Previously...
Hinata made a seal that Neji was not expecting, "Henge," transforming her clothes so that she was now wearing a zip-up, sleeveless, purple tunic that had a white hood; it was tied at the waist by a hitai-ate on a black band. She was also wearing close-fit 3/4 pants and shinobi strappy sandals with a one inch heel. Hinata said, "Now, where were we?" dropping into a similar, yet different, stance as she had taken mere minutes before.
Neji focused chakra to his eyes and examined Hinata's form. He thought, 'Her Henge gave her clothes that are well-suited to Jūken, but her stance is different.' Neji said, "I don't know what kind of stance that is, but it won't help you."
"We'll see," Hinata said, beckoning Neji to come at her with a hand movement.
"You clearly need the reason spelt out for you, so I'll do it. I don't know what happened in that chakra sphere, but the sad fact of the matter is that it caused you to grow. As such you will be unused to the increased range, causing any attempts at taijutsu to be useless. Not that it would be otherwise anyway."
Hinata let her Sage Mode drop, it having done its job in healing her and releasing the blocks on her chakra. She brought her hands into the ram handseal and said, "Baragan," her eyes taking on a rose shade...
XXXXX
Neji said, "Baragan?" as he thought, 'I've never heard of that before. Is it a derivative of the Byakugan? Judging by the veins bulging at her eyes it must be, but I've never heard of something like this before.'
Hinata though, was marvelling at seeing her cousin's nervous system, which was represented by bright yellow lines running through his body, after so many years as he had been one of the first losses in the war. Hinata didn't have any time to think on the past...or should that be future, she mildly considered... as an arcane green sigil appeared around her cousin, who said, "You're in my range." Hinata merely raised an eyebrow. Neji said, "Jūken: Hakke Rokujūyon Shō." Neji then charged at Hinata, intent on closing all of his cousin's tenketsu.
As Neji charged, Hinata moved her left, front, foot backwards, so that it was only slightly past her right foot, on the balls of her toes. She also brought both hands in front of her, her left hand by her hip and her right hand, shoulder level with her arm bent. When Neji was halfway between them, she said, "Jūho: Shūrai," causing chakra to exude from her palms in an arc, following her arm's movements. To most of the audience's surprise, the chakra from Hinata's hands was not the normal chakra that they had gotten used to seeing her use, it was yellow and emitting a kind of crackling noise.
As Neji neared his cousin he thought, 'What is...' but focused back on his attack. On his first thrust Hinata moved her forward hand slightly past Neji's thrusting hand and changed the chakra from being emitted from her palm, to being emitted from the back of her hand, and forced the electrically charged spike into Neji's wrist, blocking off the signals to his brain as she slid her left foot behind her right leg, her left foot pointing perpendicular, back to her right, so that she was standing to Neji's side whilst his original thrust was still moving him forward, and then she twisted her left foot, so that it was pointing backwards, causing her right foot to spin completely, ending with her standing behind Neji. She then stepped forward with her back, right, foot, thrusting her right hand forward, an electrical spike in front of it, which shut Neji's entire body off from his brain, causing him to fall into a mass at Hinata's feet.
Hayate said, "Winner, Hyūga Hinata," prompting the medic-nin to rush onto the field, and Hinata to drop her henge.
As Hinata went back up the stairs Hiruzen thought, 'After her tenketsu were shut down I was sure that Hinata was through. No...even before that, I didn't think that Hinata had it in her to defeat the genius of the Hyūga. But I wonder...what was that Baragan thing? Judging by his reaction, I'd say that even Neji didn't know. Even so, I guess now we know who Naruto's wife is.' He then chuckled to himself, thinking, "Well, at least he has someone that loves him...though I'm not too sure that his mother would agree that she's just like...' then he heard a massive 'thwack' come from the upper level, so looked up, only to see Naruto holding his cheek where the blue haired Hyūga had clearly slapped him. He thought, 'Well...maybe she would.'
On the upper level Hinata angrily whispered, "A 'good luck charm'? Was that really the best you could do? I mean really."
