[attr="class","APP3]The man's attempt to wield his weapon while blood slicked the handle made his grip trivial. Tenchi's slice across his hand tore into his wrist and the weapon fell from his hand, clattering onto the ground. He looked to Tenchi with begging eyes, but found no mercy as the sword slashed into his abdomen. He fell to the ground and left the swordsman to return to his work.
As Ryota made his way back to the cart and kept a vigilant eye out for more incoming enemies, he would notice a shinobi running from the front lines with an arrow in their back only a couple hundred meters away. They seemed to be trying to get to the ambulance for treatment, but they collapsed on the ground. With everyone else distracted, it seemed he might have been the only one who noticed.
This time Kaito's throw struck true in the back of his target's neck. There was very little ceremony about it, his life severed along with his spinal cord, perhaps a mercy compared to the agony some of the others faced before their end.
The cut that Korogaru took would likely need medical attention to stop the bleeding, or at least a good rubbing in some dirt. She had avoided being disemboweled at the very least. He stood little chance when she overcame him and bit into his flesh. He let out a cry of agony and went limp.
For the first time in a few moments, there was a lull in activity. There was time to regroup for now. Some time during the battle, the captain of the squad must have slipped into the shadows, for they were no were to be seen.
The area around them had forestry, but the area Ryota saw a fleeing shinobi fall was a clearing. A dense treeline to the south towards the enemy was overlooking it.
It always struck him as incredibly odd how quickly battles could fall upon someone and end. This time would be no different. However, Ryota wouldn't be allowed to ruminate on things very long. He had watched another person fall. Their job was yet to be finished.
"Looks like someone else needs some help!"
He called out to the group, pointing towards the clearing with the sword that remained in his hand. Unfortunately, due to the chaos of the area, Ryota couldn't help but feel like they might be walking into a trap.
"We'll have to be careful. Looks like he took an arrow. And with those trees nearby, there could easily be an archer hiding."
He said, having waited for the group to gather back up before saying anything else. No point in yelling across the still rather loud battlefield their plans. Always act as if you are being watched. That was a thought that one of his instructors in the academy had made sure to all but beat into his classes head. It was taking hold now, for certain.
Still, the urgency in his voice was palpable. It was clear that if anyone was taking this assignment seriously, it was Ryota. Still, he turned to face the two new arrivals. "I know it's not the best time to be chatting, but I wanted to thank you two for the assistance. They might not have been as disciplined or equipped as they could have been, but the numbers advantage is always rough to overcome. If you two wouldn't mind, could you stick around? Looks like some of our own have been caught up in the chaos."
He said, rubbing the back of his neck. Where before, he had been trading occasional glances towards the Inuzuka woman who had lent her companion to the task of pulling the cart, Ryota seemed to be making a point of not looking her way after their fighting. He had seen his share of brutality, for sure. But tearing out a man's throat with your teeth? That was certainly a new one for him. Besides. They needed to be focused. If any of these conscripts had a head for tactics, they would inevitably end up in the most danger. Taking out the medics mean that your enemy can't send people back into the fight, after all. Really, being given this placement felt like an eternity of waiting for the proverbial other shoe to drop. Hopefully they would be able to do things without getting into too much trouble.
He could hear how bad it was starting to get in other places, especially after having caught what happened to the bat while making his way back towards the cart. It was hard to miss, really. That thing was like a spotlight. So when it started to streak downwards, it was all too obvious. They had certainly been given the less difficult job. But that meant that they could only do this for so long. Eventually, one group or another was going to need some fresh faces to assist them.
He could only hope that they would be of any real assistance once that happened, though.
Kaito compartmentalized the reality of the life he took, he had no time to dwell on it - and so he didn't, brushing aside the sensation and focusing on the job at hand. He was approaching the cart when his own eyes followed the eyeline of Ryota to the downed shinobi near the tree line. Kaito didn't hesitate, drawing a few smoke bombs from pouches at his hip. Kaito wound up both, throwing them in two separate spots with a single motion - one on top of the downed shinobi, the other along the path between the shinobi and the cart itself.
He acknowledged Ryota with a nod and made it clear with his eye contact his intentions, he was going in and he hoped for some support if something unexpected happened. Better to communicate as silently as impossible if possibly under observation.
