Match of the Millennium

Description: When the Women's Team discovers that the so-called Miracle Rookies are actually helmed by the Vampire Demitri, Mai and Makoto have a tough fight ahead of them in their second preliminary round!

[MAI]
The next King of Fighters match for the Women's Team was set to happen against... the Miracle Rookies, a team supposedly made of newcomers. Great! Mai was excited to see the fighting spirit of these particular rookies... at first.

But then the rumors started going around that one of the rookies wasn't... really a rookie, but instead a powerful vampire lord?
Is this right? That... can't be right!

Not that Mai is entirely against vampire lords. Vampire lords have the potential to be dreamy and romantic! But on the other hand, she still kind of doesn't believe the story, even though her teammates are a monster slayer and a squirrel. It's time to find out... and do her best in the King of Fighters and win one for her team.

The setting for the match certainly doesn't bode well here. In the spirit of battle, it's happening in a graveyard. The dry desert means there's a cold wind rolling in as the sun sets. Lamps are set up around the outside of the graveyard arena. Mai, in a fighting uniform that's red with golden trim for her team, is shivering a little. But of course the battle couldn't begin until the sun was fully set... and the last twinge of red vanishes from the western sky.

[DEMITRI]
From the distance, what appears to be a flock of bats fly in from the distance. This isn't an unusual sight for a graveyard, but they begin to land on gravestones upright, like birds, which is a subtly surreal thing that one doesn't realize is abnormal until they actually see it.

"Finally, some good food, and I can't even properly eat." says a voice from seemingly everywhere around her.

Then his the bats begin to fly up again, swarming closer and closer together, until they form a humanoid body, and gradually morph into a rather large, towering man, his cape suddenly flaring out. "Though perhaps I'll have a taste."

[MAI]
Wow. That was quite an entrance. Mai doens't assume her usual very haughty posture, slipping back into a ready stance instead with hands both out in front of her. She may have to go on the defense.

She looks wide-eyed at the big man, then nods once, screwing up her determination. He's scary, but ... it can't be all bad. Vampires burn, right? "What do you mean? Are you one of those vegetarian vampires I read about in American novels? That would ... make it a lot easier!"

COMBATSYS: Mai has started a fight here.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  <
Mai              0/-------/-------|

[MAKOTO NANAYA]
"Punch him in the face!" is Makoto's (loud) cheer, attempting to psyche Mai back up after getting over the surprise from having a vampire put himself together out of bats. (She's seen weirder in her career, but not often. Fortunately, it is no longer her job to try to arrest him for existing... which is good, because she'd never manage it here.) "Kick his butt!"

Oh yeah she's here too. She is under one of the lamps and in her coat, because hey, it's cold.

[DEMITRI]
"Enslaving or the potential death of my opponent is, at the very least, against the spirit of the rules enough for me to avoid it. Granted, this tournament is for my own amusement, and gauging the current climate of Earth's supposed strongest warriors, so if I get bored perhaps I will properly feed." Demitri stands there, staring at her, unmoving of even a muscle.

"Though I would like a taste, even if I presume you don't fit the usual criteria of my //ideal// tastes." He suddenly blurs forward, leaving afterimages of himself before he reaches out to grab her arms, then very violently leans in to start trying to ravage her neck with rather violent bites.

He is definitely a vampire, trying to suck and consume her blood, an incredibly non-standard attack for any martial artist to be on the receiving end of.

COMBATSYS: Demitri has joined the fight here.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////////////]
Demitri          0/-------/------=|-------\-------\0              Mai

COMBATSYS: Demitri successfully hits Mai with Light Pleasure.
- Power hit! -

[ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////         ]
Demitri          0/-------/----===|=====--\-------\0              Mai

[MAI]
Mai is very insulted by this, apparently, her brow wrinkling. "Now why is that!? What's wrong with the way I'd taste?" Surely a vampire would-

Oh no, she didn't really mean it... like that...

Demitri comes rushing for her, tips her back, and bites her. Mai doesn't block this in time.

For a second, this is almost kind of cool. Some girls like to be swept off their feet, treated like a lady, and bit by a vampire on a spooky night. Why, under the right circumstances, this would be quite romantic...

