Chimera's maintenance finished, Tomoe returns to the layer area to find another match. It's the end stretch of the tournament, so she'll have to be a bit more forward in finding an opponent. Chimera is resting over her arm and hand as he has been over the entire tournament. Tomoe looks around . . . she needs an opponent. And - she spots one. Potentially, anyway. A guest duelist is sitting at a layer by himself. She makes her way over to him. "Challenge?" A simple word, but it should be enough. She recognizes this one - she's fought him before.

"Sure." Ranmaru turns his head up towards Tomoe and shows her a gentle smile. "Go ahead." He lifts one hand and stretches it out to appoint to Tomoe, the seat apposite to him. "Sit right down, take your time." The young man had his angel sitting on his lap, its head and back leaning against Ranmaru's belly. His hand returns to his side and he uses it to grab hold of an odd looking visor. One that bears a white and a black wing, each which move up with an audible clicking sound as Ranmaru puts it on his head and connects it to the layer.

Tomoe nods, then takes the seat at the layer opposite Ranmaru. Chimera is moved to her lap as she sets things up on her end. The headset is slipped on quickly, and, once it is in place and powered on, she picks up Chimera. "It's cat-flesh tonight. Chimera, fall in." With that, the beast is thrown into the layer. As he passes the layer barrier, Chimera's wing folds in close to his body and his forelegs extend outward. He lands hard on that soft grass, first with his forefeet, then his hindfeet. That split tail sways slowly from side to side, and the single wing extends slightly before pulling back in. All six eyes turn towards the opposite side of the layer, awaiting Chimera's opponent..

"All I believe you're angel will taste is the dirt." Ranmaru chuckles, shaking his head as he takes in his hand his own angel. His fingers wrap around the lithe body of his angel, holding it quite gently. "Illuminate the darkness with your soul of bonds!" He suddenly calls out as his cloak is thrown to the side and Kamui gets flung towards the layer. "Kamui, show us your light! Fallin!" The black feline angel shoots forth.

It's head goes into the bright light of the layer first. Immediatly, Kamui forces itself to open it's crimson red eyes, the rest of it's body following quite quickly. Its fur ruffles violently by the speed it had been thrown! It's limbs seems to twitch for a moment before explosively coming to live. Stretching out completely before making a beautiful double flip forth. He finishes by landing perfectly on both knees and one fist, it's other arm set before it's face. It's tail lashes violently for a moment before the angel actually seemed to 'bother' to get up and take some paces back to his side of the layer.

Kamui's head cocks slightly to the left, it's lips reveiling one tooth, allowing for the angel to give quite the smug look. But this look was not directed at any opposing angel, it was directed at Tomoe. It's eyes illuminate with that most feral of red hues.

A loud buzzer sounds as the match begins and Kamui immediately forces himself off of the ground and straight at the chimera angel. Its right claw stretched forth with a flat hand while the other follows behind his back, almost as if it was hiding something. And it was, something that looked like a small dagger of energy, enveloped in a beautiful and most brilliant blue hue that surely meant big trouble were the attack to touch down.

Tomoe's attention is split fairly evenly between her opponent and the layer. All three of Chimera's heads face Kamui, watching the cat-boy intently. The beast does not move, but crouches very slightly, his muscles tensing, his tail growing still. The two outter heads pull back, and the central head bows low. In a very deliberate move, that single wing stretches out and, just before the strike lands, that single wing slaps heavily -- but Chimera does not seem to move.

Kamui's lovely shiny dagger digs deep into the beast's chest, but there seems to be no resistence at all - an apparition? Wait . . . that's not Chimera! The ghostly beast that Kamui just struck bears strong resemblance to Tomoe's angel, but is much more . . . canine. Three massive dog-like heads, a mane of writhing serpents, and a twisting serpent for a tail - a vision of the legendary Chimera's even more legendary brother. But it is, indeed, just a vision - Kamui may find that he can walk directly through this ghostly Cerberus, for there is no mass to provide resistance, and the ethereal form quickly dissipates.

As the vision of one chthonic beast fades away, the true form of the other reappears. Chimera had managed to leap over Kamui as the cat-boy attacked, somehow fading from view as his illusionary kin appeared. The bestial angel lands behind the cat boy, but does not immediately turn - instead, he snaps his tail sharply to one side, before slapping it back in the direction of Kamui's face.

"That was... amusing. Guess your brother came to your rescue?" Ranmaru seems to be somewhat knowledgable about the ways of Mythology and gives Chimera a most interested look. He had seen angels using objects from the Angelic Fantasy database before, but never had they replaced one another with such meaning to them. Aside from him and Mikage that was, though they did not draw upon the database itself. "Hmm." He brings a hand up to his chin and rubs it while giving a most thoughtful look at the layer, as if he were pondering what to do next.

Ranmaru's angel, Kamui, gives Chimera quite an odd stare as one of its most major attacks had just /major/ly backfired on him. However he has little time to keep standing there like that, and is soon forced to quickly dodging the Chimera's snapping tail by moving slightly to the left and moving one arm away from his chest to... grab the tail between his arm and torso? That's right, Kamui attemps to grab Chimera's powerful tail and tries to noogie it!

