AN: So I had some time to sit down, read and fix up this chapter not only to find that it was god awful and nigh unreadable, but that it was also had an unfinished scene that I must've either forgotten about or ended up at the bottom of the old version of this my confusion of restoring chapters. Anyhow, hopefully, this reads much better and actually makes sense, unlike the other one.

Arc 3 part 2
Chapter Title: Tournament Arc

We trained for a solid two months on our chakra natures, it was just before we got really into it that Asuma Sensei came to us and mentioned the Chuunin Exams in passing being about two weeks ago he had come to us again and said we were being nominated for them and as a team, we'd need to come to a conclusion about whether or not we joined them this time around. The exams were scheduled to happen a month from when he told us that, but right now we had something like two weeks. Normally they were meant to be every six months but sometimes they ran every six to eight months, so we had a lot of time to work on our teamwork and other skills, though our teamwork needed to get better, me and Sasuke had figured out some combination moves that involved his fire Jutsu and my wind, we just needed to work Hinata into them more because her style made it hard to fit in with how we fought.

Basically we ended up spending that first few weeks working on our teamwork and combination attacks, we managed to get two whole team ones down with several between two of us, my biggest concern at this point wasn't our skill and output but rather the possibility of Orochimaru and what that entailed for us in our time doing the exam. I mean the man can summon a fucking enormous snake, along with all those A-rank and up Jutsu he plays with like candy or the fact that he can resurrect the dead. That's probably the scarier part but, eh.

Today though I was sparring with Sasuke.

I brought my Nodachi down in a heavy strike that the Uchiha nimbly dodged backward in a flip, in seconds I sheathed the oversized sword and pushed forward rushing the hand seals for the Jutsu I'd been working on "Wind Style: Wind Bullet!" I said firing them off, Sasuke dodged again, in return he ran through his seemingly favourite set of hand seals "Fire Style: Great Fire Ball!" the enormous flame crashed into the ground releasing its insane heat in a huge burst. I barely dodged the scorching heat as I flung myself to the left of it, I ran through more hand seals "Wind Style: Vacuum Sphere Projectile!" the beams of air shot out and cut up the forest behind Sasuke, he slid to the side cartwheeling out of the Jutsu's spread and rushed me, he was in my face in moments, his fist would have impacted on my jaw and sent me flying but, I had experience with fast opponents. My head flicked backward out of his punch and I planted my foot in his abdomen pushing away.

I stumbled after tripping over a tree root the was poking out of the ground before I could move again Sasuke had recovered and was over me with a kunai at my throat.

"I give," I said raising my hands in defeat.

"Heh," he grinned lending his hand and pulling me up.

"Good match you two! You're both improving a lot!" Sensei said coming over to us, he threw both of us a bottle of water.

"Good one Sasuke, I didn't think your fireballs had gotten that big I barely dodged it! Though I think you should try to get faster like maybe that Zabuza guys apprentice, seeing as he was like insanely fast, it might be a good goal for where you want to get." I complimented and suggested dusting myself off.

"Yeah well I hadn't realized how far you've come with the wind Jutsu' I still thought you couldn't do them properly. I could look into weights maybe…" He replied, though the last part for himself I think.

"Y-you b-both did great!" Hinata said giving us a smile.

"Thanks, Hinata," I bumped Sasuke's shoulder trying to get him to thank her.

"Hn" was what we got.

"I'm really impressed with all of your progress I feel confident in your abilities going into the Exams," Asuma said with a happy look.

"There's something I want to do with you all today though, while you're all getting really good probably better than I was at your age, I'm going to need you all to brush up on your medical knowledge and just make sure you can treat wounds properly so you can make this exam easier on yourselves," Sensei said throwing medical textbooks at us, they looked familiar to me. He also gave us a med pack filled with all the essentials.

"I've read this," I said out loud at the realization after flicking through the first few pages.

"You have?" Sasuke asked with an incredulous look.

"Yeah, I did, it's been a long time though. I read it because my mother said if I wanted to become a ninja I needed to know how to patch people up when there wasn't a medic-nin on hand." Man, she really thought ahead for this, more than me anyway.

"Well, I guess you'll just be doing revisions then" Sensei replied with a thoughtful look.