"Hey hey, I gave it to you, didn't I?" causing unbidden images to rise to her mind of the various...acts...that she had performed in their bedroom in the future. Her face turned red from embarrassment and slapped him, shocking everyone that knew her.
Naruto, just held his cheek and asked, "What did I do?"
"I...I..." Hinata blushed and said, "I'm sorry! I didn't mean to do that. I just thought of...that time," her face turning red.
"Oh...you mean when I..." Naruto teased. Hinata clamped her hand over Naruto's mouth, stopping him from telling everyone what she had done, and let him do...not that he would have anyway. Her actions since exiting the sphere had only confused and astounded the other members of Team 8 and all that knew her, her interactions with Naruto more than her fight with Neji.
As the next names were called, and Naruto and Hinata moved to watch the fights next to each other, Kurenai moved to her student and put her in a slight genjutsu, where they were standing across from each other in a room. She said, "Hinata, you and I are going to need to have a little talk after this is over. You do realise this, correct?"
"Yes, Kurenai-sensei," Hinata said before bursting into flame, dispelling the illusion without making any signs that she was about to.
In the real world Kurenai raised an eyebrow as she thought 'Yes. Although it may not be that little.'
Meanwhile, down on the field Souha and Kankurō were standing, facing each other as Hayate asked, "Either of you got anything to say?"
Kankurō said, "No. I've got nothing."
Souha said, "Yeah. I've got nothin' to say to men who wear makeup."
Kankurō said, "It's war paint. And the patterns vary amongst those in the sand village."
"Yeah, then why don't your teammates have them then?"
"They're not..." Kankurō sighed and said, "You know what. It doesn't matter what you think. I'll just have to take my time and enjoy destroying you."
Souha thought, 'Damn! I almost had him. Well, I got something at least. Those marks must have some reference to one, or more, of his abilities. Well, it'll be interesting to see what that is.' Souha shrugged and said, "Well, it looks like we're done talking, proctor-san."
Hayate looked to Kankurō, who nodded in acceptance. He then said, "In that case, the rules are the same as the last fights. Hajime," and stepped back to the dais.
Souha crossed the distance between them and punched at Kankurō's face. Kankurō ducked under it and tried to kick his leg out from under him, looking very much like a Russian dancer, an image which was only reinforced when Souha dodged his kick, and Kankurō quickly retracted his extended foot and kicked out with his other foot at the same time, knocking Souha off balance. Instead of capitalising on Souha's precarious footing, as any shinobi worth the name would have done, Kankurō flipped on the spot and pushed himself backwards, ending up standing where Souha had been at the start. Souha sighed and thought, 'What was that meant to be? Is he taking me lightly?! Why that...!' his anger palpable. He said, "Oi, teme, you underestimatin' me or somethin'?"
Kankurō said, "No. Why?"
"Any shinobi worth the name would have taken the opportunity to attack an enemy when they are off-balance."
"Like I said, I'm not underestimating you. If anything I'm giving you more credit than I need to, Uzumaki."
A tight grin appeared on Souha's face as his eye started to twitch. He growled, "You bastard, I'm gonna..."
A voice up on the second level yelled, "DESTROY HIM!"
On the second level, Amayah and Ken looked at the blonde and saw an image of their teamate hover over him. Hinata just held her head and sighed, a tired smile at the fact that her husband of many years, still got riled up when he felt someone was underestimating him. By the time that they went back, there were none that did that anymore as he had killed the last one that tried doing that with his own hands. It had been Uchiha Sasuke, after which he had the ENRAS systematically eradicate the entire Uchiha line, which were a constant thorn in her husband's side. Seeing that he had garnered the attention of everyone, including the two fighting, scratched the back of his head and laughed half-heartedly. He gulped audibly, causing the other shinobi to shake their heads and sigh before turning back to the battle, which resumed as soon as it did, both fighters loving an audience.