Mai, for just a second, imagines that the vampire is Andy. In her fantasy, Andy is dressed basically like Alucard from Castlevania in a big coat, his long hair flowing. She looks into his eyes, her own wobbling, as he pops fangs slowly...

And then she snaps back to the present, realizes she's actually losing blood, and this guy biting her is not as cute as Andy!

Her body suddenly ignites in a burst of fire. She spins around, at close range, the flames surging up around her in a way that should dislodge and dissuade any incoming undead. "My flames of passion... are not for you!"

COMBATSYS: Demitri blocks Mai's Ryuuenbu.

[  \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////////          ]
Demitri          0/-------/---====|=======\=------\1              Mai

[DEMITRI]
Demitri is driven back, covering his face and upperbody with his large arms as flames sear his supernatural skin. He hisses, but lowers his arms.

His body smokes as some burns simmer on his skin, regeneration trying to slowly heal, but clearly struggling.

He manages to smile now, licking Mai's blood from the side of his mouth. "Delicious. Perhaps you're a bit more pure than I previously assumed. Though I can assure you..." He reaches up to touch a slowly healing burn on the side of his face. "The line between pain and pleasure can be rather thin, but perhaps I should show you the depths of //my// passionate flames."

His body suddenly ignites into burning blue-orange spectral flames, and he rushes forward, spinning as he rises into the air with his arms folded, trying to slam his entire upper body into her like a flying, flaming tackle.

COMBATSYS: Demitri successfully hits Mai with Demon Cradle.
~ Cruel hit! ~

[   \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////                 ]
Demitri          0/-------/---====|=======\======-\1              Mai

[MAKOTO NANAYA]
Makoto Nanaya has some experience with fighting weird horrible monsters. Still...

"Man, don't be a creep," is all she can think of to call at the fight. "Come on, Mai! You can handle him!" I hope, she mentally adds. She seems a little more unsettled than she was before. She figured it was a team of newbies, too, judging by the name.

[MAI]
Demitri plows into Mai with an aura of fire... that's vastly different from her own. It's an awful feeling, the necrotic burning, driving her shoulder down and back into the grave dirt below.

She skids backward a few more paces, and stands up. She's already wobbling slightly, the shoulder of her fighting uniform slightly torn and her entire back dirty. Her skin looks a bit red, and a bit scraped.

She looks to the sidelines for a second, knowing she might not be doing well and maybe her teammates can fill the gap. But this is going pretty bad. Still, she has to try to give her all, so she straightens her shoulders. Mai pulls out a paper fan... it's not seemingly the most powerful item, but it helps her in her defense.

As she unfolds the fan, it ignites in a flame, powered again by her brilliant chi. The fire lights up the night, glowing as brilliantly as the spotlights that highlight the field, and warming the cold desert air. "I guess that's what it will have to be! Fighting fire, with fire!"

"Suichou - no Mai!"

Mai throws the fan ahead of herself... then she throws another... and then another. She seems to produce them from thin air, each boosted with a streak of powerful orange and red flame as they spin straight and true.

COMBATSYS: Mai successfully hits Demitri with Suichou no Mai.

[         \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////                  ]
Demitri          1/-------/=======|=====--\-------\0              Mai

[DEMITRI]
Demitri suddenly powers up, his entire body covered in a bright, glowing aura of what looks like almost blue-orange plasma than actual fire.

Fans start burning into his skin as they catch him too off-guard to properly dodge, and too powerful to adequately block. So he has no choice but to try and lessen the damage with raw power.

He falls to his knees, aura fading, pulling fans from his body as blood pours into the grave dirt.

The wounds begin to heal from their otherwise mortal state, but they're still incredibly deep, still bloody across his abdomen and chest.

She can see his strange, dark looking heart beating inside of him before muscle and bone seal enough to make him capable of continuing the fight, but not enough to keep him from constantly losing blood from that wound.

The flesh refuses to heal, that'll have to be addressed later.

"Humanity has truly embraced the brutality and skill of the night again. Truly, you are worthy of being my servant." He slowly levitates up to his feet, then holds his hand up, creating a condensed flame. "I will make a point of finding you after this tournament."

