Does Obsidian Dragon + Water Ring = Nuke? (L5R rules board)

A topic from AEG's L5R CCG Rules forum, copied for Oracle of the Void from a copy of the forum saved in October 2015, so pages it didn't save are missing. Players' names are left out; the rules officials are named. Rulings are as they stood on these dates; later rulings, the rulebooks and the Rules Archive may differ.

A player, 29 August 2007

http://www.alderac.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=59814&p=768323&hilit=Obsidian+Dragon#p768323

Okay, now say I target a non-unique, 2 chi, 3 personal honor mook with Chuda Rintaro. After he assigns, we will get -1 chi, which will put him at one. As I understand it, if he were to assign opposing the Obsidian Dragon, that would kill him as the ability goes off after the Dragon's trait already took effect.

What if I were to instead Ring of Water the Dragon into the fight. Would an order of operations be followed; i.e. Apply first Rintaro, then the Dragon (Putting the mook at 1 chi still.), or would the mook die?