Night challenges a leader who many or may not be his dad.

Night pretty much just entered the Arena, and looked around to see if his dad was in charge of it today or not. He hoped so, though talking with his dad was always somewhat of a hassle.... Even when they were battling....

When Night entered the Arena he would feel a sudden change of temperature, in here it was very hot about 96 or 97 degrees. The Arena was a few feet in front of Night, there was a man meditating on top of a large rock outside of the battle arena. The guy's name was Flare, the new guy, for some reason he was appointed after some dude died of heat stroke, ironic isn't it? Flare opened one eye and saw Night, he smiled "Hello there stranger, what brings you around these parts?" Flare said closing his eyes again but had the smile on him, he knew why Night was here, he just wanted to make sure.

Night scratched his head, looks like his dad wasn't in the Arena today. He'd just have to make due with this guy, who seemed competent enough to atleast challenge for the badge. While it was a relief he wouldn't have to actually challenge his dad, it was sort of a downer too that he wouldn't be able to watch him get his first badge....

" I'm here to challenge the Toran Arena. If you're the guy who's taking care of that kind of stuff today. " Night yelled over to the Arena Leader. He had forgotten how large the sixty foot Arena really was, he hadn;t been in here for awhile/

Flare saw the disappointment on Night's face but he couldn't help that he was the new leader of the Arena. "If it's the badge you want, then we shall start. There aren't any special rules in this Arena though it gets very hot so I warn you for your safety and your Natrelmon. If you understand that we can begin." Flare said smiling, he took out a small red marble threw it on the field, and there emerged Emleaf. "Good luck." he added smiling.

Night shrugged, seeing the leader simply throw down a marble at any random location. ~ Isn't this guy gonna set up to his advantage? ~ Night thought, suspecting the leader was, but he was doing it discreetly. Taking out a coin with Laphers face on it, Night summoned his weakest Natrelmon. The Lapher stood, five feet in front of Night, a whopping 50 feet away from Emleaf on the other side of the field. The Natrelmon not only was Night;s weakest creature, but it was also weak to fire due to its steel element. It would be a curious battle indeed.

" Go foward Lapher! " Night ordered his small rodent friend, who began to scurry foward at four feet per second, Night trailing not far behind.

The battle had finally begun.

"Go forward and use Singing Bullets!" Flare commanded, Emleaf then ran forward towards Lapher, straight ahead, when Emleaf got about five feet from Flare he started to fire out six Singing Bullets from his hands, the attack that was on fire, so it was fiery coal. Three were aimed at the feet to stop the movement, and the other three were aimed directly at the body, Emleaf would attempt to hit Lapher if she would try to move since they were 45 feet away Lapher would surely try to dodge. The temperature in the Arena was already warm, since Lapher was a steel type she would feel a bit more tired than usual, as the battle goes it, she will get hotter, and hotter.

Since Flare apparently wasn't even in the Arena, and was two feet away from the 'circle' that made it up, Emleaf was still 57 feet away from Lapher when it fired. Since the attack didn't have enough momentum to go that distance in a short amount of time to nail Lapher on her foot and body directly, Lapher just had to continue her movement of 4 feet a second kept her eyes on Emleaf as the bullets fell and nailed the dirt somewhere behind her.

In the 4 seconds it would have taken for the attack to reach the sport she had been standing, she would have covered 16 feet and was now 41 feet away from Emleaf. She kept her eyes on him the entire advance and was ready at any moment to dodge an attack. Night trailed three feet behind her and two feet to her right, so he could have a good view of the battle.

Lapher was actually feeling pretty fine, being low to the ground.

" Good job Lapher, keep going foward, avoid the grass in the middle though, dangerous territory. "

"Keep running towards her and stop at the grass!" Tashiro commanded as he ran closer to his Emleaf, he now was about four feet away from him. "Use Seed Missile!" he added, since Lapher was moving closer at a constant four feet per second, and since Seed Missiles had high velocity this one would go a lot farther aimed at the head, and back.

" Take it down Lapher! " Ordered, Night, still following behind his small Natrelmon. Since Emleaf would have to cover 23 feet to reach the teen foot long pathes of grass in the middle of the field. Lapher had a pretty open gap of firing time. On Stone Blade apeared right in front of Emleaf and shot out diagnally from the floor, threatening to stab the fiery being right below the chest, this happened in the middle of its run when it was about 12 feet away from the grass. This would both interrupt Emleafs attack and cause the leader to have to give it some new orders.

