Don't fight the elderly [Mission/NPC]

Spoiler:

It was a mild day in Kumogakure. The birds were chirping, the sun was in the sky, and Nova was actually feeling somewhat good about a mission for once. She was walking down the streets and for the first time, the citizens of Kumogakure didn't have anything to fear from the eternally pissed-off genin. Many a time they all had to cower out the way lest they get punched in the mouth. Had she been anyone else, she might as well have been skipping down the street, humming a pretty tune.

Today was a good day since Nova wasn't doing any menial labor. She wasn't shopping for a grandma, hurling boxes, or doing stuff for her asshole parents. Today, Nova was going to be training with an old taijutsu master, and she was even going to paid for it! Well, the goal of the mission was to help the master hone his skill, which, to Nova at least, sounded like he just wanted a glorified punching bag. Oh, she wasn't going to just take whatever he dished out on the chin, she was going to give as good as she got. But she wasn't holding out hope for actually lasting long. For one, she was out of practice; all her recent fights had been pretty one-sided. For the second thing, Nova didn't actually have a lot of versatility when it came to hand-to-hand combat. She could punch hard and move fast. Anything fancy was beyond her at the moment. A master with lots of training and experience had her beat.

Nova was still excited, though. She knew exactly where she was on the totem pole, but was excited to learn more.

It was with this thought that Nova approached the doors to the Fist-Shin-Lee Estate and knocked, somewhat violently. Just because she was in a good mood didn't mean she had decided to start abiding by basic etiquette after all.


(Nova's stats as of the start of this mission)

Spoiler:

WC: 320
(Requesting B-Ranked NPC for this mission)

(OOC Hey I'm going to be taking this for ya <3 I look forward to roleplayin' with ya. )

Tai Master:

Settling in his seat, Shin sighs shortly before picking up the tea that he had prepared at his table. He was expecting to have a ninja sent to his estate today, in order for him to practice his Taijutsu. Looking over his request once more, he notices that it was going to be a mildly powerful ninja coming his way today. Giving a long, thoughtful sip of his oolong, he settles into his spot and prepares himself. He was in no way worried about the spar that he had ahead of him, though Shin was in deep contemplation about what kind of ninja they would send his way. Knowing full well that his request to send someone powerful enough that he wouldn't have to hold back, he was a bit antsy to see how long the new generation would last.

As he had finished the last drop of his tea, Shin heard a loud banging at the door. He imagined that there might be a huge man standing behind it, ready to flex their rippling muscles as if that made any difference when it came to Taijutsu. Though brawn was important, tactics would assure much more victory than raw power. Moving slowly to his door, he opens it and looks to see a scrappy-looking young woman that wasn't much shorter than he was. Hmn. Shin was beginning to think this wouldn't be the usual practice dummies that he had grown accustomed to having to beat down.

"Ah, you must be the ninja sent here to help me train..." Shin then invites the girl inside of his home, in which there would be a spot at a sitting table that showed a view through the windows in the wall. He would try to have her sit down, and then discuss: "So... I don't usually do this, but..." He points outwards. Onlookers would note that there are a few different types of training areas, some with water, some with sand, and some that were just plain dirt. "Pick where you would like for us to have our spar... I'm trying to get used to changing circumstances and conditions." Picking up the tea kettle, he then begins to pour out two drinks; one for him and one for the guest whom he would be combating.

[381]

[300/300 AP]
[100/100 HP]

A couple of seconds after knocking the door was opened to reveal a deceptively frail old man. For a few seconds, she caught herself thinking 'Is that it?' but she pushed those thoughts away. Underestimating an opponent would often lead to one's early downfall. This man was a taijutsu master, she reminded herself, underestimating him would be especially dangerous.

"Ah, you must be the ninja sent here to help me train..." The man said, and it took all of Nova's willpower to not scoff in his face. One of Nova's pet peeves was people pointing out the obvious, and speaking when they didn't have to. 'Don't antagonize the guy paying you, Nova.' She thought as she accepted his invitation to come inside with a forced polite nod. Nova was hardly an expert in interior design but she'd say that the inside was pretty nice.

