[Plot Topic] Training Exodus (JC, Pine)

Enoch's eye's widened in shock at the sudden chain of events, he could hardly process it. He didn't even see Carver's arrow leave the bow, he just saw the woman dodge to one side. His eye's couldn't even process the speed he just witnessed.
At first the boy wanted to just stand in place and watch, however although still green, he remembered his training and knew that what was about to take place was a battle that he would only get in the way of.
However...Enoch wasn't as level headed as his father would be. He did indeed begin to get some distance between them as after all he had no idea if this woman was going to come after him. However he kept them in sight, and stayed close enough to be able to jump in if Carver got in trouble.

The youthful purple eye's of the young warrior watched, and waited...

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The speed which she displayed was amazing, she was fast, and smart. This level of skill showed him that she was skilled, and beyond that would be a tough match. He couldn't hold back, he had to kill her.
As she performed a cartwheel, the captain pulled out another arrow from the quiver on his back and was able to place the arrow on the wire in an instant.
As single image of his squad member Kye popped into his head. Carver was going to be fighting a dark bender. He knew what it was like to fight a master, he had studied dark benders through Kye and learned much about dark bending.

Being in a beam of light Carver knew he'd have a second to react. His ears were able to pick up her movements and where she was going. In addition, he knew he'd have to start paying attention to the shadows as well. To any normal person, it was very hard to tell the difference between regular darkness, and weaponized darkness. In the night it was basically impossible. Any normal one-on-one encounter like this with a dark bender would normally end badly for any other man. However, Carver was unique. He wasn't very special, not a master bender, not a master martial artist, or some super genius.  

Carver was a soldier, a true soldier and captain, the best kind of soldier. This very simple ability was in a completely different level then any other soldier. His awareness in battle, his intuition, his ability to think fast even in emotional duress, his heightened senses, his spacial awareness and his sheer experience in battle and hunting. All combined with his toughness and fighting ability made him a force to be reckoned with.

Now why mention this? Well it was this very thing, that would not make this a battle of speed, but a battle of attrition. Carver's awareness of the darkness around him, his ability to see the tiniest of details with naked eye's, and his ears that let him know all of the smallest movements.
Being in a beam of light and surrounded by shadow, he bent his knee's down, and jumped backwards as the spikes rose up to meet him. However one of them managed to cut slightly into his lower back as he tucked his legs in for a back flip to speed up his movement.
He heard Marisa move behind the tree and with his bow and arrow still in hand. As he was upside down in mid-air, he took hold of the back of the arrow, aimed it at the tree Marisa hid behind, pulled the arrow back and released.
The tree was a decent size, however Carver made sure to pull it back hard enough to a full draw so it would pierce right through the tree and straight through her back. He knew it would make it through the tree, there was no doubt about it. This thing could pierce through stone, a tree was no problem.

Swordsmen often talked about how the blade was an extension of their body. Benders were the same with their element, it was an extension of their selves, body and mind. To Marisa, a woman who had quite literally spent her life mastering every facet of a single element her relationship with her element was much deeper. The shadows weren't an extension of her body. The shadows were her body. She felt as they scored the first hit on the soldier, feeling the skin and flesh tear, first blood was hers, but the wound was shallow. She had not felt bones or sinews, it was a mere scratch. On the other hand given the power of his last shot this guy was capable of ending her in one hit.

She'd felt the kid's footsteps resound against the web of shadows that was the forest floor as he left their immediate vicinity. Him leaving was both good and bad, it meant she didn't have to worry about collateral, but it also meant her opponent could also get a lot more brutal. After all she still had no intention to kill him and he certainly seemed all too willing to kill her. Of course the Spirit King had told them they were immortal but she was in no hurry to test whether that was true or not.

She felt his boots impact the ground as he landed, the shadows quivering form the impact and a shift in his body weight. Now it's worth pointing out that her method of sensing his movements through the shadows was not perfect. Much like a spider's web vibrating to tell its master of the location of the prey it relied on vibrations, and those didn't travel instantly, all information she had on the man were just a few milliseconds late. A few milliseconds may seem like nothing, but when in combat it could mean the difference between life and death. By the time Marisa knew an arrow had been fired at her the deadly shaft was already free from the string. She'd seen the power of the bow once before, it had been enough for her to realise this was no ordinary weapon, she also knew this man was no complete idiot, he probably had plans for that projectile that didn't end with the arrow simply being embedded in the tree.

Of course all of this thinking didn't happen in Maria's mind, it was all instantaneous. Any good fighter will tell you that in combat there is no time for thinking. Practise will make the necessary actions become instant reaction and Marisa had had ample practise.