Lapher continued her run and would reach the edge of the grass herself in one and a half seconds. Stopping at the end, Lapher got down on all fours in a ready position, and opened her mouth. A large, but realtively thin thread of steel fired out of her mouth and landed in the grass, the small thin line of the web spread through the grass, too thin by itself to be seen, and led back to Laphers mouth. This allowed her still some control over the web, which was hard to see ion the grass.

This all happened in 3 seconds, which would be enough time to still be able to dodge anything Emleaf threw at her by the time it dodged the Stone Blade and made it to the edge of the grass.

"Dodge!" Flare yelled, Emleaf then jumped to the side and tilted his body a bit to the side so it could give a "matrix" feel to the dodge, this itself took a second. Flare quickly found it odd that the Lapher opened it's mouth and nothing came out, "Singing Bullets!" he commanded, firing from it's mouth seven bullets on fire in total towards Lapher's mouth as it did whatever it did, all Flare knew was it was suspicious. So, if Lapher continued to do whatever it did with it's mouth open, the bullets would enter and choke the Natrelmon. All this could be done within the same time that Lapher did it's web, Flare did not know that it was a web but to cover a 10 feet grass patch with steel webbing would take not much time but not 3 seconds.

Unfortunately, all Lapher had to do was shoot out the web, that was all that was involved. So yeah, it literally took just three seconds. And no, Lapher had fired her web while Emleaf had been dodging, so he wouldn't have fired them yet when she was done and the web was in the grass. Because the three seconds included the 1 and a half seconds she had used to get to the grass, which by then is when Emleafs run was interuppted 12 feet from the beginning of the grass.

Emleaf never continued his run, so he was firing at Lapher from 22 feet away. Hopping to the right, Night ordered a short " Dodge " in a low voice to his Lapher that was a few feet in front and to the left of him. This was done as Emleaf was firing, Lapher, her mouth still open, merely did a little hop a foot to the right, then closed her mouth, the small thin web line still leading from it, too small to see from Flares distance, and led into the grass that hid it.

Flare also made the mistake of assuming the web covered the entire patch, when it just covered a section of it on Emleaf's end. When Lapher was finished dodging, which again took just another second. Night ordered her to "Blind it."

Suddenly, A large mix of dust, sand, gravel and soil was shot up in a thick ball, into Emleafs face from the ground right in front of it, 12 feet from the grass.` This ball wouldn;t actually hurt Emleaf, or even hit him for that matter. But it still did it's job, suddenly the air was covered in sand and dust around Emleaf kept it from seeing. Flare would aslo have trouble seeing, as he was behind Emleaf, and the dust would cover his sight of the other side. Emleaf would be visible, to Flare though, as a glow in the dust.

Three Stone Blades, knowing where Emleaf was because, one, Emleaf was a glow in the dust, and two, they were fired right after the dust, so it wasn't that hard to just move them back a bit. One came up directly at Emleafs back, one diagnolly at his right shoulder, and the other going diagnolly at Emleaf's left shoulder.

These could all be dodged faitly easily. But the Earth Shot made it a little hard to see at the moment, though since Flare was a Gym Leader, he most likely had enough experience and talent to know how to deal with the situation. Night was just hoping he too, had enough skill to end this battle soon....

The slabs came out slowly, giving Emleaf enough time to dodge it, and ran around the grass since it was suspicious from the move Lapher did earlier "Go and attack towards it, counter if necessary!" Flare commanded, Emleaf fired five Singing Bullets from it's mouth, the dust made it hard to see it since it had no flame on it, but the attack was in a arc shape.

Flare had forgotten that Emleaf had been hit directly in the face with an Earth Shot, meaning that, for the most part, their was a ****load of dust in its eyes, so its vision was impaired at the moment.

Firing the Singe Bullets, they had all gone off target and missed because Emleaf couldn't aim while running and not being able to see. Emleaf was now around 9 feet give or take from Lapher by the time it had run around the grass and fired its Singe Bullets. Though most went over the crouched Lapher that was still on all fours, he had to hop to the right to avoid one that landed where its head used to be. The others hit the floor uselessly behind and in front of Lapher. Who was turning towards the running Emleaf.

