1408/Ladies Locking Horns

Ladies Locking Horns
Date of Scene:	24 January 2015
Location:	The Citadel - Field of Trials
Synopsis:	The Bounty Hunter Mantigora puts Gaius' new recruit through a few paces.
Cast of Characters:	583, 691

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Mantigora (583) has posed:
Just long enough passes for an appropriate scene change, and Mantigora strides out into the center of the area set aside for sparring, training, and all the other delightfully violent ways the Confederacy hones their craft without actually killing one another. "Be sure to check out 'zoo' some time too." The Draken gives a casual wave towards one of the other sections. "Lots of different creatures for testing new technique one... Should really see if they want some Nexus creatures some time."

She stops at the center and turns to face the other lady, tail lashing a few times with the anticipation. "But, that for later. You wanted to learn more about my people?" She curls her fingers in, and with the clenching of hands into fists there's a *zzzzshing* as out of each arm a set of angular blades extend, each pair almost longer than the forearms they just came out of. And Mantigora smirks. "This best way. Gladitorial combat is one of our favorite traditions."

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
And thus, Yari is suddenly on an island. She's /frowning/ heavily now that she's away from her superior. Words like 'flexible causality' are hardly comforting either. Still, she accepts it all with a breath swiftly followed by a pipe. After a few taps on her gauntlet, her armlet lets out a tiny burst of fire. Smoke trails lightly behind her. Magitek zippo deployed. She needs a good smoke after /that/.

"...I have not been hunting in some time." She admits amidst a puff of smoke. The tall lizardess' twin armblades have the Au Ra's gaze narrowing as she takes them in: length, size, width. Then the woman's arms.

"Gladiatorial? Rules?" She's never been to Ul Dah, and thus, isn't quite used to such fights.

For her part, the shorter lizard-horned-woman bends her legs just so, and her natural arm loosens her blade in its sheath. Clawed toes amidst metal and leather curl just slightly for extra grip. It's an easy, light stance, if wary. She's not one to strike without at least knowing if there's protocol in something semi-formal like this.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
"Rules? Oh, there is only one rule." That predatory grin of sharp teeth returns. "Surrrvive~" And like that, in a flicker of energy patterns Mantigora is gone!

More accurately, she's gone under her cloaking field, leaving Yari a few moments to ponder the implications of what she's allowed herself to get into. Would she finally break? Or steel herself for what was about to come? That's what Mantigora wanted to see, even as she prowls around one side of the field. Draken were known for their physical ferocity, but for a Stalker it was a mental game as well. Toy with the opponent a little, push them into revealing their abilities.

The sound of partially muffled footsteps can be heard from just behind Yari, but the sound is barely audible soon enough to be a warning as Mantigora comes back out her stealth with one boot heel whipping at the Au Ra woman's backside.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
Yari, in the back of her mind, indeed starts to question the wisdom of this. Technology of unknown reliability and her taking on a woman with unknown technology who is very obviously good at what she does.

And just like before, she has /no/ idea where the huntress is coming from. But at least she knows that ahead of time. Every muscle in her body is primed, the woman hardly moving. She needs information to fight such an opponent.

Her body is moving as the sound registers, but it's not enough. She's suddenly thankful for armor as she quite literally gets her butt kicked, sent flying a good foot from the booted kick. She ducks into a roll, back on her feet.

Not is her arm idle. A trio of kunai are grabbed from wherever she keeps the things with hardly a movement, a seemingly trivial flick sending them flying.

One kunai flies straight for where she last saw the taller lizard, while the second and third fly a sride or two to the right, and left respectively. All three are poisoned: should she not be immune, and they strike, Mantigora might note the numbing effects they possess. The Au Ra's bladed weapons, curiously, seem to be coated with poisons that dull pain.

