It's a blur! It's a mirage! It's a...Stoner..?

Shio had been challenged by someone in Nibelheim claiming to be the fastest person in the world. While realistically Shio doubted that an arrancar of this one's level could actually be the fastest as a fighter he took the challenge seriously and as it turned out a few seconds in the arrancar was incredibly fast as he claimed.. but it wasn't enough nor did he seem to be able to turn while moving.. He could at best serpentine, or zig zag, but that was it and it disappointed Shio who was quicker and more flexible with his movements. This didn't stop him from enjoying his match however. The two kept clashing Zanpaktou's but after a few minutes it was more than obvious, to anyone keeping up with them at least, that Shio had a vast advantage. Second by second Shio was not only causing one minor injury after another but remained unhurt himself.

Eventually the Arrancar in question swallowed his pride, a rare thing for his kind, and admitted he could not win. Slowly he healed physically but his pride was quite shattered. Shio sheathed his sword and blew out a puff of smoke from a cigarette he had lit, which was, in secret, weed, and shook the fire out on his dragon themed zippo before putting it aware within his black shinigami-esque robe, though it had slight differences.

"Not bad, but you need to learn better control." Shio said bluntly but politely as to not seem arrogant or offensive, as he didn't wish to start another fight, "We'll probably end up fighting again so make sure to work on that." the arrancar agreed and left but Shio remained. He loved it in Nibelheim because it was were any fighter was welcome regardless of Race or issues.

He couldn't help shaking the feeling he was being watched and he was sure it wasn't just the spectators who had saw the fight outside of the Arena..

A girl with a robotic left arm sat in the stands, legs crossed as she watched calmly watche the fight transpire between a vizard and the arrancar who kept claiming to be the fastest. And he was very fast. She knew his limitations though, having watched him fight several times. So Gaige wondered if the other man could do any better. She followed the entire fight not missing a single thing thanks to her cybernetic eyes. Every exchange that passed between to ended with the arrancar taking a cut from the other man's superior combat prowess, until the arrancar finally gave up, and lost his self proclaimed title as fastest man in the world.

Gaige smirked as the man walked away in shame. Its just as well he'd challenged this vizard instead of someone with true breathtaking speed, he would probably have died from the shame of being defeated so fast. She was no slug but she understood her limitations. Standing up Gaige made her way into the arena to catch the vizard before he left. "That was impressive. Its about time someone shut that arrancar up. I would have, but I don't like wasting my time on small fry."

She looked the Vizard up and down and nodded. "I think you'll be fun. What do you say, up for a fight?" She asked. Based on her analysis of his last fight, they should be about even in speed, and she didn't lack flexability unlike the arrancar. Of course his shikai might change things if he decided to use it.

"A challenger?" Shio said as he turned to address the girl who had spoken to him and kept his eyes on her while she moved closer, "I do not hold back against any opponent. But I do respect that you are a woman and do not intend to do things grotesquely in order to win. I don't expect the same from you so feel free to do whatever. As it should be." He didn't draw his katana yet because he didn't need to. In fact his first attack and future variations of it were always his second fastest attack because he used battojutsu.

Looked like his feeling of being observed was true. He noticed this girl has cybernetics attached to her. To what extent he wasn't fully sure, but at least the arm was evident. Generally in his experience one did not simply get "one" cybernetic "upgrade" however.. so he remained alert for other things. He pulled another weed cigarette out and lit it with the same dragon themed zippo as before before shaking the flame out and putting it back in his pocket of his robe which seemed to lead to the pocket of his jeans with just enough room for the zippo to slide into his jean pocket and not let his hand in.

He took a stance and spoke once more as a sign of competitive spirit, "As challenger you make the first move. Whenever you are ready."

"Don't worry, I don't expect you to hold back. There would be no fun in that." She said. They moved into position. He didn't draw his sword. Gaige played back the start of the fight with the arrancar using her artemis Mk V. He was a battojutsu user, a quick draw style. Made sense combined with his speed it could be pretty deadly. She was primarily ranged so this should be interesting. Gaige took up position across from him, and he invited her to attack first. She smiled. "How kind of you." She said with a slight mocking tone.

Gaige watched him for a moment longer, A pistol materialised at her side and she caught it with the magnet in her arm. Then she dashed to the right, firing three blasts of lightning as strong as bala towards shio before swapping hands to free up the robotic limb. As soon as she did she charged a shot as strong as a cero and fired at Shio's feet to force him away from advancing on her.