As such we spent the rest of the next couple hours in our own little book club reading, the refresh of information was nice though I had forgotten a decent chunk of it, I think Hinata didn't need to read it anyway because I was sure the Hyuuga would know the Human body inside out because of their fighting style and all. She seemed enthused to read it anyway, maybe the Hyuuga forbid her from reading this sort of stuff because it was improper? Sounds dumb. I went on to add notes to a new notebook I had gotten after I filled in the last one, I decided to write some of this one in English so I could keep some details to myself like the Massacre I wanted to write about what I remembered around it, or basically, all the messed up stuff Danzo incited throughout the show, I don't remember too much and I hadn't gotten any memory barrages recently so I was stuck for what I could remember.

I remembered enough to know how Shisui got his Mangekyou and the reason behind why the poor kid killed himself, it made me sad to think about it, I guess it really resonated with me or something like that since I could remember it after thirteen years or so. Thinking about it made me look at Sasuke for a bit just sort of staring off into the distance just past him, a glum look washed over my face the more I thought about it, I wanted to meet Itachi – I think anyway. He seemed interesting enough.

"So, Takezou how have you been keeping up your Kenjutsu since becoming a Genin?" Aunty Ume asked as she played with her daughter and my sister, I after training I had come home to my mother telling me to watch my sister while she was with my Aunt and niece.

"I've been doing alright probably not as much as I should be, but I've been focusing on Jutsu and enhancing my sword with wind chakra lately," I said as I idly noted down some ideas for things in my notebook.

"How about when you do the Chuunin Exams since I know they're coming up, if you make it to the one on one round I'll take you under my wing exclusively for the month and give you the rest of the training you'll need at your level? whilst you can mostly keep up with me when I'm using something like half or maybe a quarter of my full strength, it would probably be better for you to- you know? training at a higher level in case your forced against some person that's way above your pay grade that hasn't been promoted somehow." She motioned her hand around making Irisu giggle.

"That… Sounds awesome, yeah I'd love that!" I was looking forward to that then, I enjoyed my time with Ume, despite everything she was fun to spar and talk with.

"I was gonna drag you off to it if you said no anyway, but it's easy to have you cooperate," She said with a sly look.

I'd say it was concerning that she'd just kidnap me if I'd said no but, Ume had been like this since the moment I met her, she often did the same thing while I was at the Academy. I watched as my niece and sister fumbled around one another while Aunty acted as their jungle gym, she laughed away as the two tried their hardest to conquer the mountain that was her torso. I watched them like this for ten or so minutes before Dad came into the living room and got my attention before motioning for me to follow him.

I followed him down the hall into his study that was sort of a library with a desk and two chairs in it, the shelves of books were mostly his and Mums except for an entire case that had all the novels and whatnot that I had read over the years. I sat down in the chair opposite Dad as he sat at the desk after closing the door, he pulled out a book and started jotting something down for a moment before finally looking to me and lowering his pencil.

"Alright Takezou, I wanted to discuss something pretty important with you." He said turning the book in front of him around, so I could see it.

"Whoa… are those Jutsu?!" it was pages of Jutsu and all sorts of techniques there were sketches and diagrams.

"It's a comprehensive list of all the Jutsu and techniques I thought I'd pass onto you with the Exams coming up, seeing as I can't show you much of this in person I thought it would be best to make this book of it, normally there's sort of an unsaid rule among Shinobi about not writing things down such as this, but I honestly couldn't care about that." He said scratching the five o'clock shadow on his face. "Well, that and it's pretty stupid if you ask me."

"T-thanks Dad! Holy crap this is awesome!" I flicked through a couple of pages, he even had an index, there only seemed to be about twenty Jutsu though I'd have thought there'd be more.

"Well, with my older sister having stolen you away to become her little Samurai minion, while my younger brother got you into wanting to be a ninja and some of your reading choices it didn't exactly leave me with much to give you, so I thought this would suffice." H seemed quite pleased with my reaction to it all.

"I imagine you want something from me though right?" I looked at him.

"You got me, I want to be there when you're trying anything in it, so I can help but also because there's some stuff that needs supervision." He started spinning a pencil in his fingers.