This time she isn't staying still. Even as she watches, and now /listens/, for signs of her opponent, she ducks towards a wall. Only to begin running up it, leaping off as she tries to find either a beam to land on, or an area of the battlefield that's narrow and reduces avenues of attack for her Stalker opponent.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
Where the blades are stashed on her person may not be obvious but the fact that Yari is reaching for weapons of some kind is, and at the distance Mantigora predicts, correctly, that it's for a ranged attack. So it's like a strange mirroring of concepts when she raises her arms and opens her hands, only for a pair of saw-blade like discs to form in them. She throws one and then the other almost at the same time Yari flings her kunai, knocking two of the blades out of the air with her own.

But Yari has three projectiles to her two and the third kunai digs into the Draken's shoulder. She gives a grunt as she grabs it with one hand and pulls it out of the cut made in the shoulder of her longcoat, then holds it up to her cat-like nose to sniff briefly. "Poisoned... Ooh, you are going to be a cleverrr one." The blade is discarded afterwards. The poison is in her blood, but the nanotech also in her blood is moving quickly to neutralize it.

Mantigora tips her head back a bit to look up at where the ninja is leaping for a perch. High ground advantage, not something to let an opponent have easy. "Most of the universe regards the Draken as spacefaring savages.. but just because we live by laws of the wild doesn't mean we have no honor."

From a pocket of her longcoat she pulls out a small device, clicks the activator with her thumb, and lobs it up towards where Yari is jumping. It bounces off the beam so it's flying away from the woman when it detonates, and instead of a fiery explosion it's blinding flash of energy and shockwave that's more about the knockback force it causes than the damage of the blast itself.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
Yari can't help but be vaguely reminded of training with adoptive parent, if in a slightly scalier form. She quashes the thought, both for the fact it might make her soft on the competent hunter, and simply locks one into methods of attack. Assumptions could get her killed.

The Centurion gets enough of a glance to note the sniffing, and how quickly she catches on. This is no amateur, for certain. Then there's something being tossed over.

She might know what kind, but she recognizes a grenade-like weapon when she sees one. There's magitek equivalents, after all. For the moment, abandoning both stealth and grace, her footfalls are pretty obvious. Until they stop, as she leaps along the beam as it 'clicks' down. Landing in a slide feet first, metal and leather scrape against metal, Yari's tail getting lovely scale-burns that draws the lightest of curses of pain.

But it proves useful. Her slide is rough, but /fast/, a move of desperation. Just as Manti goes for that activator in her hand, the ninja-soldier's foot catches the grenade and foot-tosses it right back at the woman who tossed it.

She then stops, waiting for the effects. Luckily, she's looking slightly away as she does so, and with the renewed distance? Hopefully Manti takes it full force, only added to as she tosses a poison bomb to go along with it. Given her abilities, it might not last long, but this one is designed to get into the lungs and make breathing difficult by numbing muscles used to move them. Again, the curious lack of pain that comes with horrific effects.

Realizing the weapons purpose, she takes those precious seconds to stealthily leap down, landing with hardly a sound, and slinking into the shadows. Her breathing is quiet and low despite her heart racing, every movement measured and slow while she gathers breath and simply /watches/ what Mantigora gets up to.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
Kick the grenade back... Okay, THAT is a trick she admittable does not see very often. Most of her opponents either try to run out of the way, or just stare stupidly at it. Or eat. Yeah, eat it. Using grenades on Chompacrabas is -fun- like that. That's not here or there, though.

Switch gears in almost an instant as Mantigora lashes out with the backside of her blades to knock the grenade away from herself. Which causes it to collide with the bomb Yari threw after it, and an explosion of poisonous gas billows out between the two of them. You would think that would be deterant enough to keep them apart, now wouldn't it.

Which is why it might come as a surprise as Mantigora is abruptly leaping -through- the gas towards Yari, taking full advantage of her technology filtering out the worst of the effects. The pouncing motion brings one set of claws lashing in a downward arc at the woman. Let's see how effective that armor really is, shall we?