His hand is thrust forward, and a ball of fire flies at her with incredible speed, until it forms into a large, flaming bat that attempts to outright attack her and explode.

COMBATSYS: Mai blocks Demitri's Chaos Flare.

[         \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////                    ]
Demitri          1/-------/=======|======-\-------\0              Mai

[MAI]
That comment at least seems sort of flattering, coming from someone who seemed to think, at first, that Mai would taste disgusting. But she can't let her guard down, all the same. She braces herself for impact as a big fire bat... bigger than any she can conjure, comes searing for her. Drawing out yet another paper fan, Mai ignites it at the last possible second, letting the flickering flames of her own chi negate... most of Demitri's powerful heat. Still, as the bat impacts and explodes, the fire sears brilliantly. Mai closes her eyes, sweat rolling off her brow from the intensity.

When the light has flared away, Mai leans back as she gets ready for another counter assault. Even if she can't take Demitri out entirely, she's going to stand up to him for as long as she can, for the sake of her team. "You can remember me by this!" she shouts, her voice ringing with determination.

"Hissatsu-"

Mai leaps into the air. Then she does a flip, and, in mid-air, her direction changes. She drops forward with a shoulder charge, flaming chi surrounding her as she drives toward Demitri with her attack.

"- Shinobibachi!"

COMBATSYS: Mai successfully hits Demitri with Hissatsu Shinobibachi.
- Power hit! -

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////                     ]
Demitri          1/-----==/=======|=======\-------\0              Mai

[DEMITRI]
Demitri is taken back again, this time taking far more broad damage as the clothing of his torso burns away and flesh sears. He gets slammed into the large tombstone of a beautiful angel with a clown nose, which crumbles down on top of him, likely after Mai has a chance to get out of the way.

He seems down, this is one of those moments when it truly seems as if one has conquered a beast, slayed the villain.

Perhaps it's time to rest, sigh in relief, erase the awfulness of the night from one's mind.

Or perhaps...

The tombstone explodes, and large flaming bats begin to fly from his body as he yells with the multitonal roar of something between human and animal. His body loses more and more of its mass as bats leave, until there's nothing of him left except a flaming swarm that entirely illuminates the graveyard.

"Perhaps it's wrong to perceive your continuing to fight me as defiance. Perhaps I should consider that we are in a sanctioned fight, and you're simply following the rules. But I still find myself offended, insulted even, that you would burn me rather than bow and subjugate yourself to me. So I will punish you for it, because that is my whim." says the voice from everywhere, the bats flying in hellish circles.

Then they begin to dive, some of them exploding, others, trying to bite and rip at flesh while simultaneously burning it. He is relentless in his assault, and one can almost hear aggressive human yells somewhere in those bat screeches.

COMBATSYS: Mai full-parries Demitri's Demon Horde!!

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////                     ]
Demitri          0/-------/------=|=======\==-----\1              Mai

[MAI]
A hoarde of wailing demonic creatures...

Was certainly not the thing that Mai expected to face here tonight. But in a graveyard, fighting a vampire... she has to be prepared for the worst.

There's fire in her eyes. She stands and faces the attack, whatever may come. She holds tight to her stance, and trusts in her ninja training.

A fan whips out, and blocks one of the incoming hoarde. Another fan... she throws it, fast, and smacks an incoming bat with a strike edged in fire. Flame again explodes flame, as the bat is driven away. Mai cannot fear their screams and cries, or their flames and teeth. She must just, persisently, strike them back, her hands moving furiously against them. One hits a fan so hard that the flame on it bursts instantly, and with that last strike, Mai backflips and dives behind a tombstone, ducking down. A bat screams into it, spiraling like a missile. The tombstone explodes in shards... but, still, Mai is there.

She goes for a ninja run. Her eyes are flashing, and she lets out a scream. This time, instead of calling her attack, Mai only emits a wordless and angered warcry. Her hands are behind her, trailing as she charges in, but then, when she is close enough to strike, she uses the momentum of her charge to sweep her fan around. It trails, then leads as she turns her hip and shoulder into it. She strikes out, and again, with a swirling, in-close, super charged fan combo.