Rather then rely on stealth instead Kaito relied on speed, dashing into the rapidly accumulating smoke and vanishing from sight in it's depths.
Should he make it to the Shinobi Kaito would act quickly, hoisting the injured warrior up onto his back and sprinting for the cart under the cover of smoke and hopefully away from the prying eyes of the assailants likely hidden in the tree line. If they simply fired blind into the smoke Kaito was confident in his vision, he could react fast enough to avoid any haphazardly fired arrows.
If they did not fire at all, or were not even there all the better.
Another adversary was defeated by his blade. In a field surrounded by the dead from this skirmish, Tenchi couldn't lose focus. He saw that the many other members of this temporary Shinobi Alliance were all done with their separate battles. Maybe the other villages took the time out to send some competent men and women to work together. Here he thought Amegakure would do the heavy lifting. However, there was a possibility that shinobi whose ancestors used to live in the former Leaf Village were here as well. Kin to him. The bastard children of the villages who had united today.
Maybe some felt as invigorated as he did on this soil. He was, done thinking about it. These thoughts were nothing more than a distraction that would take his focus from the task at hand. Tenchi approached what seemed to be the focal point of this moving party. The young boy giving thanks and requesting people stay didn't look like the person in charge. He was a damn child.
"Where's the commanding officer for this area?" As soon as the sentence came out of his mouth, he thought again to the Kazekage requesting a retreat. He still hadn't figured out what had caused the pause in their march earlier and, now he was in a whole new mess. Tenchi would be sure to prevent anyone else from going that way until they had received answers on what had occurred there to frighten his leader.
Deep in the forest a call was sounding... he felt compelled to turn his back upon the fire and the beaten earth around it.
Korogaru stood up and stumbled away from the body. She wiped some blood off her chin but the effort was in vain as her whole front was dripping crimson; some of it his but most of it hers. They’d cleared the area for the moment it seemed and she came to lean against the side of the cart. She reached in and grabbed some ointment that she spread across the wound on her torso before grabbing a clean rag of some kind and pressing it against the wound. She didn’t want Naoko to waste precious chakra on her when there were so many others with needs more dire.
She listened to the others discussing their next move from a little ways off. “I agree with Ryota…” She growled, her voice uncharacteristically small, “It smells like a trap.” The young man that had joined them ran off recklessly despite the warning and Korogaru would push herself up off the cart with the intention of stopping him only for her to stumble forward and slump onto her knees, the world spinning and herself feeling rather faint. Maybe she did need a medic afterall.
Someone asked who was in charge; a jounin if the way he carried himself were any reflection of her station. Korogaru glanced around from side to side and sniffed the air in search of Oda but he was out of sight. “He was here just a moment ago.” She shrugged with uncertainty. “He must have seen something of importance elsewhere or…” She did a quick scan of the bodies on the ground nearby. The sound jounin was thankfully not among them.
Korogaru swallowed hard. Their leader had abandoned them for some reason or another and the task at hand was seeming more and more daunting by the second. She knew that genin was putting himself in danger. She wanted to back him up but there was nothing she could do in her condition so she would crawl shakily towards the back of the cart to receive medical treatment.
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[attr="class","APP3]The mulling thoughts of the soldiers wouldn't show much benefit as Kaito rushed forward to save the wounded man. Ryota's apprehension - and the apprehension of the others surrounding him - would prove apt as bow strings grew taught. A rain of arrows would pierce into the wall of smoke, undeterred by the genin's attempt of a distraction. While he would likely be able to avoid them, the second volley was questionable.
Kaito would find himself in a bad spot, although he would still be able to escape. Doing it with the wounded man? Questionable, at best.
Another knocking of arrows, another launch - soldiers mobilizing from within the forest's brush with sweeping movements. Arrows flew wildly to any nearby movement, the few animals that remained fleeing for their lives, and failing. It wouldn't be but a moment before they'd start to progress on the remaining members of the squadron, but still enough time for them to react.
As for Tenchi's concern for a superior officer, the wind answered silently. Their commanding officer had abandoned them, for one reason or another, and they would have to take charge of themselves. Korogaru would be able to dress her wounds with some of the remaining medical material - the stone shinobi having disappeared amongst their previous conflict. With thinning numbers, the smoke ridden field now polluted with archers trying to make out movement.