Ting.

The sound reverberated from Shio's area as he quick drew and sliced the first bolt of lightning before V Slashing the other two. His two steps in drawing had made him move his feet and thus allowed his speedy charge to occur right after this..but that was halted by a stronger blast aimed at his legs which forced him to jump to the left. This was obviously her plan but he had made a strategy as a back up in case she turned out to be ranged, as it seems quite a few cybernetic enhancements allow for this style with ease, and pulled down his vizard mask to throw her off.

Because at that moment he vanished and appeared right next to her laying down horizontally while air walking to hover above the ground a mere inch. With his right index finger pointed right at her he immediately proceeded by firing a "Hot" cero at her. Unlike regular cero his cero had a very high temperature and could leave burns on anyone it touched, assuming they had flesh and bone at least, before using his heightened speed to be standing again ten feet from where he fired the cero with himself being seen removing his mask and retaking his Battojutsu stance, as long as she actually looked in his direction when he did either of course.

She watched as he cut her three attacks aside easily, using a quick draw as expected. He was forced aside as calculated, but he vanished. She would have expected a counter attack with his blade but he'd engaged his mask before moving, either for a boost or to do the one thing vizards could do with it on. She didn't need to look to know it, the build up of energy she felt gave away the cero.

She turned rapidly, engaging an energy shield on her arm and blocked the cero with it which resulted in her being pushed back. There was a high level of heat coming from it suggesting that wouldn't be nice to touch. She engaged the stp in her feet and used two calculated boosts to fling her over the cero, keeping the shield between her and it until it took off on its own and she quickly twisted in the air so that she landed on her feet.

The cero hit the opposite side of the arena and did some nasty damage to the barrier that protected the onlookers from harm. Smiling she disengaged the energy shield. He'd removed his mask, and taken up position again. Gaige dashed left, then right, zig zagging towards him. She was almost to him when she started to turn to meet him only to engage the stp and launch herself the other way, hopefully tricking him for a second as she rolled and raised her arm. A plate slide away from her palm and a beam of energy as strong as a gran rey was fired towards him, and before it came in contact with anything she was already moving from her position.

He sensed it before he saw it, lucky for him he was so reflexive and speedy, as the beam was released he activated his Shikai yelling the incantation as it activated while using it's power, "Tear the world to nothing!" and using his dragon fire at a level equal to that of the beam causing a lightning bolt to slam into it and explode both attacks most likely injuring the girl as well as hurling Shio backwards a good distance before he regained his composure.

He then did something odd, at least visually, he did battojutsu and swung his blade as if attacking the girl, except he did not move when he did it! Yet at the same speed and same power he was "seen" doing the strike an invisible blade of energy following the exact path of his swing would try and hit Gaige from the side. This energy was directly connected to his Zanpaktou and was acting as an extension to his blade though the energy disappeared right after the strike was made as to keep it from being used against him in some manner.

He once again took his battojutsu stance and grinned as he purposely waited to see what else this fighter would do. He had a few ideas in mind to counter whatever possibly came up next and he was more than eager to try a few of them out.. he blew a puff of smoke into the air from his lit weed and felt his body tremble with anticipation as he made sure to keep his eyes fixed on the girl. Looked like coming to Nibelheim was the most amazing decision he could have made so far since becoming a vizard..

Gaige watched as he countered with his shikai and then a bolt of lightning that held allot of energy. She was already moving so she was only caught by the edge of the explosion. She regained her composure quickly and came to a stop a good distance away. Watching him carefully she seen him draw his sword super fast, but he made no move from his position. She watched the arc of the weapon and though about the distance, why he would do it.

Realisation sunk in quickly, but to late, she rose her left hand to the level of the sword swing and blocked an invisible attack but a second to late as it cut into her right arm slightly. The force vanished before any follow up action could be taken, and his blade was sheathed again. Gaige smiled. That was a neat trick but tricks rarely hit her twice. She did wonder how far it could reach, she was about twenty feet and it got her. Best to assume it was as long as he wanted for now.

Since he could hit her at quite some range and there was only so much space in the arena, there was only so much value to staying out of close range. More time to react since the farther she was from him the wider the arc his blade had to travel to reach her. Gaige ran to his left, watching for that blade to move, and fired a charged shot from her pistol, aimed do distract him from her moving into much closer range.