Tomoe makes no response to the comment, but isn't exactly surprised by it. After all, she knows she's not the only one with some interest in Greek myths, and this opponent /was/ the one who gave her the idea to investigate such layer tricks. On the layer, Kamui has little trouble in grabbing Chimera's tail. One of the tips - the feathered one, wraps briefly around the cat-boy's arm before the beast yanks his tail free. Apparently, he didn't like that. That massive wing beats heavily down once more, and Chimera leaps away. The wing twists and slaps again, helping Chimera to turn a bit in mid-air. He finishes the turn once he lands, facing Kamui. The central head bows low and the outter heads pull back, while the beast digs his talon into the grass. But he doesn't not charge . . . not just yet.

A charge would probably have ended in the two angels meeting face to face in the most literal sense of ways, as Kamui follows Chimera at the same velocity. The feline angel was not about to let the opponent get much rest, so a quick kick and punch are both dealt at the same time in the general direction of the Chimera, but not before Kamui had dug one foot into the ground to add some extra to the double-attack. And some extra spunk was added all right, at first this attack would seem like something really normal. But when was something around Kamui really normal? From both its foot and hand appear what looks like the faces of a tiger and a lion, the tiger behind the hand while the lion on his foot, much like a blue hue of energy they show just before where Kamui believes that his strike would touch down.

The blow hits rather squarely, the cat faces connecting with no real trouble. Still, it didn't seem to do all that much to Chimera. The beast crouches and his wing stretches out again, slamming down as those powerful legs push him into yet another leap over the cat-boy's head. Upon landing, Chimera breaks into a short, lumbering run, sending out his wing to help with a somewhat clumsy turn. And then . . . he just stops. All three heads huff heavily, a cloud of cool vapor collecting around the cervid muzzle. Why wasn't he attacking . . .?

Well, Ranmaru certainly realized what was coming. Or he had a good guess. He believes that Chimera is getting ready for a big offensive the moment Kamui would get close enough. He also realizes that unless he was going to stop it in time, it might draw heavily on Kamui's resources. So his angel raises one hand and from it appears a blue lance. It materializes as blue energy, which then spins around Kamui's body much like a sash or a ribbon, mainly around his torso before the feline angel points the lance at Chimera. He looks somewhat like a knight without a horse. The angel gets ready, and seems to start leaning onto the lance itself until suddenly with a large explosion, the angel bursts forwards, the lance seems to act like some kind of rocket! A thin blue line shines straight forwards towards Chimera, piercing it as if it were a guidance-laser. And perfectly along this line, Kamui's lance follows along with Kamui himself, sending the angel to the battlefield at a rapid speed. When it would arrive, not only did the energy lance have the potential of doing a lot of damage, Kamui would be at a close enough range to unleash a flurry of swipes with its claws.

The beast watches the cat-boy carefully. As Kamui rockets towards him, Chimera suddenly turns, presenting his flank for the attack. The lance and claws bite deep through the matted fur and feathers, breaking through the flesh beneath. There's a slight popping sound at the blow, followed by a sudden jet of black, sticky, corossive goo. The force of the stuff is powerful in itself, but the real danger lies in its acidic nature. Chimera does not leap away this time. The cervid head swings quickly around, seending those massive antlers swooping towards Kamui's face and neck.

Kamui raises his hands as the acidic fluid gushes over him and is somehow able to stop the stuff from spreading too much over its body. The angel misses most violently at Tomoe's angel and makes a slight bit of distance to shake off the effects. This causes Kamui to be so busy that he does not even notice as Tomoe's antlers come close enough to hit him. Luckily, someone else did. Wether this person was Ranmaru or Rei, or perhaps even Mikage, it did not matter. The effect remained the same. An angry gargess was stopping the attack dead in its tracks with her claws holding the antlers. Kamui gives Rei a confused look and gets a sweet look in return that seems to say 'I'll protect you'. In return, Kamui nods at his fiance angel and jumps straight through Rei, as she begins to fade into nothingness like a mist. The feline drops to the ground straight in front of Chimera and from that position... excecutes the famous Rolling Thunder attack! Though it might be lacking in finesse and speed, it came quite close to being just as destructive.

Chimera growls slightly as the gargoyle suddenly appears to guard his prey. The cervid head pulls back, yanking his antlers free. Kamui's little exchange with Rei gives Chimera the time to tense and prepare for yet another leap, and, when the cat-boy attacks, the beast leaps over his head . . . again. This time, however, Kamui's attack meets naught but air.

Chimera lands a short distance behind Kamui, digging foreclaws and talons into the grass. Hindclaw and hoof meet the ground only briefly before being brought quickly up in a sudden bucking kick. The movement staggers Chimera slightly - he's not build for that type of move - and he spreads out his wing to maintain balance.