Just before the tree hit the trunk she let herself fall off her perch, catching herself on it again with her feet as the tip of the black arrow kissed the trunk and launching herself clear of her tree just as the shaft pulverised the wood into a million tiny splinters, several of which hit her with enough force to bit into her flesh or leave tiny cuts on her exposed forearms and face. None were deep enough to be dangerous, but their stinging was quite uncomfortable.

All throughout the manoeuvre her hands had also been in motion forming a bow of her own in her hands, but unlike her opponents' her bow didn't need physical arrows to be brought out of a quiver. She fired off three arrows in rapid succession, not even needing to aim as she already knew exactly where her opponent stood. Every time she let one arrow fly she used her bending to pull the string back in a flash and generate another arrow, only stopping to land. All three arrows were made from condensed shadows and all three were under her control, she could manipulate their state as she desired. As she landed and rolled away behind another tree she clenched her fist, making one of the arrows shatter into dozens of smaller projectiles that would blanket a wide area, though each of the new smaller projectiles now carried much less force than the single arrow had, but that was fine with her. She wasn't trying to skewer her opponent, just slow him down and tire him out. Eventually he'd make a mistake, hopefully that would happen before she messed up...

Carver grit his teeth in frustration as he heard her feet shuffle from where she was standing. How?! How could she have known? This frustration came with a newfound respect however, not respect for her, but the respect that you must have for an enemies abilities in order to better understand them. He had hoped this wouldn't be the case, but he understood that with dark bending, one had an overall sense of the land so long as it had darkness around it. Of course there was lots of sun and light around them as well, but if she was a master...

Only now had Carver grasped the full realization that this was not going to be a battle he could end easily. Were she not a master dark bender, or an incredibly experienced fighter, there was no way in hell she'd know that arrow would pierce through the tree and kill her. She was able to quickly put evidence and her memories together, even blinks of knowledge such as of course what she learned from the half second she had seen his bow in action. This was all she needed to piece together that the bow could take the arrow through the strong wood, and the arrow would not break underneath the extreme pressure. This of course was not to mention her ability to react to dodging an arrow at close range, needing only what was likely the flexing of the muscles of his forearm and the movement of tendons in his hand to react. Had he just flexed his forearm as a faint would she have reacted the same way? Either way he was fighting someone that could think fast, act fast, and was a master at dark bending.

Just before landing on the ground, Carver was able to pull out another arrow from his quiver before landing on the ground to place it on the wire.
He quickly was able to grasp the incoming three dark arrows. Seeing this, plus understanding more of Marisa's abilities, Carver realized that normal arrows weren't going to cut it anymore. Pulling back the wire, he wasn't phased by one of the shadow arrows exploding into fragments.
He would give her something a little special this time.
Before releasing, he took an admittedly risky second to both point out his index finger on his bow, draw a circle, and blow out what at first seemed to be a small about of wind with his mouth.
Upon releasing the much faster arrow out of the shadow arrows, a thick shimmering tunnel of wind surrounded the arrow upon release, with a tail of wind rippled in the air like a meteor crashing into the atmosphere, the arrow was pointed in Marisa's  general direction. Only because this wind that surrounded it stretched out around the arrow to form a wide air bended shield with arrow head sticking out in the middle. It was similar to an umbrella in terms of the wide brim followed by the point in the center upon expanding the cover to protect yourself from rain, in this case it was protection from deadly rain.
The moment Carver let the arrow loose he began rotating his right hand in a circular motion to bend the air that surrounded the arrow so that it would spin with extreme force in a clockwise motion. He made sure the extent of the air shield was big enough to hit all of the shadow projectiles.
Upon making contact with the weaponized darkness, they would all be immediately swept up in the powerful mini tornado that surrounded the arrow that would pull the dark arrows and the fragments into it's spin motion, and shoot it off to the sky in an upper diagonal direction. This arrow of course was also heading for Marisa, and racing straight for her in an attempt to catch her in the tornado as well and throw her high up into the sky, high enough that the landing would be far from pretty.

Peeking around the tree she was hiding behind she could see her opponent doing... something. She had no idea what he was attempting to pull off for a brief moment, but when the arrow was released and somehow managed to sweep up her own missiles on its way to her she managed to piece a cursory understanding of her opponent's attack together. He was an air bender and that arrow was encased in some for of wind current, that's why it had swept up the shadowy fragments so easily, and that would be how she'd counter.