Within seconds of looking around, it became clear that no superior officer was coming. The words of the Kunoichi with them only confirmed that. The situation here had seemed to calm. Tenchi felt it was now his duty to take charge before things got worse. After all he seemed to be the most experienced ninja in this field. Although he could be wrong. Now was not the time to pick lots or discuss each members' experience.
Before Tenchi could begin to say a word, he heard the sound of arrows flying through the air. He turned around realizing, one of them was missing. There was no telling how far out the other member of this diverse team of shinobi was. For all Tenchi knew he could be being pierced by arrows at this very moment. No, he couldn't let that thought cross his mind. If there was still a chance for him to be alive Tenchi would do whatever it took to help him.
He began putting his hands together performing the proper seals to create a plethora of smaller Earth walls. Around the area. They would create coverage for the ones with him and hope they were helpful for the boy that had gone on his own rescue mission. After the walls were made Tenchi would turn back to his current allies.
"We must leave this place at once. I do not know what is beyond those archers but the Kazekage called for a retreat. We are of no use here right now. We shall bring support to other areas during our retreat. We also need to get some sort of communication on what the Kazekage saw that made her call for a retreat. " He was hopeful that they would listen to his words and begin to move. Tenchi intended to be the last one to leave this area but not without the rest of this group.
Deep in the forest a call was sounding... he felt compelled to turn his back upon the fire and the beaten earth around it.
There was no medic in the back anymore so Korogaru just grabbed some bandages and wrapped her own wound. She found some sort of pills back there and swallowed one of them with the hope that whatever it was would keep her going.
“Retreat?” Korogaru looked around at the battlefield. The tide certainly seemed to have turned against her group at the moment. Were things really that bad at the front?
She could hear the arrows falling as well. The Cloud shinobi didn’t see much reason for the cart anymore so she took advantage of the cover provided by their new leader to throw whatever supplies she could scavenge into a messenger bag. She climbed over the front of the cart, onto Nomi’s back, and cut him loose.
She nodded to Tenchi, “You guys grab our friend and get out of here. We’ll catch up with you soon!” Korogaru knew the enemy wouldn’t let the others retreat without a fight but maybe she could hold them off just long enough.
Nomi went tearing across the plain, using rock walls as cover wherever he could, as the Inuzuka made a few quick handseals. Her pupils dilated and her lips curled back into a feral snarl that revealed a row of pointed teeth. She leapt off of Nomi and ran alongside him until she was able to drop to all fours just past the last of the erected barriers.
“Gatsūga!” She called out to her animal companion to signal the correct timing. They moved with unnatural speed, rotating into parallel vortexes of fang and claw that wove around and bounced off each other in perfect synchronization.
The nature of their movement would deflect many arrows but both woman and beast had resigned themselves to the idea that they would need to fight through some pain. This was the fastest way to close the distance on the archers.
When they reached the treeline they would do the maximum carnage that a Chunin and a Bear could to the area that the volley of arrows had originated from.
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It felt like he had only just managed to catch his breath before everything exploded into chaos again. Before he could even begin to offer up a plan for safely retrieving the fallen shinobi, the new arrival bolted, throwing smoke all over the place to cover himself. Unfortunately, his suspicions had been proven correct. He hadn't really focused too much on the question of the other new arrival because he had been a little too focused on trying to stop the one who had left. Unfortunately, he had gone on the move before Ryota had even been able to say anything.
Next thing he knew, they were being told by the one new arrival remaining that a retreat was needed. Of course, they needed everyone. But that was a death sentence without some kind of cover. Thankfully, Tenchi had already proven that he was more than capable of taking the lead , giving them the cover they desperately needed for the retrieval by creating a series of earthen walls before sounding off the call to retreat. It also seemed that Korogaru was quick to recover.
Before he had even started to move, she was gone, bounding from cover to cover. It was settled. Ryota began to do much of the same, stowing his sword so as to free up his hands as he moved from wall to wall. The unfortunate part about the smoke was that it made it harder to see. Still, he had an idea of where things had been. Unfortunately, he had little to no way of reaching them with any real damage or distraction. He could pull water from the air..but those globs were only ever the size of coins. Think, Ryota. THINK.