The man led her through his house to a table with a nice view beside it, inviting her to sit down. Nova did as requested but anyone with eyes would be able to see how little she actually wanted to be doing so. Her leg bounced up and down, fingers tapping on the table surface, gaze locked outside. She was a person who hated to be sitting still not doing anything, especially when the possibility of a fight was so close.

As the man gave her the request of picking out an area for the spar, Nova considered it seriously. She looked through the window, this time actually paying attention to the contents of the different training areas outside. Right now, she didn't have a lot of techniques that could be leveraged in any environment more than the other. The biggest hindrance she would have was fighting in a small area with her bo staff. Fighting in an open area would be best.

With her mind made, Nova nodded towards the training area that was just a 20x20 flat plane of dirt and grass, "That one, the flat grassy square."

WC: 338
TWC: 658

Shin slowly gets up from his seat and stretches his tired old bones for just a moment, before heading towards the door. "Grass field it is. I take care of this sod myself, so please take care not to mess it up..." The man then slowly saunters out to the door and opens it. Walking out, he assumed that the young woman would be following him. As he trailed his way up to the path, he made a point to stand in the center of the field. Around them was about 20x20 meters of just plain grass, surrounded by small wooden stakes that marked the training area. Outside of the makeshift fence, the grass was unruly and it had looked like someone had spent many days pounding at the earth by hand.

Once at the center, Shin would look to the girl. "So, here's how we're going to do this..." He has them enter their starting positions, and both move 5 meters from the center, leaving them 10 meters away from each other. Shin then puts his right hand on his head, slowly pushing it to the side while sounds reminiscent of hail smashing on pavement echo from his spine. "Come at me when you're ready to start." The man then loses his carefree front, and rips his shirt off, revealing the weapon that had left many overconfident ninja to rot in the beds of village hospitals. His body.

Spoiler:

Shin is already in his fighting stance, before he offers one last breath of advice to the young ninja whom he'd be training with. "Oh..." The man stares directly at his opponent, tracking each breath while watching the movement of their hands and feet. "Don't hold back... I'm not going to." No matter the outcome, Shin was sure that one of them would be sleeping comfortably on a hospital bed for the next few days.

[314]
{695}

[300/300 AP]
[100/100 HP]

Nova got up in tandem with the man and followed him through the door as he took his sweet time walking there. Was he doing it on purpose, she wondered, to test her patience? If so, it was working. Her patience was definitely being tested. She set her jaw and stepped outside to continue walking up the path to the training area she'd picked out. From inside, she'd missed all the unruly grass outside the plane. It probably wouldn't matter, but it was something to look out for in case she accidentally stepped out of the area. Easy to trip up

She did what the man asked and got into position 10-meters away from him, 5-meters from the center. His back made an alarming sound as he pushed on it and then the man ripped off his shirt. Nova raised an eyebrow, impressed. She'd obviously been wrong about her previous assumption of him being a scrawny man; he possessed a body one could only achieve through a lifetime of training and hard work. She felt her respect for him growing.

"Wasn't planning to." She said with a small smirk when the man confirmed that one of them would probably end up beaten and bloody by the end of the fight. Good.

Since the man was watching her every move intently, he'd see Nova slowly reach into her right weapon pouch and pull out two shuriken in one hand. If nothing had changed and the man was still standing there watching her, she'd flick the first shuriken towards his face (Speed: 110/Sharpness: 30) and then throw the second one at the same speed towards his chest the moment he moved, assuming he moved to dodge at all.

If nothing changed, Nova would then take the Bo Staff from her back and hold it in her right hand as she began to sprint towards the man at her maximum speed.

WC: 320
TWC: 978

Shin was ready to kick some tail. Though it may not have been apparent in the ad that he had posted, he was fully intent on using this ninja as a test of his skill more than anything else. The fact that someone was willing to take up a challenge that he reserved for higher rank ninja off the bat, proved that they were fearless shinobi. The kunoichi in front of him could be one of the top-ranked people in her class, for all he knew. Because of the honor that previous masters of his family had entrusted with him through the years, he knew that he couldn't let this fight go in any other direction than a victory for him. As Shin saw it, this target could learn from the fight after they woke up.

