Tanebi

Chapter 7: War of Illusions

Woah. Huge turnout for the last chapter. So let's hear what you all had to say.

Chm01: Thanks a ton man. That was driving me insane.

Adam862: Glad you like it. I always feel that the best ff's are the ones that can make a story seem plausible. That's what I'm trying to create here. As far as the bloodline, I feel that it could be used and would work well for him and not make him insanely powerful, and I'm glad you like it.

Inarealpickle: Uh huh. It's how I could get Naruto in there without being obvious.

Harry foureyes: He's started on mastering it, but not Hirashin. I'm not going to make him that powerful quite yet. As far as Guy defecting, I have really yet to decide. About Sakura, I will address that in my notes as well, but I feel that Kakashi was unable to bring out Sakura's genjutsu potential whereas Kuranai could and so she will be stronger then cannon. It's not that the Alliance is letting them get away with it, more like they don't really know yet.

Zero Sakura Cross: Hey no problem. It's a weak point of mine and I'm glad you pointed it out. I'll work on that. And oh yes they are.

Prague: I had a similar criticism in F, W, and V. I try and describe the way I see something and because of that it seems awkward. Nice suggestion.

Misuryluvsdeath: Thanks man.

Wind 797: Exactly. Strained but nothing permanent. Hehe I won't spoil a thing.

Skytide 101: Awesome. So glad you like it and I hope that you keep enjoying it.

Kaiser Spartan: Yeah, I feel that a positive environment would have done wonders for Naruto. As far as my updates, I'm trying to be faster, but with school and everything I can't really promise anything.

PSI567: Actually I had no idea. For storyline purposes, I needed Sasuke to be O, but I agree that it does fit their personalities. I'm glad that you informed me about this because it's good information. I enjoy your comments.

Krymsom: No that wasn't it, but it sounds like a good read that I'll have to check out sometime.

Dragonshaun9: Thanks a lot. So glad that you all like it.

Wow, a lot of you guys really liked that fight with Naruto and Lee. Now I need to follow it up.

I'm not going to add too much as far as prechapter notes, but I did get the fic that I got the idea for the Rasengan drill. It's "Get Glory in this Hand" by Digifruit, and a shoutout goes Chm01 for pointing that out.

...

Sakura at this moment would rather not fight against the girl from Tanebi wearing the camo pants. Her head right now was a complete mess with everything that had just transpired with Naruto. It was like everything that she once felt that she knew was an outright lie.

Sakura also knew that she had to fight this battle. She had to fight this battle and win so that she could join Sasuke and become a chunin. Ino had won her match earlier and she couldn't afford to fall behind and risk losing Sasuke. For some odd reason though, there was another reason that she wanted to fight. Sakura wanted naruto to watch her match badly. For some reason, she wanted to show him just how strong and competent she really was. This was something that she would need to look into after the exams were over.

Sakura needed some support. Subconciously she looked to where the Tanebi shinobi were, but mostly she was staring down Naruto. Naruto felt her gaze and met it with one of his own. He could see the uneasyness and unrest in her eyes, so he flashed her a quick grin and gave her a head nod.

After the nod, Sakura felt different. It was as if her confidence had returned. In a trance like state, Sakura walked down to the exam arena, and if one looked closely, they would see a tinge of red on her cheeks.

Kin took the time it took for Sakura to get her head together to walk down the stairs. She now stood in the center of the arena and waited for the pinkette to get herself down to the floor. After about thirty seconds of waiting, Sakura made her way down and faced Kin.

"This is gonna be a damn good fight." Tayuya mentioned. "This girl is decent, and I'll give her that. However Kin is no pushover herself. No way Kin loses."

"Not too sure Tayuya." Naruto mentioned. "We know about what Kin can do, but this girl is unique. She's not going to lose I think."

"Usual stakes?" Tayuya asked. Naruto nodded his head and shook his sister's hand.

"Pht. Girl you just lost a bet." Ino commented. "Forehead may not be as good as me or Sasuke-kun, but still she's probably better then that girl down there. I mean had it not been for a sneak attack in the forest, forehead would have taken that girl out."

Tayuya just grunted and looked away from the platinum blond girl. She really didn't want to waste her breath on an inferior gennin, so she was content by just watching and hoping that her friend would be victorious.

The fight was announced to begin, and Kin began throwing a volley of senbon with bells attached to them at Sakura. Sakura was easily able to dodge the volley, but Kin didn't stop. She pulled on strings forcing the bells to ring.

