AN: Note that I do not own Naruto, Naruto Shippuden, or any of the characters from either Anime. This work is a fanfiction written out of my love for the series and not in any attempt to make a profit.
Proofread by: Me, as a result of writing this right before uploading, and both of my proofreaders unavailable.
I apologize for the delayed upload of this chapter, as I found myself unhappy with it and worked on it until I felt it would be worth uploading for others to read. It is becoming a bit harder to feel satisfied with what I write without proofreaders to reassure me about things that I am uncertain about or point out what should be changed.
Chapter 20: The laws of the Kekkei Genkai
Team seven were all staring, their mouths agape at the explanation Kakashi had given them about what Sakura's new status as a Kekkei Genkai wielder entailed.
"Y-you mean to tell me that I can't be a Shinobi anymore?" Sakura asked, sounding crushed while Naruto immediately grew annoyed. If he saw those council members, he would have a few choice words with them. Meanwhile, Sasuke was glad that due to his predecessors already having dealt with the laws concerning the preservation of Kekkei Genkai, he was safe from being forced to give up the Shinobi lifestyle. Although, knowing that his death meant the Uchiha clan could be restored within a generation was a weight off his back. He could now earnestly pursue his quest for revenge without having to worry about his clan going extinct in case he ended up dying together with Itachi.
"Not exactly. That's what the laws are mostly meant for, but due to some circumstances, you have a few laws that can, if certain conditions are met, allow you to remain on team seven. To preserve the new Kekkei Genkai, and allow the village to acquire more individuals with the Kekkei Genkai, the original wielder will usually be taken off of active duty if they are a Shinobi. However, there are other ways, like the ones the Uchiha used to make sure that Sasuke's situation allows him to freely pursue his own path as a Shinobi, regardless of those laws, as his clan can be restored without him." Kakashi explained, clarifying what he had meant. "If you manage to do well enough to advance to the third exam, I imagine it will turn things in your favor," Kakashi added with an eye-smile, before looking back towards the Hokage for a moment. "We will have to talk a bit more after the preliminaries, and you'll have to get checked out in the hospital as well for a proper understanding of your Kekkei Genkai," Kakashi added, before body flickering back down from the balcony, saying something to the Hokage before body flickering right back over to them. "For now, let's enjoy the preliminaries." He suggested with an eye-smile, gesturing towards Tenten and Gaara.
"Dammit, of all times for him to drop this on us!" Inner raged in Sakura's mind, making her sigh as she turned towards the two first combatants. She disliked the pressure her Sensei had put on them as well, but if she had gotten him correctly, it was his own way to encourage her, and motivate her to do better. Looking back, she could see that she had been slacking, hard, compared to Sasuke and Naruto. The only reason she had even been able to stand on even footing with them during this exam had been because of the awakening of her Kekkei Genkai. She didn't want to rely on it like a clutch, which meant she would have to do her best. Now, with the added incentive to keep her right to pursue her dreams, she would have to do her best. Looking down at her hands, Sakura frowned but resolved herself not to hold anything back. If she had to kill her opponent, she would, even if it was regrettable.
Inner Sakura, feeling her resolve wordlessly passed Sakura's share of energy back to her. Sakura felt the energy flood her body like a warm summer breeze. Although, while it was an overall pleasant feeling, she could also feel it occasionally sparking inside of her, as if giving off static shocks every now and then. "W-what is this?" Sakura asked Inner, bewildered about the change.
"It's been like this since we entered the tower. I don't know what's causing it, but it gets slightly worse whenever I use chakra, presumably the same goes for you. I can keep the feeling at bay during our fight, but I think we should be cautious with our chakra usage." Inner explained, sounding miffed about the situation.
"So, what? We don't use any chakra then?" Sakura asked, frowning even more than she had been previously. This would complicate her fight even more.
"No, I didn't say that. Just, don't overuse chakra, and don't rely too much on the energy." Inner told her before they were both suddenly struck by the same thought.
"You don't think…" Sakura began, only to hear Inner outright laugh.
"Idiot, of course, I do. We share our thoughts, remember?" Inner reminded her, making Sakura frown.
"I don't feel that's true. I don't think I can always tell what you're thinking. Is it because you're part of me, but I'm not part of you?" She wondered, only to feel Inner disagree immediately.
