"Beyond your regular limitations, you say?" The young man scratched his chin as he thought, running the young boy's words through his mind as if he were trying to decipher some hidden meaning in a text. Why did this seem familiar to the young man? Probably because it reminded him of himself. A small chuckle escaped his lips as he spoke again. "You're an interesting one, kid. Your tenacity may save us all one day!" However, the young man's chuckles quickly turned to violent coughs. He'd agitated his lungs again by laughing too much, and the resulting hacking and coughing was not pleasant to listen to. A surge of chakra came from the young man — unbeknownst to the two of them, the young man's hormonal levels were running wild again. This had been happening on and off since he'd arrived in the hospital, and it was the main reason for his transformations. However, knowing the results of his condition and the source were two very different matters. Very few people had any sort of idea what was wrong with him, including himself, but it was clear that his symptoms were similar in nature to the forbidden art of Cursed Sealing. His body almost seemed to create a natural enzyme that replicated the effects of the seals, though he had no way of controlling it. The doctors theorized that, perhaps, his body could be trained to produce an antibody to reduce the symptoms of the enzyme, but so far it was strictly a theory — no breakthroughs had been made on the practical side of things.
The more pressing issue, however, was young Hoseki's exposure to Takeyashi during this state. As the new hormones in his body naturally began to take effect, a transformation began to occur in Takeyashi. Scale-like substances began to grow on his skin, and his temper began to get shorter. "Oh Mother Suna, not again..." Takeyashi felt the familiar sensations taking him over. Anger, rage, and fear were the primary emotions flooding his brain, as well as a naturally combative instinct. Takeyashi began to fear the worst: he was about to go on a rampage. "Kid, you need to leave, now! I'm...something's happening to me..." Dark chakra was spewing out of his body, infecting the air with its evil nature. If Hoseki had left any crystals laying around, they would even begin to be affected in a noticeable way. Streaks of dark purple would seem to weave their way into the crystal, almost like a flame dancing on top of metal. It didn't change the crystal, but it did warp it and temper it. Almost like a battery, the crystals seemed to take in the effects of the dark chakra for later use. The crystal would absorb more and more energy from the man in pain, until it seemed like the material would burst from the built up pressure.
And that's exactly what happened.
The crystal shattered into a thousand little shards, each containing the dark energies that swarmed through the young man's body. The shards scattered, spreading around the room like shrapnel. A few of the pieces lodged themselves into the wall, but if a few of them found a home in the flesh of the young boy, Hoseki would be in for a world of pain. It was a tiny amount, but its potency couldn't be more overstated. If the crystals pierced the young boy's skin, their energy would rapidly dissolve into the young boy's chakra system — within a couple of minutes, he'd begin to feel the effects of the cursed chakra, and minutes after that he'd probably go into shock. Takeyashi's body naturally produced this chakra, so it made sense that while the symptoms were severe they were also non-lethal. Takeyashi's body was simply out of balance, and needed to find a new equilibrium. But Hoseki? To the young boy's body, the cursed chakra was a foreign invader. It wasn't prepared for the effects the hormones produced. And as such, the process of his body fighting to reject the invader and the dark energy fighting to claim its territory was going to be a messy one.
Did the young boy have the strength to fight this? Would he even survive?
[ooc: Using Cursed Sealing Rank 1 to give Hoseki the Gaia Seal.]