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
Leaping /through/ toxic gas is certainly not what Yari expected. Once more, her opponent's ability to deal with poison is proving a great detriment to the ninja's abilities. Clearly, she has much to learn about this Multiverse!

Leather, kevlar, and metal are amazing things, but unfortunately for Yari it seems evasion and stealth are her best friends. Being taken by surprise? Not her friend. Metal stops much of the worst of the hit, but the rest is far more yielding. She'll get a pair of twin long gashes down neck, collar bone and chest, the scent of blood in the air. Yari lets out a tiny gasp of pain, teeth gritting.

She doesn't /like/ getting up close and personal when she has a feeling her opponent is at an advantage, but neither can she give up the opportunity. Rather than letting the taller lizard end her leap and get away, the smaller one counters by simply leaping backwards with her and up slightly. It's Yari's turn to violate personal space, as two deceptively strong legs wrap about Mantigora, squeezing tight as she leans her head back.

The faceplate has fallen down on her helmet, and then Yari quite simply makes for ringing Mantigora's bell with a helmet-clad headbutt into her face. Repeatedly, even as she tries to turn her about to land atop her, on Manti's back with much slithering.

From there? It's a textbook one-handed chokehold as she tries to send her opponent to sleep with something far less sophisticated than poison.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
One of the blessings of the Stalker nanotech was the amount of adaptability it gave the user. At the first realization that her opponent used poisoned weapons Mantigora only needed a brief mental 'switch' to flip and increase the fileration effects of the augmentory nanosystem. It wasn't an immunity, but it did keep the worst of the effects at bay. Though there's no telling how long it will be able to keep up with repeat exposures.

Legs grabbing around the neck and shoulders usually preludes a throwing maneuver with them, so that's what Mantigora braces herself. Which in turn means she's not at all ready to move when Yari up and slams her helmeted and horned head against hers. Several times. The Draken recoils with a growl, momentarily dazed by the tactic.

A few seconds are plenty of time for a well trained ninja to move and grab onto her neck, though her scaly hide does present more resistance than the typically soft and squishy flesh of a human-like being. Mantigora makes a choked growling sound, and reachs back with her arms... to wrap them around Yari's legs? Why? So she can throw herself back against one of the generic wall structures, intending to slam the other woman into the surface hard enough to jar her loose.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
For all that Yari's agile, fits nicely into relatively small space, and can flex about like no one's business? Armor or not, she's light and easily tossed about. Thus, Mantigora gets to work with both greater bulk, as well as harder scales versus Yari's much smaller frame.

Oh, and a wall. Which the woman becomes very well acquainted with. Like most walls, it's hard, and she's soon slammed back enough to rattle her brain. Those legs loosen, the woman briefly knocked unconscious as she goes limp. Should she not hold onto the horned Au Ra? Manti would find Yari falling to the floor, stunned.

It's only training that even allows her to respond. Her first showing of her sword skills would be utterly humiliating if she could think straight. Somewhat limp-wristed and sloppy owing to just how hard she's been hit, that blade of hers flashes from its sheath with respectable speed. It's a wild strike, though might vaguely be aimed for the back and forearms. But 'aim' might be a bit generous right now.

Yari doesn't even return the blade to its sheath as she scrambles to get up. Her helmet falls off, horns and platinum-blonde hair spilling out as she breathes heavily.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
Mantigora feels the weight slump loose from her back, but not having any other means to really strike at her opponent behind her she takes a quick stride forward and turns around to face her properly. Okay, Yari couldn't take a heavy blow very well, but she was small and agile. Foes like that were always more of a challenge to actually hit hard enough to exploit their lack of physical mass.

Though right now this one was sprawled out on the ground. Was it that easy? Of course it couldn't be that easy ... but she wouldn't be much of a huntress if she didn't try to capitalize on the moment. Mantigora draws one arm back, energy starting to charge along the length of blades before she steps back into the attack and starts to swing.