Marisa's left hand twisted, clenched into a fist and she then slammed it downwards in a single fluid motion, in response the shadowy fragments and arrows rushed together forming a single hefty block on top of the arrowhead which down crashed into the arrow, pulling the deadly shaft down into the ground with its sheer weight and force, leaving only the blast of air coming at her. As she'd been pulling off her bending with one hand her other hand had darted to the machete's hilt, literally ripped it out of its flimsy leather sheath and stabbed the weapon halfway to the hilt horizontally into the bark of the thick tree. Her hands moved so fast they were blurs, her muscles knew the bending motions by heart, and the handling of the machete was simple enough. The brain's input wasn't even required, much less needed.

The wind blast was supposed to fly her her sky high, resulting in a landing that would shatter her body. Holding the machete in the tree gave her something to grip that would resist the upwards motion, however the air blast was like a small tornado, its current was circular and the machete blade being in the tree horizontally meant there was little resistance to the sideways motion.

Marisa was swept off her feet as she'd expected, the flat side of the machete stopping her from rising any further, but she was taken slightly by surprise by as the sharp edge cut through the bark, spinning her around the tree. The wind blast kept on moving forward, and as soon as it had passed her she pulled the machete out of the tree, letting the tremendous momentum that had been imparted to her by the wind hurl her towards her opponent, knees bent and legs tucked in to avoid touching the ground and slowing herself down. She had had to rectified her plan on the move, but this was going to work to her advantage, she wasn't about to let an opportunity to turn her opponent's strength against him pass her by.

She couldn't do much that he couldn't counter with air bending and his bow at a range, that much had started to become evident. Now she had to gauge how well he handled close quarters. Soldiers usually focused on range or melee, hopefully he had too, otherwise this was going to be a very long and drawn out fight. As she was soaring through the air she had a fraction of a moment to think about how much she was missing her normal combat gear. A single clumsily made machete wasn't much of a replacement for her glaive and daggers.

She travelled the distance between them in the blink of an eye but a couple of feet before colliding into him she extended her legs and angled her body to slip just past him aiming a quick lazy flick at his ankles with the machete as she passed him. Still sliding, albeit slowed by the friction between her feet and the ground, she spun around to face her opponent, digging her heels sharply into the ground, coming to a complete stop, legs spread wide, knees bent, poised for combat. She clapped her hands together twice and her opponent's now hardened shadow leapt from the ground, attempting to tackle the soldier to the ground.

Carver frowned as the darkness that was caught up in the wind tunnel quickly formed together and weighed the arrow down into the ground. However the wind tunnel itself wasn't hindered as it moved to blow Marisa into the air.
With her being caught however he had time to pull out another arrow from his quiver.
Once she landed on the ground, Carver could see her very clearly with his enhanced eye's, everything she did became clear. He even found her machete rather amusing. Was that thing even supposed to be a took made for cutting? Or maybe a collectors item showing the weapons that homeless people used 100 years ago? It hardly intimidated him either way.

Seeing her jump into the air towards him, Carver himself jumped straight up into the air while spinning in a circle, bending the air currents around him to ascend him upwards like a rocket on a flurry of white shimmers and air gusts surrounding his body. He so high in such a small amount of time that he ascended above the tree's. The sun fully hit his body and it was bright and beautiful even with a dragon flying in the sky in the distance.

Carver's body was horizontally positioned in the air, he faced the ground and as he did, he reached his hand back into his quiver.
"Lets see if the bitch can handle this" He mumbled as he took four arrows in between his fingers and pulled them all out. His skill with a bow did not hinder his movements in placing the all on the wire and pulling it back, it was just as quick as if he was manipulating a single arrow. By blowing with his mouth on them a very strong air current surrounded the tips. The current tightly circled around them in a barrage of sharp winds that were tightly compacted into a sphere that was a transparent white with a faint blue tint. The immense amount of air tightly packed into the spheres that surrounded each arrow head made the metal vibrate in all directions so fast that it caused a high pitched ring to be produced from the hardened steel of the arrow tips.

Marisa's positioned would be straight in the middle of the four arrows, after all it didn't matter if they were actually pointed at her. With the wire at a full draw and ready to launch the arrows at a massive speed that would also be assisted by gravity as they would be traveling down, he released the arrows. As he did however, he took it one step further by using the hand that released the arrows by opening his hand and throwing a palm strike causing an air current to punch the backs of the arrows, making them fly even faster to be just like bullets.

The would ram into the ground with tremendous force that would cause the sphere's around each of the arrow heads to explode like grenades in a shock wave that when combined together covered a wide portion of the area with a 4 powerful explosions that would result with an organ rupturing shock wave and a massive wind that blast that would not only blow any person several yards away, but fire the roots, branches, twigs, splinters and foliage all around like shrapnel, effectively creating four explosive arrows with there own improvised shrapnel. All of the this with the intention of Marisa being dead center in the middle according to the aim of the arrows. He didn't worry about Enoch, he knew the boy wasn't close enough to take damage from this, however since he was a little closer he was supposed to be, he'd likely get blown back a bit from the much wider wind pressure yet that by itself was not lethal.

