(A/N) Miss me? Second half of the preliminary rounds begins now. For those who didn't catch it, Gaara fought Shikamaru! And the proctor is still Hayate Gekko, although for those who remember, he doesn't have the sickness anymore in this AU! Tell me if you remember why in the reviews/comments! The poll'll be up for one more week! So vote while you still can! Guest: Thank you! I'm really glad you liked them! Bless the smols indeed!
Shino wasn't sure how he felt about going up against one of the seven swords of the mist. The other mist genin already seen had been somewhat easily taken out by Neji, not like it was any sort of surprise, his insects could sense the Byakugan hidden under the eyepatch, and even without it Shino recognized the jounin as Ao of Kirigakure.
(For the record, I have no clue how Chojuro fights, and this handicapped me. So you get a skip to who won. Like the Naruto v Lee fight. Except I literally have no clue how to write this fight. Sorry? You got like, 6 other perfectly good fights, so excuse this one.)
Honestly, Shino was content with how he did. He hadn't won, the other genin had certainly been above his skill level, but he'd done well, made a good showing. He'd done all he could, and he was content with that.
Tamako was familiar with the pink girl, Sakura, knew that she was loud and fairly enthusiastic, although not much besides that. She was inclined to think close-range fighter, just based on her attitude, making her and Kiba the close-range fighters while Shino provided long-range backup. The showing the Aburame had put on in the battle before this agreed with that assessment.
The proctor called for them to begin, and Tamako raced for her opponent, Sakura bracing herself for the impact, only for nothing to happen as Tamako appeared to glitch out, then glitch back in on the other side of Sakura. She whirled around and had Sakura on the ground in a second, forearm at her throat.
"Yield," Tamako insisted, pressing slightly harder as Sakura attempted to buck her off.
Sakura coughed a few times, but slapped the ground a few times to show she yielded.
The proctor declared Tamako's win, and she hopped off of Sakura, offering a hand to help her up.
"Sorry you didn't get to show anything," Tamako said sheepishly.
"No problem, just tell me what on earth you did there," Sakura replied, taking the hand and pulling herself up. They started moving back to the railings.
"I glitched!" Tamako replied proudly. "I wasn't entirely sure I could build up enough speed in the short distance between us, and I was not at all sure I could, y'know, not glitch out of the arena entirely, which would've been troublesome."
"How on earth do you glitch?" Sakura asked curiously.
Tamako shrugged. "It's a family jutsu! Can only tell you it involves seals and a lot of speed."
"Well, congratulations anyway!" Sakura said, waving. "I gotta get back to my team."
"Good luck next time," Tamako replied easily, waving as well.
Sasuke couldn't say he was impressed by his opponent. Kori Yuki didn't seem like very much, especially compared to his two teammates.
"Watch out," Shisui said, leaning over to him. "The guy's a Yuki. Which means he probably has the Hyoton bloodline. Ice style. Be careful and don't let him ensnare you. Try and stay off the ground if you can."
Sasuke nodded at his cousin's advice. 'Got it.' He'd have to do what so many before him had, and hang from the ceiling. He couldn't do anything one-handed yet, so he'd have to just hang upside down by his feet.
The match started, and Sasuke immediately leaped for the ceiling. This proved to be a good choice as the floor iced over in a second.
"Hey! Get down from there!" The Yuki looked almost offended.
Sasuke shrugged. He doubted Kori knew Konoha SSL, so signing at him was pointless. No one would be yelling translations for him.
"The quiet type, huh?" Kori asked, puffing up, drawing kunai.
Sasuke snuck a glance at Shisui, who looked like he was going to murder someone. As the Yuki prepared whatever he was doing, Sasuke kept an eye on him and signed at Shisui. 'Something wrong?'
Shisui rolled his eyes. 'He should use Senbon, but who am I to tell him how to use his kekkei genkai.'
Sasuke scoffed silently, swinging up on top of the beam hed been handing from to jump to another one and hang from that one.
"Get down here and fight me!" Kori squawked.
Sasuke just stared down at him. No thanks. He wasn't stupid. 'You come up here.' he signed, despite knowing full well the genin wouldn't understand him.
"He said to go up there and fight him," Shisui shouted, smirking at Sasuke when he was sent an annoyed look.
The Yuki looked similarly annoyed, chucking kunai at Sasuke.
Sasuke dodged again, then did the signs for a fireball, one of the few jutsu he had down.
He blew it out, and sent it barrelling towards Kori, and he threw up a wall of ice, only for the fireball to go straight through and crash into him.
Sasuke looked to the proctor. "Well?"
"Sasuke Uchiha wins," the proctor confirmed after checking to see if Kori was unconscious.
Fuji wasn't sure what his opponent's skills were, although based on her teammate's both being close-range fighters, she was probably a long to mid-range fighter, to balance them out.
