... Chapter 3 ... The Tournament / a simple hug

Disclaimer:No, I do not own Naruto! Although I wish so. It belongs to Masashi Kishimoto. I love the characters and the show more than I love myself. Please don't sue me, I'll return them after I'm finished.

A/N: Chapter three has finally arrived! Yeah, I know it's going a little slow these days. GOMENASAI! (*bow*) Coz I'm still trying to figure out the kinks to this story so please bear with me.

Thank you very much for the great reviews!

Special thanks to MyGoddessofthemoonandsun (Mygod, such a long name you have!) for being my #1 fan. Thank you very much for your support!

Here's a very long chapter three, I appreciate you taking the time to read!


"Neji!" Lee called out his name, he stood up beside him and continued, "Be extra careful on the Sharingan user."

Neji nodded.

Both walked out and jumped onto the arena almost at the same time. It was the time people were waiting, the match between the two noble clans of Konoha.

On the other side, Lee and Tenten were waving a hand cheering for his teammate.

The sun shined unmercifully down on the arena, both of them stood boldly at the middle, their eyes locked at each other. Both were powerful, serious and arrogant. Neji stood up and crossed his arms, his official badass look.

The officiator stood between them and called out loudly, "Commence fight!" then he backed away from the arena afterward.

The two men were not yet fighting.

Neji was the first to speak, "I always hoping to have a fight with you, I think it's going to be a great fight, Uchiha."

"Do you think you can defeat me?" Sasuke asked while gaving him a grin, shrugged once to loosen his shoulders.

Neji's eyes narrowed, "Ohh… you are scaring me. I won't lose without a fight!"

"Are you ready?"

"Let's see how strong you are!"

They stepped forward and begin the fight.

Sasuke made the first move and charged towards Neji directly. He punched him on his stomach and kicked him upward with full strength into the air.

"Shishi Rendan!" he shouted.

Neji took the hits.

Unexpectedly, it was just a wood clone. He had already replaced himself with a clone before he took the hits.

"Byakugan!" Neji had activated his byakugan. His veins filled with charka and he could see everything around him.

He reappeared at his back tried to close a tenketsu (chakra point) on his shoulder.

But miss.

Sasuke leaped back swiftly before Neji hit him.

"It's risky to get near a close range fighter like him." Sasuke thought to himself.

He jumped a few steps backward and threw the shurikens dashing towards his opponent. Neji evaded the attack smoothly as he leaped into the air. Sasuke continuously aiming and throwing shurikens towards his opponent. The way Neji moved his body perfectly dodged all the shurikens again.

They started testing each other, followed by real fight.

Sasuke had his Sharingan activated, revealing his red eyes.

Sasuke stopped and turned his gaze at Neji, "Katon Housenka no Jutsu!" Sasuke blew out multiple fire balls from his mouth towards his opponent, combined with throwing shurikens, which engulfed in flames.

"Hakkesho Kaiten!" he shouted.

Neji barely avoided the fireball but he can felt the hotness on his body, followed by using his absolute defense Great Heavenly Spin to toss away the shurikens.

"Katon Housenka no Jutsu!" he shouted again, another fireball emit from his mouth.

Sasuke smirked and rapidly spit out fireballs. Neji leapt up into the air to dodge all of them. Every time Neji trying to get closer, Sasuke jerked back, dodging the man's fists.

He was able use his gentle fist style, if only he got him closer.

Before Sasuke spit out another fireball, Neji bagan his first attack.

"Hakke Kusho!" (A/N: Neji's new technique after time skip)

Overwhelmed by Neji's incredible speed, he knocked off his opponent onto the ground by using his new techniques- Eight Trigram Empty Palm.

Sasuke took the hits and was blown away. Luckily, he already shifted himself with a wood clone. Sasuke felt amazed but jealous that he's truly a prodigy; he surpassed the main house with his promising skills, even though he was merely a branch member of Hyuuga clan.

The fight continued for about half an hour.

"It that all you got?" Neji sneered.

"What did you just said? I'm going serious on you!" Sasuke yelled, his face was fuzzy with anger.

By the time, Sasuke accumulated as much chakra as he could in his right palm to cast his Chidori, it consumed a lot of his chakra. Neji had his eyes popped wide, locked his gaze at him. "The powerful charka and the visible lighting…" He thought to himself.

