The stadium in Konoha was buzzing with the excited crowd, after all, nothing got people excited like watching teenagers engage in battles using lethal techniques to determine which were good enough to be promoted so they could kill more people in the line of duty for the honour of their country.
But regardless or any lingering moral questions, the great and the good of the world were sitting and ready to see what the next generation of shinobi were able to do. Eight contestants in a pyramid style tournament. Seven matches, one overall winner.
Currently, seven of the eight contestants were standing at the centre of the stadium in a loose line. The one who was missing was causing the crowd to become agitated. The star performer hadn't shown up yet, and his absence was loudly felt.
Naruto watched all of this from a position in the high, dark rafters under the roof stadium. He'd crawled up there after watching his target, and was now going to watch his every move, ready to strike if necessary.
Oddly enough, he was due to be fighting the missing Uchiha. Naruto knew that Kakashi wasn't an idiot, and probably just had a dramatic entrance planned. It fit with his personality. If he didn't turn up, his job became a lot harder.
That meant other contests were going to happen first. Not that they mattered to him. Unless the two competitors, a dark haired boy and a girl with a fan, were going to do anything spectacular, he would be watching his target.
He noted the fan down as something slightly interesting. It was useful for wind jutsu, but he could see the disadvantages. That was a weapon you could get too attached to, not good at all. He knew how he would kill her if he needed to.
He kept his focus on his target, the boy was sitting there in the dugout for the competitors, ignoring everyone else and holding his head every so often and talking to himself. The other competitors seemed to be keeping their distance from him.
Naruto chalked this up as just another eccentricity people had. Everyone else seemed to be staying away from him however, so maybe there was something more.
Eventually the match happening in the arena came to an end, and there was some applause.
From what he had seen, the dark haired boy might be someone he could get along with. Possibly. He was a thinker and had won without using a big flashy move. He used shadows. Naruto made a mental note to try and obtain some of those jutsu. They could be useful for him.
The next two genin walked out to fight. Naruto realised one of them was Baka. The boy looked nervous, shifting his weight from foot to foot as he waited to begin.
His opponent was a Hyuuga, and Naruto briefly looked around the arena to see if any more were watching. He saw a stern faced man next to a girl he recognised as Hinata.
He swiftly shut off his own Byakugan when Hinata looked close to his direction.
When he turned it back on again when the fight started, the girl was looking at him. She looked scared. But she raised a hand and waved slightly at him before looking back to the fight, clearly concerned with the outcome.
The fact she wasn't nudging the man next to her and pointing was probably a good sign. In fact, her response was illogical in every way to him.
He dismissed the thought and focused on his mission, checking back on Gaara, nothing was really happening with him.
Baka wasn't doing very well. The strikes of the Hyuuga boy were keeping him on the defensive, chakra charged fingers knocking kunai strikes aside with ease. Then a gasp ran around the assembled crowd as he heard Baka yell something loudly.
The boy's body was beginning to glow with an odd aura, a pale golden glow that seemed to clothe him loosely. It was difficult to describe with the naked eye.
With the benefit of the Byakugan however, Naruto could see clearly what was happening. The chakra around him was forming the basic outline of a figure around him, a loose ghost-like entity. He could have sworn it had wings. The figure glowed a weak gold, and whilst it had his shape, it was more powerful than his frame. It was eerily familiar though.
As baka moved, so did the being around him, striking forwards with a glowing fist. The Hyuuga boy saw it and dodged the entity and swept out a leg at Baka's feet.
Baka leapt and his hand and the figures behind him struck downwards.
They met the dome of spinning chakra the Hyuuga generated hard and Naruto found the spray of chakra it generated to be almost as mesmerising as the chakra charged sand.
It ended with both boys panting before the Hyuuga rose and moved to strike again.
He turned his gaze back to Gaara as the proctor ended the fight . Now he would get to see his target in action.
And on cue, Kakashi reappeared with Sasuke.
Naruto actually found his pulse rising slightly as Sasuke stood opposite his target. Although he always planned for the worst, which was that Sasuke died almost immediately when his target went all out, he found himself wondering if he would be needed. The premise of a possible need for action at any moment felt electric through his veins.
The fight was exactly the kind of fight he wouldn't have fought. Sasuke was being quick but obvious, almost as if he wanted his opponent to know he was good. He wasn't fighting effectively, but it was oddly working.
Both fighters were holding back. But why would you do that Naruto reckoned. If you had an opportunity to kill your opponent, or take them down if not kill, then you took it.
A tendril of sand put an end to the early jousting, tossing Sasuke away from his stationary opponent. Then he watched as Sasuke gathered lightning chakra around his hand from some distance back.
He could have sworn he heard someone in the crowd state that it was a powerful assassination jutsu. He almost physically retched at the idea. That thing was not an assassination jutsu. It was a killing jutsu, but not an assassination jutsu. Try to assassinate someone with that and you attracted the attention of guards. It was too slow, it was too bright and it was too loud.
He looked back at his target, ignoring the glow of the chakra from the show-off Uchiha. He had encased himself fully in his sand, rendering himself completely out of sight to Naruto.