At which point she'd exchanged that Pistol for a very impressive looking shotgun loaded with a clip of standard shot. Firing from five feet away, the shotgun had a spread of about 5 foot over an effective range of 15, doing a cero worth of damage if it landed a direct hit. Anything past 15ft would mean a significant increase in damage, if any.

Good she had figured out the energy extension. That went as planned. Step two however was already in motion even as she fired more shots at him which he side hop/stepped to the left and he drew his blade again except this time he didn't return to his battojutsu stance afterwards instead he made several quick slashes from various angles in rapid succession with the energy blade extension happening every single time. So although he wasn't moving the attacks were still reaching her. She had already drawn and fired a shotgun at this point and instead of trying to dodge it, and probably failing, he created an armor of his own dragon fire thickly and densely around his entire being to protect him from the spread shot. The bullets melting before they even reached him due to his fire being much hotter than normal.

After which he fired a fireball the same size as hadou 31 shakkaho at his opponent from the tip of his sword. In baseball pitcher manner with the "hand" throwing the ball being the tip of his sword.

But that was just a distraction of his own as he used the time to draw his mask.. and as soon as it was over his face he used hyper step three times in a row to have covered a circular area around her at his highest speed, short of bankai/mask, and swung his blade four times in an area around her in order to leave "arcs of light" where he had swung each of the four times. These arcs when and if touched would do the same damage as Shio's actual swing even if they were barely touched at all.. and that applied to physical things.. to spiritual things it would rip the attack/object into ribbons if Shio's spiritual output exceeded the spiritual thing's output.

His trap left only one escape and even then Shio was already there waiting. Up. He used his dragon fire from his sword to launch a barrage of smaller fireballs, like bala's in all regards except on fire, down upon Gaige like a rain as to make her either touch the arcs or get hit by the bala and if she came up towards him he'd simply fire a "Hot" cero down at her at full strength..

Let the games begin said his mind to his conciousness.

She ducked and weaved around his attacks now that she was aware of the extendable blade. He put on armor that nullified her bullets. She smirked. Micro rockets it was then. He threw a ball of fire at her and she jumped aside. He moved, using some kind of flash step, and placed four arcs of energy around her.

He obviously expected her to be trapped but before his barrage of fire hit from above she dashed forwards and used her stp to launch herself over the arc but not towards him. Mid air she reloaded her shotgun with a clip of micro rockets that would explode on contact with the force of a cero. His armor might provide some protection but these would explode rather than melt if they met his armor. Gaige twisted around in mid air and fired two before hitting the ground and rolling backwards onto her feet.

Her high speed battle analysis was starting to pick up now. (25%) The longer they faught the more fun things were going to get. She liked that he was a smart fighter, and he seemed to be enjoying himself too. Gaige launched herself into the air towards him, using her Stp to dodge left if he did fire a hot cero now. She dashed in close enough to kick and did so, giving the kick a sudden shunpo speed boost with her stp. She spun around mid air and a blade popped out of her metal arm, she aimed a slash with that before launching herself up and back, fired another rocket at him.

He noticed the rockets and how he had fail to even hit the girl at all. That was fine though considering this was a sparring match he didn't want to overdo it. However at the rate this was going that may be an inevitability as things would continue to escalate. While these thoughts flashed through his mind he flexed his energy and released the flame armor around his body as a wave to hit the rockets prematurely and set them off without hitting him and instead of firing his cero at her he instead fired it at her third rocket to end it's threat immediately.

He had only shown the "Arc" technique to her once and he didn't expect her to have figured out it's entirety after one simple showing that didn't even show it's full use. So he would save it for when he required the extra defenses.

In regards to her he rapidly fired several volley's of dragon fireballs while mixing the swings he used to toss those fireballs with his extended blade ability so that she would have to dodge both the fireballs AND his blade swing's path which was an incredible feat even for a fast person. He didn't think she would get out of it unscathed..

But he planned for it anyways by creating a "False" path. His eye's never blinked and they never lost track of her. The second she found the path he purposely made he would shatter it and her with a cero as she wouldn't be able to dodge while within that path without getting damaged by his other attacks in the process. One way or another he was going to injure the girl just on principle of the matter alone not for any real hostile reason.

Afterwards he would use hyper step and his battojutsu to strike at her flank whether his plan worked or not. Cero or fireballs hitting her would have been nice but even if they failed he would still make this strike at full speed as a resort of trying to land the first blow.