COMBATSYS: Mai successfully hits Demitri with Hakuro No Mai EX.

[                  \\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////                     ]
Demitri          0/-------/----===|>>>>>>>\>>>>>>>\2              Mai

[DEMITRI]
"More defiance! You must have the blood of a slayer, but even so, I will not allow this!" The bats reform into Demitri, and he starts trying to block her attacks, but his weakened body begins to take more damage than expected. Blood flies from his arms as fans create large gashes, openings are created to outright attack his already damaged torso.

She gains great headway, drives him back, and he snarls as she starts to back him into the corner of a tomb door.

And then he vanishes.

When he appears again, it's behind her, in the air, covered in bright energy that he seemingly pulled out of goddamned no where. His body bloody and covered in what would be mortal wounds on a normal man, he swoops down, his body spinning like a super powered drill, intending to gore her like a chi-infused rocket. "I refuse to suffer this humiliation any further!"

COMBATSYS: Demitri successfully hits Mai with Chaos Spin.
# Disabling hit! #

[                   \\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //                            ]
Demitri          1/-----==/=======|>>>>>>>\>>>>>>>\2              Mai

[MAI]
Demitri leaps up and drills Mai down into the ground, his frustration finally fully manifest as her hits keep striking him home. He hits her HARD, this time, and she goes flying backward, pushed back by the drill attack of his body.

A little flame still erupts around her. This is all she has left. But now she has nothing left to lose here. She will try her best to fight back... just for the tournament, though as angry as Demitri is, this may as well be for her life!

Flame surrounds her, beating with a pattern like the fast palpitations of her heart.

Mai then finds the strength to push back, diving into Demitri as he dove into her. First, she leads with her shoulder, but swings for a power hit driving with her hip. She strikes with her fan as many times as she can, rapidly. The strikes fly powered with fear and a bit of desperation. Each strike bursts in fire, and these fires... linger, settling on the ground like bombs waiting to off.

And then...

There is a conflagration of flame. The flames surround Mai, surround Demitri...

And shoot up into the air like a brilliant firework over the desert. The shape of the explosion in the sky in fact forms the shape of the Japanese character for 'WOMAN'

Before there is one last blast, this one on the ground, and this one, signalling her final strike.

Mai has to be showy, even in the face of defeat, defying those who might suppose female inferiority.

COMBATSYS: Mai can no longer fight.

[                   \\\\\\\\\\\  <
Demitri          1/-----==/=======|

COMBATSYS: Demitri blocks Mai's #Shiranui Ryuu Kyuubi no Kitsune#.

[                     \\\\\\\\\  <
Demitri          1/----===/=======|

[DEMITRI]
Demitri tries his best to keep up with her, the flurry of attacks that break his defensies every few hits.

The blast sends him flying back into another tombstone, and he lays there for a few moments, before, much like the Undertaker, he sits up.

Wiping blood from the side of his mouth, he stares down at the back of his hand. "Humanity has grown and refined itself. Surely I will taste you again one day."

COMBATSYS: Demitri awaits the next challenger.

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  <
Demitri          1/----===/=======|

[MAI]
Mai is burned and blasted, but she manages to wobble to off-sides before she starts to get dizzy ... and has herself a seat on a camp blanket. It looks like Makoto is going to have to take it from here...

COMBATSYS: Makoto Nanaya has joined the fight here.

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////////////]
Demitri          1/----===/=======|-------\-------\0    Makoto Nanaya

[MAKOTO NANAYA]
"Not if I have anything to say about it, creep."

Makoto snaps off her jacket as she bounds away from the lamp, momentarily vanishing into the darkness before reappearing in the (slightly) better-lit area where the fight is to take place - it needs lighting, otherwise the cameramen will be very sad.

Under the jacket, she is wearing her usual combat outfit, but in the same red and gold as Mai instead of her standard black and orange. Also, somewhere along the way, she has gotten her tonfa on: big, cross-shaped guards that cover her arm up to the elbow, more punch-enhancers and weights for power than regular tonfa. Her tail is fuzzed up to maximum fluff.