Earth Shot wasn't so big of an attack that it covered the whole field, it only covered the area Emleaf had been in, though Emleaf was still suffering from the effects because it had been hit directly in the eyes.

" Trap it! " Ordered Night, putting his hand out towards the unfolding battle, just in case....

Lapher quickly let its earlier web slip from its mouth, no long caring about it, and made another Earth Shot pop up from the ground in front of Emleaf, trying to blind it once more, while another net Lapher fired from above swooped down. Not taking any chances, Lapher let four Stone Blades fire up from each side of Emleaf, One aiming for his lower back, one for the space between where his lung and kidney would be on each side of him, and one for his stomach, At the same time, one fired directly up from beneathe Emleaf, and would hurt it greatly.

Flares vision wouldn;t be impeded depending on how close to Emleaf he was, but since these Stone Blades were made 9 feet from Emleaf, they were much faster than the onces from 22 feet. His reaction time would be put to the test, and by the time he ordered something, it may have been too late, because his Emleaf would have to react as well with the Earth Shot.

The choice of whether to continue or stop the battle was Flares choice, whether he wanted to recall his Emleaf or have it try to dodge.

Night meanwhile put his hand out towards the front of Lapher, preparing himself for the counter attack that would no doubt come.

"Flip forward!" Flare yelled, Emleaf did a flip high in the air, it was enough to dodge the stone blade that was aimed on his lower back and stomach, and the dust didn't hit his eyes since he rotated, whatever came first he was able to counter. Emleaf then landed behind Lapher a few 3 feet from it, "Use your bullets on Lapher!" he commanded, again Emleaf shot at a arc, 3 at a arc and 3 more shot straight at Lapher.

Emleaf, having to register the command, bend its knees, and time the jump perfectly so that it would avoid the Earth Shot, be able to go foward with out running into the Stone Blade, without jumping too high that it would run into the net, would have no time at all to do so before it was hit on all sides with the Stone Blades. Lapher stopped them right before they impaled Emleaf, so that they were only stabbing him and keeping him from moving. While the Earth Shot was keeping the Emleaf from seeing.

The net then fell down on the further trapped creature from above, and kept it in place. Flares relic would be glowing profusely, and the first battle of many, had just been won.

" Good job Lapher! " Night yelled encouragingly to his rodent Natrelmon. " That was a great battle! "

Flare returned Emleaf to it's own Relic, "Nice job, you deserve to rest." Flare said smiling as he took out a fang-like necklace and pointed it to the field which summoned Ocalia that looked at Lapher with it's large fangs. The fiery cat was in the grass now, a 10 feet large grass patch. "Let's start again shall we?" Flare said smiling as he gave a hand gesture for Ocalia to attack behind Lapher by running in a half arc shape, this one was quicker, and much dangerous looking with quick reactions.

" Web it! " Said Night as soon as Ocalia was summoned. Spinning fast on its hind legs, Lapher fired a large metal ball out of its mouth that was attached to a long wire, also hanging out of its mouth. Swinging the metal sphere sort of like a wrecking ball, Lapher swung it so that it would hit Ocalia in the side mid run. Though the ball seemed to be unfurling a bit as it went, which might give Flare a few ideas or too.

Ocalia should probably stop running.

Night meanwhile put a hand out, waiting, just in case.

"Jump! Then attack!" Flare commanded simply, Ocailia would jump up a bit to dodge the wrecking ball like steel ball since it would be easily seen. The amount of momentum on the ball would make it very hard for Lapher to stop, or move anywhere quick enough. After it jumped it fired six flaming Singing Bullets aimed at Lapher's head, and top body, after the attack Ocalia would proceed to get closer in random patterns.

Though the ball was unfurling along the way, Ocalia and Flare didn't seem to notice, or they didn't two and two together. For the ball was actually a Steel Web, still compressed but not yet opened. It had been opening on the way to hit Ocalia, and was open completely just as Ocalia jumped. The though the cat missed the middle of the net, the rest of it hit the side of Ocalia, went around it, and due to Steel Manipulation innate, caused spikes to to shoot from each thread of net into the Ocalia, who was in the Net and was still being swung around by Lapher.

Immedietly after he had capture Ocalia in his net that he was swinging and had made spikes in ( this meant Ocalia never fired Singe Bullets), Lapher released his hold on the net which sent it flying along with Ocalia who may or may not have been in it filled with spikes depedning on whether Flare had recalled it yet or not.