For every move he made she countered it, and vice versa. He destroyed two rockets and instead of attacking with a cero took out the third. Then he made his counter attack with fireballs and sword swings, forcing her to move. She could see a path through the attacks and it was obvious she was being led through it, he was to clever not to try a trap. As she expected he fired a cero right down the safe path which men't she was fucked. Atleast, in his eyes. She reached into a pocket and armed an explosive disk. She threw it just over the edge of the cero straight to him, detonating it right next to him. It exploded with the force of a cero. Doing this left her little time to react to the cero, even using her bubble shield would take to long. She engaged the shield on her left arm and blocked.

The cero hit her, exploded and sent her flying towards the stands. She hit the ground, skipped, one or twice the rolled to a stop. Her shield and reactive body armor took the brunt of the damage but her legs and right arm had taken some minor burns. She was still capable of fighting however, and was standing in seconds after stopping. She quickly switched weapons from her shotgun to Oblivion driver, her custom high powered assault rifle. (semi auto fire only, dont worry.).

He came at her again, using a full speed swing. Popping the blade on her left arm she blocked and deflected his swing and swung oblivion driver at his face. She twisted and aimed a speed boosted kick for his ribs, and as she winded out of that kick jumped back and fired two standard shots from oblivion driver, each doing a bala and a half worth of damage. They would also be tougher to melt.

His eyes narrowed as he saw the disk coming. He wasn't sure what it was and as such could not counter it effectively. Even though he had the speed and the ace in the hole move to stop the disk. He wasn't sure if it was a cut or an explode attack and couldn't make a judgement call fast enough to make a difference.

Thus the mutual exploding of both parties occurred without further counters. He had a bit of blood leaving his mouth, but it wasn't as bad as it looked. The explosion had hurt but it wasn't much worse than what it looked like he had done to her.

As his next course of action became blocked, since he had rushed her at full speed and swung at her only for her to deal with it, he dipped backwards limbo style because she had tried to clock him in the face with her rifle and sent a kick up towards her chin in response, only for it to counter the kick SHE had made for his stomach instead of reaching her chin.

She jumped back giving him the time he needed to revert back to a normal standing position and then shot at him with said rifle. Which he dealt with by cutting them before they got within range of his body with his extended energy blade sword technique so that he himself was still at a distance from the girl. The energies cancelled out and the bullets were exploded safely before reaching him.

"This is getting us nowhere and I still couldn't be having any more fun if I tried." He said suddenly with a grin as he kneeled down japanese style and remained there with his sword sheathed and infront of him in both hands. This was bait of course. He would either deal with her next action by dodging or countering it.. or she would close in on him and he would use his final attack that he had access too.

One minute she was moving away, the next she was almost collapsing from a sudden migraine and deep nausea in her stomach.  She tried her best to hide the fact that she was suddenly unwell as she cursed under her breath.  "Not now dammit." Hand shaking she reached into her pocket and took a pill.  "Sorry Shio as much as I'm enjoying this I might have just lost the fight" She said as she waited for the sickness to subside.

She shook her head and sat down.  "I'm sorry about this rather anti climactic end." She said, head still throbbing.  "I did enjoy the fight. The look in your eye at the end was very interesting, I'd like to see what you had planned some time. But not today, I'm throwing in the towel for now."

He waited as she seemed to break down and take some form of medication. He didn't care if it was for battle of health he would simply wait and see. She then forfeit the match causing him to be aware it was indeed medication instead of battle stimulant, "That is fine. Considering you have some kind of condition I am happy to see you did so well. I am happy to have fought you as well." Shio stood at this point and reached his hand out to shake her own if she chose too while disengaging his shikai. Even if this was a trick and she was intending to get him while his guard was down that was fine because he could still use his final attack.

"Perhaps one day you can spar with me again and if you manage to get better we can even take the fight even further?" With that he turned and left with a happy mood, "I am Shio Sventar... Remember it." He called over his shoulder as he stopped momentarily only to see if she gave her own name as well before continuing to leave. If she did give her name he'd acknowledge it and say he remembered it. If not then nothing changed. Either way he still left Nibelheim.

She nodded. "Thanks for understanding. Of course this would happen when I'm enjoying myself. Buzz kill or what..." She said, standing back up she shook his hand. "I would like that. And if your ever in the market for equipment I can hook you up. But I don't think you'll ever need anything beyond that sword." She laughed. He offered his name as he walked away. "Gaige Ashe. I'm sure you wont forget it, I'm the girl who almost barfed on your shoes. Almost. Good luck." She said, and left the arena to go find some water.

(thread end)