The Black Leaves
Chapter 26
"Begin!" Hayate shouted before jumping out of the way. Naruto wasted no time and charged right for his opponent, intent on finishing this match quickly. He held his arms straight out and prepared to make the first attack.
Korudo simply stood there with a smile hidden underneath his black mask. He stood completely motionless as Naruto rushed him, right until Naruto was just a few feet away. Korudo suddenly brought his arms straight out in front of him, tossing the long sleeves of his outfit back to reveal two sonic amplifiers attached to both of his arms. Naruto did not even have time to react before the Oto ninja smashed both amplifiers against each other.
Naruto's hands instantly flew to his ears as he tripped mid-dash and tumbled over several times before coming to a screaming halt right at Chord's feet. The blond continued to scream as blood started to leak out from in between his fingers. Korudo chuckled darkly as he hit his weapons together once again. The high pitched sound was heard by everyone but was quickly toned out by Naruto's loud screaming and violent thrashing.
The Oto ninja gave a slightly louder chuckle before kicking Naruto hard enough to send him a few feet away. "How pathetic," He spoke darkly. "And here I was told that Konoha had strong shinobi. What a load of crap."
Naruto slowly rose to his feet. He slowly wiped the blood off of his head and hands and glared daggers at Korudo. Said Oto ninja smirked before bringing his hands up once again to prepare for a deadly sound blast. On instinct, Naruto leaped as far back as possible and pressed his back as hard as he could against the massive wooden doors. Naruto may not be as smart as Shikamaru, but he did know a thing or two about sound, thanks to Venom.
For one, He know that sonic sound waves were at their strongest at their very point of origin and weakened the further away the sound waves got from said point of origin. All he could do was assume how far a safe distance was and stay there until a plan could be thought up. His enemy gave a huff of annoyance.
"What the Hell do you think you're doing? I was told aaaaall about you Uzumaki. Like how you can't stand loud noises or fire." The black wearing ninja reached into a kunai pouch located on his right leg and pulled out two of the throwing knifes. "I also know that you neither have or use projectile or long distance weapons."
Naruto's only response was a deadly glare. Kurodo smiled before lazily chucking the dangerous weapons at his standing target. Naruto simply sidestepped the weapons before transforming his hard glare into a wicked smile.
"So," He hissed. "You know everything about us. Is that so?"
Korudo gave a half-assed shrug. "Pretty much. Hell, I know that you have a frog shaped wallet that you named Gamma-chan. Haha!" He laughed loudly. Kiba could not help but smirk at that.
Naruto's smile simply got bigger. "Then you must know what is inside of us." He spoke calmly. "What we really have inside us." Korudo raised an eyebrow at the kid's words. He was never told about any sort of ability or power the brat might have. He did know however that the brat had absolutely no chakra at all what so ever.
"A load of BS?" The Oto ninja laughed.
"You could not be any more wrong." Sakura noticed that Naruto's back was moving again. Almost like something was trying to force itself out of his jacket. Naruto gave a grunt before speaking again.
"We would like to let you know. There is something inside us. Something very strong." Naruto chuckled before grunting again and hunching over slightly.
Sarutobi, most of the Konoha council that was present and several of the jounin looked intensely at Naruto. They all fearing what Naruto was going to reveal but for their own personal reasons.
Kurodo took a step back and slowly lowered into a fighting position just in case Naruto was planning on something that might beat his sound attacks.
"We've had it inside us for a very long time. We've tried our hardest to hold it back." Naruto groaned while wearing a large smile. "If we let is escape, it could kill everybody." His eyes darted to just over Kurodo's left shoulder and directly into Empress' hidden eyes. "And we wouldn't want that, now would we?"
Two rounded points started to press against the inside of Naruto's jacket. "Fortunately for you. We will only use a little bit of it. Unfortunately, for us. It will be permanent." The two points on Naruto's back kept getting longer and longer until they started to tear out of his jacket. But before the points could tear free, Kurodo swung his right arm foreword and revealed a hidden attachment to his weapon. A gauntlet exactly like Zaku's, only this one was directly attached to his arm brace and had a system of vents lining the rectangular knuckle part.