"Chidori!"

Neji felt his muscles tensed as he predicted the powerful attack. He stayed calm and must be extra careful. The jutsu was classified as an assassination technique, it rarely fails to kill or at least fatally hurt its opponent.

Neji concentrated on his current fight, he took a deep breath as he focused.

Sasuke raised his palm and charged it towards his opponent. It was an incredible speed and would have been imposibble to dodge.

"Hakkesho Kaiten!" he shouted again.

"I'll pierce your ultimate defense!"

He charge forward in high speed and stabbed his opponent. The jutsu was so great that can stab anything.

Sasuke increase his speed and charged it forward, slowly it broke into Neji's absolute defense.

"If you're going to fight like that, then I'm going to challenge you with speed!" Neji slammed.

"Hakkesho DAIKAITEN!" he shouted.

Neji had released a huge amount of chakra started spinning until he created a larger, a more solid and powerful shield than Kaiten.

His speed increased double, he was spinning faster and faster; and this caused Sasuke reduced his speed. The forceful of their attacks had reached an ultimate limit, immediately it burst out into a powerful explosion.

A huge shockwave sending them to either side of the arena.

The impact was startling, everyone stood agape at the light of the shockwave.

After a few seconds the smoke slowly cleared, both of them were choking on the strong smoke. Sasuke put his hand on the floor, steadied himself from failing. He shot a withering glare at Neji.

The silver eyes shinobi felt when the wave of dizziness hit him. He barely managed to fight off Sasuke but was wounded himself. His left hand was dripping blood and gained some small bruises on his body. His shirt was slightly worn out, his lithe and muscular chest gleamed in the passive light of the arena. Luckily the wounds were not that harmful.

Thousand eyes fluttered open and stared at Sasuke, "Uchiha, I'm gonna XXXXX!"

"You, BASTARD!"

Neji 's fangirls scolding Sasuke harshly with their most horrible and awful words.

"Punch him, Neji!" shouted a man from the crowd, it was Lee.

Neji grinned, "No one can kill me this easily, I'm not down yet!" exclaimed Neji as the anger began to build up.

He stood at the side of the arena, breathing hard. Even in the desperate moments he was still thinking about the promise between him and his cyber-pal. He got the chance to meet her, only if he passed the jounnin exam.

It was the first reason he fought so hard.

Sasuke had his eyes flashing, it was the first time a person had managed to evade his attack.

Sakura did not take her eyes off, she felt her heart beating fast while watching the two prodigy fighting each other. He hated Neji when he hurt Sasuke, but at the same time she felt her heart clenched every time Sasuke hurt him.

"What am I doing? What's wrong with me?" she thought. "Yes, he's strong, capable and…. q-quite good looking, yet he usually showed no emotion when we talked. It just like last time I saw him in library, it seemed like there's no key to unlock the secret of his emotionless exterior."

"I absolutely agreed." Inner Sakura popped-up.

She scanned though her memories again, "Beside, we don't have any interaction, we never going for any mission together."

"NO, you always nursing him when he badly wounded!" her inner self interrupted.

Is that she had turned her affection to Neji?

OR …maybe just a little?

"If it's true, then I can't help you!" her inner self interrupted again.

"I don't need your help either!"

She stopped thinking.

She tried to ignore her inner self. BUT is it true that she felt for the Hyuuga? She's always nursing him back to health, will she felt for her patient? Another 'Sasuke-tic' guy again?

Her thoughts were interrupted again when Neji took the hits.

The crowd clamored.

"Dear God…" Naruto murmured while gazed at the both prodigy.

Sasuke dashed towards Neji in full speed, meanwhile casting his Chidori once again and ready to strike. His byakugan gave him very sharp sight, he can read that the attack was weaken; probably he had put too much power on the first strike.

Neji has been continually releasing chakra around his body on a wide scale to detect the hit and managed to jump away swiftly to dodge the hits.

Neji was waiting for a chance and finally the timing to attack had come. He raised his fists forming his 'Divination field 64 Strikes' pose.

"Here it comes, Hakke Rokujuu Yonshou!" said a voice, got ready for the attack.