Right away, Sakura felt it. She felt the muscles in her body begin to spasm and caused her to collapse on the ground. She knew that none of the senbon had touched her, so she wasn't injured at all. She also knew that no hidden jutsu beyond the bells. All that left was genjutsu.

Sakura knew that she was caught in the mental trap by the girl. As Kin continued to ring the bells, Sakura began to feel herself get extremely dizzy. She lost all control of her arms and legs, and saw Kin multiplied by the hundreds. What Kin didn't count on though, was Sakura being an expert in genjutsu herself. Kuranai had taught Sakura several ways to escape a genjutsu that had been laid. Kuranai had also taught her something else to do inside of a genjutsu that she would use here to turn the tide of this fight.

The first thing that Sakura did was bite on her lower lip until it bled. The effect released her from the genjutsu somewhat. She could tell that this genjutsu was very powerful because she still slightly under it. Her muscles had relaxed slightly, but at least now she was able to move, and she could see only a single Kin as opposed to the multitudes. That being said, Sakura could not see perfectly straight.

She considered a chakra pulse to break the remaining hold that the genjutsu had over her, but decided against it. With the plan that she had in store for this girl, she would need to save all the chakra that she could.

Kin once again tried to ring the bells, but they seemed to do nothing. For Kin, it seemed like the effects on her opponent were all that they were going to be. Still though, Kin thought, she looks to be suffering greatly. Even without further use of my genjutsu, I should be able to take her down easily.

Kin fired a few senbon at Sakura, but she dodged them all. Kin hadn't even considered that she would be able to dodge her throws quickly. From Kin's perspective, Sakura was barely able to stand up and breathe. For her to dodge the attack as cleanly as she did shouldn't even be possible. She tried again to hit Sakura with another barrage of senbon, but again the girl was able to dodge cleanly.

Tayuya had no idea what was wrong with Kin. Kin was usually so accurate with her senbon throws that her complete lack of aim was astonishing. To her, it looked as if Kin was moving in slow motion. Another thing that puzzled her was just why Kin didn't come right up and fight her head on. Sakura was not in good condition surely, but even then she was well enough to be able to fend off throws.

It was then that it hit Tayuya. Sakura was using a genjutsu on Kin. She was disguising herself to make it appear as if she was more injured then she actually was. That was throwing Kin off her game and forcing her to lose her energy by repeated throwing. That would also explain why Kin seemed to be reacting slow and sloppy. Kin was beginning to get frustrated and that was effecting her accuracy. Tayuya may have thought that this strategy was a bit cowardly, but at the same time, she could see that the logic was perfectly sound.

After completely missing with a large barrage of senbon, Kin decided to go with a more direct approach. She lunged at Sakura with a punch straight at her face, but Sakura easily dodged the attack. She then tried a kick to the face, but again Sakura was able to dodge it.

Kin growled and continued her assault. She now threw a bunch of wildly thrown punches and kicks which easily missed the mark.

"As always with Kin." Lucien said. "She misses a couple of times and then that wild temper of hers gets her angry. She's always been like this."

"Is it just me, or does Kin just look really slow?" Naruto asked.

"You know now that you mention it, she does seem a bit slower then normal. I don't know why though." Tayuya responded.

"Duh, that's all forehead." Ino gloated. "She does this well. She casts a genjutsu on her enemy which delays the amount of light that filters in the eye. As a result, the user then sees things in slow motion. She's essentially a half second behind forehead."

Unknown to Ino, Kin had heard every word. Being a ninja that trained using a sound based genjutsu, Kin was able to hear things much easier then people thought. Her eyes widened as she learned that she was being played for a fool the whole time.

Sakura hit her forehead with her hand at Ino's gloating. Ino could be a good ninja and a good mind at times, yet at the same time, she could be so vain with her gloating. She had basically had her fight in the bag, but now the fight was back in the questionable area.

Kin put her hands into the cross shape and released Sakura's genjutsu. To her surprise, she also was able to notice that Sakura was standing fine and that the effects of her genjutsu were now almost completely gone.

It made sense actually. After Kin stopped ringing the sound of the bells, then the original effect of her genjutsu would be dropped. Thus, over the course of a select period of time then Sakura would completely recover control of her body.

"When did you put the genjutstu on me?"

"Just before I regained control of my body. I double casted a genjutsu. The first one disguised what I looked like. I exaggerated my appearance to maybe frustrate you. Perhaps then you wouldn't notice the second one which the pig over there pointed out so well."

"I see. Perhaps then we could finish this match."

Sakura and Kin then engaged in a taijutsu battle using basic taijutsu. Both girls were not experts by any means, so the taijutsu was not near as exciting as the display shown by Naruto and Lee.