Souha ran at Kankurō again, this time anticipating the kick at his legs, dodging that the same way that he had the last time, this time though, when Kankurō kicked out his leg again, Souha flipped over it, grabbing the tuft coming out of the back of whatever was wrapped in bandages on Kankurō's back and pushed off of Kankurō's head, pulling the tuft with him...or...he tried to at any rate, as, when he pushed off, all that happened was a very loud shriek, and an arm reaching up out of the wrappings to grab Souha's arm and try to get him away from his hair. Souha wasn't going to let...whatever that was, get a hold of him, and grabbed the hair tighter, pulling his body down before kicking the mass of bandages, kicking him away from the hand grabbing him, taking with him the tuft of hair that he was holding. The mass of bandages started to roll around on the ground, grabbing the area that Souha had taken hair from.
Souha said, "What the..." unsure what was going on. Then he saw the 'person' that he had been fighting, start to have cracks appear all over its surface. He thought, 'Okay, so...not...the guy I'm meant to be fighting. If I didn't know better I'd say that it was some kind of weird automaton. But if that were the case then it would be illegal, so how...'
The bandages fell off of the bundle, revealing the real Kankurō as he stood up. As he stood he was still rubbing his head where Souha had torn the hairs from. He exclaimed, "What the heck's wrong with you?"
"Uhh...are you a mummy or somethin'?"
"A...!?" Kankurō growled in anger. "No. You damn...waterlogged cactus!"
"Uhh...?" was heard all through the room, along with Temari, Baki, Naruto and Hinata face faulting.
Souha, for his part, just blinked before waiting a while and saying, "Uhh...is that really the best you could do? Because if it is, then maybe you should leave the insults to someone else. I mean, if 'waterlogged cactus' is the best you can come up with, I'd say that even dry wit would be beyond your capacity," causing some groans and muffled laughter to echo around the room, causing Kankurō to get angry at the ease with which Souha was making fun of him.
A scowl settled on Kankurō's face and he growled as he said, "Fine. It looks like I was giving you too little credit if you could see through my disguise."
"What do you mean? I didn't see through anything..." Souha said, angering Kankurō even more. "...It's just common sense to deny a shinobi as many of their tools as is possible."
In the stands, Tenten thought, 'If he's saying that then he's probably the same type as me...well...maybe not,' as she remembered Souha's engaging in close combat with the dummy-looking thing.
As Tenten was considering Souha's method of fighting, Naruto was having similar thoughts himself. 'So, he's a ninja tool user. That would probably cause people to assume that he's the same type as Tenten and use ninja tools to fight from a distance. But that's wrong. Since his first thought was close combat, I'd say that he's more like me.'
Naruto grinned as Hinata said, "Well, I never thought that I'd ever meet the same type as you Dear," not looking from the match, shocking the nearby shinobi who knew her.
Amayah though piped up and turned to look at Hinata and Naruto and asked, "The same type? What do you mean?"
Naruto just grinned and cut Hinata off before she could answer to say, "Information is the lifeblood of a shinobi." Which only served to annoy Amayah with his reticence.
Kakashi, hearing Naruto's line, thought, 'What the hell? Who is that and what have they done with Naruto? I mean, the clothes were strange enough, but this...'
Down on the first floor, Kankurō said, "Well, since there's no point in hiding it anymore, I guess I might as well tell you that I'm a member of Suna's Puppeteer Corps."
"Puppeteer Corps? So...there's a bunch of ninja that like playin' with dolls? Sounds kinda lame if ya ask me."
Kankurō growled, "Why you..." and extended his right hand out to the side and parted his fingers, attaching threads of chakra to his puppet as he said, "Let's go, Karasu," as he started moving his fingers, causing Karasu to start moving towards Souha at a decent speed, but nothing that Souha couldn't easily avoid. Or, so Souha thought, but, as soon as the thought came into his head, the puppet that he was mocking opened its mouth and a senbon shot from it. Souha didn't have enough time to avoid it completely by itself, so stepped to the side as he brought his hand up, forcing it away from his body. He ran past the puppet, looking at it as he passed, before turning back to Kankurō, who wiggled his fingers, causing an arm to separate from Karasu and attached a chakra string to it as it 'flew' at Souha as he ran at Kankurō, who had a dangerous grin on his face.
