Mikoto Kusanagi vs. Suzumi Ishikawa: Friendly Foes!

By counter balancing her own weight with Suzu's and tensing her slender frame in the over the shoulder throw, Miko was able to fluidly hoist the Tsunami upward and bring her tumbling over to an emphatic thud. Miko straightened herself back up and steadied her breathing from what was a more exhausting throw than she anticipated. The entire exchange had happened exactly how she envisioned, Miko knowing full well that her judo techniques were always an issue for Suzu to overcome.

Though once she reapproached Suzu, Miko was caught off guard by how quickly her former friend had shaken off the throw. She backpedaled a step but was ultimately caught up in a grapple with Suzu, the priestess intertwining her arms with Suzu's in a clamped on collar and elbow lockup. Miko winced in exertion to keep herself from being pushed back, but it was hard for her not to be bullied around in the makeshift grapple...

"Y-you're...such a...child..."

Suzumi strained against Mikoto as the two grappled, widening her legs and grabbing onto one of Mikoto's arms with both of hers. Suzumi just glared at Mikoto as she kept her feet planeted, twisting her torso, and pulling with her arms in an attempt to toss Mikoto to the mat! Suzumi was already breathing heavy and the verbal jab of Mikoto served only to anger Suzumi.

If Mikoto thought that simply not letting Suzumi win would somehow equal a walk in the park Suzumi wanted to show her that she was gravely mistaken.

Miko arched her back and extended her legs behind her for what the priestess knew was a vain attempt to out-muscle Suzumi. She tensed her muscles nonetheless but was ultimately chucked off her feet like a ragdoll and sent flying a good few feet across the ring before crash landing on her spine.

"Hggh!" The priestess rolled right along with the tumbling momentum before coming to a halt on her front side, massaging her lower back as she attempted to shove herself back to her hands and knees. The ease by which her former friend flipped her around didn't come as too much of a surprise to Miko, the dizzied priestess knowing full well that their were fewer things scarier than an irate Tsunami...

Suzumi was upset, allowing her anger to come to the forefront. Normally a calm70ing influence, Mikoto had come to embody all of Suzumi's own doubts about herself. As Mikoto started to getnup Suzumi ran straight at her! Had Suzumi had a cooler head, she likely would ave tried to look at things from her former friends standpoint. She would have at least tried to understand things. However, right now Suzumi only worried about one thing: Proving she was no fluke, and that she could beat Mikoto without Mikoto letting her win.

Suzumi screamed as she jumped up, flying feet first at Mikoto's chest! A good hard dropkickmwould put her back down on her back if it connected!

While not entirely intending to provoke or antagonize Suzumi with her condescending words, Mikoto had come to accept that Suzumi had chosen her former friend to vent all of her teeming frustrations upon. It was a role that the priestess had to begrudgingly accept and embrace if their was any chance of salvaging any semblance of their shattered friendship. She began shuffling herself upward, albeit at a noticeably stilted pace considering the lingering disorientation from being flipped through the air like a flailing ragdoll...

Shoving herself off of one bent knee, the priestess got back to a vertical standing and tilted her head upward to reassess where Suzu was. A question she would immediately get an answer to as the Tsunami was taking off in a charging sprint towards her, the priestess' eyes widening in shock before having her chest caved in by the flying dropkick!!

Mikoto heaved out the air in her lungs before being propelled off her feet and sent tumbling backwards, landing awkwardly on her shoulders in a curled up ball with her toned rump in the air before unfolding forward and collapsing spread-eagled before Suzumi.

Suzumi saw Mikoto down and knew she had to pounce! She ran over and flipped Mikoto onto her stomach, not wasting any time. Suzumi sat on the low of Mikoto's back, draping Mikoto's arms over Suzumi's bent legs as she wrapped her own arms around Mikoto's chin and leaned back to begin applying pressure! The camel clutch was a painful hold, one that Suzumi hated being stuck in.