Only for Yari to finally show off the quick drawing skill she had mentioned before. It's only by the sheer virtrue of split-second reflexes that Mantigora is capable of pulling back from her full attack to keep from losing an arm. Instead of blades collide with blade, snaring the sword between them as she uses the rest of her swing to push the sword to the side and away from her. It's an effective parry, but one strenious on her own systems for having to change the move mid-swing. But she tries to push it down to the point that her blades hit the ground on either side of the sword and pin it there. An awkward position to attack back from, isn't it?

Unless one has a big, long tail. Yari already went with heads, so Mantigora goes with tail(s) and tries to smack Yari across the face with it! Good thing that tuff of barbs on the end aren't poisonous.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
Blades clash, and Yari's strike is parried. Her arm goes wide, and she's in a /terrible/ position to follow up now that it's pinned aside. That other arm of hers /certainly/ isn't good to strike with.

Whap! Right in the face. There's an audible crack as Yari is sent to the ground once more. The woman, by the looks of things, isn't doing too well. Heavy breathing, quite literally slapped around, and sword in a horrid place. What can she do?

A flex of her toes, her head pounding, and a blade slips from her right foot's greaves. She aims a blow at Mantigora's knees, trying to similarly put her to the ground! This one /isn't/ poisoned, perhaps unfortunately for the tall lizardess. It's a kick hard enough to send her turning about. She lets go of her blade, and her second foot aims a back kick to Mantigora's hips to jar her away and get some space to recover. Then she'll try to spin-roll back to her feet, a kunai grabbed from her person with her blade effectively taken from her.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
There is an audible sick sounding crunch as the boot slams into one of the Draken's knees, enough that it actually gets a yowl of both pain and surprise out of Mantigora as she staggers back a few steps, pulling her blades free of the ground as she does so. She leans heavily on the other leg, tail thrashing erratically to keep her balance. "Ooow, yeah... definately felt that one..." There's another softer cracking noise as she shifts, the smashed leg at a bad angle at first. Until she pulls herself back up and stands on it and with a final creaking sound it pulls back into alignment. The advanced nanotechnology can force the joint back into position and make it usable, but it doesn't actually remove the harm done any.

It certainly hurts, but clearly not enough to keep Mantigora from darting back towards Yari, trying to close in before she can recover and get her sword again. But interestingly enough, the arm blades retract into her arms.

And she pulls out a pair of some sort of crossbred between short swords and maces, resulting in weighted heads studded with sharpened spikes and edges. Mantigora swings one for Yari's arm to knock that kunai out of her hand, then jerks it back to thrust for thes center of mass in the mid-torso. Followed by twisting away and spinning around raise both up and then down in one unified blow at the back of her shoulders.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
With that pained howl, there's a certain amount of pride in Yari's heart. Powerful predator or not, she's till as mortal as Yari is. It's enough to give the woman a boost of confidence.

What's not so confidence boosting is the weapon she chooses. One that Yari has never seen before, and were she not being on the receiving end, would find fascinating. It takes but a look to note how powerful a strike from it would no doubt be with so much bulk. And those fist-mace-spikes fly just as fast as expected.

The first strike knocks away Yari's kunai, only for the ninja to spot the strike to the torso. She redirects it aside with a thin wrist against Mantigora's own, this woman no stranger to pugilism. But the two-handed blow upon her shoulders is far more effective, causing yet another crunch as those shoulder blades break. /Ow/. Teeth grit, and she strangles her scream. Rolling to the side, she reclaims her weapon, swiftly putting it back into its sheath. Another kunai is thrown straight for Mantigora's chest!

Her hand moves. Straight, then turned to the side. Aether flows from the woman and her weapon. Where once there was a single shuriken, easily twenty split from it just before its set to strike the taller lizardess, a flurry of the sharp piercing weapons for her to contend with. Then, Yari is fleeing, straight into the darker corners of the room, and finally up the wall again. With luck, she'll fade into the shadows for Mantigora to hunt once more! /If/ she can get away in time.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
Did we not learn that throwing weapons were not going to be that effecti -- I take that back. Mantigora swings to deflect one blade with her weapon, but it abruptly turns into a hailstorm! And the momentum of her own swing carries through, resulting in multiple blades digging into her side and lacerating across her back. There's even visible blood dribbling there as the Draken takes a moment to readjust. While reinforced with firmer materials and technological support her armored coat isn't all that heavier than Yari's own armor.