We spent the next couple hours poring through the book as he started giving me an idea of a lot of the stuff he wanted to do with me first and how he'd like to build into others, we stopped for a short break when Mum called us for dinner, dinner was pretty eventful because Akatsuki started saying some of her first words though she had most favoured this phrase over others, she was trying to get Mum's attention and started waving her hands saying "Kaa Kaa!" Mum was nearly in tears with how happy she was, Dad had a huge proud smile on his face.

Dad and I cleaned up after dinner leaving Mum to try to get some more words out of Akatsuki, when we were done cleaning up we headed back to the study and continued going over the book deciding what to do. When we were probably about halfway through the book and had spent the last four hours not counting dinner going through it I decided to broach the topic of my book I was writing with Dad because with his book he'd made me I wanted to ask something.

"Dad?" he paused writing looking at me "I wanted to ask you if I'd be able to put some of this stuff into a book? I've been putting together for the last six or so months..." I asked.

"Is this the one you got your Mother to help you with not too long ago?" he asked eyebrows raised.

"Yeah it is, I want to write a… kind of like a book on and around the philosophies of Kenjutsu styles and some Shinobi stuff along with like my own thoughts on a couple of topics." I felt a little uncomfortable because it was hard to ask for opinions on things that meant a lot to you.

"I can help you with it if you want, if it means I can get an insight into that head of yours I'd really like to see it, I'm more than willing to allow you to do that then." He said simply.

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"Using a simple method to accomplish something impressive, far outshines using a complex method to achieve the same thing." I quoted aloud in English as I watched the sky above me from where I sat in a tree, the quote was one of a king speaking to his retainer, a retainer that believed he was useless and unworthy of his great king.

Below me Sensei was smoking while he helped Hinata by sparing with her, she had already beaten me, and Sasuke was off skulking around after being hit by her thirty-two-palm technique. I had stopped accidentally spouting off quotes and such in English a year or so ago and often I found myself missing my mother language, despite all its imperfections and annoying qualities, I once went through a period in my life where I often cursed the people of the past for butchering Greek and Latin as they did to create our mongrel of a communication tool, but I passed that and see it for what it is, I still don't entirely love it though I do appreciate it more than I once did.

Hinata had improved insanely since our time at the academy, she could probably give Sensei the biggest run for his money with how fast she'd become though Sasuke and I picked up wearing weights on our legs and I was wearing weights on my arms as well for my sword, though with a week until certain death and or the Exams we probably would barely get to work them in. When Sensei and Hinata finished their spar, I dropped from the tree I was in and walked over to them.

"Man, just watching you fight makes me want to train Hinata, you've improved so much it's insane." I complimented, I was in the midst of my plan to make her more confident in herself with compliments and it seemed to be working she was stuttering less.

"T-thank you!" she got out with a smile.

"Finished talking to yourself in the tree then Takezou?" Sensei asked.

I froze up for a moment "Ah… I- I have no clue what you're talking about." Huh, right he was a Jonin wasn't he? though it's not like I was trying to hide what I was saying.

"I'm sure you don't," he said letting it go "Go get Sasuke for me Takezou," Sensei stated.

It didn't take me too long to find him he was in the Uchiha district at a lake that had a pier on it, he was doing his great fireball jutsu off of it.

"Father! Father! Come on I want to show you my Jutsu!" the six-year-old Sasuke ran up to the edge of the pier with a huge smile as Fugaku came up behind him with his stern look and watched Sasuke "Fire Style: Fire Ball Jutsu!" he announced letting the large ball of orange and red, he looked back to his father with a hopeful look only for his father to turn away saying "Not as good as Itachi's" under his breath. the distraught look Sasuke wore showed he heard the words of his father.

I collapsed with a sharp gasped breath as the memory burned itself into my retinas, I clutched my forehead as I hit the ground "FUCK!" I yelled in English, the memory was so strong, it had been so long since one of these, was this how it felt before? "AGH!" a yelled as the pain continued. I think Sasuke was standing over me because there was suddenly a shadow looming over me with uncertainty. I'm not sure how much time passed but at some point, I'm sure I blacked out or went unconscious because when I woke up I was in a vaguely familiar scene, there were white clean walls, a large window that opened out to a blue sky with the tops of trees only just in the view, and it smelled aseptic and slightly of flowers.