Makoto wastes no time in diving forward, her arm weights shimmering with power as she concentrates energy into them. He might still be off-balance from fighting Mai, and if he is, Makoto isn't going to give him any more time to recover than he's already had.

She drives her fist at him with all her force, causing a shockwave to radiate outward from the impact from sheer physical power if she actually manages to connect. "Ha! Come on, I'll give you a good shot of SQUIRREL POWER!"

COMBATSYS: Makoto Nanaya successfully hits Demitri with Impact!.

[                   \\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///////////////////////////// ]
Demitri          1/-======/=======|=------\-------\0    Makoto Nanaya

[DEMITRI]
Before he can even stand up, Demitri gets lifted from the ground, and goes flying back through multiple tombstones this time, before he smashes through one shaped like a small circus car.

He floats up to his feet, staring at his hands as he measures his own power. "A creature of the night." he says after a deep inhale of the air. "I'm rather weakened from your partner. The only way I'll get through this is to borrow some of your power... and you certainly seem to fit my criteria for a snack without much modification."

Unlike when he fed on Mai, this time his entire body grows fur, replacing his outfit entirely, and his cape expands into wings. "I can only imagine the taste..."

He flies toward her at breakneck speeds, digging deep from the well of his undead stamina as blood still flies from his wounds. Then he begins to throw a few punches and kicks at her.

His entire body ignites in a flash, trying to take her off-guard as he covers himself in flames, then he reaches forward to grab her arms and sink his teeth into her neck.

COMBATSYS: Makoto Nanaya blocks Demitri's Midnight Pleasure.

[                   \\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////////////      ]
Demitri          0/-------/-----==|====---\-------\0    Makoto Nanaya

[MAKOTO NANAYA]
Makoto's follow-through keeps following through a little too far; she takes a couple small steps to regain her balance before bringing her fists (and arm-guards) up. Fortunately, since she actually hit Demitri and smashed him halfway across the match field, her leaving herself open for an instant wasn't a huge problem.

This time.

"Okay, I am totally not up for that," Makoto says, eyes narrowing as Demitri shifts. She can't tell if he's mocking her or if he actually has to do that, with the fur; she's fought monsters before, but never Demitri himself, and all the weird magical monsters are ... well, weird and unique. (She doesn't include herself in that.)

Makoto withstands the strikes, bringing her arms up to deflect at least some of them; the guard-like tonfa are pretty useful for that, as some of the blows smack into them and barely move her arms. Makoto is, if nothing else, strong.

But just as he burns, Makoto acts. She drops her guard for an instant to slam her fist forward, the blunt tip of the tonfa striking at Demitri's gut accompanied with a blue-white aura of chi just as she starts to bound backwards, blurring with speed and power. His grab misses him by inches as she hops backwards, but her blow might have struck home in the meantime. "Don't you know how to *listen*?"

COMBATSYS: Makoto Nanaya successfully hits Demitri with Shooting Star EX.

[                       \\\\\\\  < >  ///////////////////////       ]
Demitri          0/-------/---====|====---\-------\0    Makoto Nanaya

[DEMITRI]
Demitri vomits blood when Makoto slams into him with her supernatural strength, and he holds his stomach, doubling over as he steps back.

He breathes heavily, body back to normal, tattered suit and cut/burned flesh replacing fur. "I wasn't prepared to fight an actual creature like myself tonight. Perhaps I underestimated this tournament..."

But her momentum, that's what he has to stop. He flies toward her again, this time trying to wrap his arms around her. "I won't let you have this match so easily." he says, intending to fly into the air, then fly back down into a spinning dive to try and smash her on her head.

COMBATSYS: Demitri successfully hits Makoto Nanaya with Negative Stolen EX.

[                       \\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////              ]
Demitri          0/-------/---====|=======\==-----\1    Makoto Nanaya

[MAKOTO NANAYA]
"Uh, I think I'm a *bit* different than you, thanks!"

Makoto's skin crawls, which makes her tail floof shift slightly. She does not like Demitri. He's setting off all of her 'predator alert!' mental warnings, and no wonder, given what she is. No part of her likes this. She's going to have to get past him and hope to handle someone else, who she can maybe deal with a little better.

