"Alright, you sissies! Welcome to Area 44, better known as the 'Forest of Death'. This test's gonna be hard, not like that joke you had earlier with that wimp Ibiki. It's much harder but much simpler. No need to look underneath all the rules." Already Naruto's mind seemed to wander off on its own even before any news of importance had been announced. Anko easily detected this lapse in attention and a kunai sprung from a flick of her fingers, flying close enough to Naruto to grace his cheek with a thin cut. She sped behind Naruto in time to secure his head by the hair even before enough blood had pooled to form a single drop. With great relish, she felt and smelled his exquisite fear at her crazed antics and dragged her tongue along the wound even as she needled the student (was he the jinchuuriki?) for his inattention. 'Heh! This is fun! This Genins are so easy to manipulate; perhaps I should administer more of these tests.'
However, the Genin directly behind her managed to ruin her euphoric thoughts. "Proctor, I believe you dropped this."
Using her chakra-awareness, she was able to identify the exact location of the ill-restrained aura of the Grass Genin who approached her from behind. Anko deftly sprung from her coiled position, manic smile firmly in place, and twirled in the air much as a snake would, hand lashing out with extended fingers to retake the offered weapon as the venomous reptile would strike with open maws. When the Grass kunoichi failed to react, Anko almost -almost- pouted. As that would have entirely destroyed her image, which would affect not only her reputation but the goals of the test as well by showing them a vulnerable overseer, the Special Jonin restrained her urge and in doing so started her subconscious analysis of the situation.
The conclusion was not pretty: the Kusa kunoichi had to have been of a much higher level than a simple Genin. On one hand, she was able to catch one of Anko's flying kunais, a feat even mid-level Chunins struggled with. On the other hand, she displayed nary a twitch at Anko's acrobatics, acrobatics which were developed by Orochimaru himself to intimidate the enemy while leaking so little telegraphing that even Sharingan users (or, more accurately, novice Sharingan users) were completely fooled. Yet this supposed Genin from another village had been able to pinpoint the exact moment at which Anko would reappropriate her projectile! Worse still, her curse mark had started throbbing ever-so-slightly -if she hadn't been paying attention, she wouldn't have even noticed it.
Anko was tempted to call a halt in her exam. However, even though this would be well within her rights as a proctor, she felt that the best course of action was to pretend that she hadn't noticed anything amiss. She therefore tunneled back to the front with a Shunshin before turning back to her audience. With great emphasis on the possibility of death, she unveiled the rules: enter the forest with one scroll and get to the tower in the middle by 120 hours with both scrolls. The one restriction: all three members have to be alive by the end of the contest, and the scrolls may not be opened until then. She then reminded them once more of the possibility of death by handing out waiver forms to remove any responsibility for deaths or serious injuries from Konoha. Anko collected the signed forms before she sent the Genins on the way to their respective starting gates, each with a Heaven or Earth scroll. At exactly 5:00PM, the gates opened and the game was on.
"Who in their right mind randomly licks another's blood? I mean, sheesh, that was creepy," one blond Konoha shinobi brayed with no particular audience in mind, thoroughly embarassed by his previous encounter with the proctor. "I mean, even if she didn't do that crazy..."
"Dobe; for the last time, shut up. You've said it already, we've heard it already. So stop repeating yourself! Stealth is part of this test. Do you want us to be ambushed just because little boy is a scaredy-cat?" Ever since the first test, Sasuke had been grumpy. Apparently, it had been a blow to his esteem that he'd had to play with the prescribed rules and had been unable to complete the exam without assistance.
"Teme! You didn't have her hold your head..."
"Naruto-baka, shut UP!" While the sheer volume was enough to send a few carrion birds cawking as they fled, it was her fist that effectively silenced Naruto. "You're disturbing Sasuke-kun, and you're endangering our mission." The tone left no doubt as to the priority of the two statements even if one were to discard the order in which they were delivered.
"Sakura-chan..."
The trio travelled a while, an uneasy silence reigning over them. Quietly and efficiently, they dispatched bloody chipmunks and giant tigers alike, and untangled themselves from countless predatory vines as they progressed further into the forest. The most unusual sight that greeted them, however, was that of a leech the size of a horse being devoured by a flower. They tiptoed their way around the plant and any flower in the vicinity, cautious and silent, only letting out their breath when they were surrounded by howling wolves.
Sakura started behaving suspiciously two hours into the Forest. At first, it was limited to stumbling every few steps, but then it spread to giggling in odd moments while covering her mouth with both hands. Naruto would have asked what was wrong, except that Sasuke also joined in the madness, tripping over thin air right before harshly attacking a stump of a tree with kunais on both hands. 'Wait. Both hands. Both Sakura and Sasuke.' Once Naruto caught onto the train of thought, it was shockingly easy to notice all of the other signs: hiding hands where only Naruto and Sasuke could see for but a fraction of a second while doing everything possible to show them at all other times, behaving wildly and blatantly out-of-character, bumbling through easy terrain; the list went on. Naruto decided to act up as well: he had to show his teammates that he'd gotten the right message. He was just as careful and care-free as his companions, and just as clumsy as well.
Suddenly, all three whirled around with different handsigns: Sakura in the Ram seal, Sasuke in the Tiger seal and Naruto in a cross-shaped seal. At once, the surroundings melted away to reveal the true environment behind the genjutsu even as fire pooled out of Sasuke's mouth to form a gigantic fireball that blazed toward three Ame Genins while Naruto surrounded the entire area with Kage Bunshins. In hindsight, it was clear that the foreign examinees never stood a chance: they were woefully deficient in skills and tactics when compared with the Konoha nins. In addition, they had easily ensnared the wrong team with their genjutsu, as noticing the low-level illusion (one even weaker than what Kakashi had unleashed on Sakura during the Genin test) was but child's play for Sakura, who then alerted their teammates and overlaid Sasuke's Sharingan with black pupils even as he searched for the opposing team through the illusions.
As soon as Naruto joined in their scheming, they set up their strategy and executed it flawlessly: first Sakura would violently dispel the genjutsu, shocking them into inaction just long enough for Sasuke to send his Katon: Goukakyu no Jutsu toward the ninjas he's seen with his Sharingan. Naruto's role was that of a simple back-up, which he filled to his satisfaction when he knocked out the two who had predictably leapt away from the roaring fireball. Unfortunately, this team was also given an Earth scroll, which did not complement Team Seven's own scroll.
The Konoha ninjas sighed at expending so much effort for an ultimately pointless task before taking to the trees, never knowing that a pair of slitted yellow eyes had watched the exchange with rapt attention, noting that the Uchiha still took the Earth scroll after a while despite its apparent uselessness.
'Ah,' thought Orochimaru, 'one of them finally leaves the den. Who would have thought that it would be Naruto-kun who would need to relieve himself so quickly?'
In truth, Orochimaru had devised a plan for whichever Genin left the team first. He would test the Uchiha's mettle one-on-one if Sasuke were the first to leave his teammates, whereas Sakura would be gifted with an implanted urge and mark Sasuke in Orochimaru's stead. Currently, though, the plan the Snake Sannin set in motion was the one that most agreed with his serpentine urges. He silently drew a deep breath even as his fingers flew through a string of handseals with practiced ease, grinning madly only to loosen before reaching the end of the sequence.
'No, that won't do at all,' Orochimaru realized with a frown. In truth, he'd almost shredded the Genin with a Wind kinjutsu, and not even the thrice-damned kitsune would be able to revive Naruto from the gory leftovers of the jutsu. He normally wouldn't be averse to such an outcome, though his plans required dear Sasuke-kun to make it through to the Finals, and killing the jinchuuriki would automatically disqualify the entire team. No, that would be entirely inacceptable.