With his quick blows he hit his opponent and closed down all of his tenketsu.

The hits knocked him down. As the dust cleared, Sasuke felt blackness enveloped him. As pain beyond tore through his chest, he chocked out some blood, breathing hard.

Neji emerged victorious.

The flow of the charka completely stopped, effectively eliminated his ability to use chakra. "Damn," he gasped. That was the first time he fought with the incredible abilities of byakugan, it was amazing yet fearful.

Neji turned off his Byakugan.

The match was over.

"The match has ended," the officiator stepped forward and announced, "and the winner is- Hyuuga Neji!"

Sasuke opened his eyes, he met with the familiar silver eyes. Sasuke felt hard to get up and turned to face him. Sakura's optics filled with worry.

Neji walked towards Sasuke, he reached down and grabbed his hand and pulled him up.

"HYUUGA NEJI! I'll kill you!"

"We're gonna XXXXXXXXXXX!" Sasuke's fangirls throwing their most horrible and awful words at Neji, as returned.

"Those fan girls are so annoying!"

"Don't forget you owned half of them." Sasuke smirked.

"Hn. You are strong Uchiha, others shouldn't still be standing."

"… I will have to take note of your strength. Someday, I'll defeat you…."

"Perhaps that we will meet up again, Uchiha."

"Yeah."

The two smirked at each other. The audience applauded. There were cheers from everywhere in the crowd and were absolutely going wild as everyone stirred. They yelled and cheered for the both Neji and Sasuke.

It was an awesome fight.

They bowed politely and exited out the back of the arena. The arena had received the worst damage than the other fights, but this was none of their concern.

"I can't believe it…."

"Wow! Wasn't that a great fight?"

"Well, let's get to the next fight."

Everyone was waiting eagerly for the next fight.


Neji was assigned to get a medical treatment after the fight. He sat on a wooden chair and a medic-nin stood in front of him, checking and healing his wounds

"Neji-san, are you feeling better?" she asked with concern.

He opened his eyes and gazed up at the medic-nin, "Ya, much better. Thanks." Neji replied, his tone was rather lower than usual.

After bandaged and treated by the medic-nin, (A/N: aww… not Sakura…) Neji walked back to his own seat and sat down next to his teammate.

"Neji! You did well!" Lee cheered tapping Neji with his hand firmly.

"Well, thanks."

"Neji! Are you alright? Have you hurt?" Tenten said in a worried tone, "We are so worried for you!"

"It was just some small cuts and bruises. Not that serious. Thanks for the concern, Tenten." He replied with a light smile.

"Next week we'll be having the semi-final basketball match with the other high school. We need your strength, Neji!" said Lee.

"Fine." he stated.

"Don't forget we've a training session after this." Lee said following by his thumb up and catching a shine on his teeth.

"Aa."


Sasuke walked slowly back to his seat.

Sakura pulled out s small blue bottle from her purse and handed over a bottle of medicine to Sasuke and said, "Take a sip of this, I'm sure you'll feel much better."

Obediently, he took over the medicine and gulped it down without a question; she was the best medic-nin in Konoha, after all.

Miraculously, his pain reduced.

"Thanks, Sakura."

She smiled back at him.


On the other hand, Sakura met Tenten in her fight, no one had won the fight and it was a draw because of time up.

But Sakura's genjutsu and new strengths had drawn everyone's attention. The crowd felt so surprised to see her awesome genjutsu. The great Godaime Hokage-sama felt her heart swelled with pride as she watched her apprentice fighting greatly.

At the same time, someone in the arena began to admire her great skill, "Amazing genjutsu…" he said. She'd grown a lot, not in height, but in skill, maturity and beauty. He admitted that she's not weak and indeed she's strong as the years had gone by.


It took about five hours totally to finish the jounin exam, there are quite a number of people who qualify to be promoted to Jounnin rank and Neji was one of them.

There was an induction ceremony in the closing tournament. The ceremony was not as bored as he expected...

Lee, Sasuke, Shikamaru, Naruto, Shino, Sakura and five other chuunins got promoted as Jounin too.

The twelve new promoted jounin went up to the arena again, to receive the jounnin induction officially from the great Godaime Hokage.