Unfortunately, he takes the initative, and this time Makoto can't stop it. The grab catches her before she can pull further away, and she finds herself being taken into the sky, where she has nothing to push against and little she can do about it.

She smashes down and rolls, but the roll is reflexive; Makoto seems a little dazed, squeezing her eyes shut before opening them again. She at least gets up to her feet quickly, bouncing up - literally, as she herself takes to the air, trying to hop over Demitri and get behind him.

But... "METEOR DIVE!"

While in the air, Makoto smashes downward with all her force, trying to flatten Demitri against the ground. And, as an added bonus, she'll hit hard enough to throw her back up a little bit and get some extra distance away from him.

COMBATSYS: Makoto Nanaya successfully hits Demitri with Meteor Dive.

[                            \\  < >  ////////////////              ]
Demitri          0/-------/=======|====---\-------\0    Makoto Nanaya

[DEMITRI]
Demitri slams //directly// into the ground, sinking down into it as she uses her attack to also get away.

He's weak, Mai was tough, this squirrel girl is tough //and// a supernatural creature. Surely this tournament has a lot of ridiculous opponents.

When he sits up this time, it's with a flame in his hand. It grows larger and larger, until he tosses this large ball of flames at her. But if it hits her, shockingly, it turns into an actual large bat instead of simply exploding, then the //bat// starts trying to attack her. "I'll leave this to my young cohort."

COMBATSYS: Demitri has reached second wind!

[                         \\\\\  < >  ////////////////              ]
Demitri          0/-------/-======|====---\-------\0    Makoto Nanaya

COMBATSYS: Demitri successfully hits Makoto Nanaya with Chaos Flare.

[                         \\\\\  < >  //////////                    ]
Demitri          1/-------/=======|=======\=------\1    Makoto Nanaya

[MAKOTO NANAYA]
Makoto lands past Demitri and turns just in time to see him rising from the ground. With a fireball. Well, Makoto knows what to do about fireballs; she throws herself to one side, assuming it will go past her. And, in fact, it might have, except it clipped her guard as she passed, which means it turned into...

A BAT. A squirrel's worst enemy. It's true! (Probably.) Look it up.

Whether or not it is true in most cases, it is certainly true this time, as the bat harasses Makoto. There's not a lot she can do about it; she swings her fist at it several times, but being a small flying creature versus a human-sized squirrel person wearing heavy objects strapped to her arms, the bat has the advantage on not getting hit here.

After a few moments of flailing, Makoto figures that the best way to get rid of it is to punch Demitri in the face. So she makes a pretty good attempt at doing that, rushing low with her hands held up in front of her face, defensively. "Your cohort is a jerk! CORONA UPPER!" she roars, as she springs upward in a rising uppercut.

COMBATSYS: Demitri dodges Makoto Nanaya's Corona Upper.

[                         \\\\\  < >  /////////                     ]
Demitri          1/-------/=======|=======\-------\1    Makoto Nanaya

[DEMITRI]
Demitri bursts into a flock of bats when she swings to punch him in te face, laughing like a creepy monster man before he reforms behind her, and starts to explode with even more energy, a large ring of chi surrounding his flaming body.

"I will give your team credit for something. I truly feel alive, for all that such a thing means to me. The challenge, the pain, the struggle. Finding myself so close to defeat truly feels like an exquisite vacation from constantly succeeding at life!"

Demitri bursts into a flock of bats when she swings to punch him in te face, laughing like a creepy monster man before he reforms behind her, and starts to explode with even more energy, a large ring of chi surrounding his flaming body.

"I will give your team credit for something. I truly feel alive, for all that such a thing means to me. The challenge, the pain, the struggle. Finding myself so close to defeat truly feels like an exquisite vacation from constantly succeeding at life!" He starts to spin, thrusting forward to tackle her into the air with a spinning tackle.

COMBATSYS: Makoto Nanaya dodges Demitri's Chaos Cradle.

