Enma calls Enma
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Part 6 - A dangerous step
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Piccolo suppressed a sigh. Vegeta. Naturally. The Saiyan always wanted his head through the wall or, in this case, through the forest.
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For a moment the Namek considered ignoring the scream. But then he gave himself a jerk and left the chosen path to follow the scream.
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As expected, this path led right into an area which Piccolo's subtle instincts classified as extremely dangerous. He hadn't come thirty paces when a swarm of biting insects popped out of a tree hole and enveloped him. Angrily, Piccolo endured the first bites in his bare arms, in the hope that the beasts would see that his purple blood was not the coveted red diet, but since insects are not endowed with much brains, he let his aura flare up. Only then did he remember Genkai's phrase about "no energy attacks".Too late was too late and it wasn't a real attack. Besides, it worked. The paralyzed to charred little beasts rained into the moss and Piccolo hurried on. A good twenty meters later it was a deceptive cushion of moss that turned out to be a home for bloodthirsty suckers who would not let Piccolo go until he turned them into a pile of ash. So it went on and so passed almost half an hour before Piccolo reached the place from which the scream had come. He squeezed between the thorns and stepped into a small clearing.
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"Vegeta?" A choked sound answered him and Piccolo was not badly startled when he realized what trap the Saiyan had fallen into.
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The hungry tree had poured a special resin on Vegeta from a kind of natural jug that looked like a reshaped giant leaf and was probably two meters high. It must have surprised the Saiyan when he fought off some cheeky tendrils, which the tree now also snaked onto Piccolo as a distraction.<br />
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This resin was hellish stuff, a mix between syrup and gum, and it had corrosive and crippling components in it. Vegeta's jumpsuit was already quite full of holes and the skin underneath was discolored bright red. Only his extreme strength of will kept him going. Attack was out of the question, because his arms, like the rest of him, were already completely covered in goo resin.
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Piccolo hesitated, having no idea how to remove this resin from Vegeta. A strong energy attack was out of the question, not only because of Genkai's rule for this race, but because otherwise Vegeta would be well done.
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"Let me do it!" it rang out suddenly from above and Kurama jumped smoothly from the branch of the adjoining tree. "I heard the scream too," he explained to the surprised Namek and plucked a small seed from his hair. "This is probably the best ..." With that he threw the seed on the ground, gathered his auric powers and ... Piccolo took his shoulder."Did you forget the rule?"
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Kurama shook his head. "For me this is not an attack and even if Genkai gives me minus points for it ...", he let the aura flare up again and smiled, "I like to cook."
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The seed responded to Kurama's aura and a pale pink something began to sprout from it. It didn't look very much like a plant, was about a good square decimeter and flat like a flounder. Tiny roots on the underside carried the pink flounder plant to the enclosed Vegeta.
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"It's a creeper," he introduced the thing. "She really devours a lot and her favorite food is anything that contains sugar. The resin pourer," he pointed to the tree, "always mixes a lot of it into his resin because his real goal is giant ants that don't exist here." Creeper lived up to its name. Piccolo watched in amazement as she gradually squeezed the resin away. It was like she just dissolve it and soak it up.After a while the creeper had reached a diameter of a meter and after another five minutes an almost unconscious Vegeta Piccolo literally fell into his arms. The creeper didn't seem interested in Vegeta, it just wanted the resin. When the last chunk of it was consumed, the creeper formed a ball that condensed more and more until it was only a decimeter in diameter and was covered with small, triangular seeds.
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"The next generation," Kurama said happily and carefully picked one of the seeds to let it disappear into his head of hair.
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He plucked three leaves from one of the bushes nearby and, with Piccolo's help, forced Vegeta to eat them. At first Vegeta was terribly nauseous, but then the real effect kicked in and the poison from the resin caster was neutralized. A paste made from various berries, which Kurama picked from half a dozen different plants without hesitation, helped against the burning, burned areas of the skin.<br />
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When he wanted to smear the finished mixture on Vegeta, he fought off gruffly despite his pain.