Naruto did not have the slightest chance to move out of the way just as a large channel of sonic waves slammed him into the wooden door. Kurodo kept flicking a kunai against his arm guard while aiming at Naruto. The continuous attack forced Naruto's pinned body to writhe and shake violently. Inside Naruto's mind, Venom was screaming and screeching in pain as he smashed into the walls of his host's mind.
'Make him stoooop!'
Venom shrieked. His wish was granted just a few seconds later when Naruto's body suddenly went limp and Kurodo stopped his attack. A massive grin formed on Kurodo's face as he saw Naruto's body slowly fall from dented wood and fall face first into the hard floor. Naruto did not move.
The whole room was deathly quiet. Sakura had a hand covering her mouth in complete and utter shock of how quickly Naruto was defeated. He did not even get a chance to show off this new power that he claimed to have. Hinata was gripping the metal railing so hard that her knuckles were turning white as she fought back tears, fearing the worst. Nightmare and the rest of the gathered symbiotes did not show any signs of concern.
Hayate had yet to announce the winner of the match due to being both stunned and intrigued at the Otogakure boy's weaponry. This gave Kurodo the pleasure of approaching his opponent and giving loud and boisterous taunts. "How fucking pathetic! This village is completely worthless! I bet I could take over this whole fucking place in less than a day!" He laughed loudly. The instant he looked down, however, his laughter came to an abrupt halt.
Naruto's body was gone. "Where they Hell is he!" Korudo shouted as he looked all over the arena for his opponent. He looked up to his allies up in the stands for any sign that they saw where he had went. They were all just as confused as he was. This just frustrated him further.
"An interesting ability this boy has, Hokage-sama." A dignitary said to the village leader. "I've never heard of a ninja being able to turn invisible without the use of genjutsu." Before the Hokage could respond, a part of the floor and wall; strangely shaped like a certain loud-mouthed blond, started to run towards the large group. The few ANBU started to prepare to defend the group of VIP individuals.
The human shaped image suddenly leapt up onto the side of the large statue behind the group and quickly scurried up to the very top of the rocky structure. The figure sat on the top of the statue in a rather uncomfortable looking position before shimmering and returning to the normal coloration of one Uzumaki Naruto. Kurodo had yet to notice his opponent's reappearance.
"The ultimate art of the ambush versus the ultimate ambush predator." Naruto whispered loudly before letting his sharp red tongue flop out of his mouth. "Let's see who wins!" He shouted before shooting his tongue right for the back of his opponent's head.
Hearing Naruto's loud voice, Korudo turned just in time to avoid his brain being stabbed by the red appendage. To say Korudo was shocked would be an understatement. The only person able to do anything like that was his lord Orochimaru. The black dressed ninja looked at the point of impact to see that Naruto's appendage had punctured the concrete floor.
Korudo swiftly grabbed Naruto's tongue and gave it a hard tug in an effort to pull the blond off his perch. Instead, the tongue quickly wrapped around his arm and raised him into the air with enough speed that he smashed into the ceiling with enough force to crack the roof. Naruto released the ninja and allowed him to fall to the Earth below. Korudo was just barely able to right himself and land on his wobbly feet. He stayed in a crouched position, breathing heavily.
"Where's all that tough talk now?" Naruto asked, sounding as if he was asking a serious question. His response was Korudo raising both of his arms and aiming his sound cannons directly at Naruto. He fired duel blasts of sonic waves right for the symbiotically possessed blond.
Naruto leapt off the top of the structure just as the wall behind him exploded into splinters. He landed on all fours on the wall adjacent to his former position and glared at his foe. His body started to shake slightly as the two points on his back finally tore through his black jacket to reveal the two bony elbows of his extra set of arms. He had to jump out of the way of another charged blast of sound waves, thankful for his symbiotically enhanced senses. This time, he landed upside down on the ceiling of the arena and finally revealed his bladed pair of arms for all to see.