She hated it so much that she opted to use it on Mikoto. Apply pressure, cause pain, and show Mikoto that Suzumi would have won that first match on her own no matter what Mikoto thought! Suzumi did feel some guilt, remembering how well the two used to get along. How much Suzumi saw Mikoto as a sort of confused, timid younger sister. As of this very moment, that time was long gone.

Only having just uncoiled from being hunched over herself, Miko was only permitted the briefest of glimpses of the overhead rafters above before she found her prone form being shifted and flipped over. It was simply overwhelming to be on the receiving end of the Tsunami's rising tide of offense, the priestess squirming from Suzu's curvy backside weighing her down and being a foreboding precursor to a maneuver that Miko hated being stuck in...

"Hggh..." Suppressing her groans through gritted teeth, Miko scrunched her face from the mounting pressure of the camel clutch slowly straining her spine into an unnatural curve. Miko's arms dangled limply over Suzu's thighs with her tapping foot against the canvas emphasizing just how miserably painful this was. Tensing her neck muscles mildly helped her endure the hold, but for now that was all she could do given how expertly applied the maneuver was...

Suzumi pulled back even more, gritting her own teeth and letup out a cry as she put more and more effort into inflicting punishment with the submission hold! "Like, give it up Mikoto! I'm not a pitiful pushover like ya thought am I?!" Suzumi shouted out as she continued to pour out her boiling over emotions.

Suzumi was letting her ring smarts and logical approach to matches seemingly fall by the wayside. Right now she still wanted to win, but this seemed to be about far more than just winning. This was almost like a driven rookie trying to prove something to everyone in the crowd. She was going to validate her Friction debut win, and her belief that she was indeed back, and as good as ever.

Chuang was leaning forward in his seat with a worried expression, his eyes focusing on what was going on in this match. The young man saw that it wasn't looking too good out there for his girlfriend Mikoto, she'd had a good early going but Suzumi was proving the advantage to knowing your inner anger. The young man would admit he'd given in to that back in the past, usually when Qi was in danger. Though Chuang would also admit that it wasn't healthy, Miko's calming demeanour was proof that there was another way to go about it.

Regardless of the philosophy of combat however Suzu had locked the Priestess in a solid camel clutch, for a moment it made Chuang recall that one particular sparring session he had with Ms Kusanagi. But he mentally kicked himself, there was nothing nice about this situation that Mikoto was currently in, but Mr Lingxian knew that she was one to remain calm under pressure. That was one of her qualities he so liked about her, though he could tell it certainly hurt.

"C'mon Mikoto! Stay strong!" Chuang put his hands in a cone around his mouth and shouted aloud, he wasn't enjoying seeing Miko being strung like a bit of taffy right now. There had to be a way to deal with this hold though and the Chinese warrior believed it, he just hoped for his girlfriend to figure it out before it was too late.

While certainly not enough to have Miko throwing in the towel so early in the match, Miko could already tell that the lingering aftereffects of this hold would be felt from some time on. Suzumi was usually most comfortable keeping her offense practical yet impactful. Such as with a simple camel clutch that was already stretching Miko's spine to her limits, the priestess scrunching her face with her half lidded gaze peering upwards towards the rafters.

The methodical swiftness with which Suzumi had turned the match around was a prime example of her former friend's veteran instincts. Being helplessly propped up like this was slowing eroding her own confidence as well, the priestess being inundated with flashbacks of the countless sparring matchups she had with Suzu...and how Miko was always the one to come up wanting...

"C'mon Mikoto! Stay strong!"

Slowly shuffling her legs under her, Miko would suddenly find the holes in Suzu's application of the hold. The priestess leveraging herself up while using one hand to claw and yank at the the interlocked fingers under chin, a small swelling of audience support growing larger from seeing Miko soldier on through the hold.

"N-never a push...over...but...*hggh*...I do...p-pity you...Suzu..."