The moment Shin saw her move, the battle had begun. It had seemed that she was taking her sweet time to take out her thrown weapons, and he attempted to intercept her before she was able to get them in her grasp. So, Shin puts his right arm out while lightning shooting up his arm as he charged at her with 75 Speed, closing the 10-meter gap to attempt and hit her. If the shurikens were somehow drawn fast enough to hit him on his route in with Lariat, the inherent DR granted by the technique would cause them to simply get knocked away [50 DR clashing with two 30 sharpness projectiles]. Shin was now closing the distance between the two ninjas rather fast, aiming at her core with the inside of his right arm. Shin was sure that this attack would potentially miss, so he thinks of the next move that he was going to do in a split second. It all depended on how his opponent dodged, or how they counter-attacked. If the attack hit, Shin made sure that he wouldn't end up splitting the girl in half. 

[323]
{1018}


Lariat A -40 AP

[260/300 AP]
[100/100 HP]

Seeing as how the man wanted to speed things up, Nova would too. Instead of leisurely reaching for her weapons as she'd originally intended, Nova would speed up and do so at her maximum possible speed. Since this was much faster than the man was moving, even with the Lariat active, and the small distance she had to reach, the man would only make it roughly a meter before Nova had already thrown her two shuriken at his chest and face (Speed: 110/Sharpness: 30).

Nova didn't recognize the technique the man was using, which was something she'd expected to happen. Hopefully, after this fight, she'd get the motivation needed to start learning techniques like the man. In this fight, though, she would have to work with what she had. She usually fought with her fists, but she sensed that she'd have to change up her fighting style a little in this fight. The man obviously had the advantage when it came to being in fist-range, but Nova had something he didn't: a staff. When the man had reached the 5-meter mark, with this thought in mind, Nova would step back 2-meters and draw her staff from its holster on her back. During this time, since Nova was moving at max speed, he would have made it a meter and 3/4, which left a final distance of roughly 5 meters between them by the time Nova had finished stepping back and drawn her staff.

If the man continued on with his Lariat, then the moment he entered within range of an attack Nova would swing the staff as hard and as fast as she could towards his side. Assuming, of course, that nothing changed.

WC: 284
TWC: 1261

Shin continued to follow through with the lariat to the full range on his approach, Shin then noticed that she began to swing her staff at him, and in his mind chuckled silently to himself. His Lariat had only been effective up to 10 meters in range, and while he was this close, it seemed his feint would pay off. It was typical that one would try to gain the advantage by having weaponry, though it didn't make much of a difference to him. She was swinging her staff to the left of him, so he let his left arm block the blow, as he went for the decisive strike. Already in range with her making the attack, the swing that she had made cost her dearly. 

Because of the nature of her attack, Shin's block would cause the attack to stop dead, and before she had a moment to process that Shin had taken the hit straight to his arm, he would already have been pushing right his hand forward, using Nukite: Spear Hand. This would be going at 120 speed towards her torso, less than a split second before the staff contacted his arm. The first jab was aimed at her ribcage, and with his increased speed during this technique, he would continue laying on exactly 5 total. The first would be ribcage, the second would be a follow-up around her chest, and for the third and fourth he would decide where to target if his opponent was somehow able to move. 

Because of the nature of the attack, each stab would be dealing (STR 120 + SPD 120 / 2 = ) 120 impact force to the kunoichi's body, and as such, would likely punch holes through the ninja. Because of Shin's skill and the years he'd spent training, vital organs would be avoided during the attack, taking no extra time or reducing his speed in any way. If connected, it would be likely that he would stop attacking as soon as his opponent passed out, and he would make sure to rush them to a hospital. He wasn't a killer, after all.