He readied the bow, slotting a bolt with an explosive tag wrapped around it tightly into the slide. It had taken a couple of months in the Root training halls to perfect the attachment method, but he had done it eventually. He'd never actually had to use it before, his kills being markedly less showy than explosions.
Still, this time it might be necessary. If all else failed he just wouldn't activate the tag.
Sasuke charged, down the wall and straight at the ball.
Spikes extended from it, nearly impaling the Uchiha, who stopped with his face mere millimetres from the end of a spike.
His hand had punctured the dome and he staggered, gagging at the smell. His hand was clamped by sand that focused on him.
Naruto focused only on the opening dome of chakra. His target was holding his shoulder and looking at his own blood-soaked hand. The sand was moving slowly for Sasuke, his arm held in place, unable to escape. Gaara was focused only on him. He could feel the bloodlust pouring off him.
He saw the signs of a genjutsu falling into the arena like feathers. The attack was beginning.
He fired.
The sand moved on its own to try and stop to speeding bolt, but in its hardened state, with its wielder shocked by the pain, it broke before the speeding metal bolt, fractured into two chunks. The hardened steel bolt kept going.
The bolt rammed home into the boys neck, shattering the weakened armour. He screamed in agony but he wasn't dead. Jinchuuriki did not go down that easily.
No chances. The tag detonated.
The chakra laced explosion obscured Naruto's vision enough for him to get moving to a different spot for sniping, using the 360 degree vision to see what was happening.
Sasuke was staring in shock and ninja were running everywhere. Of all sides. The smoke had cleared enough for Naruto to see that his target was dead. Not many people got up without heads in his experience. The tag had done its work and dramatically widened the puncture from the bolt.
Mission done, he decided to see how many other unsuspecting enemies he could help to kill during the battle. After all, he was a shinobi and his village was under attack.
He felt his pulse rise again and controlled his breathing to keep his aim steady as he rolled into the next cover position. In the dark of the room, he aimed and fired at an enemy in a Suna flak jacket who had his back turned.
One.
The next kill came a few minutes later, another careless foe in dark clothing who was trying to strip a corpse when he thought he wasn't visible.
Two.
He lay on the roof and watched constantly for targets. And behind him. Being able to see behind and in front of you at the same time really helped when you were a sniper.
He saw a small group of Suna shinobi running down the street, and moved to the roof. He leapt over the street, and fired a bolt directly beneath him. It thudded into the street at their feet and he detonated the explosive tag attached to it.
Five, the sixth one was merely badly hurt. He turned and finished the man with a bolt to the heart.
Six.
He rolled on the roof into cover. He realised that last move had been a little too showy for his taste. He realised that felt good. Very good. He wanted to shout some battle-cry about his actions.
He once again stopped in the roof shadows to control his heartbeat. He had to think clearly.
This was a situation unlike any he'd found himself in before. The heat of battle, enemies everywhere, and no specific target. Just enemies to kill.
He peered out from his cover to see what was happening below. Leaf shinobi were beginning to re-gather and were sweeping the attackers back.
He needed to get higher. The Hokage Tower loomed in the distance. A perfect vantage spot.
He moved from roof to roof. There was some fighting up here as well.
Whilst a normal army was limited to the streets, with occasional parties with bows heading to the rooftops, a shinobi could walk up walls. They weren't much of an obstacle.
Some of the more creative foes, and similarly minded Leaf-nin had taken their battles to the rooftops as well. Freed from the confines of walls and the majority of other people, they were able to use just about every destructive thing in their arsenal.
Naruto ducked under a fire jutsu which had missed its intended target as he took the most direct route possible to the tower.
He glanced back at the stadium, seeing the great purple barrier atop a nearby building. That must be where the Hokage fought.
Still, he couldn't help there. He heard a yell, and ducked a kunai.
A Suna ninja with a cloth wrapped over his head charged at him, a wickedly curved katana in hand. The man leapt into a powerful thrust, which Naruto glanced aside with his own blade.
He rolled under as the man's momentum took him forwards, dropping the tanto blade and making hand seals. He activated his technique as the man landed.
The man turned as the genjutsu took effect. His face twitched as the horrifying vision filled his mind. He quickly dispelled the illusion and ducked on instinct.
The kunai clipped his hair as it went passed. He moved forwards again at Naruto.
The blades clashed again. He had learned not to give Naruto time, and pressed his advantage.
Strength and experience won out, and the katana hit home, digging into Naruto's shoulder with the crack of a collar bone fracturing from the impact and the squelch of flesh.
The tanto fell from his hands, and the explosive tag in his other hand exploded.
Naruto kept moving as the clone's memories reached him. His shoulder ached with sympathetic pain caused by the clones memories, and he winced as it faded.
It was something he'd learned quickly about the shadow clone jutsu. Provided you had good control of it, the clone could be surprisingly durable. They could bleed, they could stall, and they could take more than a few knocks before holding the body intact was too much.