The arena was once again silent as all saw Naruto's new appendages. This caused Naruto to smirk. "If you had allowed us to finish," He spoke. "Then you would know that while it is housed in our body and uses our chakra as food. The power we contain gives us the strength and power we need to fight and protect our village!" He shouted before launching himself directly towards Korudo. His bladed arms poised to strike into his opponent's soft flesh.
Korudo leapt backward right before Naruto smashed into the ground. Naruto swung his bladed arms at Korudo and just barely missed gutting the Oto ninja. Said ninja stumbled back from the attack only for Naruto's human arms to grab onto the sound weapons and give a hard jerk forwards. The bladed arms swung down and tug themselves into the ninja's shoulders, causing him to shout out in pain.
Naruto held him in place as he wrenched his blades out of the Oto ninja and plunged them back in. Blood poured out from the kid's wounds and drenched Naruto's blades as he continues his assault on Korudo's shoulders.
Korudo tried to struggle free but instead felt Naruto's foot place itself on his chest. Naruto began to pull harder on Korudo's arms while pushing against his chest. The blond haired ninja gave his prey an over-sized and wicked smile before raising his extra set of arms as high as possible. He brought the weapons down with enough force to go straight through Korudo's shoulders and out his armpits.
Korudo screamed out in pain as the blades tore through his skin and bone. Blood splattered the floor as the sickening sound of flesh tearing and bones popping echoed through the room. Naruto's foot pressed harder into Korudo's chest while his human arms pulled the Oto ninja's arms in the opposite direction. His prey screaming louder and louder as his arms were slowly pulled out of their sockets.
With one final yank, Naruto tore off Korudo's right arm while slicing have of his left shoulder off; leaving his left arm dangling uselessly as his side. As blood poured from Korudo's wounds; Naruto, still holding the severed arm, changed his grip on it before raising it high into the air and bringing it down hard on the Otogakure ninja's head. The sound weapon cracking his skull. Korudo's body fell to the ground with a dull thud; Naruto looked at the severed arm in his hand before lightly tossing it aside.
Naruto slowly turned to face the proctor, waiting for him to announce the winner. Now Hayate has seen some gruesome things during his time as a ninja of Konoha. He has experienced first hand how low an enemy's tactics can be. Such as the suicide bomber that left him trapped for a good two hours in a burning structure, forcing him to inhale an unhealthy dosage of smoke; hence his sickly appearance and his constant coughing.
Hayate shock himself out of his stupor and finally made his declaration on the match. "The winner: Uzumaki Naruto!"
The match winner slowly looked at Hayate will an approving look before stalking his way over to the set of stairs that lead to the balcony that most of his fellow Konoha ninja stood. As he walked, Naruto allowed his abnormal tongue to hang out of his mouth. He was most definitely not looking forward to the inevitable confrontation with his peers about his arms and such.
He made his way up the stairs and stopped once just to watch the medical officers carry away his late opponent. It was such a waste of food. Venom had the mindset of always eating what you kill.
Naruto made his way up to the balcony and did not have to see the large number of eyes focused on him. He could feel the mixed feelings of fear and confusion among countless other negative emotions. The only people that did not show any at least negative response to his appearance were Shikamaru, who was half-asleep, and Shino. But then again, Shino never showed any emotion at all.
Naruto stopped right at the very top of the landing and turned to face the arena and leaned against the railing with his human arms crossed over the metal bar. His other pair of arms lazily slung on top of the railing and simply lay there in a relaxed position. Internally, Venom was trying his best to lessen the impact of once again being a social outcast to the boy.
'Hey now,'
Venom spoke gently. 'It's ok, you still have us and Nightmare and Payback and Revenge and even Lady Empress. Hell, you have the entire Symbiote horde. Who needs to have human friends?' Venom's attempted to cheer up his host. His attempt failed when Naruto visibly showed his sudden depression by hanging his second pair of arms limply over the edge of the railing.
The next two genin were called down to the arena to fight. They were just two unnamed and unimportant characters that the author did not feel needed any significant place in the story except to make an excuse as to why what is going to occur in the next scene will happen.
Just a few feet away from Naruto, Hinata looked at her crush with a mix of worried and confused eyes. She wanted to go over and talk to him, but the many looks he was receiving from his peers and superiors caused the young Hyuuga to hesitate. The sudden sound of something hitting the ground behind her drew Hinata's attention to a prone Nightmare.