He was able to see whatever the result would be as he had a direct view from straight down.

She'd landed by the time he had stabilised up in the air, from his new perch he'd have a tough time dissimulating any of his movements, and she saw him reach for his arrows clearly. She knew the power of that bow, she knew he was an air bender capable and willing to use his bending to deliver devastating attack through augmented projectiles. The tree he'd obliterated with a single bolt had been proof enough. She didn't want to be anywhere near those when they hit.

From high up there, with the entirety of the sparse forest below him he probably thought he could keep an eye on whatever her reaction would be. There was something he didn't know though, diversion, distraction and confusion were the areas where her unrivalled mastery of dark bending was at its strongest. Back in her pirating days those had been the aspects of her bending she'd pushed to their furthest possible extreme. She was unparalleled when it came to confusing her opponent.

A simple movement of her arms gathered shadows around her in a thick cocoon, and as the soldier prepared his attack she prepared her defence, performing a few complex hand gestures at lightning quick speed. When she let her arms drop and the cocoon dispersed there was no longer just one of her, there were dozens of her, oily black copies, indistinct from one another. The original was nowhere to be seen, or at least the original Marisa was indistinguishable from the clones. She'd practised that move so many times, controlling each replica had grown so much easier over her years of practise. The clones were all incorporeal, making them require very little concentration to maintain but they were also incapable of harming anything, but her opponent didn't know that. Only she was corporeal, she'd merely covered herself in darkness, making herself aesthetically indistinguishable from the mass of mirror images swarming about around her.

As the arrows were let loose they all reacted in tandem, some started running like frightened animals, others mimicked the movements of a bender, shadows coiling around their legs. Those who had coiled shadows around their legs were able to leap massive distances, using the shadows to vastly augment their speed. Most of those who ran were blown away by the arrows' shock wave, their shadowy forms dissipating in black dust as they were shattered. A handful of them darted behind trees, solidified darkness wrapping around the base of the trunk, greatly reinforcing the wood. When the pulse reached them three of the four trees shattered, crushing the illusion that was hiding behind them, only one of the trees held fast, protecting the being behind it.

Of those who had coiled shadows around their limbs some darted to the side, leaping out of range of the blast and taking cover behind trees, getting themselves far out of lethal range of the explosion, but also far away from their enemy. The others leapt upwards, leaving dust in their wake, darting past the arrows before they hit the ground and hurling themselves at Carver, flailing at him, trying to bite, kick, punch, claw and slice at him as they neared him. Were any of them even the real Marisa?

Back on the ground, those still on the ground had counter-attacked, forming bows of their own and firing them. Eight heavy black arrows sailed through the sky towards Carver, just as the shadow silhouettes who hap jumped up reached him. Of course if the real Marisa was among the archers only her arrows would be physical and corporeal.

Wherever she was, her attack would be real. If she was attacking at all. But was she, or was she merely hanging back, waiting for an opportune moment to make her move?

A moment of hesitation rose in Carver’s actions as he suddenly saw several complete black silhouettes scatter in all directions, all performing their own actions. For a moment it was confusing, so many different bodies. Yet Carver took no time at all to discern that this was an attempt to confuse him.
“I train with a man that pulls shit like this everyday” He mumbled confidently.
His ears and eye’s honed in on the only black figure that carried the breathing of a person in combat and actual weight in her movements and not simulated weight.
To some surprise he saw Marisa’s form flying right towards him along with a few others black forms. He found his temper rise slightly. Did she think him weak? Or was she just stupid? Did she really want to attack an air bender in the air head on? He began to think maybe his ability only extending to air bending with his bow and arrow. He was more than happy to prove her wrong if that was the case.

Minding the shadow arrows as he couldn’t tell if they were solid or not, as they all rose up to him like a barrage of anti-air projectiles to an aircraft. Carver pulled his leg back and swung his leg upward with a mighty kick which would catch all the shadows including Marisa in a wind tunnel upon contact. He made sure the wind tunnel would arc upwards and was wide enough to decrease area of dodging room. Also upon contact the clones and Marisa alike would find themselves all pulled into a tightly formed single file line from the air currents within.
Knowing the air arc would carry them all upward into the air, Carver proceeded to use his other leg to use an air bended push to glide underneath them regardless of being caught or not, once again mind the arrows as from where he was positioned they would harmlessly fly up into the air.
With his arrows pulled back on the wire and pointing at the bottom of what he hoped would be a single file line, he’d release, firing away in hopes to pierce the entire line, creating holes in all of them at once, including Marisa.