Bleary-eyed I looked to where I felt a weight on me and seemingly another familiar sight was there, Mum was sitting in a chair next to the bed with her head resting on it as she slept, no one else was in the room. I waited a few minutes for someone to come in on their own volition and when no one did I nudged Mum.

"Wake up Mum, c'mon get up please?" I said gently shaking her shoulder until she stirred.

"Takezou!" she nearly yelled pulling me tight into her embrace.

"Morning," I said sleepily.

"Don't scare us like that again!" there were tears forming in her eyes.

"What happened?" I asked as she leaned back into her seat, letting me go.

"Well your teammates turned up on our doorstep looking concerned and started saying me and your Father need to head to the hospital immediately because it was an emergency and you were here," She said wiping her eyes.

"Oh…" That didn't really clear it up all that well.

She continued, "When we got here your gloomy pale friend said he was training in the Uchiha compound when he suddenly heard someone screaming in pain and when he arrived there you were on the ground clutching your head…" she trailed off.

"I don't remember any of that, the last thing I remember was leaving to look for Sasuke after Sensei asked me to look for him," I said with my brow furrowed as I tried to remember more.

Kaede sat with me a while longer before Sensei and a Medic-Nin came in, they both seemed glad I was awake, though I imagine it was so they could question me. Before they could do much of anything though Sasuke came into the room Hinata in tow looking embarrassed by how Sasuke barged in on the scene. He had the right in a manner of speaking to be as pushy as he was if what Mum said was the truth and I did that in front of him. He made a 'Tch' as he saw me before something seemed to click in his head and he left.

My doctor - Dr. Takahasho and his assistant Nurse - Miss Kokoro proceded to talk to me about the instance and ask if anything similar had happened beforehand, eventually, it came down to them discussing my neural activity while I was passed out, there were a few things I didn't quite get but essentially my the part of my brains that dealt with memories as well as the part that dealt with dreams were hyperactive while I was out. It left us all with more questions than answers, but it wasn't like I could tell them what I actually saw either, I had just said I saw some memories from when I was a kid.

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I know the exams are coming up and that's what we're training for but, honestly, I'm against them to the point where I think despite everything Sasuke is beginning to hate me for it, sure we're a strong team with decent teamwork. Some half-assed chemistry that functions enough that none of us has any real ill will towards one another, but I don't want to go through with this event that will change our lives, it has things that are to happen that I doubt can be stopped, that will put us the closest to death we'll ever get or just straight up kill one of us. Imagine that though… another chance at death? I'd rather not put myself in that position when I can avoid it.

Actually I overheard a few of the other teams talking about them getting recommended for the exams as well, while sure it's something to feel proud about, it's also something that no one should rush right into and just assume it'll be another D-rank or something stupid like that. Because as it would turn out rushing into things that are known for having people die in them is tantamount to suicide without forethought as for what to consider is likely to happen.

The world of Shinobi is that of beasts pretending to human, after all, so why these kids thought nothing of… well… a battle-royale of all things, not that I remember that movie all that well obviously. Anyway, I'm not wrong, the whole exam is some kind of tournament more so than an exam, we aren't going to pass school with flying colours and get an endorsement or scholarship when we get to the end and have a good enough score. This is a tournament to kill all other participants or take them out and claim our prize if we make it that far if we don't well then I guess we'll just have to train up for the next one and it's that about this whole thing that makes it a tournament.

I'm not about to put my life on the line to satisfy the thirst of this village while they try their damnedest to show off and gloat about all their candidates for this damn thing, like what did they get for parading us around to the other villages other than telling them who to kill when the left the village first? like just think about that. "Oh look the last Uchiha and the last Uzumaki who also happens to be the Junchuriki are shit at what they do and easy targets!" let alone the fact that basically all of the biggest clans in the Leaf have their heirs in this generation.

It's like they're really trying to get this generation killed faster instead of training them up for the war that anyone with a brain could see coming from a mile away, it's not like the villages are hiding their prejudices and lingering resentment from the other wars.

Too bad for me I give in easily under the right amount of pressure.

AN: Troublesome stuff that, I'm definitely glad I came back and saw how atrocious this chapter was and fixed it, it was so beyond awful. I almost feel like posting the next chapter to make up for such a blunder really, cause, like... yeah. it was bad. Though the chapter seems to read better now, at least to me.