He would simply send one of his lesser summons to gobble up Naruto, Orochimaru decided with a twitch in his lips and dispel to the Snakes' Den until he had marked Sasuke, if necessary. Of course, he had also considered marking Sasuke after confronting the entire team. The injection process was a delicate task, however, and the seal itself was rather difficult to work with. As it was, Orochimaru could only afford to bring two custom-made cursed seals with him, leaving him with a low margin of error. Therefore, though the blond jinchuuriki would be but an annoying swat, even annoying swats could unravel his carefully crafted scheme, especially if said swat's regenerative abilities threw a wrench in most restraining methods.
His mind racing through the various snakes available to his disposal, he finally decided on Jakotsu, a moderately-sized snake with a voracious apetite but nearly no digestive abilities. 'Kukuku, Jakotsu will be pleased!' sneered Orochimaru. His hands flashed through the five required handseals: Boar, Dog, Rooster, Monkey and Ram. Just as he was about to slam his hand onto the ground, a flash of blond warned him to dodge. Dodge he did, though he kept his jutsu ready. As soon as he landed on a branch five meters above, he was glad for his reflexes: his prey had almost ensnared him with chakra-enhanced wires. He was of course quite capable of releasing himself from such an amateurish trap, though the barely-escaped humiliation was sufficient to make the leap worthwhile, however costly it may have been to jump while keeping a half-formed jutsu active.
When Orochimaru finally did slam his hand on the tree trunk, though, it was clear that Naruto had still managed to humiliate the Sannin: more chakra was suffused into the technique than intended as a result of the spectacular leap. 'Jakai instead of Jakotsu? Kukuku! Naruto, you'll pay for your insolence!'
"Jakai! I offer you this cute little runt as a snack." After the snake had complied with his orders, gulping down Naruto without any struggle or resistance from the latter, Orochimaru addressed his Summoned snake once more. "Good! As with snacks, though, I'm afraid you must regurgitate him just before he is fatally digested." Seeing his snake nod obediently, the Sannin added: "Oh, and dispel yourself if by some miracle you think he might damage you. Or regurgitate him then, it's your choice. You are too valuable to waste holding that insect away."
Naruto couldn't quite believe his eyes. A huge, giant, enormous, disproportionately large snake! A big snake! He'd thought himself desensitized to abnormally sized animals after his admittedly short foray into the Forest of Death, yet this one completely dwarfed everything else he'd ever seen, with the single exception of the Kyuubi in his chakra-scape. He'd only known that the snake had swallowed him whole when the animal suddenly wasn't in his sight -nor could he see anything else for that matter, either in front or anywhere around him. It was only then that he was aware of the peristaltic motions clomping him down the reptile's oesophagus. Naruto flailed his hands about until he hit his thumb on some unknown object, something solid and compact quite unlike the slippery cartilage or the slimy mucus lining it. He tried to hold onto it, but he cut his hand in the process and blood lubricated his hand until his grip wasn't sufficient anymore. Sinuous contractions once more propelled him deeper into the snake's digestive tract.
Moments later, Naruto's dizzying descent abruptly stopped. He was surprised to find the snake's intestine quite spacious, with plenty of air to breathe. Unfortunately, the fumes from the knee-high digestive juices immediately sent Naruto coughing for quite a while. By that time, he'd adopted a most disagreeable disposition toward with his current living quarters. The thick liquid sloshing every which way was not quite corrosive enough to warrant immediate panic, though the blond was convinced it would eventually melt its way through his body. As Naruto had no intention of being absorbed by the snake, he catalogued the tools at his disposal for escaping his prison. There was of course the option of bursting through with a large number of Kage Bunshins. However, the likelyhood of succeeding in such a manner was rather low given that the thick connective tissue surrounding him should be tough enough to cause his clones to simply dispel. He could also try to carve his way out with a kunai, though the prospect of slicing his way across the thick muscles of the snake elicited a snort.
The imagery did however remind Naruto of one more technique in his arsenal: the Fuuton: Kaze no Teisei. The more Naruto thought about it, the more appropriate the method seemed: he would simply set the listening field to be the snake's body rather than the air immediately around him, and target the vulnerable brain rather than solid muscle and leathery skin. Naruto walked to the edge of the snake's digestive tract to put his hand on the epithelial tissue, repressing a shudder of disgust at the viscous secretions lining the stomach wall. Little did Naruto know that he had happened upon the safest place to put his hand: if he'd chosen a spot barely three inches in any direction, his hand would have dissolved from the concentrated acid being secreted along the stomach lining.
Naruto closed his eyes and sent his chakra bit by tiny bit into the summoned animal. It was a difficult task, the resident chakra disturbing the tiny film Naruto sent along. After a long delay, Naruto finally found the correct density with which chakra could be pumped, one that was neither so miniscule as to be perturbed by the resident chakra yet not quite large enough to be easily detected or, worse even, to disturb the snake's own chakra and disrupt the entire chakra field. His chakra now sped along what Naruto surmised was the spinal cord until suddenly the snake reared itself up, nearly causing Naruto to tumble upside-down and waste all of his efforts. Fortunately, his hand was still pumping out chakra and the blond managed to stick to the slimy surface just in time to avoid falling with the sluicing liquid.
Naruto concentrated hard on detecting the brain. Targeting through a hand rather than through his ears was a novel experience: he could feel the snake's tiniest tremors resonate with his whole body. However, there was a task at hand and Naruto brought himself back to attention to complete it. It was then that he noticed a snag in his scheme: while he had successfully located his target using his hand, he was now unable to perform the required seals. Naruto immediately swung his leg up to contact the spot his hand was on and, without wondering about the very feasibility of his endeavor, he set about to transfer his detection field to his feet. A few tense seconds later, Naruto accomplished the impossible task and completed the Kaze no Teisei by targeting through his feet. However, just before the nervous tissue was shredded, Jakai detected the disturbance and promptly dispelled himself without his meal, leaving Naruto to sputter in the smoke while his painstakingly constructed detection field was thrown every which way. Several seconds later, his haywire Kaze no Teisei destroyed a random tree thirty meters away.
Anko felt something when the Kusa Genin had handed her back her kunai. It wasn't simply wounded pride, as she knew exactly what that was and had taken great care in learning how to deal with such a condition since Orochimaru's betrayal of the village. No, it definitely wasn't wounded pride, even as she admitted to feeling slightly outraged. After all, it wasn't every day that Genins caught her kunai. A Genin!
Her source of unease was instead the casual way with which the Kusa Genin was nonplussed by her antics. It was true that she had telegraphed her movements much more than usual, yet the style should have still been enough to at least startle the Genin and caused confusion. Indeed, most people would require a doujutsu to read her attacks despite the tics and extraneous movements. Instead, the Genin had simply released the kunai at the perfect moment to avoid having it snatched roughly out of her hands. It was almost as if she knew the Hebi style in depth, and only one person outside of Konoha knew that cursed style. Orochimaru.
Which was why she was standing inside a conference room with the Hokage, his ANBU and all the Jonins available.
"There is reason to believe Orochimaru is back in the village, under the guise of a Genin team." Ninjas were trained to be silent in the presence of their leader. However, the shock was such that mutterings could be heard rippling throughout the room. Sarutobi allowed a few moments for his soldiers to compose themselves before addressing them once more. "Anko?"
"A Kusa Genin was able to catch a kunai that I had thrown, and was able to release it exactly on time when I used the Hebi style to reappropriate it."