The charred princess lay there on the ground for a few moments before she slowly raised her head high enough so that her one yellow eye could be seen looking directly at the dejected Naruto. She slowly brought her left arm forward and firmly planted her charred hand on the concrete in front of her. Nightmare just as slowly pulled with that arm and proceeded to slowly drag herself over to Naruto. A look of pure determination radiated from her visible eye.
Hinata watched Nightmare for a moment before looking back at Naruto to see that he had not noticed his teammates attempt at approach. Even though Hinata instinctively knew that the apparently burned girl was her rival for Naruto's heart, she just did not have it in her to watch Nightmare's pathetic attempt. So, with a heavy sigh, Hinata bent over the struggling symbiote and threw the girl's arm over her shoulder and hoisted her onto her feet.
Nightmare sent the Hyuuga a confused glance only to see a gentle smile being returned. Understanding what Hinata was doing, Nightmare gave a near silent grunt while nodding her hidden head. The two then proceeded to very slowly approach Naruto to comfort him and to show him that at least two people honestly cared for him. About halfway through the lengthy fight below, the two girls finally made it over to Naruto.
"Um, N-Naruto-kun?" Hinata almost whispered. Naruto's head spun around so fast that Hinata thought that if she were any closer, the boy's tongue would have slapped her across the face. He had a look of initial surprise that quickly leveled down when he saw who had approached him.
"Oh! Hi, Hinata-chan, Nightmare-chan," Naruto looked past the two to see a majority of his fellow Konoha ninja staring hard at the three. "Is there something you two need?"
Suddenly, Nightmare lurched forward and swung her arms over her head, slamming into Naruto. The boy instinctively wrapped all four of his arms around the girl when he felt all of her weight press down on him. He was surprised by the sudden action along with her burying her burnt face into his chest. Hinata was just as taken back and could not help but let a little bit of anger appear on her cute face.
"N-no Naruto-kun. We don't need anything. We just wanted to come t-talk to you." Her eyes flicked to Naruto's back right arm and back to his face in such a small amount of time that it was almost unnoticeable. However, Naruto noticed.
The blond looked up at the arm and gave a humorless chuckle. "Don't worry Hinata-chan. Even if these things are not really mine, I can still control them." To prove it, Naruto used the same arm to give a large slow swing downward in a bowing fashion. "See?"
Hinata silently watched Naruto's display until he was finished. "I won't hurt you or anything if that's what your afraid of." He said solemnly.
Hinata quickly shook her head. "N-Not at all Naruto-kun. I-I was just interested in the p-parasite that you said lives inside you." This time, she allowed her pale eyes to purposely trace over the details of Naruto's deadly second set of arms.
"Really?"
"I am most interested in it too Naruto-san." Shino suddenly appeared next to his teammate. His sudden appearance scarred the ever-living daylights out of the other three teens and almost made Nightmare summon one Hell of a horde. "May I ask you a few questions?"
Naruto looked at Shino for a moment before looking down at the snuggling Nightmare then back up to the living hive. "Um, ok. I'll answer what I can."
Shino was quiet for a moment before leaning in a little towards Naruto. "You lack any sort of orifice for your arms to hide, how were they constructed and why were those specifically created by your parasite?"
Naruto stared at Shino for a moment while allowing Venom to tell him what to say. "Well, back in the forest I was in danger and in an effort to save itself and me, the parasite forced a change in my genetic coding."
"I am able to see the obvious, Naruto-san. So please get to the point. Where did the parasite get the 'materials' to create those arms?" Shino said in a humorless tone.
"Oh," Was Naruto's intelligent response. "Well, the skin is made from revitalized dead skins cells and the muscles were made from muscle cells taken from my arms and given an increased metabolism. The same with the bones and blades, except those were taken from one of my ribs. The same thing happened. The cells' metabolism was sped up so that they would multiply faster. This is why the creation of the arms happened in such a short amount of time."
"Hmm," Shino responded. "I am to assume that the same goes for your tongue then?"