"NEJI! Let's work hard together!" Lee said following by his thumb up and catching a shine on his white white teeth. He slung one of his arm over Neji's shoulder as they walked up to the arena together.

After the ceremony, the twelve jounnins were congratulating each other with a friendly hug.

Neji stood silently, he heard a familiar voice calling his name. He turned around.

"N-NEJI!" another boy his age ran towards him and cried, he engulfing Neji in a bear hug TIGHTLY for a few seconds.

He was having hard time to breath because of the tight hug, "LEE! It's too tight! Too tight! Air… I need air…..(*cough*)…" he complained ending with a cough.

In addition, Neji felt relieved and happy at the moment, that's why he didn't push his best buddy away.

"Oh, gomen ne! I was too happy!" Lee let him go, apologized sincerely. The both smiled.

"Sakura-chan!" Naruto put his arms around her and hug her tenderly.

"Finally…." said Sakura while rubbing his back lightly.

Naruto released her after a few seconds. Sakura turned her head to the other side, she saw Shikamaru, who was standing next to her.

Without hesitation, they walked up at the same time and gave each other a friendly hug.

They broke apart after a second.

Sakura turned her head to the back, she saw Neji! He was standing in front of her, no one was hugging him at the moment.

It was then when he noticed her too. He stood straight and looked blankly at her.

Silence fell between them.

"Um..."

"Um, uh..."

"Should I hug her?"

"Should I hug him?"

"Should I?" Neji's head kept pulling in and out from hesitation.

"Can I hug him?"

Finally, he decided to make the first move, he walking up to her, holding a kind of embrace and gave out an expression of "would you like a hug?"

Sakura replied him with an "I'd like that a lot" kind of expression, added with a smile.

Sakura walking up to him at the same time he walked up. They opened their arms toward and hugged each other.

They were getting closer and closer until their body touched as skin radiated warmth. Sakura's cheek reached right up to his chest and her head touched his chin. "Man, he was so tall!" Unintentionally, she touched his soft silky locks. "His hair is soft." She enjoyed the feel of hug.

Sakura lose her nerve when the tall boy get closer and put his arms around her.

Her hair smelled like cherry blossom, fresh and clean, he truly enjoyed. It was the thing that drew him to hug her longer. He found his heart clench in shock. A strange tinge happened in his chest. "What's this feeling? It's different when Tenten hug him.

It's different.

What kind of feeling is that?" He thought again.

That was a strange moment between Sakura and Neji. After a few confused seconds, they broke apart. As much as they want to hold each other longer but they still have to let go.

That was their first hug.

Naruto, who was standing between them, arched his eyebrows in amusement - obviously, they are hugging each other.

Grinning.

It was the first time he saw his pride and arrogant buddy hugging a girl, and the girl was his precious Sakura-chan.


Author note:

Guys, as you wish, NEJI WIN!

So, did you guys like it? I apologies that my fighting scenes wrote in a mess! But I promise, the next chapter will be much much better. In my story, Neji had improved a LOT in speed, because he often trained with Lee. (in my story, he was! ^_^ )

And sorry for the all Sasuke fans, I've made the fan girls scolded Sasuke in the fiction, you have my apologies. But, since this'd a Neji fiction so I can't avoid it! Sorry again.

The last part's a bit rush, I'm sorry!
But WOW! Their first hug! At least there's a bit 'NejiSaku feeling' coming in! Although it was just a friendly hug but at least it's a good beginning, ne?
Do you think it came in a little unnatural? Coz I purposely slotted this in. lol.

Well, there will be a basketball match semi-final in the coming chapter! What more? I'm thinking hard, any ideas on how it might improve? Please let me know.

Miyuki (me): Sakura-san, I know you're very good in writing essay, am I right? So what do you think of this chapter?

Sakura: Well, it was okay... I'm sure you'll getting better if you write more!

Miyuki: Yay!

Sakura: AND try to make me more wonderful, lol

Miyuki: Huh? Oh well, no worry, I definitely will! Ja!

Is this chapter long & boring? I'm sorry, but please bear with me! I'd appreciate if you'd review this, good or bad, I would love to hear it.

Well, I'm going to stop here, if not my author notes are getting longer than my chapters!

Lastly, thank you so much for reading this. ARIGATO! (*bow*)

Ja!