Disclaimer: I just own most jutsu in this chapter.
Chapter 8: The Cherry Blossom, Blossoms
"W-wow," Sakura gasped out through pain as the other two sauntered up to her with identical smirks (or so she assumed, one had bandages wrapped around his face). "You guys are really good." This only boosted the ego of all three. "Compared to you guys I'm, I'm," Sakura stuttered out before letting her fearful face turn into an evil smirk, "fucking awesome." Then all hell broke loose.
The Oto kunoichi, who had a hold of Sakura's luscious pink locks suddenly screamed out as Sakura's hair transformed into hundreds of razor sharp needles. She had to wrench her hand out of Sakura's hair, which surprisingly to her, still had Sakura's needle hair lodged in them.
"Ninpo: Harinezumi no Jutsu," Sakura purred out as the Oto kunoichi tried to pull and shake the pink needles out of her hand, result in her pulling out copious amounts of skin and blood. Sakura spun up into a standing position while sweeping the Oto kunoichi, knocking her out of the fight for the time being.
Sakura then ran her hands through her hair, pulling out a handful of her razor sharp strands. "My hair is so nice for my original jutsus… bitch!" and kicked the other kunoichi in the gut before turning back to the other two Oto genin.
Sakura rushed towards the other two, and throwing each handful of her 'senbons' at them, only for the one with wrappings around his face to faze away from the onslaught and the other to blow the senbons out of the way with air holes from his hand.
"That the best you got?" the one with spiky hair and air holes asked sardonically.
"Far from it," Sakura smirked back before running at a tree and using it to launch herself into the air. "Ninpo: Shuurin no Sakura no Jutsu!" Sakura screamed out as she swung her head around, raining her needle hair down on the Oto genin. Again he blew away her attack with his hands.
"Fool, don't you learn?" he asked as he rubbed his wrists, trying to intimidate Sakura.
"Just trying to gage your abilities, idiot," Sakura quipped back as she ran another hand through her hair, pulling out three more needle like strands. However, this time, she rammed them into the ground. The Oto nin stared perplexed for a few seconds before three, three inch five feet long pikes erupted from the ground in front of him, trying to impale him, but he jumped out of the way a second early. "Ninpo: Saizensen no Jutsu!" Sakura said as she released her attack, watching as her former hair deteriorated without the chakra she was feeding it.
That jutsu sapped most of her chakra, sadly. While Sakura had improved herself after the mission to Nami no Kuni, she still had not built up a lot of chakra. Her Saizensen no Jutsu was supposed to be her finisher, because of the lethality and the chakra it ate up to send it through the ground and enlarge. Sakura tried to not let her chakra depletion show, and it apparently worked by looking at the panic stricken Oto nin.
"I guess I'll just have to pull out my new ninjutsu," Sakura said as she went through six hand seals. "Ninpo: Kijo no Jutsu!" Sakura yelled. Before the unfortunate Oto nin's eyes, Sakura shifted into a monster. She had one horn in the center of her forehead as her skin turned green. Her eyes bled into a dark blue that encompassed her whole eye as she grew another five feet. Her muscles bulged and her fingers turned into talon like appendages. Her silky hair turned rough and course and she let out a monstrous roar that actually caused the Oto nin to faint.
Sadly for him, it was only genjutsu. Sakura had figured that if she announced an obvious genjutsu as ninjutsu, the opponent would take her word for it. She was right in this case, but sadly it sapped most of her chakra and she forgot about her last opponent, which saw that moment as his opening.
The mummified Oto genin threw a wild hay maker at Sakura, which missed even though he attacked from the back. However, Sakura quickly realized he intended to miss. Her vision swam as he balance gave way and heaved on the battle field.
"Silly girl," the Oto genin spoke. "One should always mind their surroundings and opponents," he began before a bellowing voice screamed "Konoha Senpu!"
Sakura was unable to see her savior, but recognized the voice as her fellow Konoha genin, Rock Lee. What she didn't see was Lee giving the Oto genin a kick to the bottom of his jaw, launching him into the air.
Lee followed closely behind as his voice rang out through the clearing "Omote Renge!" Lee's bandages wrapped around the Oto genin as gravity took effect and they both spun towards the ground.
The impact was massive. A twenty foot crater emerged from ground zero and only a dizzy and slightly injured Lee emerged from the rubble.
"Don't worry Sakura-chan," Lee said as he attempted to help Sakura up, "the threat has been eliminated." However they both looked up when they felt sinister chakra.
Standing before them was Sasuke, covered in a purple-black chakra. Sakura had finally recovered enough of her vision to be repulsed by the sight before her. Sasuke was covered in purplish-black flame markings all over his skin as he shared a deadly stare with both Sakura and Lee.
"Did you two do this?" He asked in a deep, almost evil rasp. The widening of both Sakura and Lee's eyes were all the indication he needed to faze behind both of them and sinisterly whisper, "Fight me!"
"Not today bright eyes," a chipper voice rang out through the clearing. Behind Sasuke was Naruto, not looking any worse for wear. His clothes were obviously dirty and ripped, but his face held a familiar foxy smile that both Sakura and Lee could both hear. Naruto reached a hand out to the surprised Sasuke as he pinched a nerve along Sasuke's collarbone, knocking him out.