Naruto nodded his head then had his tongue shoulders like a coat. "I have one other question for you Naruto-san. Where is the parasite located on your body?"
Naruto struck a thinking pose for a moment before answering. "Well, most of him is in and around my brain, but he has spread out to most of the inside of my body."
Shino just gave a small nod before turning his attention back to the match below. Hinata however continued to stare at Naruto. More specifically his long tongue. Her young and perverted mind started to form several mature scenarios that all involved Naruto's tongue doing countless naughty things to her body.
Sensing a threat, Nightmare turned her head slightly to see the distant look on Hinata's face and shot the girl a terrifying glare. Unfortunately, the Hyuuga was too far-gone to notice a thing. Nightmare snuggled deeper into Naruto tried to ignore the blushing girl behind her.
A little while later, the match below ended with Random Ninja Number One winning. Next was...You know what? I'm not really in the mood to have the rest of the fights since they don't change much from the original matches. The only difference is who fights whom; the winners are all the same. So, instead I'll give you the ending of Hinata's match with Neji. I mean, come on, that would obvious have sort of significance in a NaruXHina fanfic. Right?
Hinata held herself up with one hand on her knee and the other holding her agonizing heart. She had put up quite the fight against her angsty cousin. Her combined style of the Hyuuga fighting style and Naruto's brutish brawling took Neji by surprise at the beginning of the fight. Since she never showed any sign of learning another fighting style during the main branch training exercises, Neji had to change up his strategy a little.
Neji's quick thinking and reflexes saved him from a brutal beating from his younger cousin. Though, he would never admit it. He tried to steady his breath while staring down at Hinata. He allowed a wicked smirk to form on his lips as he watched the young Hyuuga heir struggle to stand up straight.
"I knew the main branch was nothing but a gang of weaklings." Neji said, trying his hardest not to let his panting show in his voice. "Without that accursed seal of yours, your nothing but a weakling that is destined to fail at my hands." The prodigy continued with his rant about destiny and failure.
Up in the balcony, Naruto's anger continues to increase. Neji's harsh words throughout the match just fueled his anger towards the teen. Even when Naruto was training with Neji's team, he felt at least a small amount of anger towards that egotistical bastard. He was always looking down on his teammates and Naruto. More Lee and Naruto then anyone else since neither of them could use chakra properly.
He would rant on Naruto about how it was impossible for him to become a ninja without any chakra at all and that it was simply blind luck that Naruto was even alive. Ever since he first met him, Naruto has wanted to clock Neji right across his pretty boy face.
"Hehe," Hinata laughed. "Oh *pant* dear cousin, are you really that blind? You may have mastered our families blood line, but you're the blindest person alive." Hinata looked up at Naruto and gave him a gentle smile before turning back to Neji. "Someone very important to me has been watching our match." Hinata could feel her heart skip a beat for a moment as she carefully planned out what she was going to say. "I know I can't win Neji-san, but I won't allow myself to be embarrassed in front of my special person." She ignored the screams of pain coming from every cell in her body and slid back into her unique fighting pose.
Unfortunately, before Hinata could even move towards her cousin; the girl's damaged heart sent a massive jolt of pain through her form and caused Hinata to cough up a few drops of blood and fall down to her knees. Seeing his chance to finally get his vengeance on the unjust actions of the main branch of the Hyuuga family and charged forward to end the heiress' life. He knew he was going to die for killing the heir to the Hyuuga clan, but at least he would have finally gotten justice for the wrongful murder of his father.
In an instant, nearly all of Konoha's jounin level ninja were in the center of the arena. While nearly everyone was expecting the jounin to have tried to stop the obvious murder attempt of Hyuuga Hinata. Instead, they all had their arms wrapped around one extremely pissed off Uzumaki Naruto. They were not simply blocking his pathway or keeping him place. All of the jounin had their arms wrapped around some part of Naruto's body and were desperately trying to prevent the boy from advancing towards Neji.
Even with all of their combined strength, Naruto continued to slowly advance towards Neji. His eyes had gone from their sky bright blue, to pure white. His normally spiky blond hair was slick back a little and a massive amount of saliva was pouring from his snarling jaws.