In the exchange, Kin started off with the aggression. She began attacking Sakura with punches and kicks, but never made solid contact. As a result, Kin began to get frustrated again and Sakura was able to capitalize with a single punch to the face which knocked Kin out. Sakura was declared the winner of the match.

Sakura dragged her body up the stairs to the balcony area knowing that she had advanced to the next round. The first thing that she noticed was a look from Tayuya. Tayuya's face was emotionless, but still she could see the other girl give her a nod of approval. Naruto looked over at her and gave her a quick grin before turning away while Ino gloated to Tayuya about how much better is Sakura was then Kin. However, Tayuya looked as if she was going to strangle Ino, and Sakura was tempted to join in on the fun.

Fugaku was pleased at the turnout, but at the same time he was a bit disappointed. He had expected a teammate of his son's to win with a display of dominance that Tayuya showed. Even though she won pretty clearly, she needed to win by tricking her opponent. He was now even more convinced that Kurenai was not the right person to teach his son Sasuke.

The doctors that were working on Sasuke now faced a serious situation. No Konoha gennin had managed to lose their life in the forest that matched the blood type needed to fully transplant a lung. They however found one gennin team from Suna that would have made a perfect match for Sasuke. The only problem with that was the rules of the exam which stated that bodies of fallen gennin in the chunin exams belonged to the country of their origin. This meant that performing the transplant would be completely illegal and Konoha could get hammered if they were to get caught.

One factor that Konoha had going for them was their political position. Their negotiations with Kumo and Iwa had been going very well. With the pull from Kumo and Iwa, they may be able to get off easy from the Alliance. However, should one faction betray them in the Alliance, then Konoha could get hit very hard.

Punishment for what Konoha was about to do would start with a very heavy fine that Konoha would need to pay. Also, Konoha would be unable to promote any gennin to chunin without proper approval from the Alliance, which would harm their military tremendously. Konoha would be put on probation from the Alliance, and would be barred from hosting an exam for the next three years.

Even though they were facing all this pressure, they knew that for their own sakes, they would have to go forward with the operation. They knew what the Alliance would do to Konoha, but what Fugaku would do to the doctors would be just as bad. They just hoped that nobody would figure anything out. Unfortunately for them, a spy was watching over them intently. A spy whose pale eyes saw the entire procedure in extreme detail.

At this point, the amount of competitors was beginning to dwindle. As of now, only Kiba, Temari, Kankuro, Shikamaru, and two gennins from Kumo were left able to compete. Sakura, Sasuke, Ino, Lucien, Tayuya, and Naruto were the ones who had advanced at this point as well.

A quick match occurred between Temari and another gennin from Kumo. The match lasted about ten seconds before Temari mercilessly ended the match covering her opponent in a giant tornado. Shikamaru went next and quickly captured the hapless gennin from Kumo into his shadow and forced him to forfeit the match.

That only left two people to compete in the final match. It would be Kiba and Kankuro in the final match of qualifying. Kiba and Akamaru jumped down to the arena while Kankuro took his sweet time walking down the stairs.

The match began and Kiba went in quickly with a punch to the face of Kankuro. Kankuro took the shot right to the face, but it didn't faze the gennin at all. He then reached his arm back and tried to punch at Kiba, but Kiba barely dodged it. He then went in for another attack and again it never even fazed his enemy. Kiba dodged another attack and then retreated to a safe distance.

Kiba took a bit of a break to try to figure out what was wrong with this guy. His taijutsu was his strongest aspect and was almost as good as Sasuke's. For all of his attacks to have no effect was just shocking. It was then that the barking of Akamaru brought him up to something.

The barking that Kiba heard told him that the Kankuro that he was fighting was a fake and that it smelt of wood and the real scent was coming from the bundle on the back of the gennin. Kiba figured that what he was fighting was only some kind of puppet that Kankuro was operating from the back, but the question was how to take Kankuro down without revealing too much.

He didn't want to have to reveal all of the tricks that he had with Akamaru. He would need them for fighting any of the other gennin. But then again, the only way that he could advance was to get around it. Kankuro didn't want to waste any more time and charged at Kiba in full force. He attacked with such a ferousity, that Kiba was barely able to defend himself.

Kankuro was not made to be the aggressor in this scenario. Kankuro is a counter attacker. He excels at turning any opponents aggression against them in a critical manner. What he was doing now, was give the boy Kiba a chance to counter him.