"So what? Someone for once was able to see through your fancy moves and you get your panties in a knot?"
Anko glared at Hayate. "Do you want a reminder of what the Hebi style looks like exactly? From up close?" Seeing that he had quieted down, Anko continued. "Even worse, my seal acted up." There was a collective gasp that Anko cut into. "It wasn't anything significant -no pain, really- but it did act up when I was really near that Genin."
This time, it was Kakashi who was alarmed, going as far as to remove his nose from a colorful little book. "Your seal acted up?"
"Yeah. As I said, it was really subtle, so much that I almost missed it. It was only the shock of having someone react appropriately to the Hebi style that made me notice it."
And then, wonder of wonders, Kakashi put the book into his kunai holder without so much as a sigh. "How obvious was Orochimaru about his identity?"
"Not obvious at all. He scrambled his chakra signature so much that I didn't recognize it at all, and he only masked the scrambled chakra as well as a Genin would. In fact, his reserves seemed perfectly average for a Genin."
The Sandaime's right eye twitched twice. "It should be obvious that he is interested in some of the participants. I would suspect his targets to be the Sharingan in Uchiha Sasuke or the Byakugan in Hyuuga Hinata." The Hokage paused, stroking his beard. "Or he could also have his sights set on Hyuuga Neji, or the Kouton user from Kiri. Regardless of his intentions, they are unlikely to be beneficial to Konoha. Therefore, I would..." A gasp from Anko interrupted his speech. "Anko?"
"I just sensed Jakai in the Forest." Seeing the blank stares from some of the assembled ninjas, Anko added: "Jakai is the one holding the Snake Summoning Contract. Or at least, he was. This is bad news because Jakai is -or was- a very important snake, one that Orochimaru wouldn't call upon if he was fooling around. I believe it's still the case, as Snakes rarely deviate from their positions once instated. Therefore, Orochimaru may have possibly located his target."
"Anko, take this tracker seal and keep it on your body. Go to the snake's location immediately; I'll send ANBU after you."
"Hai!" In a swirl of leaves, Orochimaru's erstwhile apprentice was gone.
"For those of you who wish to do so, all of you assembled in this hall, I will allow you to follow Anko. As you're well aware, your help will be valuable if Orochimaru is to be subdued. However, if you have students in the exam, I'm afraid I will discourage you to do so. Your participation will automatically disqualify your Genin teams."
Gai had one more concern to voice. "Hokage-sama, shouldn't we cancel the Chunin exams if Orochimaru is here?"
"That is a possibility I've considered. However, we're not quite certain what Orochimaru is plotting. He could simply be testing our defenses by infiltrating Konoha as a Genin, in which case it would be advantageous to simply observe him and modify our security measures as required. He could also wish to acquire kekkei genkai by harming Genins. If this is the case, then we should stop him before he succeeds. However, if we do this by cancelling the exams, it would send a message of weakness to the other nations, some of which may start a war. After the Kyuubi and the Uchiha massacre, we can't afford a war right now. Therefore, it would be best to quietly oust Orochimaru rather than simply planting surveillance or cancelling the entire exam. However, for the same reason, we can't afford to make actions such as allowing interference from Jonin-senseis go unpinished, which could be construed as warmongering. That is why I would encourage Jonin senseis to refrain from participating in the hunt, though I will still allow it. Is there anything else? No? In that case, you're free to go."
With a nod, several ninjas, including a few Jonin-senseis, disappeared in a swirl of leaves.
Orochimaru was annoyed. First that idiot jinchuuriki detected him while he was trying to sneak around -a Genin detecting a Sannin!- right before Orochimaru summoned the wrong snake. Then, that pink-haired gnat refused to be blown away by a Fuuton: Daitoppa. Of course, he'd been careless when he'd released his jutsu and hadn't poured nearly as much chakra as he could (and normally would) have. Still, the humiliation of it all itched incessantly, prodded him with needles of irritation. On the upside, though, the teamwork of Kakashi's squad wasn't nearly what he'd expected and as such, he still easily ensnared them both with his Kanashibari in preparation to applying the cursed seal.
He sensed an erratic chakra coming at high speed before he could apply it on the Uchiha, however, and he let go of the precious seal. He also dropped the Kanashibari from the Genins, shaking his head in disappointment until he observed their reactions. Whereas the kunoichi grabbed a kunai even as she collapsed on her branch, prepared for an attack despite her precarious perch, the Uchiha stood stock-still, his eyes still wide with fear. 'Hmm,' mused Orochimaru, 'perhaps he is even more unhinged than I thought. How lucky!' His thoughts were cut short by two simultaneous events: one was Jakai dispelling, and the other was the grand entrance of his ex-apprentice crashing through the trees, snakes weaving out of her sleeves.
"Kukuku, Anko-kun, I see you're still as hasty as ever!" The taunt was delivered even as Orochimaru sank into the tree, impervious to the hissing reptiles launched fang-first towards his previous location.
Anko was oblivious to the ease with which Orochimaru slapped her attacks away. She instead threw an exploding tag to the tree branch while dispelling her summoned snakes even as she landed gracefully on the tree trunk, torso coiled like a snake. "Orochimaru! You'll pay for your crimes today!"
Orochimaru emerged right behind her, casually ducking below a furious kunai swipe aimed at decapitating him and lazily dodging the numerous follow-up jabs sprung from arms coiled to impossible positions even as the torso shifted unnaturally to accomodate the harsh demands of the style. While most would have been dazed by this onslaught, Orochimaru was the foremost practicioner of the Hebi style for a reason. Orochimaru grew bored with Anko's antics a few seconds into the dance and broke the pattern with a clockwise twist of his shoulders that rippled downwards until his left foot spun a full circle while his right foot lashed out at an inhuman speed, brushing the air nary a centimeter from Anko's nose when she stumbled backwards to avoid the blow.
The break was sufficient for Orochimaru to fly through a mind-boggling number of seals, stopping with the Tiger. Anko leapt away just in time to avoid the beginning of the Mandara no Jin, an innumerable number of snakes spewing forth from Orochimaru's mouth to form a net. It was fortunate that Anko had covered her retreat with a volley of shurikens, as Orochimaru was bluffing with the technique and had instead intended to kill her with a Sen'eijashu. When the explosive tag skillfully hidden on a few of the shurikens detonated, Orochimaru looked surprised before the blast reached him and exposed him as a mud-clone when Orochimaru's body dissembled into a mud pile.
"Damn it," muttered Anko as she searched her surroundings for Orochimaru, raising all of her senses as much as she could. Her paranoia paid off when she heard the barest shift in the wind behind her and ducked just in time to let Orochimaru's tongue pass safely above her. Or rather, the snake protruding from Orochimaru's gaping maw.
"More snake-based kinjutsu?" Anko scoffed derisively even as she completed the seals for the Goukakyu.
Orochimaru was surprised when fire burst in front of him: he'd expected another half-second (if that much) before she completed her jutsu. As it was, he was forced to leap into the air prematurely and drop his Suiton jutsu -a weak Mizurappa, but sufficient to counter the fireball. Thus, still dazed by the early fireball, he was hit squarely in the face when a Katon: Housenka emerged from behind the still-active fireball. Orochimaru cursed loudly as he wrenched the Kusa Genin's flaming face off his head. He was about to discard it haphazardly when he heard Kakashi's Genins gasp, and redirected his movement to throw it in their direction before promptly ignoring them once more.