When his opponent grinned, Souha thought, 'What's he grinnin' about? Since I'm past that doll there shouldn't be enough time for him to bring it back around and defend himself with it. So why...?' then he noticed that Kankurō was looking past him, over his shoulder. Souha turned to look behind him and mentally exclaimed, 'What the! Oi oi, seriously? He can detach the arms from that thing? Wait...how's he controlling it?' he squinted, barely making out the minute threads of chakra that extended from Karasu to the arm. He then noticed that there were similar blue lines running from Karasu to Kankurō. He thought, 'So that's it. He's using chakra threads to control that thing. In that case...' a kunai dropped into Souha's right hand from the delivery mechanism up his sleeve that had a tag wrapped around it. He sent a small burst of chakra to it, activating the tag, causing it to glow yellow.
In the stands, Naruto thought, 'So, he's related to the Fūma Clan as well, eh? Wish I knew him 'then'.'
Souha flicked the kunai at the chakra strings running from Kankurō's fingers to Karasu and severed them, causing the arm flying after him to drop to the ground, surprising Kankurō enough to stop and try to figure out what happened, giving Souha enough time to get close. Souha punched Kankurō, saying, " Fuzui Fūin," black marks appearing around Kankurō's body from where he was hit as he flew backwards. When Kankurō had come to a stop he found that he couldn't move. When Kankurō didn't say anything, just lay there, trying to move, Souha said, "Do ya give up, doll boy?"
Kankurō screamed wordlessly, his anger palpable as he tried to use his anger to get rid of the genjutsu that he thought he was in. Souha, not liking Kankurō's antics, threw a kunai that flew just above his face, piercing through the lip of his hood, causing him to turn white as a sheet, only then realising just what kind of predicament he was in. He then tried to think of a way out of whatever he was stuck in, as nothing he was doing was breaking him out of any kind of genjutsu, not that he thought that the redhead could use any anyway. Souha commented, "Well, I suppose that this would be a good time to practice my slow slicing technique," as he drew a kunai and approached Kankurō, having grown bored and wanting to see exactly what it would take for the judge to call the match.
It didn't take too long for Hayate to break his silence after Souha's statement. He said, "Souha, you win, now, release Kankurō."
"Sure thing," Souha said, making a hand seal, releasing the fūinjutsu before gathering up his kunai and heading back to his teammates. Kankurō collected Karasu and went back to his, wondering, and muttering about, how he lost.
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A/N
Terms
ENRAS: Elemental Nation Recon and Assassination Squad
Attacks
Neji
Jūken: Hakke Rokujūyon Shō(Gentle Fist: Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms)
A dangerous technique that is, appropriately, handed down from father to only a single child within the Hyūga clan. It is a manoeuvre of the Gentle Fist fighting style. With the Byakugan's near 360° field of vision, the user envisions an Eight Trigrams circle. Then the enemy within this circle is hit with a series of violent blows. By striking sixty-four of the tenketsu throughout the opponent's Chakra Pathway System, their chakra flow is stopped, making them unable to even stand. Once someone is within range of the user's field of divination, the user assumes a Gentle Fist stance and begins to deliver the attack. Each set of strikes is done at an exponentially increasing pace and strength. The attack not only disables the enemy but also knocks them back with every set of strikes.
Hinata
Jūho: Shūrai(Gentle Step: Lightning Strike)
The user, using the Baragan, targets the opponent's nervous system with spikes of lightning chakra from either their palms, or the back of their hands, which cut the signals from the brain from telling the body what to do. Hinata originally created this to prevent her patients from moving during complicated procedures and in recovery immediately afterwards, which was very useful in treating her husband, who insisted on leading from the frontlines in the war.
Kankurō
Karasu
A puppet that resembles a three-eyed, four-armed humanoid with jagged teeth and a spiky brown hairstyle protruding from the top of its head and framing the sides
Souha
Fūma Seal
A seal that can be connected to a kunai that grants the ability to cut the chakra threads of the Fūma Clan. Interestingly enough, it can also cut through similar techniques, such as the chakra threads used by ninja from Sunagakure
Fuzui Fūin(Paralysis Seal)
Multiple black marks appear from under the users hand that wrap around the victim's limbs preventing them from moving