Sure enough, Kiba found an opening. Kankuro was in the middle of his attack, when Akamaru bit Kankuro's wrist. The real Kankuro's wrist. All of a sudden, Kankuro came out of the sack holding onto his wrist heavily. Kiba then rushed passed the puppet and hit Kankuro with a spinning Tsuuga which finished the puppet user off.

Even though he was puzzled, Fugaku called everyone down to the floor of the arena to have them draw lots for the next stage. He explained how the next month would allow all the students to train themselves and get new techniques. With an odd number of nine participating, one person would have to fight four rounds, while the others would need to only fight 3.

The first person to draw was Sakura and she drew a number 1. Kiba drew next and he picked up an 8. The next to go were the team from Tanebi that all passed their matches. Naruto drew a 3, Tayuya drew a 2, and Lucien drew a 7. Temari was slotted with the number 4. Shikamaru drew a 5, and the last person to draw, Ino, got 6. That gave Sasuke the default number of nine.

After getting the correct numbers to the officials, the board was then created. The match ups had Tayuya facing off against Sakura and Naruto against Temari. The winners would face each other and the winner of that match was in the finals. Ino would face Shikamaru, where the winner would face Lucien. But the last match of the first round made Kiba give the biggest grin he could muster. He would square off with Sasuke one on one. That made him happy.

After about another hour, Kushina had another visitor. This time it was Baki, the sensei of the team from Suna.

"Ah, Baki, nice to see you again."

"As always it is a pleasure Kushina-sama. I am curious though as to why you called me here, but Itachi said that you wanted to see me."

"Now now Baki, let's not be so formal. Are you aware of the intelligence I received from one of my spies just a few minutes ago?" Kushina asked.

"No, I am not. What happened?"

"Apparently, Konoha stole the corpse of a Suna gennin found in the Forest of Death. They plan to use his body parts to recreate one of Sasuke Uchiha's lungs."

"WHAT!?" Baki screamed. "How can they do something like this? What are we going to do?"

"Relax Baki. The first thing that I did, was sent a message out to Kumo telling them about all the evidence of everything that Konoha has done through the course of this exam."

"What will that do though?" I mean, negotiations are strong as always in the Alliance, but Konoha and Kumo have been under great conditions as of late. Won't they just turn a blind eye to it?"

"True, but negotiations between us and Kumo have been great as well. Let's just say that their princess is rather fond of a certain person in my ranks. A marriage is currently in the works. I feel that they will gladly listen to our point of view."

"And without the support of Kumo, Suna, Kiri, and numerous smaller villages, Konoha can't bully its way through the Alliance anymore." Baki finished.

"Exactly."

"But won't Konoha be angry about this? Won't it put several of our gennin in danger if they figure out what's going on?"

"Yes they will. That's why we had to limit the number of Suna, Kumo, and Tanebi shinobi."

"I see. That's why you requested that Kankuro blow his fight in the prelims should he fight a Konoha shinobi."

"Yes. Our presence here is very risky. It's also the real reason why I pulled out Itachi's team, and asked Kin, Choji, and Shikamaru to throw their matches should they fight Konoha gennin. We're going to need to be able to withdraw any force from here quickly and work to evacuating any civilians from Tanebi, Suna, and Kumo."

"But if that's the case, then why leave your children's teams in?"

"Naruto needs to show Sasuke up. It would damage the morale of Konoha if they saw Naruto defeat Sasuke on the biggest stage. Lucien's deep powers will allow him to escape danger easily and my daughter scares me. She's so much like me, it's truly frightening."

Baki and Kushina shared a long laugh. "But seriously Baki." Kushina said, with her tone starting to get serious again. "Konoha is up to no good. I feel that there is a good chance after this that they will defect form the Alliance and cause a huge war. Fugaku never did like to live under the rules."

"I'm curious though. Should this thing go to war, who would fight with who?"

"I don't know. Tanebi can fight Konoha now on even terms, but Iwa probably couldn't take both Suna and Kumo. Kiri is always a wild card, but I feel that they will obtain some of the smaller nations whose economy thrives on Konoha. As of now, it looks like we need to free some smaller nations from the grasp of Konoha. Business will start to pick up shortly.

...

Sorry I'm a bit late.

Finally that's over. Now I can get back to the main point of the plot.

I'm happy to be able to progress now. I have a lot that I want to cover and that will most likely be the next few chapters. Then I'll go into the chunin exam finals which will take a while for me to do.

Yes I had the plot twist of the pulling out planned the entire time. I hope that you all liked it. It goes to show that I'm not afraid to go there.

I think that this chapter came out a bit rushed. If so, then sorry.

Thank you for reading Tanebi.

Next Chapter: Surgery Successful?

Please review.