And in that moment, as he moved up another wall, it hit him. Suiton was best with a water source, sure. But there was something else he knew how to do that didn't. He'd just not had a chance to really refine it further.
"Well..now or never.."
He muttered as he started making hand signs behind one of the walls. By the fourth one, he was ready, and leaned out. The resulting jutsu was a series of compressed bullets of wind, aimed not directly at where the people would have been walking--so as to keep Korogaru and her companion, as well as the one they were aiming to save out of the line of fire--but at the ground near the treeline. The intent was to cause the archers to stumble and lose their footing as the bullets churned up the earth with concussive force where they struck.
There were only about four bullets fired before Ryota dipped back behind the wall, hand on his sword again. He could feel just how much that had taken out of him..but it had worked. Part of him was incredibly excited. He had indeed had a breakthrough, and was that much closer to getting a handle on the things he had been gifted with at birth. But there was no time to think about that. Between the walls, the smoke, and now Korogaru acting as distraction, Ryota dashed forward, past the last wall and into the smoke. The plan was simple. Grab the genin that had charged in, and get the hell out of there.
[attr="class","APP3"]Attempts to intervene were too late, Kaito was struck by a volley of arrows. One pierced his heart, ending his life abruptly. Tenchi’s earthen wall was only feet away from saving him, but fate had been unkind to the fledgling shinobi. He fell to the ground and more arrows were shot into the wounded shinobi that he carried.
Nikukyuu Inuzuka, Daichi Konishi, and Ryuunosuke Nara arrived in time to see Korogaru and her bear barreling past the small earth style walls towards the tree line as archers fired at them. Nomi took several arrows to his upper body, which he angrily swiped away as he ran. Korogaru’s own face was glanced by an arrow that didn’t manage to pierce through, leaving a cut across her cheek.
Things might have been even worse, but Ryota’s wind bullets had suppressed several of the archers. One too a direct hit to the neck and gripped their hand on a bleeding neck before turning to run away.
As she got into the tree line, she would come across a group of six archers using the base of trees for cover. The first of them was trampled by Nomi, but the one that she approached dropped their bow and drew a knife up to try to greet the kunoichi’s rush. Other archers rushed to draw more arrows, two knocking their bows and firing towards the bear, while the others fire towards the shinobi behind the earthen walls hoping to keep them from advancing further to assist Korogaru.
For the messenger team, what they were coming into was an open clearing with forestry in front of it. They would have seen not only Korogaru charging in, but the death of the genin trying to rush another wounded shinobi out of the clearing as well. Tenchi and Ryota had the cover of earthen walls but archers continued to shoot towards them while the sounds of Korogaru’s bear growling could be heard distantly.
OOC: Rabbit had departed discord and did not reply to the post while being in immediate danger.
An aggressive fit of BARKS and SNARLS sound from the north. Having broken off from the team in the midst of their flight, Nikukyuu's loyal ninken had carved a path to poise himself between the edge of the front lines and Onomichi, to where the shinobi would be called to retreat. As the dog sound off, Kyuu continued in bounding forward, leaping from one branch to another as she lead Daichi and Ryuunosuke toward the battle ahead.[break][break]
AWOOOO!
[break]
The howl rang clear over the repetitive patter of raining arrows. To Korogaru, the call would be a familiar one. The commanding howl that echoed from Ginmaru's position was a summons, a battlecry to rally the group to his location. Despite the call, Nikukyuu was pressing forward, eyes toward the arrows soaring for the team they had been sent to inform. It took little more than a cursory glance to see that things were looking grim, and as she spy a genin dropped to rest dead against the open grass of the clearing, Nikukyuu's lips peel back with derision.[break][break]
❝ COVER OUR ALLIES! ❞
[break]
The words tore off from her tongue, hot with aggression as she threw herself down from the canopy. Her fingers flashed swift to join themselves together in a quick string of signs, and as her palm hit the earth the ground rumbled, numerous featureless, human-shaped statues shot up from the earth to serve as protective decoys within the wooded maze of the forest's growth.[break][break]
❝ RESCUE! Orders from the Hokage. Ginmaru'll show you to your new position! ❞ [break][break]
YIP!
[break]
The ninken's bark sound eagerly ahead of the group, the hound's restless paws tearing at the ground as he prance energetically in his place. The dog was eager to shoot off in lead toward Onomichi.