After all, he still had countless more projectiles to dodge. Most ninjas would have been incinerated by the subsequent fiery missiles, but most ninjas were not Orochimaru. He simply twisted and bent his body out of the way as his mind raced along, weighing different hypotheses to fit the unusual attack pattern he'd been subjected to. Just as he landed, he finally figured out the double-fire jutsu: it must have been one of the ANBU supports Anko had undoubtedly requested. Orochimaru scoffed at the idea of asking third parties to join something as private as a teacher-apprentice reunion before he made short work of the masked pests: one Kage Senbon Bunshin later, the newcomer and the three hidden interlopers were all disabled as snakes coming from the summoning seal inscribed along the weapons bit their necks.
"Tsk, tsk, Anko, I thought I'd taught you better manners than that!" Orochimaru raised a hand into a single-handed seal and fully activate the pain component on Anko's seal, yet her groans, when they came, seemed forced. Nonetheless, Orochimaru strutted up to her side and gloated above her. "Really, did you think I wouldn't have put safeguards? After , you know what comes with great power, don't you?"
Abruptly, Anko sprung up and nailed Orochimaru with a vicious uppercut, coiling her left arm around him when they descended from the collision. "Did you mean responsibility? Heh! That's one lesson I learned better than you did, you traitor!" When they both landed, Anko immediately nailed both herself as well as her opponent to the tree with a kunai. "Today, you'll die with me!"
"And how do you plan to do that? In case you haven't noticed, you've pinned yourself to me. Ah, how that reminds me of the good old days when you'd follow me around!"
"Hn! You fool! I know the only way I can make sure you die is by dying myself. Which is why I'm currently charging chakra into this little explosive seal I've written on my shoulder."
"Kukuku! Do you truly believe you can kill me with just one explosive seal? Me, Orochimaru?"
"Ah, but you see, it's a new design that ANBU developed just two years ago. And now it's too late: even if you could shunshin, your chakra would also fuel the explosion so you'd still get caught! In addition, the safety guard would open a time-delayed portal to an active Soujasousai no Jutsu after the explosion is through, and your blood would be targeted."
Anko felt dread creep up her spine when Orochimaru smirked. And then blinding pain shot through her body, and she knew no more.
Sakura had been petrified when the Kusa kunoichi had glared at them and lowered one eyelid. She could literally see her own death, over and over again in excruatiating detail, and the fear of her death, the fear of the pain, was driving her crazy. The kunoichi's maniacal cackling didn't help much either, and neither did her predatory smile and piercing gaze. Yet even as Sakura was seized by fear, paralyzed into vulnerability, she could still see that her opponent merely immobilized her as an afterthought, as collateral damage while her attention was fixed solely on Sasuke. Unfortunately, neither she nor her teammate were able to move, both cowed by the tainted chakra of the Kusa Genin. And then, suddenly, the oppressive presence was gone and Sakura flopped down, hyperventilating.
By the time she regained her senses, she could see her Sasuke-kun scowling at the fight going on. Following his gaze, Sakura saw the crazy proctor and one ANBU engaging the Genin and, for the briefest of moments, was ashamed of her village for teaming up against a Genin from another village. Then she remembered just how powerful and cruel that Kusa-nin was, and stilled her protests. Instead, she observed how Anko used the cover of the ANBU's fireball to abandon the Goukakyu she'd been preparing and started a familiar series of handseals instead. Sakura noted how the Kusa kunoichi was blindsided by the first of the five projectiles from the Housenka yet managed to somehow peel her face off to remove the flames -peel her entire face!-, revealing a pale-skinned male instead.
There was something familiar about the face, as though she'd seen it somewhere before. Idly, Sakura's analytical mind started going over the various people she had met, and then when that failed to retrieve the required information, she started reviewing the numerous texts she'd read about famous ninjas even as her eyes followed the possibly-not-Kusa nin throw senbons that somehow erupted into snakes after the ANBU parried them. The ease with which he dispatched the ANBU was frightening: if the elite shinobi forces were unable to restrain him, just how far above Genin level was he?
It was then that Anko pinned herself and her opponent both to the tree and announced her suicidal method to remove this mysterious ninja. Clearly, they knew each other, if their conversation was any indication. Then, the foreign ninja dropped the bombshell: he was Orochimaru! The Snake of the Densetsu Sannin! A Sannin who obviously outmatched the proctor of the second test despite the latter's best efforts, as proven when Orochimaru bit her in the neck. What was such an infamous missing-nin doing in the midst of the Chunin exams? What could he want with them? Did he want anything to do with them?
Apparently so, as he now returned his gaze to the two Genins. "Kukuku! How nice of my prey to wait for me! Now, be still!" Accompanying the command was once again the dreadful Kanashibari rooting Sakura and Sasuke to their feet. Yet Sasuke now seemed to twitch every so often. At first, it was a subtle twitch right above his left eyelid. And then, his mouth tipped up a corner before settling down once more. Then a slight tremor shook his right hand.
Orochimaru seemed to have noticed it too. "Kukuku! You're resisting my Kanashibari! Marvelous! Absolutely prodigious! Show me what you'll do; show me your power, your will! Show me the power of your eyes!" Three kunais were thrown to punctuate his statement: two were aimed at Sasuke and one at Sakura.
While Sakura was unable to move despite her frantic efforts, Sasuke's kunai-holding right hand inched towards his thigh and the Uchiha successfully broke out of the Kanashibari using self-inflicted pain, much as Orochimaru predicted he would. However, by the time the Uchiha managed to push Sakura into safety, the Snake Sannin had finished his handseals and blew both Genins out of their perch with a fully-powered Fuuton: Daitoppa. Sasuke had by then managed to activate his Sharingan, and safely navigated their tumbling trajectory to land on his feet. The landing was abrupt enough to send Sakura off into the sweet embrace of sleep, and Sasuke set her gently on an adjacent branch even as he kept an eye on their opponent.
His caution was well-placed: Orochimaru was disinclined to allow him any resting time and immediately set upon the Genin with a bevy of attacks.
First came a shower of assorted projectiles just before an acidic spew melted the tree that rested beneath Sasuke's location but an eyeblink ago. Frighteningly accurate Housenka fireballs forced Sasuke to keep moving before he ran straight into a slew of senbons, each parried by a hastily retrieved kunai with the help of his Sharingan. However, even this effort yielded him no respite, as he then vaulted above a Suiton: Mizurappa and thanked his training in the Taka taijutsu style when he used one of the odd twisting maneuvers to evade a windmill shuriken by the breadth of a hair, taking advantage of the motion to throw a kunai, followed by an explosive one trailing in the shadow of the first one.
Despite casually slapping away the first kunai and throwing the second one back at Sasuke, Orochimaru was rather pleased with this development. "Kukuku! Your Sharingan is quite useful indeed!" And indeed this seemed to be true: Sasuke managed to slip in several other attacks, timid though they may be. However, Orochimaru was one of the Densetsu no Sannin and outclassed Sasuke by far, Sharingan or no. It would have been but child's play to end the fight at any given time, yet he'd restrained himself to high-Chunin grade sklls in order to test Sasuke's skills. Soon enough, the Sannin found the perfect opportunity: he let Sasuke ensnare a mud-clone to a tree and was rather impressed by the Genin's ingenuity when the latter managed to modify the Katon: Goukakyu no Jutsu in order to concentrate the jutsu along the wires.
The the mud-clone dissolved one moment later, and Sasuke whirled around lightly on his feet to scan his surroundings. Much to the Sannin's surprise, the Uchiha immediately narrowed his eyes when looking at the right direction. "I see you're able to see me already. Perhaps your eyes are even better than Itachi's were at your stage?" Sasuke's response was to simply fling more shurikens in Orochimaru's direction, much to the latter's delight. It seemed that swaying Sasuke would be an even easier task than he'd dared envision!