"That's not quite right. Sakura, I can keep my thoughts from intruding upon yours, but nothing is stopping either of us from listening to the other. All you need to do is focus." Inner corrected her, urging Sakura to give it a try through their connection. Doing just that, Sakura mentally grabbed onto the mental connection to her inner self, finding it immediately, not even having realized she could do so until she tried, and found herself suddenly assaulted by an increase of thoughts, impressions, feelings, and sensations at once, making her gasp out loud and hold her head as she was overwhelmed. Letting go of the connections, she realized that while she had been overwhelmed, it hadn't actually been painful.
"Sakura! Are you alright?" Naruto asked, worrying about her. While the sound of Lee and Guy cheering Tenten on was heard from where they stood nearby, being loud enough that Naruto had to raise his voice, and keep his hands on his ears.
"I'm fine. Just surprised myself." She tried to assure him, only to see that he wasn't entirely convinced. "I'm fine!" She insisted, raising her voice slightly and glaring at him. Kakashi didn't say anything, but his one visible eye was strained on what remained of the curse mark on her arm, looking for any sign of it activating.
"Okay, okay." Naruto gave in, backing off from her, although he was still somewhat concerned as he turned back to look at the match that was about to begin. Sasuke spared Sakura a brief, worried glance as well, but didn't say anything.
Sakura, on the other hand, while physically looking down at where Tenten and Gaara were about to begin fighting, turned her attention back to Inner. "You could have warned me!" She complained, to which Inner simply responded by cracking up and laughing.
"I could, but why ruin the experience?" She answered in between laughs, before finally calming down while Sakura fumed at her. "Sorry, but I had to. That's kind of how I feel all the time, I had the reverse experience when I took control of our body from you. Thought it'd be a good idea to have you experience it at least once." Inner explained, and while Sakura wasn't pleased with it, she could understand her reasoning, even if it could have been handled better. She'd hate to dislike a part of herself after all.
"So, about what we thought of earlier…?" Sakura tried to bring them back on topic, to which Inner sighed in annoyance.
"Yeah, even if molding chakra with this energy is the answer, we shouldn't try and do it while we know so little about it. Especially with how it is currently behaving when we use chakra. We need to wait until after the preliminaries." Inner explained, rather annoyed with the idea herself.
"At least it is just one fight at least. We should be able to handle it." Sakura tried to be positive, thankfully feeling Inner agreeing with her, feeling her nod, despite no physical movement taking place.
"I wonder who we'll end up fighting," Sakura said out loud, getting a shrug from Sasuke, while Naruto smiled.
"It doesn't matter, no matter who it is, we'll crush them!" Naruto said confidently, and Sakura couldn't help but smile at his enthusiasm and confidence, while she felt Inner Sakura sigh again and shake her head at Naruto's antics.
"And if we end up fighting each other? Idiot." Inner commented in their mind, making Sakura frown at the thought. Having to fight her own team… no matter how it went, the aftermath would be ugly.
"Now then, please begin," Hayate told Tenten and Gaara, starting their fight.
As soon as the match began, everyone found themselves disappointed as the only thing happening was Tenten putting some distance between herself and Gaara. Only the more seasoned Jonin, Chuunin Proctors, and the Hokage noted how well of a position Tenten had put herself in, putting her neither too close nor too far away from her opponent, at an ideal distance for both offense and defense. However, from there on, neither Tenten nor Gaara made any further moves, and a dead silence overtook the room, as both of them waited for the other to make a move.
"What… are they waiting for?" Naruto asked, a little bewildered. "Didn't they hear that they could begin?" He asked out loud, getting a sigh from Sakura.
"They're watching their opponents for openings. Unlike you who can just charge people with your shadow clones, they can't risk getting hurt frivolously." Sakura explained to him. Although, while she understood the idea they both had, she had to admit that it was rather annoying that both of them had decided to be stubborn and not be the first one to attack.
"Whatever you do, you won't succeed. Come at me." Gaara told Tenten, trying to bait her as he severely doubted she could hurt him.
Realizing there was no point in waiting for him to attack her instead, Tenten decided to listen and attack first. "Well, you said it, I won't hold back!" Tenten retorted, jumping into the air and launching four shuriken at Gaara with one hand. Gaara didn't even seem to react to them as the cork on his gourd popped off on its own, and sand spilled out of it, moving on its own volition as it intercepted all four shuriken with ease, surprising Tenten, as well as all the spectators besides Gaara's teammates who simply smirked in satisfaction at the other's reactions.