Sasuke had awoken a couple hours later, not remembering that he had challenged a fellow Konoha shinobi and his teammate to a fight. Naruto tried to take command back of his team, but the funky thing the androgynous shinobi put on him had been messing with him. Naruto had flashes of stomach cramps, nausea, and couldn't control his mood; plus his chakra control, what he worked so hard for, had completely gone to crap. After two hours of his whining, Sakura made a comment that shut Naruto up for the time being (she said it sounded like Naruto was on his first period).
Luckily for Team Seven, they ran into another helpful Konoha shinobi, the goofy kid a few years older than them who had the nin-info cards. Naruto was glad to find out that he was an accomplished medic-nin and had him look at his stomach. After a few seconds of 'humming,' Kabuto, the medic-nin's name, said that the seal messed with his charka coils in his 'hara' region and that, be consequence, slightly rearranged some organs. It wasn't life threatening, but he said to Naruto that it would either take his body to get used to or to have the seals removed.
It had also seemed that Naruto's clones had done their job. The group of four didn't meet anyone on their way to the tower in the center of the forest, and when they got in, only four teams were there; Team Eight with Hyuuga Hinata, Inuzuka Kiba, and Aburame Shino; the Suna team with the creepy red head; Kabuto's team; finally, a Konoha Team from the year before that had another Hyuuga and a goofy guy in a green leotard; and finally Team Seven, with one day to go.
Naruto was counting down the minutes until the second part of the Chunin exams had finished. He looked all over the tower for someone who knew about seals, but either no one knew anything about them, or they said that they weren't allowed to help any genin until it was decided if there would be a preliminary round to the third part of the exam, whatever that meant.
As Naruto hobbled around, clutching his aching stomach, he never noticed that he walked by the entrance to the Tower from the forest. His only warning he was in danger was a loud shout of "BAKA!" before Yamanaka Ino's fist sent Naruto careening through the air.
"Love you too, Ino," Naruto winced as he rubbed his sore jaw.
"What the hell did you have to destroy all of the scrolls for jackass!?" She yelled back after his response. Had Ino voiced that question to her teammate, Nara Shikamaru, she would have found her answer, maybe. Shikamaru was smart enough to know what was bothering Ino (it bothered him too because she drug him all through the forest looking for a scroll they needed).
"He did it because he could, he should, and it was tactically the best move," Shikamaru droned out, trying to hide his calculating gaze from Naruto, who was too busy clutching his stomach in pain.
"What the hell are you talking about, lazy ass!?" Ino again shrieked out. Naruto was able to look up at that. Ino's voice was so loud and painful, it was able to distract Naruto enough from his abdominal discomfort so that he could look at her('She should make use of that voice of hers and make it a jutsu,' Naruto pondered, before thinking, 'that's not such a bad idea…'). Her once pristine hair was disheveled, with twigs and leaves in it. Her beautiful, designer shinobi clothes were ripped and torn, and above all else, she was dirty.
"Since Naruto could make corporeal bunshins and take on most genin, he used them to take out as many teams as possible to reduce the chances of him actually having to work in the third exam," Shikamaru explained out.
Surprisingly, Ino didn't get mad (well, madder) but did let out a frustrating sigh. "We're all Konoha shinobi though," she pouted at Naruto.
"Doesn't matter," Naruto wheezed out, "If you couldn't handle one bunshin you didn't deserve to go further. I saved a lot of teams time and effort and maybe they'll start training seriously now."
Instead of dawning comprehension, Ino had a bewildered look on her face. "What the hell happened to you?" She finally asked Naruto.
"A big dick head with a shoun-ai fetish. He put a seal on me that messed with my insides and chakra, and bit Sasuke on the neck, leaving him some weird hickey-seal."
Ino immediately squealed when she heard about 'Sasuke-kun,' but Naruto just hobbled on, giving the two a half hearted salute before hobbling on. What Naruto didn't know was that Shikamaru had watched the whole altercation in the forest. From when Sakura first started the fight with the Oto-nin, to when Naruto stopped Sasuke.
Sakura, in her own right, could actually beat Shikamaru. It was true that he was a genius, but Sakura wasn't far behind, book wise. And from the looks of it, she had created several of her very own jutsu, which she was proficient with and also knew there strengths and weaknesses.
Sasuke was the rookie of their year at the academy, and he also had the Sharingan. He speed was unrivaled at the academy, his chakra capacity was easily chunin level and his taijutsu and ninjutsu were already bordering on the chunin level. It also looked like his skills had grown exponentially.
Naruto was the one that scared Shikamaru most though (in a fight, otherwise it's hard to be scared of a goof ball who dresses in all orange). After they turned nine, Naruto had completely disappeared from the academy. Most kids thought he flunked out or quit, but he shows up in he chunin exams, already having three years of more instruction from jonin-sensei or equivalent than the rest of the rookies. Just from the few seconds he could see from Sasuke and Naruto's brief encounter, he could see that Naruto had more speed than Sasuke (which put far faster than Shikamaru himself) but at least an intermediate understanding of human anatomy.
Shikamaru studied the results and came up with the conclusion that Team Seven was smarter, faster, and stronger than all other teams participating; and that if it came down to it, not fighting them would be the only way to ensure things didn't get more troublesome than they already were.
Harinezumi no Jutsu: Hedgehog/porcupine technique
Shuurin no Sakura no Jutsu: Autumn Rain of cherry blossoms technique
Saizensen no Jutsu: Spearhead technique
Kijo no Jutsu: Ogress technique