Upon this thought, Orochimaru was reminded of his original mission, the very one he hadn't dared delegate to Kabuto: he had yet to mark Sasuke. Once more focused on his goal now that his reservations about Sasuke's strength were addressed, Orochimaru tried another paralytic tactic with a combination of Kanashibari and genjutsu. Sasuke proved to be susceptible to this combination, yet Orochimaru found himself delayed once again -this time by a rapidly approaching blond ball.
"Where are they?" Naruto muttered to himself once more. Once he'd managed to dispatch that giant snake, he sped back to his team -or so he thought, until he saw naught but broken twigs and fallen leaves where he expected his teammates to be waiting for him. The trail was thankfully easy to follow, and Naruto bounded along a wide path of cleared branches in an otherwise dense foliage. Before long, however, Naruto found himself doubting his tracking skills: how could his teammates possibly leave such an obvious sign of their passage behind? Yet something clearly hurtled across a straight line and Naruto was determined to find what it was.
By the time he reached the end of the trail, he found Sakura just starting to stir. "Hey, Sakura-chan! Are you alright? What happened?"
"Ugh... My head hurts. And Sasuke-kun... Sasuke-kun!"
"Sakura-chan! Calm down. What happened?"
"There was this Kusa Genin..."
"Wait! Was she the same one who handed Anko's kunai back to her?"
"Yes," answered a startled Sakura. "How did you guess?"
Naruto growled. "That... that..." Naruto took a moment to visibly compose himself. "She made a snake eat me, but I managed to kill the snake. I took off as soon as I could to come back here, but..."
"I see. Anyways, that Kusa Genin turned out to be Orochimaru of the Densetsu Sannin, and for some reason he keeps attacking Sasuke."
"Where is Sasuke?"
"I don't know! We have to find him; he could be in trouble! He's no match against any of the Sannin!"
"Let's find him."
And with that, the two Genins set off in pursuit of an opponent far above their abilities, in a suicidal dash to save their teammate.
"Ah, Naruto-kun! So nice of you to join us." Even though his tone was jovial and his smile genial, Orochimaru was seething. How dare these insects interrupt him time and again! Nevertheless, he couldn't afford to fool around while applying his cursed seal. Thus, Naruto would have to be properly restrained. Thinking about this problem, Orochimaru wondered: how did Naruto manage to escape from his snake? Well, no matter; Orochimaru would take care of him and his badly camouflaged teammate now, before he could get even more bothersome pests on his trail. "Here, have a kunai!" Immediately, Sakura was forced out of hiding while seeking sanctuary in another bush.
Naruto, on the other hand, barely dodged the weapon, feeling the wind from its trail as it whizzed with naught but a millimeter to spare. The blond was denied the time to give into his fear as a relentless onslaught of attacks kept him performing wild acrobatics to stay just a fraction of a step ahead of the life-threatening attacks surging all around him. Unfortunately, he was neither as graceful as the Uchiha or as limber as Sakura. Though none of the attacks were life-threatening or even crippling, he still ended up with an impressive collection of cuts and scrapes on his body seconds into the fight. When the offensive seemed to dwindle down, Naruto's first instinct was to leap at his opponent. After all, the Academy had repeated oft times enough that even Naruto knew what the best defense would be.
Kakashi, however, was a much more effective teacher than any Academy instructor could possibly achieve, and had insisted that his Genin think as ninjas rather than mindless drones regurgitating information without understanding it. Therefore, it was no surprise that Naruto's immediate response ran contrary to his urges and instead queried the welfare of his teammate. This was quite fortunate for Sakura, as she was starting to falter under Orochimaru's continuous stream of projectiles. Where Orochimaru found the time to pepper his teammate with a barrage of deadly fireballs, kunai and acidic spews while keeping the blond occupied Naruto would never know. All that mattered, however, was his teammate's welfare, and Orochimaru's slip in relenting on his assault against Naruto, if only for a moment.
Naruto was tired and injured, yet he pushed Sakura out of the way in time, the jolt once more sufficient to knock out the weary girl. Naruto felt guilty with his rough handling of the situation, yet self-recrimination soon morphed into something far uglier as he took in his surroundings. One teammate had fallen out of the fight from exhaustion and the other was frightened to uselessness, to a quivering heap as helpless as Academy shuriken targets. And then Orochimaru smirked.
The Sannin smirked at Naruto, gleeful at the mayhem he'd caused, rejoicing in the suffering of others, goading Naruto to attack. Naruto had had enough. As happened before when Mizuki had critically injured Iruka, Naruto's determination and rage burned into a white-hot inferno and he drew strength from deep within himself, from the very core of his being. He subconsciously tightened both his stance and his chakra until he was a coiled spring, a drawn bow, a weapon focused and deadly. Orochimaru could see the glint in the boy's eyes and should have been warned, yet the Sannin mistook it for common rage.
"Kukuku! Don't tell me you're angry; they're just burdens, after all!"
"Shut up, hebi-teme!"
And then Naruto was gone from his branch, with Orochimaru surprised to only barely scramble off from his seat on the tree trunk in time to see it explode in a shower of splintered wood. The Sannin was then forced to dodge a kick, and a kunai thrust (when exactly did the brat manage to take a kunai?), and then a right hook followed by a roundhouse kick only to find the original kunai sailing straight toward his head. By the time he managed to regain a modicum of his composure, there were five copies of Naruto surrounding him. However, his intelligence reported that Naruto should be able to easily summon at least five times as many clones without suffering any considerable chakra loss. Orochimaru therefore knew that there was a trap waiting for him, courtesy of the damnable blond.
But he was left without the opportunity to analyze the situation more deeply, as the clones started engaging him in taijutsu. A Genin holding his own against a Sannin in straight-up taijutsu! How did the idiot manage to bump up his speed this much? It was unheard of! Yet here he was, facing a foe with speed that would have stumped Orochimaru had the blond's skills been any better. Fortunately, he dispatched all five clones within a few minutes, though he was left wary of the blond's next move. After all, that was only five clones -five!
Orochimaru decided that he had to stop fooling around: Naruto was suddenly proving himself a much better foe than anticipated. Though the Kyuubi's power was still left undetectable, perhaps its presence had skewed matters even further than Orochimaru generous error margins had allowed. As such, it would only be fitting to knock out the brat by the very source of his ill-gotten strength, concluded Orochimaru. He prepared the Gogyou Fuuin while waiting for Naruto to unveil his latest scheme, all the while releasing his full power into this disgustingly weak female body. Such an action may shorten the life-span of his current host, but he would not be defeated by a Genin, jinchuuriki or not. Fate must have been smiling at Orochimaru, as his fully-awakened senses indicated the location of the brat, who was molding an absurd quantity of chakra -it was already almost at Orochimaru's top capacity, and the jutsu's power was still growing!
The Sannin darted about in the trees post-haste, careful to conceal his presence even as he left a mud clone as a decoy. After he snuck behind the brat, he lengthened his arms thanks to a kinjutsu developed through experimentation conducted under the very nose of his sensei and surprised the brat by lightly slapping his stomach with glowing fingers. The effect was immediate and Orochimaru smirked when Naruto fell to his knees screaming in pain. The kid may not have been drawing entirely on the Kyuubi's chakra, but that seal would still filter out all impurities in chakra and thereby cause wild fluctuations in both quality and quantity. In the case of someone with Naruto's raw chakra potential, such fluctuations should be sufficient to render one unconscious.