A much more feral sounding growl emits from the lizard woman as she pushes herself back onto her feet and turns back to her foe, catching only a glance of her as she bounds of a wall and into the shadows. Despite how much that last attack stung she actually smiles again. "Ah, now the chase is on..." She gives her injured leg a bit of a wiggle, and satisfied that the nanoweave is going to hold, springs in the same directly Yari did.

Reptillian eyes narrow as augmentations shift, sweeping the shadows as she approaches. She doesn't have the time to spare stopping for a full sweep, but every little edge she can squeeze out is a benefit. She leaps, kicks off the wall, twists with the arc to kick off the other wall, and propel herself in the same general direction as Yari tried to slip away. As she comes up she brings the Macerators together and swings them as one much like she had before.

It doesn't matter if she actually strikes the other woman, or slams them into the wall, when she does the impact discharges what looks like a splash of icy water, increasing the chances that even if she misses the target directly, the aqua-like shockwave has a good chance of catching her in its wake.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
There's a flash of movement in the dark as Mantigora leaps and twists in her direction. Very nearly flat to the ground, the flexible Au Ra has kept herself to a low profile to avoid being detected, and so though the woman gets the direction right, she goes flying /over/ her. She's skittering away, before a blast of watery chill hits her full in the face!

Only to freeze over much of her body. The impact is enough to send her flying deeper into the darkness, but with enough noise to easily be found! Tumbling on her side, the impact breaks the ice quite literally, and she manages a semi-graceful recovery roll. Her pale skin is bloody, bruised, and the woman looks close to the end of her stamina.

As quietly as she can, she rushes forward, abandoning tricks for pure skill. A leap to the wall, a kick off vertically until she peeks over where she last saw Mantigora. She 'clings' to the wall as she quietly slides down, only to let go. Her hand goes to her blade, and attempts a downwards slash from above! This time, she's going for the kill, drawing the weapon fast enough to leave afterimages to one with such dark vision as Mantigora as it's aimed for her neck. The slash could be seen even as the weapon's being returned to its home.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
Mantigora realizes she overshot too late to bring her attack up short, but at least the water shockwave still connected. She lands with a skidding motion, trying not to strain the patched leg too hard. It takes her longer than normal to turn around, meaning Yari's got the time she needs to slip into the shadows again. There's a pause, and she stows the mace-blades away again. Internally she frowns at double-checking the internal HUD to her datacron. Defenses are compromised. Her nanotech has been able to strive off the poisonous effect of Yari's weapons, but that means it's using up its energy to do so, limited the resources available. Personal shielding is almost do -- "DAMN!"

The incoming motion is literally a split-second away from slicing her neck when she notices and only by her own heightened reflexes manages to jerk her head out of the way. But there's a crackling sound as the blade catchs across her back, destroying the device integrated into her jacket that generates the personal energy shield, little electronic bits and pieces scattering on the floor in its wake. So much for trying to stall for that to recharge.

Mantigora reels around with the blow, snarling as she steps on the injured leg wrong, though not hard enough to drop herself to the ground. Fists clench, the amr-blades snap back out, and she practically roars as energy crackles around her entire form. Conserving resources be damned at this point, it would seem, as she launchs herself back towards Yari.

That crackle proves to be more than just a charge, as there are suddenl TWO Mantigora's rushing her, both of them leading with a thrusting drive of their blades. And the holographic doppleganger is hard-light enough that it's going to still hurt if it's the one that hits, leaving it a bit of a puzzle to figure out which Draken is the real one.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
Yari's hardly doing much better. With what she suspects is broken shoulderblades, numerous other wounds, bruises, internal bleeding from being slammed far too hard against a wall, and a pair of lizards coming for her.