"Neeeeeejiiiiiii!"
Naruto roared loudly as he yanked his head free from Guy's strong grip. He opened his mouth and prepared to stab the Hyuuga with his tongue when Anko released her grip and quickly slid her leg brace over her forearm and slammed it into his open mouth hard enough to shatter several of his teeth. Naruto growled loudly from his now bleeding mouth.
Hinata watched the whole scene play out and had mixed feelings of admiration and shock. Admiration that Naruto cared enough for her to try and prevent her death without any regard for his own safety. Shock for how scary Naruto looked when pissed off and fighting a group of jounin.
"Uzumaki Naruto!" Sarutobi bellowed loudly. "Stand. Down." He set a threatening glare to the boy. He hated to sound so intimidating to the kid, but he knew that there was no other way to prevent Naruto from attacking Neji and causing a potential political outburst for the blonde's death.
Naruto slightly turned at the aged Hokage and stared at him for a moment with his pure white eyes. His head turned back to looking at Neji and he continued to slowly approach the ninja with malicious intent.
"Having troubling controlling your genin there, Hokage-sama?" Some old fart representative from Amegakure chortled loudly. His teenage escort gave an overly exaggerated laugh at her companion's horrible insult.
"Mind giving us a chance to stop the boy?" Empress asked in a kind tone.
"What the Hell do you think you could possibly do?" The same representative blurted out. "Not even his village leader couldn't stop him. What could some prissy woman leader of some small and worthless village do?"
A low rumbling growl emitted from the two big daddies behind the group. Their eyes had turned a dangerously dark yellow and their drilled arms started to spin.
"Please be careful what you say, sir. As I have said before, our big daddies take their guard duty very seriously. Even verbal attacks may send them out of control." Empress warned the old fool. She stepped foreword and was about to give her two extra long "antennae" a twitch, when Hinata started to cough violently and more blood was spat out of her mouth. Hinata leaned over as she coughed more.
"Hinata?"
Naruto's gaze landed on the fallen Hyuuga. His eyes widened as he saw Hinata fall face first onto the cement floor. With a massive jerk of his body, Naruto was able to pull him, and everyone holding onto him, towards Hinata. With a lot more force, Naruto approached the prone Hinata, dragging everyone behind him. His hair slowly came back to it's normal spiky fashion and his white eyes slowly returned to their normal blue as the flow of saliva slowed down to a halt.
Seeing him return to normal, the jounin slowly let Naruto go and allow him to approach the injured Hinata. Naruto fell to his knees and careful turned Hinata onto her back and checked if she was breathing. A sudden violent cough proved Hinata to still be alive. The girl slowly opened her pale eyes and stared up at Naruto.
Now, to some, seeing a blond haired, blue eyed teenager with a pair of grotesque arms kneeling over you would send them into a flying panic. But, for Hinata he looked like and angel sent from heaven; the back lighting from the ceiling that made a halo-ish outline of him didn't hurt that thought either.
She gave a soft and pained chuckle right before giving a hard cough and smiling rather big at the boy over her. "H-How did I do, Naruto-kun?"
Naruto returned her smile with a sad one of his own. "You did amazing Hinata-chan. I was really impressed with you far you have gotten with your training." Hinata's smile grew vastly before another violent coughing fit took over her small frame. Naruto held her shaking body close as she tried to control her coughing.
Only a short moment later did the medics arrive and placed Hinata's semi-conscious body onto a stretcher. Naruto silently watched the medics carry Hinata out of sight; then instantly shifted back at to his semi-symbiotic state while swiveling to face Neji.
"Neji!" Naruto growled; his long and unruly fangs forced his mouth into a wicked grin as his tongue dripped copious amounts of foul smelling saliva. THe surrounding jounin prepared to make an attempt to stop Naruto should he try to harm the Hyuuga protegee.
"For what you have done to Hinata,"
Naruto's eyes narrowed dangerously before his creepy smile grew way too big. "We'll eat you ALIVE!" And without another word, Naruto leapt up and backwards onto the above balcony.