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"Tsts" came from the shade of a neighboring tree. "First scream like a stick and then play the brave hero. Only fools prefer to be a burden to their companions instead of being helped."
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Hiei stepped into the sunlight and took the leaf with the berry mixture from Kurama's hand. "You are far too indulgent, Kurama," he said and before anyone understood what he was getting at, he slapped the Vegeta leaf on the chest. The mixture stung the burned skin and Vegeta had to take a sharp breath.
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"Our hero can do the rest himself, or do you need someone to play a nurse?"
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Instead of answering, Vegeta rubbed the berries on the burned areas and although tears came to his eyes, he didn't flinch.
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"We should slowly go on again, otherwise we will still be here in three weeks", said Piccolo, who was already tired of the constant teasing between Vegeta and Hiei.
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"That's right," Kurama nodded and pointed to a place between two trees. "The slightest negative energy emanates from there. Let's take this route!"
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Although no one specifically suggested it, they stayed together. And precisely that turned out to be a trump card.
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It was Piccolo who discovered the net crawler lurking between two trees before Hiei could step on it and be packed into a roll roast.
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It was Kurama, whose spiked balls paved their way through an almost impenetrable thicket of blood needles.
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It was Vegeta, whose physical strength processed a group of well-camouflaged stone trolls into heaps of dust, where neither Hiei's sword nor Kurama's thorn whip could do anything.
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And it was Hiei who hissed from branch to branch at lightning speed to chop the newly blooming deer anemones from the branches before they could entrust their deadly poisonous pollen to the wind that would have blown it in the faces of the four.<br />
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Despite the teamwork, they did not make very rapid progress, and so it was already getting dark when they arrived, dirty and exhausted, but largely without any significant wounds, at the big spruce, where Genkai was waiting for them.
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"You two," she pointed to Piccolo and Kurama, "you obviously like to cook, don't you?"
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The two looked at each other and nodded, Kurama pleased and Piccolo resigned, whereupon Genkai pointed to a pile of ingredients spread out on a stone table. A fire and a kettle and a large pan were already waiting.
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"And you both!", Genkai pointed to Hiei and Vegeta, "run back to me and fetch Yusuke. He will have finished his exercises by now. You know the way."
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The two looked like the blow hit them. "Through there again?" Vegeta croaked? In the pale light of twilight, the many luminous insects and phosphorescent mushrooms began to glow, it looked pretty scary.<br />
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"Unless you manage to make a detour around him, which should take about three days ...", Genkai's words were as sharp as lashes.
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Gritting their teeth, the two turned back and ran down the hill towards the forest.
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In the blood fortress, the audience went wild with enthusiasm. Marami's two opponents had wordlessly agreed to attack them at the same time.
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The massive, green demon rolled towards them with astonishing speed and his followers shouted his name: "Bollob!"
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But also the slim one with the needle-sharp claws had his fans and they stood with their calls for "Keerefz!" after the Bollob screamers in nothing.
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Marami, for her part, didn't seem to have made any friends and Firozz was very happy about that, because the more interested Marami was, the greater the chance that someone would stumble upon her secret.<br />
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But at the moment they had completely different worries, because Marami's opponents weren't small fish. During the race, Bollob's already impressive mountains of muscles began to grow even more and when he reached Marami and wrapped his arms around her, the arena held its breath. Everyone expected to hear the demon scream in pain as Bollob crushed her body into mush.
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"Leave me something else!" Keerefz crowed and extended his claws even further. "I want her eyes!"
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Marami hung apparently motionless in the clasp of the muscle monster. Keerefz started to jump and Firozz jumped up, but then Marami lifted her head and instead of desperation, blood thirst and satisfaction glittered in her eyes.
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She jerked her head down and cut her sharp teeth into Bollob's arm. Although his skin was as thick as an elephant's, the venom in Marami's saliva ate its way through every layer of the muscle and paralyzed him within a few moments.So she got free in time to avoid Keerefz Sprung, whose claws bored into Bollob's chest instead of her face and since they were now long as knitting needles, they reached