without her bloodline, but that wasn’t the intent behind what they were doing. For now, it was a way to train and get food at the same time, and looking at the size of their haul, she knew that they were doing well. How the hell were they going to get all this food back to the village though? It was a big problem, and it wasn’t like she could just toss them on her back all at once. Either they were going to need some help, or they were going to be making multiple trips, and risked it getting pecked at by birds.

Since they had a moment, she wanted to learn more about that method while she regained her bearing. She hadn’t used all the much of her regular chakra, but she would need time if she wanted to use the Transformation again. “Should I try again? And while I prepare, please elaborate on that ‘method’ you spoke of before.” She was assuming that she was going to need to try again, after all, because she still messed it up… but she could very well be wrong. She never really could predict what he was thinking more often than not.

[15]

Satori glanced at her as she stated that she couldn’t, and shook his head. “You can alter the cellular structure of your body. There’s no reason you can’t. You just haven’t figured out how yet,” he replied idly before resting his elbows on his knees.

“Studying Ijutus will help alot with that. Understanding biology and anatomy and how such functions will help you maximize the bloodlines abilities,” his gaze trailed toward the dried out shark briefly. “It’ll let you better learn how to utilize that ability as well so you can heal properly even in combat.”

Straightening a bit he shrugged. “Don’t ever think something cannot be done, you used to think controlling your bloodlust was impossible too, right?” A slight smile formed on his lips, before he contemplated her next question.

“If you want to keep going I won’t stop you. If you don’t know how to alter your size in that transformed state then rely on your base state with partial transformations instead. Minimize your costs, maximize the effectiveness of each movement. But, I think for now instead of trying it on more sharks you should try it on more common opponents,” Satori grinned a bit.

“We’ll have a match later. I want to test you for something, anyway,” shrugging he turned, examining the orca’s and sharks decorating the grounds and took a slow breath as chakra pulsed through his body. Rolling into his limbs before he moved forward. The chakra-enhanced strength forming before he grabbed the nearest orca by the tail and, with a grunt, flipped it across his shoulders.

Another burst of chakra into his neural network and joints to maximize balance… and he began to pile the massive kadavers across his shoulders and under his arms. Leaving her the largest of the sharks to carry herself as she lacked the balance to support a stack of dead fish on her back and shoulders.

“Shall we head back for now?” he inquired simply as he glanced back at her.

Midori nodded as she contemplated Iijutsu; she had read a bit on the subject because regardless of her constant comparison to Satori and the irritation she felt at never being quite comparable in that department, she wanted to be useful. Medicine was also a way for her to be able to heal without the need for the needle associated with her bloodline; it was a fragile thing and had a lot of weaknesses, only really useful when out of combat and trying to recuperate.

She also wondered about what he said regarding changing her shape when in that form… that would be nice to not be quite as monstrous, and if Iijutsu was a reasonable approach for that solution too then it was a good idea for her to really put some effort into researching the subject. No more excuses... and then the offer of a match came to light, and she smirked and nodded. She had hoped this would happen sooner than later. “I have a scroll of techniques I want to try, something I have been working on when reading about Ninjutsu…”

She then got to her feet and marveled as Satori stacked the majority of the weight on his back, looking ridiculous but she couldn’t deny that it wasn’t effective. Apparently they wouldn’t need trips… as the rest of it she could gather with her normal strength, and moving beside him, she did exactly that. She was pretty thankful for her height and reach right now as it helped to have long arms capable of balancing the large carcasses on her back. Once she was set, she nodded to him and they started the long trek home, and she smirked at the fact that they were both going to get some awe-inspired looks, even from the likes of the Ryuutei.

[16]

//THREAD EXIT

Satori nodded once at her comment on having made a scroll. A curious light in his eyes at the fact. He doubted he could use them; he’d told her to focus on creating techniques that only she could use since he could do the rest. But it was still good for her to have begun working on them. Besides, by analyzing what she was doing he could come up with even more techniques and options for himself as well.

“I’m looking forward to it. I’ll teach you a few more basic Taijutsu techniques I created as well. They’re good for maximizing energy expenditure as much as possible,” with this simple statement Satori’s gaze then flicked toward the shore a final time. Content they had everything that they needed before he looked back and focused on the forest ahead of them.

The route back to Kirigakure may mark up the meat a bit, but the thick hides of the kadavers should help in that respect at the least. Grunting he moved forward, heading back toward the village with the sharks and orca in tow.

// Thread Exit.