But the clones transferred memories. This was normally fine if you were training or could cancel the clone in time to avoid its death pain.
But if you forced one to hold on, or rather instructed the clone to hold on to a reasonable lever...the pain came back with it. It had been part of his training. He could do some exercises in the Root halls, whilst his clone was sent to the specialists in another room.
A couple of hours later, when he had completed the exercise, he would go to a meditation room. They'd then finish up the clone, and Naruto would have the memories. All of them.
It had been the hardest part of his training. It had taken three years for him not to scream when the memories came back.
He'd managed it in the end. He could repress the memories.
Then he felt that he was being hunted again. Someone must have spotted him, he searched the area with his Byakugan and saw the chakra building in the fan before it became a speeding gale of razor sharp wind.
He threw himself from the cover as the wind jutsu tore into the roof. He jumped back through the hole to avoid the second one.
He felt glad that the house had been evacuated when the tournament started. This was likely to get messy.
He used what little time he had to draw any blinds that weren't drawn before moving downstairs as his assailant landed down through the hole he had come in by.
"Come here and die you bastard!"
The female voice rang through the house. He would certainly not be coming out to die. He slid into a cupboard under the stairs.
"You killed him. I know it was you. I saw you fire the bow. You didn't have to kill him."
There was the sound of furniture smashing and a wall collapsing upstairs. They were definitely angry. He could see the outline of a person and the wind chakra coursing through the fan they held. It was the girl from the fight in the arena he had barely watched.
At least he knew how to fight her. She'd made a mistake following him into the house.
They were playing by his rules now. In the open, he would have died or been forced to flee.
She finished demolishing the upstairs and he heard the slow careful footsteps on the stairs above him. He primed the next shot and waited until the footfall was above him.
The bolt tore through the wood and carpet of the stairs and he heard the thunk of impact. He rolled out of the cupboard and dove into another room as he heard the yell of pain.
His brain strained to work out what he was seeing with his eyes looking in different directions. The Byakugan was looking behind him, focused on his target. His normal one was focused on the world ahead of him. His bolt, fired through the stairs had deviated enough to hit the girl in the shoulder. She had just pulled the bolt out.
He heard the smash of the fan hitting the stairs to reveal his former hiding spot.
Naruto worked on his options as he shut the blinds in the room he was in, trying to create as much darkness as he could. He realised the staircase was in the centre of the house, the other rooms forming a ring around it.
Perfect.
He watched his target get to the bottom of the stairs, holding her shoulder in pain.
"You killed my brother. You killed him like a coward!"
If coward meant he was intelligent, then he was a coward. Still, not time to think about that.
He shifted into another room and shut the blinds there. He picked up a book from a shelf and threw it into the room he had come from.
He moved round into the next room as the gust of wind slammed into the room and tore it apart. He found himself in a kitchen. His target was staying put, struggling to hold the heavy metal fan properly with only one good arm.
She moved into the destroyed area to find no trace.
He only needed to hear the roar of frustration and the sound of her slamming the fan into something in the house.
He picked up a chopstick from a counter and tossed it through the staircase hallway into a room he hadn't been in.
The girl moved quickly to the area to find nothing there.
"Come out! Come out and fight me!"
The voice was different, it was panicked, and it was higher pitched. He tossed another stick onto the stairs. It was working, and his target was afraid.
He didn't know fear himself, but he'd seen it. He shuddered at the memories, but he knew its effects.
She ran out and began to move upstairs. She turned half-way up, realising her mistake.
Naruto fired the bow at her heart.
The fan came up open to try and stop the projectile, but she didn't quite raise it in time. It ricocheted off the open edge into her good shoulder.
She cried out in agony as she dropped the fan and tried to pull the bolt out, but both arms were badly injured. The heavy fan crashed down the stairs, splintering wood as it went.
He wasn't wasting time, and leapt over its fall with the tanto to finish his work.
She saw him and screamed. He tried to block the noise out as he leapt forwards, blade outstretched to slam into her chest. The scream turned to a gurgle as blood trickled from her mouth.
"You...killed...Gaara. Bas...tard."
He twisted the blade and she was silent. He pulled it out and cleaned it on her clothes. He realised he was trembling.
He tried to get back to the rooftops but collapsed at the top of the stairs. He dragged himself into an undamaged room. His limbs were shaking violently, and felt less like his than someone elses.
He slumped into the corner and tried to throw up his shadow genjutsu. All he ended up throwing up was his stomach contents. There wasn't much of it. He barely noticed the smell that splashed over his cloak that he wrapped even more tightly around himself.
He focused, and his trembling hands just about formed the hand seals. His corner became darker, hiding in the destroyed house, a hidden chakra pulse in the midst of a battleground.
He knew he should be getting up and continuing to fight. At least he did somewhere deep inside in. Right now he knew he just had to stay quiet and repress. Repress. Repress.
He pulled his cloak over him still further and visually becoming nothing. Then he tried to forget the scream. Her face was back. The face, the face of the maid. Her face.
He blacked out and dreamed of a face contorted into a scream in splashing blood red vision. The face of a ghost.