When she pulled out scrolls, Fuji grinned delightedly and pulled out their own. A weapons master then. Well, they'd just have to see who was better then.
They started with long-range, throwing kunai, shuriken, and senbon at each other, knocking each other's weapons out of the air, and dodging the ones they didn't manage to knock away.
Fuji chucked a spear with its shaft covered in explosive tags at her, ducking under a well aimed kunai. "THINK FAST!"
Tenten squawked in protest, substituting with an earlier thrown mace. The spear blew up, and Fuji cheered. "Yes! Didn't hit you, but it was still awesome!"
Tenten smirked. "Oh, is that how this is?"
Fuji wondered if they should be afraid now. Probably.
She slapped a series of explosive tags Fuji could see from here were definitely not standard Konoha ones, onto a spear of her own, and threw it at them, holding up the sign to detonate it as it landed near them. She smirked, and it exploded.
Fuji managed to grab a shield to protect themself, although the metal was warped and hot. They dropped it before it could burn them. "Not bad, for a Konoha kid."
"No more explosions please, we do not need the tower destroyed," the Hokage intervened quickly.
Fuji and Tenten both pouted quickly, but recovered. Fuji drew a sword, waiting patiently for Tenten to draw her own, then lunged, the two swords crossing.
"Not bad," Fuji agreed, exchanging spark producing clashes with the Konoha genin.
"Not bad yourself," she replied, ducking under one of their swings and swinging at the back of their legs, forcing them to bend and twist awkwardly to stop the sword with theirs. A weird twist and flick later, and Tenten's sword went flying over Fuji's head to land a ways away. They twisted and pinned her, sword at her throat.
"I win," they crowed, smirking as the proctor called it.
Tenten huffed. "You have got to show me that last thing."
They got off her, offering her a hand. "Sure. If you show me how you construct your explosive tags, I recognized the symbols, but didn't quite see how they connected. But it looks odd."
"Deal," she replied, grabbing the hand, and letting them pull her up.
Maybe Fuji hadn't been expecting all that much when they came to Konoha for the Chuunin exams, but they daresay they made a friend!
Umi and Yunikon glanced at each other. "I'm doomed," Umi noted, sighing.
"Yep," Yunikon agreed. "Come on, let's go anyway. I won't be too rough, promise!" He hopped over the railing to assume his position down below.
"You'd better keep that promise," She threatened. "I want to see the rest of the matches!"
"There'll only be like, two more," Eidoko offered unhelpfully. "So even if you do get beaten into the floor you won't miss much."
"Thanks for the vote of confidence," Umi said sarcastically. She sighed, but jumped over the railing. "Let's go."
Yunikon charged at her immediately after the proctor told them to go. He was kind enough to start with the taijutsu style Umi know, to at least let her put up a fight.
So they fought, exchanging blows and blocks.
Yunikon got a lucky shot in, then changed style, and Umi went down quickly.
"I yield," she called to the proctor, from her place in the stranglehold Yunikon had gotten her in.
"Yunikon Uzumaki wins." The proctor noted.
Kamisori blinked at the person with the dog he was going up against. "Well, at least I have my backup trumpet."
Hirata patted his back. "At least you have your backup trumpet indeed. Better not break that one too."
They stuck their tongue out at her. "Yeah yeah. I'll ask Mom to bring another when she comes to see me in the finals."
Hirata gave a hum. "Great, now get out there and fight him. Before I push you over the edge."
"You wouldn't dare!" He squawked.
"I would," she sang. "Now go!"
She made a pushing motion, and they quickly jumped over the railing.
The proctor called for them to start, and Kiba immediately barreled for Kamisori, attempting to do...something with his spinning drill. Kamisori copied Miyo, leaping up to the ceiling then pulling out his trumpet. Good thing he could play the trumpet one handed.
While Kiba barrelled around looking for him, Kamisori started a melody, one he knew well, an old Uzushio sea shanty. The lyrics were a bit vulgar, but the melody was pretty. His trumpet sound came in first, hiding his own melody, followed by a higher flute sound, doing an upper version of the melody, followed by a clarinet sound, making nice chords. The flute sound was to hide Kamisori himself, and the clarinet to disorient Kiba. It'd mess with his inner ear and his balance would be horrid.
Kiba came out of the drill, as did the dog. Both were stumbling slightly and rubbing their ears. Well, Akamaru was pawing at his ears, but same thing.
He added cymbals, which were his favorite sound to play with, to add a high pitched noise that theoretically only Akamaru could hear. Technically the flute sound was better for doing that particular layer of genjutsu, but it was already occupied, and he couldn't do duel sounds of one instrument yet. He also couldn't do more than five sounds, so he had to chose the last one carefully.