"Go, Kamui." The angel nods and jumps straight upwards into the sky to get away from Chimera's offensive. "We have him now!" Ranmaru grins as his angel quickly comes dropping from the skies with its claws stretched forth, aimed straight at the tail at the end. Its intend was to grab the snakehead and jerk it around with the intend of doing something Zankoku had done previously, swing it around by its tail. And even though it might not seem like Kamui has the strength to do this, one would be suprised how much strength a violent little catboy can have when he puts his muscles to it!

Kamui has little trouble grabbing and yanking at Chimera's tail, but the beast is extremely heavy - while the cat-boy does manage to tug him an impressive distance, Chimera is not swirled around. He roars - a loud, tripple-voiced sound - and the three tips of the tail wrap around Kamui's arm. This time, they wrap around it tightly, as if trying to hold on to the cat-boy even as the cat-boy holds on to them. Chimera lunges forward, trying to drag Kamui a bit, and the horned tip of one end of the tail flicks sharply down in an attempt to slice open the Kamui's arm.

"Kggg." The feline lets out a violent hiss as it finds itself caught within the tail's grasp and instead of trying to get loose it just grabs onto the tail and goes through its knees for a short moment before suddenly bursting upwards into the skies to get away from the pointy object coming his direction and while still stuck to the tail he launches a series of swipes at one of the Chimera's legs to try and see if he is able to rip it off with its sharp diamond claws.

The swipes cut deeply into Chimera's flesh, but the beast still has life left in him. The cervid and serpentine head are turned around, watching the cat-boy at the beast's rear. The tips of the tail tighten even more around Kamui's arm, and the sturdy appendage attempts to tug the cat boy close. In the same motion, that stocky hind hoof rises, then kicks strongly back, aiming for Kamui's chest.

The hoofs seem to phase straight though Kamui. Was he even there? The angel seems to still be moving, was he moving so fast that his image did not seem to change, or did the alien green glow below them have anything to do with it? Whatever it was, the counterattack had failed. "As you see, what one might see is not always the truth." Ranmaru states. "Most attacks from angels rely on their deus seeing the opponent's angel, preparing for their attacks. But what if the deus gets to see something that is not really there?" Kamui finally disappears on Chimera and from all the way up at the top of the layer, where the beam still reaches, the angel is coming down at a high speed, much like a meteor, with one foot extended. If that were to hit completely, it could have disasterous consequences!

Tomoe does not respond, her attention still split evenly between the fight and Ranmaru himself. Over time, she'd found that it was easier to see through certain traps if you paid attention to the dues as well as the angels - particularly with the friendly, talkative types. One the layer, Chimera does not seem terribly surprised by the missed strike - it was a bit clumsy, after all, and he was not accustomed to fighting from that end. Indeed, Kamui's escape seemed much flashier and fancier than needed - showy little cat boy, indeed. As the tail freed from that feline grasp, it lashes a bit violently, and all three heads turn sharply upwards, towards Kamui the moment he can be seen again. That meteoric strike lands squarely on Chimera's back. The massive form of the beast crashes down into the grass, yet Chimera still holds on to that fragile thread of life. The single wing beats, and Chimera rolls onto his back, all three heads turning to look at his attacker. There's a brief intake of air, then all three mouths open wide, each expelling a unique fluid. The serpentine head vomits forth more of that thick corossive goo; the central head belches out a wave of intense wave of mercifully brief flame; the cervid head bellows forth a cloud of frigid air and shards of devilishly sharp ice. Still, the angle is a bit off, and the cat-boy still has plenty of energy. Tomoe is quite sure that Chimera's prey will escape this one.

Kamui ducks away and does a fancy roll away from Chimera to get away from the attacks. It has to pull some fancy movements to get away from each seperate attack and ends up doing some flips and backflips that take it in a circle around Chimera. He keeps circling around the heavily damaged angel until it finally jumps at it in attempt to pounce the mutated angel in an attempt to finish the match.

The breath attacks were evaded, just as Tomoe expected. She nods slightly as Kamui flips and circles around her pup. The catboy's pounce is enough to do the beast in . . . but he does not go quietly into that good night. As the life is torn from his mismatched claws, Chimera convulses, legs twitching and claws snatching at empty air. Heads writhe and jaws snap on nothing, tail lashing violently, snatching up clumps of grass and dirt. That single wing beats wildly. And, finally, the beast's life meter depletes, and Chimera grows still.

Tomoe nods again, reaching up to power down the headset and carefully slip it off her head. She stands, reaching over for to collect her angel, looking over him carefully. "Good match." She nods to Ranmaru, and, without waiting for a response, takes her leave, tinkering with Chimera as she walks.

"Thank you. I agree, good match." Ranmaru nods silently as he watches the girl leave before turning his attention to the lifeless body of his angel. "You fought magnificently, Kamui." He states and reaches out for the angel before placing it on his lap and closing his eyes for a moment. The last matches were being done, and there were not many who still wished for last-minute quickies. So he figures he could just lay there for a while.