" Good job Lapher! That's two down! " Said Night gleefully, standing up after he dropped to the ground while Lapher was swinging. He walked up to his rodent freind and rubbed the fur on top of his head.

Flare recalled his Ocalia, he didn't want his Natrelmon to be too injured or even killed so he decided to use something he always wanted to use, a Atrix. "Go my phoenix!" Flare yelled as he summoned his Atrix and it flew to action, rising up into he air, and it circled around Lapher, firing flaming Singe Bullets, this phoenix looked fired up.

" Woah! Woah! Time out! " Night yelled, recalling his Lapher immedietly. " I already knew what Natrelmon were in this gym, so I set everything up accordingly, Lapher is no match for Atrix and Volcannon, I don't want it to get toast! No, my next Natrelmon I'm bringing out, is Blossom! " As he said this, Night pulled out his next relic, and standing three feet in front of him, was a Sakura-Re, also known as Blossom, who stared around at the carnage that had already been rought on the Arena.

By this time, the Singe Bullets would have already struck the floor. " You ready to go? " Night questioned both his Sakura-Re and Flare at the same time, the battle would begin when he was ready.

"Use whirlwind and your fire breathing!" Flare commanded, Atrix was about eight feet from Sakura-re as it started to flap it's wings, the gusts were powerful for some reason, most likely because of the hot air already in the gym. Atrix as it flapped it's wings, released it's fire breathing which created even hotter air, with the whirlwind pulling in Sakura-re and the heat in it would no doubt catch it. Flare stood ready for something to happen, he felt the air currents were very unstable because of the heaters and Atrix itself.

Atrix had made a very unfortunate move, one that made blocking the next attack impossible. With the vortex so close to Atrix, there was almost no space. Night took advantage as soon as the whirlwind was made and pointed, " Petal BARRAGE! " He smirked a bit as Blossom carried out his wishes. 5 Petals turned a lime green on Sakura, and another 5 turned a deep purple, snapping its branches foward, Blossom relaesed 20 Razor Petals that flew right into the vortex that was pulling her in. The result? The Petals, already fast objects, were being sucked into the vortex, which led to Atrix. Atrix, whose vision was blocked by the fire it was shooting up, wouldn't be able to see the twenty razor sharp petals that were going incredibly fast, aided by the vortex' power that shot them towards the fire bird.

Even if Atrix could see them, at an 8 foot distance, along with Vortex pulling them in faster, it had about a second to dodge. There were also twenty of them, all aimed to his Atrix on his head, chest, and both wings to the tip. This was a KO move right here that was gonna be very hard to dodge.

Since wind powers up fire in this case, the flame did create a shield of sorts against the petals. Since it takes flapping to create the whirlwind the wings barely missed the ones that were aimed at it, and the chest and head ones were burned by the flame. Since the purpose of the attack was to "able to blow around lighter things including Natrelmon." so the trajectory of the petals were somewhat off target. Also, since Sakura-re was being sucked in while the flames were produced, her petals would also get burned, and get injured by the flames.

Unfortunately, TWENTY petals were fired, and since the flame was being aimed up because otherwise it would have been canceling out the vortex by hitting it. Also, the wings, to create a horizontal vortex would be beating foward, not down, so that was pretty much not true, all the petals hit. The fire, going up, caused heat but only actually hit the petals that were aiming for the head, some were burnt, but others just ran into Atrix while on fire. Otherwise, each and every petal, poisoned and with Siphon touch on them ( The ten that were glowing purple and green ) hit right on target. Atrix would now be both weak from being cut and slashed by twenty different razor petals while its energy was being siphoned to Sakura-Re, and poisoned because of the Poison Strike that was on the petals.

In conclusion, the Vortex didn't suck up Sakura-Re, but did damage it alot with wind. Unfortunately, Vortex was a move that sucked in objects, so none of the Petals were blownoff targetbeing fired right into the vortex, that sped them up to Atrix. In short, twenty objects basically cut up Atrix, it would be bleeding quite alot now, and probably wouldn't be able to fly because its wings were completely cut up and covered in blood. It would be poisoned, its strength sapped away, it would be tired from exhaling the fire breath and not breathing, while also beating its wings to stay up in the air while creating whirlwind.

It would be wise for the bird to be recalled.