Re: Checking the Eighth [Rei/Hana]

Sat Jun 08, 2024 11:17 pm

Checking the Eighth [Rei/Hana] - Page 3 Hana_PostingHeader21

Enter: Hana Aoyama

Hana’s situation was that the more focused she became on what she was doing, the more she saw, the more she felt, the better she could react. It was like letting the rest of the world fade away and only focusing on what was in front of her. And yes, it created a strange and dangerous tunnel vision problem that could get Hana killed if she wasn’t careful. Rei seemed to realize that real fast.

Hana pulled herself out of that strange, hyper-focused state. She took a few steps back and stopped sparring. She closed her eyes, shook her head, and came back to reality. “Thank you,” Hana said. “That is a bad habit of mine. I am trying to stop doing it. Well done noticing it... Haha. No one else has but me.”

By this time, Hana was sweating a little. They two had been fighting for a while, challenging each other with different moves and levels of attack, but Hana had to work on her stamina. It wasn't surprising when she was almost out of breath.

End Post

Sun Jun 09, 2024 12:19 pm

Rei would notice the state the woman was in. The focus was a good thing, but it was borderline a bad thing with how focused she was on the blade. So what Rei would do is attempt to step on the woman's foot to trip her up as they were sparring. Trying to show the issue with being so focused on one thing may lead to openings in other ways. Not everyone is going to fight like a spar.

"It is an impressive thing to focus like that on a fight, but it can also lead to injuries. When you're fighting a hollow you don't want to focus that hard because not everyone is going to fight fair ya know?

Noticing that Hana was running out of breath sent some sort of pride through Rei. This is why she is so okay with extended fights. Rei constantly pushes her body to the point of exhaustion, and that may not always be the best thing. Now that she's had a few conversations with Hannah and Erica, but her stamina did ultimately benefit.

Sun Jun 09, 2024 6:06 pm

Enter: Hana Aoyama

Having recently trained with Hono over her endurance, Hana knew she had to push herself more and more when she got to the state of tiredness. She learned that her body could push through it all, and had no interest in slowing down now. With a smile, and after wiping her forehead of some sweat, Hana took her wooden sword and decided to ask if they could take it up another notch. "What about increasing the challenge and utilizing shunpo in our spar? We have been using normal footwork, but getting used to combining it with shunpo could benefit us both.”

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Mon Jun 10, 2024 9:58 am

Rei would smile at the question. Despite her being able to tell Hana was getting tires the fact she wanted to kick it up a notch made her smile. It was the fact she could see her old self in wanting to go over her limits all the time. As she would then shunpo behind the woman taking a swing down towards the woman's shoulder.

She would ready herself to parry anything that Hana would go for. She wasn't sure what the woman would do at this moment but she knew they were pretty close in strength. So she assumed Speed would be the same case, but she would try to prepare for the case if Hana was much faster than her.

"You sure you want to keep this up? you seem like you're getting a little tired, Hana"

She would tease after her swing. Wanting to light a fire in the woman's stomach so she would try to tease her. She wanted to get her to push herself as hard as she was able to do so.

Wed Jun 12, 2024 7:37 pm

Enter: Hana Aoyama

Hana expected an agreement; a smile did not confirm anything. When Rei shunpo’d behind her, she was taken by surprise. Luckily, her skill in reikaku gave her an edge and allowed her to react by instinctively shunpo’ing forward enough to avoid the incoming attack at her shoulder. She turned to face Rei and used Shunpo to once again close the gap between them. She swung her wooden sword sideways, arching the blade to sweep in at Rei’s side with an impressive show of accuracy.

“If I do not push myself, I will never get to where I want to be.” Hana said and then shunpo’d again. This time, Hana ended up behind Rei, repeating the same attack Rei attempting by swinging down at the woman’s shoulder. Hana kept moving. Each attack was followed by another and another. She utilized her shunpo each time, trying to catch Rei off guard and to even push Rei to feeling challenged.

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Thu Jun 13, 2024 8:17 am

Rei would smile as it seemed that the sparring match was going to get a little more intense. She would mash the flash steps with the other woman. The wood clacking against each other as she did so. She wanted to make sure that both would get the most out of this. They were both trying to catch each other off guard with shunpo which would tire them out a little quicker than the pace they were going at before this.

"You're good Hana"

She'd say as they would keep up their spar. Sweat was beginning to form on Rei as they continued to fight. She could feel the familiar stinging sensation in some of her muscles in her arms as she continued to battle the fairly equally skilled shinigami.

Thu Jun 13, 2024 12:33 pm

Enter: Hana Aoyama

"You are quite skilled as well,” Hana said, as another clack of wood echoed through the air. They maintained their quickened and much more intense intense pace for several minutes until Hana abruptly performed a shunpo backward, creating a ten-foot gap between herself and Rei. She lowered her sword and paused to catch her breath. Exhausted and drenched in sweat, Hana collapsed to the ground, letting her wooden sword slip from her hands and clatter to the floor.

"Give me a moment, please," Hana said through breaths. "And we can start again."

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Fri Jun 14, 2024 6:53 am

Rei would come to a full halt at the request as truthfully she could probably use a break as well. She could feel the familiar burning sensation in her muscles, and sweat was dripping down her face. As she looked onward to the other shinigami she would try to see if she things Hana should keep going or not. it was a good thing to know your limits, and that was something that Rei had learned rather recently in the grand scheme of things.

"You sure you wanna keep going? It's good to know what your limit is. Going over it is only diminishing returns."

She would speak from experience. It was easy to tell she was a little out of breath but she could keep going if the other shinigami wanted to. However she didn't want to force her in either direction as she waited for Hana to make the choice. She wouldn't try to pressure her either way. She just wanted to confirm this is what Hana wanted to do.

Fri Jun 14, 2024 8:52 pm

Enter: Hana Aoyama

The two of them had been fighting for a while and Hana had gotten a pretty good work out in. She could feel the heat of her muscles and was hating the idea of standing up now that she had caught her breath. Maybe Rei was right. Hana smiled and nodded. “You are right… Maybe it is time to call in a day. I am exhausted, and I would rather not end up in the infirmary. Thank you for the spar.”

Hana allowed herself to fully relax and laid down on the floor, letting her arms fall outward to the side. She closed her eyes and wished for an ice cold smoothie.

End Post

Mon Jun 17, 2024 6:18 am

Rei would take a seat next to her on the wooden floor of the barracks as she would let out a content sigh. The spar was good, and it was beginning to get late enough that she should be able to head to bed sooner rather than later. However, she wanted to talk to Hana for a little longer.

"It was an awesome spar. I appreciate you doing it with me."

She'd admit as she would let go of the wooden sword allowing it to lay lazily beside her. She kinda wished they had used their actual swords, but she's knows for casual sparing that's a little more on the dangerous side. If you're going to do that then you both need to understand that it's dangerous.

"Hana, might be a little bit of a weird question but could you tell me more about what it's like to have been born here? In the Soul Society I mean?"