Yari's hand flicks her armlet, and a scanner pops up. Unfortunately, all it can currently read is aether. Time to find out if either the projection or real Mantigora is magical in any way! It's her only way to tell.

After that brief glance? It's the hardlight Mantigora that has at her first, Yari gambling on the second being an illusion. Rather than draw her blade, she parries the blow of those wristblades with the wooden hilt of her weapon. The wood gets scraped and cracked, barely holding true. But the fighting has severely sapped her stamina, and so she reacts far slower than she did beforehand. A fatal strike is barely avoided by ducking aside, but it earns Mantigora a hard strike to the side of Yari's stomach. Those wrist blades bury in nicely before there's a foot aimed for kicking this Mantigora back from her.

Should she escape, she's left with only one choice: rather than puzzle it out, she drops a trio of bombs on particularly short fuses before engaging in a desperate dodge away from the wall...and out of the shadows. Perhaps a tactical error, but rather than waste time puzzling them out she'll aim for blowing them up. The bombs would explode in a mix of incendiary ceruleum, and shards of shrapnel!

Mantigora (583) has posed:
There's the oh so satisfying feeling of blades spearing through armor and sinking into flesh, but Mantigora doesn't get too long to revel in the moment before a boot to the stomach pushes her away again. She exhales deeply, though as she stands she actually lifts the set of blades to lick some of the blood off of them. Now that is just a wee bit creepy. Or maybe it's suppose to be. Intimidation is a lot of importance in her line of work, after all. It's actually not quite as good as biting it out of fresh flesh, but imagery is everything.

Bombs! Several bombs, several explosions, and a lot of smoke and flame resulting from them. It's enough to engulf a small area in her wake as Yari springs back for more open ground. Well the holographic duplicate definately isn't going to make it through that pyrotechnic display, that was pretty harsh.

The real Mantigora, however, strides out of the smoke like a friggin' boss. Sure, with a slight stagger to one leg, and her combat outfit outright on fire in several places, burned through in several others, and normally red-brown hide scorched black in several places. And yet as she strides towards the ninja she's still smiling.

She did warn you gladitorial fighting was a tradition for her people, after all.

The stagger was definately there, but it may of been exaggerated a bit because once she gets close enough and her blades start to glow with crackles of nano-energy Mantigora moves surprisingly quickly for it, leaping towards Yari with a arcing slash. That doesn't stop. Rather she lands in a pivot that sends her into a whirling dervish of motion, leaving energized arcs in the wake of her arm blades spinning in cyclonic motion several times over.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
Now /that/ is creepy. Yari actively blanches as she notes Mantigora licking the blood. There's that horrid tingling of fear again, like a lizard fleeing from a predator. A wounded predator that walks out of the bomb blast hurt, armor singed, and partially on fire.

That blanch passes quickly. It's hard to be /too/ terrified of something when it's beaten down as both of them are. With the smell of blood and pain in the air, Yari's brain is actively switched to 'survive and kill'.

It saves her from being torn to pieces. The initial arcing strike slices into her shoulder, Yari ducking away and spinning about as her blood splatters both wrist-blades and her own cheeks. Strikes come one after the other, a blurr of cyclonic strikes. Her eyes, keen as they are, are useless against such a tidal wave. She relies purely on instinct and training.

A blow to her neck scrapes along her flesh, a line of sharp pain. The next strike is met by the sheath of her weapon, sent far above her head and gaining only a few strands of hair. And then the last two spinning blows strike at her chest, her own armor now sliced, gutted, and blood and pale flesh exposed.