'Ah,' thougth Orochimaru, 'finally.' Indeed, Naruto had succumbed to the combination of excruciating pain and bucking surges of chakra after a long struggle against the rising darkness. Orochimaru then turned to Sasuke, who had dispelled the combination of Kanashibari and genjutsu sometime during the Sannin's fight with Naruto.
"Kukuku, dear Sasuke-kun, you are quite surprising indeed. It's not easy to shrug off Kanashibari and Kokuangyo no Jutsu at the same time. I've left Anko with a special gift, Naruto with the means to train his chakra control and at the same time increase his chakra pool. But for you, I have something special in mind: I'm going to give you power, more power than you can comprehend. And when you'll need even more than what I'm about to give you, you'll come to me and I'll give you enough to kill anyone, even your brother." Sasuke was stunned for the entire duration of an eyeblink, yet that moment was sufficient for Orochimaru. He cast his Sen'eijashu to bind a now-squirming Sasuke and called forth the delicate construct. Once everything was in place, Orochimaru bit Sasuke on the latter's neck. The Uchiha whimpered at the pain before he collapsed, joining his teammates in their defeat.
Before departing, Orochimaru considered his words once more. He had given gifts to Anko, Naruto and Sasuke, yet none for the last remaining Genin of Team Seven. Perhaps he might as well attempt to collect the entire squad rather than only the Uchiha. There was a snag, though: what could he possibly offer that Kakashi wouldn't, or couldn't? There wasn't much time as the Jonins were now fast approaching their position despite the numerous summon snakes Orochimaru had called forth from the earlier Kage Senbon Bunshin, yet however hurried the choice may be, it still had to be relevant to Sakura. 'Ah,' thought Orochimaru, 'I could give her those.' Biting his forefinger hard enough to draw blood, the Sannin proceeded to draw some seals on her left forearm to allow her to bend light around herself, effectively hiding her from sight provided there were no high-speed movements involved. In addition, the seal could act as an emergency chakra battery, which, given her mediocre reserves, would be a much-needed enhacement. Orochimaru then drew another seal on her right forearm, this one providing a sealless way to cast some high-level genjutsus, including the Kokuangyo no Jutsu and the Magen: Jubaku Satsu. Sensing his time as a Kusa Genin was quickly drawing to a close, Orochimaru formed the Ram seal before disappearing in a swirl of leaves.
The Jonins were getting antsy. A moment ago, they had collected an unresponsive and clearly suffering Anko, marked with a second cursed seal right before they saw Kakashi's team sprawled out on branches, unable to move. They were faced with a dilemma: should they leave the Genins as they were and risk their lives, or should they provide help and disqualify the team? It was Hayate who noted that Kakashi hadn't deemed it necessary to provide help despite knowing Sasuke to be a probable target. The assembled ninja would abide by Kakashi's implicit instruction: so long as Team Seven had a chance to go through to the next round, they would be allowed to take that chance. Thus, they were left following the chakra trail of a Shunshin, which should have been an easy task. However, Orochimaru somehow managed to split the trail in five and none of the destinations bore any signs of his passage.
Sakura awoke to see a ninja hovering over her. Her fist shot up by reflex even before she could identify the color of the sky, meeting soundly with the intruder's head. By the time the pink-haired Genin was fully cognisant of her surroundings, she witnessed Kabuto flying backwards before regaining his bearings and flipping back to land lightly on his feet. Sakura leapt up, just as nimble as Kabuto, and retrieved her kunai in one smooth motion, ready for both defense and offense.
"Kabuto. What do you want?"
"Ah, Sakura-san, was it?" Without waiting for a response, Kabuto continued, "I was separated from my group when I saw signs of battle. I'm a medic-nin, remember? I had just finished doing what I could for Sasuke and was about to move on to you. It seems you don't need my help however, if I'm to trust that punch. If you don't mind, I'll be checking Naruto."
"Why would you help us? What's in it for you?"
"We're all comrades of the Leaf, are we not? That's reason enough for me. You may not know it, but we'll be facing one another in single combat for the finals. Having seen what some of the other teams can do, I've decided not to participate and try my luck next time. My teammates are still going in, though, so I'm doing the best I can to ensure their survival. All that I ask is that we Konoha Genins refrain from causing permanent damage to each other. Is that reasonable enough?"
Sakura scrutinized Kabuto for a long while. Something was off about the Genin, and her instincts wouldn't let her drop her guard. Kabuto still appeared as earnest as ever. Tense moments later, Sakura conceded Kabuto's point as a valid one. "I guess the other teams do look rather intimidating. Fair enough, I guess. Not like I have the energy to fight you and your teammates right now, in any case."
"I'm alone right now, so you don't have to worry about my teammates for the moment. By the way, is that a seal that you have on your forearms?"
"Huh?" After Sakura looked at her skin, she answered, "I guess so. But I have no clue when they got there. I... guess someone could have done that while I was unconscious. Hopefully it's not something bad."
"I'm not too well versed in Fuuinjutsu, but they don't look harmful to me." After snorting at the thought, Kabuto added, "Then again, what do I know? Although it probably would be a good idea to heal the wounds caused by the inscription of the seal. If you'll allow me?"
"Yes, that'd be nice. Thank you."
Kabuto spent his time making sure the wounds were properly closed before moving on to Naruto and extended his palm to cover Naruto's body, a now-familiar green glow enveloping his hands. The medic-nin concentrated and frowned almost immediately. "Does Naruto have trouble with chakra control?"
"I know he had the hardest time of all of us to learn chakra control. Why? Is there anything wrong?"
"It's just that his chakra is spiking up irregularly. Everyone does that when they're sleeping," Kabuto added, preempting Sakura's question, "but most are just like small waves in a pond. When I get from him is more like... I guess it would be like a lit fuse with explosive tags tied randomly around the fuse." Kabuto raised his head to smile uneasily at Sakura. "I'm not sure if that helped, actually. Other than those weird chakra surges, there's nothing much I could do for him."
"So what do you think I should do?"
"What I would do in your situation is to find a safe place to sleep and guard your teammates. I wouldn't trust my usual abilities if I've had some unknown seals written on me by a potentially belligerent party and both teammates are unconscious. The Uchiha -Sasuke, if I recall correctly- has also had a seal written on him, though his chakra pathways seem normal to me. His coils have been rather forcibly enlarged for a fresh Genin, and his stores currently depleted, but his chakra pathways are otherwise normal. I'd guess he fought your opponent the hardest, right?" Seeing Sakura nod, Kabuto resumed his analysis. "Then he should be fine after some rest, as far as I can tell.
"Naruto also seems normal, though his chakra is fluctuating very wildly. He may have troubles with control, or he may not -again, I'm not quite sure what is normal for him. Perhaps the attacker has done something to him, or perhaps he just over exerted himself and temporarily depleted his reserves, which is possible if he's normally that inconsistent with his chakra. In any case, both of your teammates should be fine after resting, so I think that's what you should do. Is there anything else I can help you with? No? Well, then, I'm afraid I have to go meet my own teammates."
"Oh, right. I hope we didn't cause you trouble with your teammates!"
"Nah, it's alright. I'm just a bit late. Ja ne!"
Sakura reviewed Kabuto's analysis as the latter leapt away and found it sound. She was currently dealing with multiple unknown factors, including the seals inscribed on her own forearms. Her first goal would be finding an easily defensible shelter; even if she was reluctant to accept help and advice from the suspicious Genin, it was her only choice at the moment. Therefore, Sakura started lugging her teammates about, silently grumbling about their weight all the while. She was surprised to soon find an abandoned cave with sparse enough vegetation that she would be able to anticipate incoming attacks yet dense enough to properly hide snares all around the location.