[334]
{1354}

Nukite: The Spear Hand S - 50 AP activation, - 25 x3 for 3 extra jabs (Total of -125 AP)
Block S -50 AP

[85/300 AP]
[100/100 HP]

Unfortunately for the man, he seemed to underestimate the strength of Nova's throw. Although it was true that the natural damage resistance granted to him by the Lariat would nullify the sharpness of the shuriken, it would do nothing for the impact force they possessed - a deadly assumption to make since he didn't even try to dodge. As they hit the man in the face and chest, they wouldn't pierce the skin but they would leave a nasty bruise and possibly a broken bone (70 impact force - 50 DR = 20 damage each). Nova grinned and something crazy flashed in her eyes for a split second - the first hit belonged to her. Now, time to see if she could follow it up.

The man also seemed to have underestimated the range of her swipe with the staff, though not enough to fail to block it like he'd intended to. While her staff was indeed 2-meters long, the effective range was actually about 2.3-meters since Nova had been using the full range of her arm as well as the staff. As mentioned earlier, the man would still be able to block with his left arm and it would stall Nova's momentum temporarily as he'd said. However, the extra 30-centimeters granted with her reach would mean the staff would have hit his arm around when the Lariat was ending, and he wouldn't have been able to activate his Nukite before the impact as he'd originally intended which gave her enough time to recover. Even if he'd managed to activate his Nukite faster than Nova had anticipated, she still would have more than enough time to recover from the hit and start to bring the staff back towards her considering there was currently a 2-meter gap between them, and the speed difference between them wasn't that vast.

Since the man had activated his Nukite at such a large distance away he likely wouldn't have been able to land the strike any way since the technique was limited by the reach of his arms. Just in case, though, Nova would sidestep a meter to the right at 130 speed (100 speed + 30 reflex) the moment after he activated the technique to put a little more distance between them. At her max speed, assuming she went uninterrupted and with her bo staff still in her right hand, Nova would reach over her body with her left hand into the weapon pouch on her right leg and pull out another shuriken, where she would again throw it at the man's stomach as hard and as fast as she could.

WC: 432
TWC: 1693

Yeah, those shurikens did hurt like hell. Though he was a great master, Shin was no stranger to the old parable that he had learned many years prior, once first beginning his training. He remembers the old wise-man teaching him one important lesson.. 'one must first take on chin, before they have courage to win'. It seemed that in this fight, he had taken those shuriken to the chin. Litterally. Though they didn't go straight through his head due to the DR offered by Lariat, they definitely still left two good gashes on his chin that would likely have to be healed after the fight. No matter. Shin was here to win this.

Nova Tsuba wrote:As mentioned earlier, the man would still be able to block with his left arm and it would stall Nova's momentum temporarily as he'd said. However, the extra 30-centimeters granted with her reach would mean the staff would have hit his arm around when the Lariat was ending,

Though Shin DID have a possible effective range of 10 meters on his lariat, he had made sure that he would feignt out of it as the time came, leaving plenty of time for him to activate his nukite.

Daiko wrote:His Lariat had only been effective up to 10 meters in range, and while he was this close, it seemed his feint would pay off.

Though as he had delivered the first two jabs, because of the range in which he had to reach, he had seemed to graze his opponent. With these next two, still traveling at 120 speed towards his opponent, Shin would be following her in a 'vector' towards her. Considering that she had taken the time to jump to the right, he had a straight shot towards her body, and would reach her just in time, aiming to strike true at her core.

Shin thought back to his days of training, and most of his mind had been going blank because of the hard hits that he had taken to his face. Though he wasn't out of the fight left, it would be apparent to someone looking at him that in this case, he had bitten off more than he could chew. He didn't really expect someone to use weapons in this way, and as such, didn't start off as powerful as he may have liked to. It was no matter, though, as it couldn't be changed now. Shin only hoped that this young shinobi would learn from the error in his own ways, and apply that to their future battles. Either way, the final two strikes of nukite would still be heading for the core of this shinobi, and Shin was doing everything in his power to make sure at least ONE would strike true.

[387]
{1741}

(OOC -- A lil over halfway to 3000!!! Let's get there soon >:D)