Landing back on the ground, Tenten brought out more shuriken, this time holding four in each hand before launching them all at once, letting them arch in the air to try and hit Gaara by outmaneuvering his sand. Unfortunately, Tenten quickly discovered that his sand seemingly was still more than enough to keep her shuriken away.
"Is that all?" Gaara taunted, rather bored as he didn't consider simple projectiles as a threat.
"I'm just getting started!" Tenten shouted back, a little annoyed by how Gaara was easily handling her attacks while looking as if he wasn't even trying. Fed up with his display of how casually he could defend against her attacks.
Switching things up, Tenten drew a set of kunai instead, skillfully wrapping explosive tags around them as she did, hiding the action with her speed and skill before she threw the kunai, expecting them to be blocked like before.
Just as expected, Gaara's sand once again blocked the kunai from hitting Gaara, only this time, he was immediately covered from sight by the explosion resulting from the thrown kunai exploding, making Tenten smirk as her plan worked. After all, if hitting your opponent directly with pinpoint attacks didn't work, hitting them with large area attacks in their vicinity was a reasonable alternative.
Unfortunately, as the smoke from the explosion cleared, Tenten couldn't help but drop her jaw in surprise as Gaara stood there, unharmed. Glaring at Tenten, his sand suddenly rose around him despite Tenten no longer throwing anything at him and then began rapidly moving towards her as Gaara began to retaliate.
"Sand controlling Jutsu… but that leaves you vulnerable!" Tenten exclaimed, thinking that if he was focusing on attacking her with his sand, he'd be too late to protect himself as well as the sand got farther away from his body, as only the sand moving towards her seemed to animate, while the sand by his own feet remained still.
Grabbing a storage scroll, Tenten avoided a wave of sand and jumped into the air to escape it, unfurling the storage scroll while spinning it around herself, reaching out with her hand and letting it brush against the seals on the scroll's surface, summoning weapons which she immediately chucked at Gaara.
Unfortunately, Tenten had been mistaken, as while the sand below her shot up to catch her, the sand around Gaara once again began moving, easily intercepting her weapons. "Useless," Gaara informed her before his sand caught her mid-air.
With a quick set of hand seals, Tenten was replaced by a cloud of smoke, revealing a cut block of stone in the same color as the floor, before it was swallowed by the sand. Gaara, not caring to look for where Tenten had gone, let the sand fall to the ground and waited, before hearing the sound of the air being cut through by another barrage of weapons, raining down from above on his left side. Unimpressed, he let his sand once more, block the barrage effortlessly.
"I told you, it is useless," Gaara repeated himself, not even bothering to turn and look at her.
"Tenten! Don't be let your opponent get to you!" Lee shouted from his spot up on the balcony, trying to encourage his teammate, swaying Tenten to give it her all.
"How is he doing that?" Naruto asked in disbelief at the display of what seemed to be incredible chakra control.
"I don't know, he isn't using any hand signs to control that sand, and it moves so fast," Sakura observed, impressed by the rather eerie kid, who for his age was showing incredible skills for a Genin, in her opinion at least.
"Didn't work either, huh?" Tenten asked herself, surprised he had managed to block her attack, even as she attacked from outside of his visual range. Hearing Lee's attempt to encourage her, she smirked, while regretfully deciding to use the ace she had been saving for the actual, third exam. "In that case, I guess I really have to use "that", "She muttered to herself before taking out a pair of storage scrolls this time, ready to use her strongest technique.
AN: I'll be honest. I am not entirely happy with this chapter. Despite taking some additional time to work on it and uploading it late, I can't find quite the right flare to add to the fight. There's little to no exposition I can give, as was done in canon because Kankuro isn't there to provide Naruto with the information. At best, I can only have Naruto asking questions that Sakura could hypothesize about, but it still feels… lazy in a way. Postponing the chapter more than once today, I have finally managed to make it feel a bit more to my own tastes. I believe that the quality might be suffering without the support and motivation my proofreaders usually provide me. If that is the case, I might come back to edit this chapter a whole lot. If I do, I will make sure to mention it in the AN of a future chapter.