The pink-haired Genin retrieved both her own as well as her teammates' equipment to set the trap. For once, she was happy that Naruto constantly kept the necessary components for setting pranks available ever since he'd set the trap for Kakashi on their first meeting. Sakura used one spool of chakra-reactive wire to rig the environment such that even genjutsu wouldn't hide incoming Genins from the poison-tipped senbon set on the far perimeter of their location. Around mid-way from the outer perimeter, Sakura interspersed the remaining senbon with kunais tagged with explosive seals. With the vegetation around, that distance was at about the edge of the audible range likely to wake up Sakura if she were sleeping in the cave. As she progressed even nearer the camp site, Sakura was once more thankful for Naruto's near-inexhaustible supply of spool, as she started setting up more traps. By the time she travelled back to her teammates' side, she was exhausted.
The Kyuubi, a demon of pure chakra, scourge of the world ever since its creation, the most powerful of all nine bijuu; the Kyuubi was confused. It had picked up the main thread of the fight through Naruto's subconscious, even if the details were a smudge fuzzy, just as it had dutifully made sure that Naruto didn't need any healing, ready to send out waves of chakra as soon as possible. However, all injuries were minor, and even despite the massive excess sent out the Kyuubi was left to sit on its haunches. Yet, suddenly, glowing chakra somehow pierced in from all around to react with the bars of the Kyuubi's prison and the very foundation of Naruto's chakra-scape. The earth bucked and heaved as a wild horse rejecting a saddle, the air blew blistering cold and scalding hot and ocean-wet and bone-dry all at once, and then everything grew white and even whiter until it muted all sound and all that was left was blinding blackness.
By the time everything settled down, the solid rock foundation that even the Kyuubi commended for its unshakable firmness, the very floor of Naruto's chakrascape was in constant turmoil, rippling like waves in the ocean, the walls rising and falling constantly to reveal more of the damnable bars holding the Kyuubi hitherto hidden within the cavern walls, and the ceiling itself shimmered like autumn leaves in a brisk wind. The most notable difference, however, was the addition of five columns of chakra: five solid constructs that spanned from the malleable ground up beyond even the Kyuubi's keen vision. The Bijuu knew that no mere human could ever hope to match it in sheer, raw power, yet even it was awed by the sight. As an experiment, the Kyuubi sent out tendrils of its demonic chakra out to heal the wounds Naruto certainly had to have sustained in order to accomodate these intrusions into his chakra pathway, and to its surprise, the entire mass of energy seeped across the bars. Just as the demon was about to celebrate, however, the five pillars darkened and power transcending even that of the Kyuubi's gathered before suddenly flinging the demonic chakra back to the Kyuubi, the backlash harsh enough to cow even one of its might.
However, instead of whimpering at the unexpected pain, the Kyuubi smirked. The bars were visibly scratched by the backlash and whereas the Kyuubi would heal its wounds, the bars would not.
Around midnight, Sakura was shaken awake by the rumblings of multiple explosions. Much to her dismay, the incoming party was barely fazed, if the continued progression of thumps was any indication. She had barely started to recover the chakra she had lost during the fight, and her trek through the forest with two unconscious teammates as luggage certainly did not help in relieving her fatigue. Even under normal circumstances, she would be a liability in a straight fight against enemy ninjas, as the role Kakashi had given her within Team Seven was that of support. Holding the enemy at bay without her teammates to deliver a mid-range finishing attack would be useless in this case. She could always rely on the ninja basics, which Kakashi did force on them, though she doubted their worth against a full team of ninjas. Nevertheless, she would have to suffice in confronting the other Genin team or teams: she was the last line of defense for her teammates. Hopefully, they wouldn't be quite as strong as Orochimaru.
'Tcha!' enthused her Inner Sakura. 'As if they could match a Sannin!' With a smirk, Sakura acknowledged the point. If her teammates could survive Orochimaru's onslaught, surely she could hold her own against true Genins.
Yet seconds later, Sakura found her resolve waning in the wake of trees collapsing like a house of cards -trees as large as her room in diameter and that seemed positively monstrous mere moments ago toppled like dominoes. Nonetheless, she could not afford to desert her teammates in their time of need. If these Genins (or were they?) came through to the cave despite the barrage of projectiles, surely they knew there were Genins inside the shelter. Evading the incoming party may save her own life, though the price of her teammates was too steep. Thus, Sakura now stood her ground, stubbornly entrenching her feet in the soil. She may be overpowered, but at least she'd give her teammates more time to recover.
And then the assailants came into view. Sakura could identify the opponents as Oto ninjas -in fact, the very same who had attacked Kabuto before the first test. Sakura recalled how one of the group had hurt Kabuto, despite his punch swaying wildly from the intended target. He had also implied that their abilities were all based on sound, which would make sense given Kabuto's punctured eardrums. Therefore, she'd have to stay on the lookout for unconventional attacks such as that one. If she were to avoid falling in the same state as Kabuto did, she'd have to make sure that she avoided punches completely. A plan of action to neutralize that particular Genin soon formed in her mind, though she would still have to account for his teammates.
The other male had carelessly displayed his abilities when approaching the camp -a rush of sound strong enough to knock down trees erupted from the apertures in his palms, by her analysis. He could be presumably defeated using Katon jutsu, given the strong similarity between his ability and Fuuton jutsus. Though Sakura had seen quite an arsenal of fire jutsus by this point, how well Sakura's meager Goukakyu would roar against with the strong winds was a source of worry that would have to be dealt with, and soon. Assuming Sakura could manage to either bluff or burn her way through, the sole remaining target would be the female of the Oto team. The kunoichi remained a mystery to Sakura. Hopefully, both males could be quickly defeated before Sakura had to deal with the remaining Oto Genin. From the way her fists were bunched, Sakura could guess that she held senbons, though how senbons related to sound was still a mystery to the pink-haired Genin. Nonetheless, if she could remove both of her teammates from the equation, it would considerably increase her chance.
Sakura carefully settled into a defensive stance. For her plan to work, it was imperative that the ninja with the sonic-disruptor contraption on his forearms attack first. Fortune smiled on Sakura: it seemed he had a rather short fuse and even shorter leash on his behavior.
"Hey, girlie, call out the Uchiha. We wanna play with him!"
"Really? You don't look old enough to even play in his sandbox. To tell the truth, Sasuke wouldn't bother playing with you even if I went to ask him. If you really want to play, though, I guess I might be willing. That is, if you ask nicely."
"Why, you!" Enraged, the Oto Genin almost leapt at Sakura before his teammates forcibly restrained him.
"Calm down, Dosu! It's obvious she wants you enraged."
"Tcha! As if I'd need a handicap when facing a weakling like him."
Dosu, who had slowed his struggling against his teammates, now shrugged off his teammates to stampede toward Sakura, snarling and nearly frothing at the mouth. He wouldn't let anyone call him weak and was prepared to make the pink-haired kunoichi pay for it! Which would have been the case, had he not completely misjudged Sakura's movements at the last minute. Somehow, it seemed that she moved to deflect the blow and suffer the sonic trail of his weapon before suddenly appearing inside his guard, a kunai in her hand. While a frantic whirl managed to prevent damage to internal organs, the kunai still grazed his skin, and that was sufficient for Sakura.
Before Dosu had fallen from the poison Sakura had coated over the kunai while exchanging barbs with Dosu, the pink-haired Genin had already initialized her calculated sequence and raced through the seven handseals for the Goukakyu. Whereas Sakura dispatched Dosu using a simple Academy Jutsu coupled with Genin-level technology, Sakura needed something far more substantial to reach the other shinobi and she was desperate enough to rely on the Goukakyu. Sasuke could easily throw fireball left and right as easily as he would kunais and thus Sakura learned something of the technique behind the jutsu, though Sakura's meager reserves would only allow sickly fireballs that invariably winked out of existence at the first challenge.