Despite the pain of her wounds, Yari doesn't back down. She puts all of her strength into one final strike as Mantigora's whirling motion exposes her back. In that small instance of weakness, Yari ducks nearly to the ground, chin only three inches above it, before her powerful legs thrust her back up and straight into Mantigora as she draws her blade in a savage strike aimed to bisect from knees to just below the armpit of the tall lizardess in a single strike. The fact the other woman is spinning won't help matters.

After? She'll be left all but defenseless after such a strike.

"FOR HIS RADIANCE!" Screams out the ninja, with fury befitting far larger creatures. The quiet one can raise her voice after all.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
That the whirling maneuver left potential openings is exactly why Mantigora typically reserved it for a finishing move, or for having to clear out several small targets at one time. Yari does manage to evade some of the worst of the attack, and counterstrike with a devestating rising slash to the back before Mantigora can pull out of the motion.

The blow sends her reeling forward, finally putting a stop to the spin by virtue of slamming face first into the ground with a resounding thud. She lays there for a moment... then moves one arm to get a hand against the ground. Then the other. And starts to push herself back up. Oh shit, was she going to even get back on her feet from something like nearly having her spine sliced in ha--

*CRREERAACK*

--Or not as the bone-splitting sound crunchs and she stops mid-movement. "... Ooooh that hurt worse than I thought it did..." she manages to growl before flopping face down again. Ow.

Good thing it's a simulation! On both sides of the matter.

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
With a flick of her wrist, Yari flips the blood from her blade, and smoothly returns it to her sheath. Shakily, the woman stands. Breathing heavy, vision swimming from pain and fatigue, her eyes widen as it seems her opponent is yet going to rise! By all rights, she should be...

Thunk. The woman actually winces at that sound. Ok, now she feels slightly bad. Yari tells the simulation to shut down. Then?

She bows to her opponent. "Miss Mantigora, it has been an honor. You are a superb huntress, and a terrifying warrior."

Her real arm goes down, assuming most of the actual damage was simulated for them both to try to help her up. It may end up more of the two of them awkwardly clinging from their experience today. Yari's barely conscious as it stands.

"...Can you stay up enough to sit? After a duel, it is customary to buy the loser drinks."

That may or may not be camp-grown b.s., but Yari believes it. From the look she's giving Mantigora, the Stalker has earned her respect today.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
Mantigora emits another soft grown as the simulation ends. The injuries may go away with it, but there's always that lingering phantom feeling that takes a few seconds longer to clear. Then she rolls herself over onto her back, and uses an arm to push herself back up onto her feet. "Aaah, they chose well when they sent you to serve the Legatus. That was impressive for having so little experience outside your home lands!" It's sincere, too. "Heh. Think I like sound of that custom." Made up or not.

Though before anything else Mantigora grabs the the shorter woman, and pulls her close enough to just lightly bop their horns together. "Now we sisters in battle. Woe be it to foe unfortunate enough to get in the way!"

Yari Takane (691) has posed:
There's another humble bow from the Centurion. "Preconceptions are death. That is something that my master told me when I completed my training. When one abandons the fear of the unknown and allows one's mind the freedom of analyzing one's opponent, even the most absurd of techniques may be countered. I was fortunate to be given such wisdom, for without it, I would have fallen to your strange techniques and pure physical superiority." Explains Yari, neatly shouldering it on another. She's good at that.

"Let us train together often. You have taught me much today. So too would I like to see of your technology." A pause.

And then horns lock for a precious moment. Battle sisters. Family. For an orphan like her, it's both an uplifting and confusing moment. Yari openly stares for a moment, once more blushing.

And then breaks into a smile. "I...am honored, Horn-Sister." She chokes a bit on her words, feigning a cough. She's not going to look touched and emotional. Ignore the smile as she leads the way to the nearest watering hole.

Mantigora (583) has posed:
Mantigora smiles, slapping an arm around the shorter horn-girl's shoulders as they turn to leave. "Now I believe there was something to be about drinks, yes?" Only thing to make a good sparring match better is to go drinking afterwards. "Your mentor is a wise warrior. We will make sure her guidance is fully acclimated."