Chapter 4
In the sands of the stadium, we see the participants for round two of the finals gathered. We see the members of team 11, Suzume of iwa, Shiki of suna and Mayumi of kiri. The six chunin hopefuls were gathered for the second round matches which were still at random.
In the stands stood a proud Mikoto who saw her team with pride. Next to her sat an equally proud kushina, who came to see the matches. In her mind, even though Naruto was not her son by blood, he was still her son.
The first match was shown on screen as Suzume of iwa vs Izumi of Konoha
Izumi vs Suzume
The match began with suzume engaging izumi in a bout of taijutsu with izumi being able to predict her movements thanks to the sharingan. Deciding that taijutsu was doing no good, suzume decided to move to ninjutsu. She fired off a fireball which was countered by izumi with a fireball of her own. Izumi then moved and used 'fire style: phoenix flower jutsu' which was countered by an earth wall by her opponent. Suddenly, izumi was stabbed from behind with a rock spear but turned into crows and she countered with the sharingan triple windmill attack combined with the 'fire style: dragon flame jutsu'. This combo hit but suzume substituted out for a mud clone and appeared from under ground at izumi's feet but izumi jumped upwards and created distance between them. Casting a genjutsu on suzume was what brought about the finale of the match as suzume used her lava style kekkei genkai but was too late as she was caught in the genjutsu. As her attack missed, izumi was able to use her 'sharingan genjutsu-forced sleep' to put her opponent to sleep, winning her match.
The next match was Naruto vs shiki of suna
Naruto vs Shiki
At the start of the match, shiki used a wind jutsu to attempt to disorient Naruto but Naruto countered with a fire technique. In a burst of speed, Naruto was behind shiki slashing through his midsection with his sword. However, Shiki just turned to stone and fell apart. Shiki tried using 'earth style: flowing mud river' against Naruto but Naruto avoided it by substituting himself with a rock and appearing out of the technique's range. Cancelling the justsu, shiki drew a kunai and coated it with wind chakra and dashed to Naruto. Naruto drew his blade and clashed with shiki's wind-infused kunai. As the two clashed, Naruto unleashed a fireball from his mouth engulfing shiki but when the smoke cleared, shiki wasn't anywhere to be seen. Looking around to where his opponent may be, Naruto determined that the best possible choice would be underground. With this in mind, he retreated to higher grounds and was proven to be the right choice as shiki emerged from the ground after a few moments with his right sleeve burnt off but otherwise fine. Shiki went on the assault using projectiles coated with wind chakra. Naruto dodged most of them but received a cut on his cheek from one of the shuriken thrown. Deciding that it was time to end the matchup, Naruto threw kunai at shiki who deflected them with a short wind style jutsu. Of course this was what Naruto planned and as the kunai were deflected by the wind jutsu, he threw more kunai to direct them to the path he wanted them to go. He then attacked shiki with a short taijutsu bout, pushing him to the middle of his trap. He then kicked him in the temple, momentarily stunning him. Naruto immediately jumped back and channelled his energy to the ground and a seal array lit up with Naruto calling out ' uzumaki secret sealing style: five point barrier'. Looking to his opponent, Naruto said "you should forfeit now. This barrier not only drains your chakra to empower it but it also incorporates a paralysis aspect where you will not be able to move from that spot. Therefore, you cannot move and all your chakra will be drained so give up or you will fall unconscious from chakra exhaustion, either way I win." At this, shiki nodded to the proctor and said that he forfeits. As the proctor made the announcement of naruto's victory, Naruto collected his kunai that were thrown around so that nobody could decipher his markings and learn his technique even though they may not be able to but he wouldn't risk the information getting out.
The next match was between takeshi and mayumi which was an interesting matchup with takeshi's fire being countered by mayumi's water techniques and mayumi's taijutsu being equal to takeshi's and neither combatant giving an edge. Even the medical techniques takeshi used was countered by with a water clone from mayumi or her maintaining a distance. Eventually it came down to one final clash where both finalists had one punch resulting in a double KO and neither of them moving forward.
"The final match between izumi Uchiha of Konoha and Naruto Uzumaki of Konoha will begin in thirty minutes. Will the contestants please get ready for their match" said pakura as she made her way out of the sands.
Up on the balcony, the kages were deliberating on who promotions should go to. After much deliberations, it was decided that of all participants, izumi, Naruto, shiki and suzume had shown qualities necessary for a chunin and would be awarded a promotion regardless of the outcome of the final matchup. As for mayumi, she had a good showing as well and her match against takeshi was a good showing of both of their talents but they would leave the final decisions up to their respective kages.
In the stands, kushina and Mikoto were glowing in pride as their babies would be competing in the final matchup of the chunin exams. For Mikoto, she was proud of both her students and secretly wanted her daughter to win. For kushina, it was good seeing the Uzumaki fuinjutsu being used and hoped that Naruto would pull off a victory against his teammate. Both mothers however were noticeably awaiting this fight as it would give one of them a leg up on their rivalry as kushina trained Naruto for the month and Mikoto trained Izumi for the month.
Soon the time came for the final match to begin and the crowd was as lively as ever in anticipation of seeing an excellent showcase of the young ninjas talents and skills. Pakura appeared in the middle of the sands and called for the final matchup's contestants to come to the field. Izumi appeared first with the only noticeable difference was that she now had a tanto strapped to her back. Naruto then came out looking pretty much the same but if one were to look closely, they would see that he had a seal fading out of view on his right forearm. As they made their way to the middle of the field, pakura stood between them as they gazed into each other's eyes. Charcoal black gazed into violet as the silent challenge was issued: let's see who is better.
After confirming that they were both ready, pakura shouted for them to begin and jumped back. Naruto and Izumi wasted little time in jumping back creating distance between each other and the match was underway.
To be continued