Yet with so much on the line, Sakura grit her teeth and settled into a strong stance. Even if she knew how weak her Goukakyu was, perhaps her enemy might prove too cautious to verify the actual strength of the jutsu. Thus, Sakura slipped in another kunai in-between her palms just before she raised her index and middle finger to her lips. She compressed all the chakra in her lungs to the air they held, and sent the rest of her chakra into her fingers, attempting to generate as much fire as she could. Sakura closed her eyes in anticipation of her failure before she blotted the thought out. Now was not the time for failure, not even in thought! She focused all of her mind into visualizing a roaring fireball. And then, when she imagine a fireball emerging from her fingers, Sakura released the air in her lungs with a puff and all her pent-up chakra in a spark springing from her right hand, feeling the recoil from the strain all the way down to her elbow. Much to her amazement, from her fingers sailed forth a fireball, a roaring, wreathing mass of plasma as furious and intimidating as she'd imagined. Sakura was so shocked that she almost forgot to throw her kunai in the trail of the Goukakyu.
While the ninja failed to associate the imminent danger of countering a fire jutsu as powerful as the Goukakyu with his sound blasts, his teammate quickly diverted his arms to the side to prevent a foolish action, thus vindicating Sakura's analysis. To her surprise, however, the few stray sound blasts that collided with the fireball did not fan the flames, but rather elicited a weak puff, one that Sakura had learned to associate with the dissipation of her attempts at performing the Goukakyu no Jutsu, even as the fireball marched straight forward to its target. However, instead of exploding in a shower of flames licking everything in its path, the roaring ball simply passed through the Oto ninja without causing any harm.
'A genjutsu?' wondered Sakura. Just as she was about to panic, however, the kunai flying in the shadow of the illusionary fire travelled forward. Whereas the weak flames of the true fire had been extinguished by stray winds, the kunai was merely sent on a tumbling path, one that ended with a collision between the blunt end of the kunai and the ninja's head. Instead of incapacitating her opponent by either incineration or unnamed puncture wounds, the kunai knocked her much more powerful opponent cleanly out of consciousness. If the situation hadn't been so stressful, Sakura might have laughed at the irony of it.
The sole remaining Oto ninja, however, was not impressed. "You know, my teammates were rather foolish. I'll admit that I'm weaker than they are, but you'll find me a much more difficult opponent. I won't be underestimating you as they did, now that I know what you can do."
"Tcha! You think that I've showed you my true abilities? You'd be the foolish one if you truly believed that."
"It's no use denying it, as I've already seen through your deception: your trump card is your tactical use of genjutsu. There's no way you could have maintained a fireball while throwing a kunai. Hmph! I'm not sure if Zaku saw through the ruse or if he was just being pig-headed, attacking a fire with a sound blast. After all, he must have seen that you used genjutsu to defeat Dosu as well."
Sakura nearly winced at kunoichi's analysis: even if some of her assumptions were off, the main points remained correct. However, as Sakura started to panic, she realized that her reaction must have been her opponent's intention, as it would better serve her purpose if she were to attack straight-on rather than divulging her knowledge. Thus, Sakura knew that this kunoichi was indeed more dangerous than her teammates, as she clearly had a plan of attack, one starting with a psychological taunt. Her knee-jerk reaction was to derail her opponent's plan by attacking immediately, though she stayed her hand even before a fist was formed. Talking might play into her opponent's scheme, but it would also gain recovery time for her teammates. This was far more important to her than the dubious advantage of first attack, especially when the opponent might be expecting it. "That's only partially true. My trump card isn't quite genjutsu, for instance. Would you care to try again?"
"It matter not what your trump card really is. You're clearly used to constraining opponents, probably with your teammates providing the final blow. Even if you do have other methods, which I highly doubt, they'll still be delaying or at best temporary handicapping methods. I, on the other hand, have a much more complete arsenal at my disposal."
"Well, good for you. I'm afraid, though, that you'll discover me with slightly more at my disposal than simple genjutsu or other containment techniques."
In truth, Sakura had also been slowly considering an uncommon maneuver. If she could get close enough, she might be able to get in one chakra-enhanced punch, and if she were to release the chakra all at once as Tsunade had done, the results would be devastating. If Naruto or even Sasuke were to attempt this maneuver, they were as likely to hurt themselves as the opponent from their inability to properly direct the chakra release. They would therefore favor focusing the chakra to enhance speed rather than impact. Sakura's meager reserves, on the other hand, would not enhance speed to any significant degree, though her control would allow a much more directed impact. Her lack of field trials with this maneuver was a worry, though: the only she'd ever manipulated chakra in a similar manner was when bashing Naruto's head. Sakura nonetheless proceeded with her preparations despite these shortcomings, as the results should be well worth it if she could achieve even a tenth of Tsunade's prodigious strength through this method.
The first step, one that even books detailed, was collecting chakra near the impact area yet far enough to allow for acceleration. Tsunade was known to activate the jutsu instantly. Sakura however lacked both the reserves as well as the experience to do so. She therefore compensated by pooling chakra into her forearm long before the blow was thrown, pushing as much as she could without letting the strain show on her face.
It seemed that however much she had collected would have to suffice, as the Oto Genin now tightened her fists, light glinting off the senbons clenched between her knuckles. Sakura was upon her in an eyeblink, leading with a kunai in her right hand. As expected, the Oto kunoichi evaded to Sakura's right, in just the right place for Sakura to follow through her motion by launching a reverse-kick with her left foot. Sakura's opponent ducked the kick, just as Sakura had hoped. It was then that the Oto ninja smirked, and Sakura's carefully planned offensive unraveled. The Oto Genin flicked open her palm and Sakura twisted to the side to avoid senbons, only to notice that they had never been thrown. And the world spun out of control.
Sakura was vaguely aware of the kunoichi -Kin, by her speech- gloating over Sakura, pompously relating how Oto would become greater than Leaf, the supposedly greatest of the Five Elemental Nations, and how she would beat the last Uchiha even if Sasuke had awakened the legendary Sharingan, and how the leader of Oto would become revered as the very first Otokage. With most opponents, such gloating would have been safe, if on the wasteful side. However, the chakra Sakura had concentrated in her hand now seeped into the seal, and Sakura could feel that the chakra had somehow not dissipated. Once she was accustomed enough to move her limbs, Sakura struck the ground with all of the pent-up chakra released in a focused burst. The results were devastating.
Trees were uprooted and Kin stumbled as the very earth beneath her groaned and churned open, falling face-first into the crater Sakura created and losing her senbons in the process. Immediately, Sakura was on her, launching a slew of kunai that kept her dodging left and right, unwilling to let Kin disorient her once more. Unfortunately, her experiment with exploding-chakra punches also had an unexpected side-effect: it woke Zaku from his slumber. The latter took advantage of Sakura's inattention to slip behind her and charge up his most intense blast of sound yet. When it was ready, he nodded to Kin, who nimbly cartwheeled away from a trio of shurikens right before Zaku unleashed his attack.
"Zankuha!"
Author's note: A big "thank you" to all the reviewers, even if I don't respond to them (especially Salamander Hanzo, to whom I haven't responded yet despite having posted an entertaining yet puzzling poem as a review for Chapter 8/9). Once again, if you have criticisms, please feel free to share them with me. I might disagree or I might not, but I can assure you that I won't be offended.