He went with drums, using them to do a weird binding genjutsu he'd picked up from Hirata. Turning the genjutsu into a musical genjutsu had been an adventure though, and it was still a bit buggy, over riding his original sound's genjutsu. They'd have to work on that.
Kiba struggled to turn to him, looking extremely confused as Kamisori dropped to the floor. He couldn't stop playing, so he just drew a kunai and knocked Kiba out.
Kamisori hoped he didn't have to knock out the dog too. He didn't know where to hit to safely knock out a dog.
He stopped playing when the proctor declared his win.
He got back up to the above watching areas, and Katsu elbowed him. "Kushina would've been proud. Using that ridiculous and vulgar of a song in front of the Hokage."
Kamisori beamed. They'd heard many tales of Katsu's female cousin, he'd been fairly close with her before she left for Konoha. Bottom line, if he would've made Kushina proud, he did good.
Hirata puffed out her cheeks. "I'm dead."
Miyo patted her on the back. "Well, we can't all make it into the next round."
"The entire Sand team is making it in," Hirata complained, sighing. "No one's complaining there."
"One of them is a jinchuuriki," Jinbei pointed out. "I can sense it. And the other two are older than us. I'm not entirely surprised."
Hirata sighed again, but jumped into the arena. "Alright, let's just get it over with."
She faced Temari, eyeing the fan apprehensively. That fan would be her downfall. If she couldn't get a genjutsu on before Temari caught her in a wind jutsu, she was dead.
She could manage exactly one in the time she estimated it would take for Temari to get the fan open and swing it, and she only knew one she could manage in that short of time. Unfortunately it was one layered on herself. Fortunately, it would hopefully hide her presence from Temari.
She was at a disadvantage here, and a severe one at that. With the mist nin it had been fairly easy, Miyo had been there to distract him while she took the twenty seconds she needed to weave the genjutsu she'd used.
Twenty seconds didn't sound like much, but in a fight, it could be everything. Temari likely wouldn't give her more than two. If that.
The proctor started the match, and Hirata did two half signs and activated the genjutsu, diving out of the way of Temari's opening blast. It was a basic genjutsu to make the other person's eyes slide right off of you. Could be circumvented with enough practice and willpower however.
Hirata started doing as many hand signs as she could while Temari couldn't find her. And while she wasn't throwing wind jutsu every which way. She got halfway through a set of seals for a genjutsu that would hopefully end the match before she had to dodge a wide area effect jutsu from Temari. She perched on a wall, trying to finish the seals before the genjutsu backfired on her. She only had so much time before the genjutsu misfired.
She dodged another jutsu, but didn't manage to finish the final sign before the jutsu misfired slightly, coating the area in chakra to make it look weird.
By weird, Hirata meant psychedelic. As in everything was colored wrong and sometimes spinning. At least this wasn't the bad way for it to misfire. Just the strangest one. Oh, look, there was a neon orange and green deer.
Temari looked understandably confused, and Hirata took that moment to start another genjutsu, hoping beyond belief this would confuse her long enough to get this one actually finished.
She was to the last sign before the girl recovered. She finished it as wind hurtled toward her, slamming her against a wall and knocking her out.
Her last thought was that she hoped someone would be there to get rid of the genjutsu. It was a fun disorientation one, so it was possible no one would notice.
"Is it bad I'm glad I didn't have to face anyone?" Jinbei asked, watching the proctor assemble a hat with those that had passed.
Everyone got a slip of paper with a number. Jinbei paled when they realized they were against Temari. "I'm even more dead than Hirata was." They got pats on the back from all nearby Uzu genin. It wasn't particularly reassuring. They were a sensor, they weren't on combat training yet, they wouldn't be for a little while yet. They were absolutely doomed.
(A/N) Hope you lot have a slightly better idea of the skills of everyone I'm working with here. I just stuck this in a randomizer honestly. Same for the finals. Well kinda, I used dice because I didn't have wifies at that time. Close enough, lol. It's long because reasons. Enjoy it while it lasts. (Sorry this A/N is gonna be really long)
Since it is after November, I have a bunch of spots open to be filled. So, poll! Either check out this fic on Ao3 where it's under the same name and by Flux_Uchiha to find the link since doesn't like links, or join my discord server with the code pnQAF39! Come and chat!
So an explanation behind Tamako's thing. She can 'glitch' which is a bit like a slightly uncontrolled hiraishin. It's also extremely short range and requires a certain amount of base speed to pull off. She is still a Hogo Uzu, as that falls under space/time, albeit a more taijutsu focused one. Hogo Uzu will be a wide range of things, so they're a bit of a wild card. Some will be masters of one specific thing that makes them really hard to beat, others are jacks of all trades. Some are more speed based, some punch like Tsunade to crack the earth. All depends on the person, and occasionally, their family line. Some families keep track of their lines(Tamako's family is one of them) because someone in their ancestry developed a seal that spread to their children, and their children after that.