[                          \\\\  < >  /////////                     ]
Demitri          0/-------/=======|=======\=------\1    Makoto Nanaya

[MAKOTO NANAYA]
Makoto's uppercut hits nothing at all as her fist passes through a dispersing cloud of bats. She feels him behind her when her tail starts to catch some of the heat, and she whirls, dropping to the ground in a low crouch as Demitri strikes above her.

While down low, Makoto comes to one conclusion pretty shortly as Demitri continues to talk: "I really don't like you," she says. This is the kind of being she expected to be fighting back when she was in NOL, not - well, it doesn't matter now; she's hardly a member anymore. Now she has to worry only about the tournament.

Which means worrying about Demitri. He's the threat here, isn't he? Well, you can't win if you don't go hard...

Makoto springs upward in an almost vertical uppercut, trying to clip Demitri again. He's seen this before - he just dodged one, in fact! - and Makoto is almost counting on that; she expects him to flit backwards, out of reach, a second time.

Which is why she swings her *other* fist in a hook. That alone could be a powerful blow - but Makoto follows it through with a gigantic fist made out of chi, shimmering blue-white and trailing energy like flames. The fist is almost the size of *her*, honestly, even if it trails away into wispy energy not far above the wrist. "You think you're that much better than us? Well, a huge power difference doesn't mean a thing if you've got the will to win! CYGNUS COMBINATION!"

COMBATSYS: Makoto Nanaya successfully hits Demitri with Cygnus Combination.

[                                < >  /////////                     ]
Demitri          1/-----==/=======|===----\-------\0    Makoto Nanaya

[DEMITRI]
"Equality is a very modern concept. Mice don't cry unfair because cats feed on them, cats don't cry foul when hunted by wolves, and surely a wolf can do nothing in the face of a bear. But humans and lesser creatures believe that inferiority to a predator such as myself as an insult rather than a mere statement of reality." Demitri explains this right as she prepares her next attack.

He does flip backwards, he's underestimating her despite how vulnerable he's become. And when he does, the gigantic fist comes and plows into his body. It painfully sears his most likely unstable flesh, given everything he's already healed from, and he falls back against the door of a tomb with the image of a circus tent etched into it.

He's struggling to heal, his torso is horrific to look at. So instead of maintaining such a humanoid form, he roars, cape expanding into two massive wings, fur replacing his clothing once more as his mouth overflows with jagged and uneven teeth.

There is no comment, no attempt to accept defeat, he instead unleashes a hell of flaming bats flying from his body as he continues to roar in his monstrous demon form, a swarm of bats that once again attempts to consume someone tonight.

COMBATSYS: Demitri can no longer fight.

[                     \\\\\\\\\  <
Makoto Nanaya    0/-------/----===|

COMBATSYS: Demitri successfully hits Makoto Nanaya with Demon Blast.
- Power hit! -

[                                <
Makoto Nanaya    1/----===/=======|

[MAKOTO NANAYA]
Makoto Nanaya's tail frizzes as she lands, puffing up into something that is almost round for a few moments before she forces herself to loosen up enough to return it to normal.

"I'm real tired of people calling me inferior." Makoto sounds almost serious for a moment, her voice low, but she breaks the image almost immediately; she sees Demitri's weakness, or thinks she does, and hopes to take advantage of it.

She rushes, plowing through some of the flaming bats to follow through with the smashing giant fist with a roar. And it looks like she's almost going to manage it, for a moment, for a second blow - but the cloud of bats batter her away from Demitri, and she turns it into an evasive roll, ending up flopped on her back with her tail curled up over her upper torso some distance away.

Her one advantage is that Demitri can't really follow up, either. So it's a loss... but at least she'll walk out of here.

Well, be walked out of here. She's not getting up for a bit.

[DEMITRI]
If Aurora is here, Demitri doesn't seem to bother looking. He instead bursts entirely into regular bats, following his basic instincts.

He needs to feed, he can no longer fight, so it seems some unlucky people will be getting swarmed by bats tonight.

At least the camera crew who were hiding out got some good footage for the general public to enjoy, and increase their existential anxieties about magic squirrel women, vampires, and mystic boob ninjas.

Log created on 20:51:30 06/26/2019 by Mai, and last modified on 00:48:11 06/29/2019.