[u][b]Riku POV[/b][/u]
[@Crimson Lion] - [url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6GFFd0mirU]The Fated Sword[/url]

The glancing shot was one Riku could shrug off easily enough. Between the Izanagi and the Anti-Beam Coated armor, the Shin Musha Hyaku Shiki was nothing if not incredibly resistant to almost all forms of beam weaponry. Particle beams from a GN Rifle was no exception to this. And so even though the shoulder of the gunpla was grazed, the shot left looking virtually undamaged thanks to the Anti-Beam Coating.

"That might have been a decent shot if not for the Shin Musha's armor. Nice try." Riku said to no one in particular. Immediately after firing his shot he let go of the Tactical Arms and let it return to it's previous Flight Form in the time it took for Kobayashi's shot to glance off his shoulder, "You'd better have brought more than just beam weaponry!" he said aloud, once again to no one in particular. He had also spotted the distant figure of one of the Gunpla's retreating into what looked like Zone B. Unfortunately, that route would take him close enough for Riku to get a decent look at the Gunpla in question.

"Heads up, Tomi!" Riku said over comms as his Gunpla shot forward toward the rider of the GN Arms with Izanagi drawn, "You've got one coming your way. He looks like he's pretty light on ranged weaponry. Use the waverider mode to keep your distance and you should be able to edge him out!" naturally, his opponent had been taking additional shots with their rifle in addition to the cannons of their GN-Arms. The cannons weren't intended for long range and so avoid those shots was a simple enough affair thanks to the extra mobility courtesy of the Flight Unit wings. As for the beam shots, well... he'd drawn Izanagi for a reason. Rather than actively waste particle energy by dodging those, he instead used the Izanagi to deflect the beam shots as they came at him. And with each one he deflected, that meant a small amount of particles absorbed by Izanagi's pommel.

Riku was able to close the distance rather easily thanks to the superior speed of Flight Unit provided by the Tactical Arms. In fact he'd actually pushed to full throttle as if preparing a rather high octane lunging slash at the Gunpla. Against an non-moving target he probably could have sliced clean through at that velocity. But the GN-Arms was presumably moving to try and match his velocity, though Riku suspected he would edge him out in terms of pure speed. But the real purpose for all this was a bit different.

Initially he'd given them all the impression that he was a sniper. So hopefully, his sudden switch to shooting straight into melee combat would hopefully catch them off guard. Riku had to presume this opponent was their resident ranged attacker, and so the natural assumption was that they were weaker in close range. Outside of the Tactical Arms' Arrow Form and Gatling Form, the Shin Musha on the other hand was almost entirely spec'd for close range combat.

[u][b]Yuna POV[/b][/u]

"Yeah, go Ri-kun, go!" cheered the girl when she saw Riku's golden gunpla race into a charge attack. But another voice brought her back down to reality. It was Ri-kun's mom.

"Those are supposed to be energy shots, right?" she asked with a look of confusion, "How could a metal katana deflect them like that?" while she didn't understand all the rules, she could at least tell that a metal blade shouldn't normally be capable of deflecting a burning hot energy beam.

"It's Izanagi." said Yuna with a grin, "Ri-kun made it special, you know? Particle... Alteration... something-or-other." she remembered having watched Riku build the Gunpla some time ago, but a lot of the specifics had been beyond her understanding. She liked the Gunplas and how they could look and move, but she was no where near as good a builder as Riku was, "Anyway, it's what lets the Izanagi deflect beams like that. I think Ri-kun also told me something about absorption too, but it kinda flew over my head. Gunplas are a blast to pilot, but I don't know the mechanical parts like he does."

This prompted Chisato to glance over at Takemori-san, as if hoping he could it explain it in greater detail.