The rest of the preliminary matches went about as expected, except for when Sasuke started to use an odd chakra that drew the attention of every symbiote within a five-mile radius. Even Nightmare was able to stick her tongue out and lick her lips in a starving fashion. After his fight, Kakashi took Sasuke away for some unknown reason, leaving the symbiotes hungry and agitated.
It was now time for the final match and Nightmare's turn to fight and she was more than ready to impress Naruto with her already massive array of Otherworldly monsters. Having the Prayer suddenly appear from underneath the balcony and climb up and over the railing startled nearly everyone, which caused Nightmare to release an airy giggle. The living transport raised Nightmare onto a large throne attached to her back.
Nightmare cursed inwardly at her still useless legs as the Prayer carried her creator down to the arena. If she only had the full use of her body, she wouldn't have to fully depend on her creations and would be able to impress Lord Venom with her own fighting abilities. Her opponent was the teammate of the Otogakure ninja Naruto had fought against. She was a little worried that the guy would have some sort of sound-based weaponry. She was positive that her fragile body would shatter from even one blast of the same weapons used by Naruto's opponent.
The Prayer set Nightmare gently on the ground and helped the burn victim into an upright sitting position before departing once again for the Otherworld. Thinking that this fight was going to end quickly, the Oto ninja took out a kunai and waited for Hayate to begin the match.
"Are you two ready?" The proctor asked. The Oto ninja nodded his head with a smirk. Nightmare simply sat there. "Alright then. Begin!" He dropped his arm and jumped out of the way.
Just like his arrogant teammate, the ninja stood straight up and half-hazardly tossed his weapon at his target. The kunai sailed through the air, aimed directly for Nightmare's head. The symbiote princess closed her one visible eye and allowed the kunai to sail harmlessly through her dimensional rift and vanished into Otherworld.
In response, Nightmare shot her intestine out and stretched to mammoth proportions before trying to slam the appendage down towards the lad. The kid jumped out of the way of the slimy appendage and threw three shuriken at Nightmare's torso. These too were harmlessly sucked into Otherworld. Seeing how throwing small numbers of weapons at a time was not working, the Oto ninja rolled out a weapon scroll and started to send volleys of sharp objects at the young girl.
Above on the balcony, one Tenten was pouting at having her fighting technique already copied. Sure it was a much less flashy and the weapon numbers were drastically smaller, but still, it just was not fair that her fighting technique could be so easily copied.
Despite the massive amount of weaponry that was being thrown, none at all were making any contact with their intended target. Before they could even reach Nightmare, small Otherworld portals would appear and send the weapons to that dimension. After a good chunk of a half-hour was spent chucking weapons, the male ninja had finally run out.
He stood there panting hard while watching Nightmare's intestine rise up into the air. He prepared to dodge once again only for the appendage to slink away back into Nightmare's charred gut. The Oto ninja kept his distance from his opponent and prepared for her next attack.
Suddenly a very thin and unhealthy looking man appeared out of Nightmare's stomach and was raised high into the air by several wires of rusted copper. The skinny man had several red scars of a symbol; Naruto was told were called the Halo of the Sun, all over his body. The scars looked old but they appeared to be bleeding nonstop as the man continuously moaned from the never-ending pain.
As he was raised higher into the air, everybody focused on the copper wire growing razor sharp barbs and the many weapons that had been thrown at Nightmare become intertwined with the barbwire.
The mess of pointy objects started to crawl over the now moaning louder man. They wrapped around his small frame slowly while painfully cutting into his slowly darkening skin. His skin continued to grow darker until it looked like thawed, rotting human skin. The man started to scream louder as the wires started to cover every inch of his body, leaving no visible sign of the flesh underneath.
The man's body was dropped onto the hard ground below and start to twitch and writhe around violently. His violent shacking continued as the barbed wire and weapons slowly sank into his gray flesh and slowly shaped themselves into sharp, metal spines. His arms, legs, torso and even hid head was covered in the sharp spines. The man's moans of pain became very, very raspy; as if he was struggling to just barely get enough air into his lungs.
His mouth gasped out from in-between the barbwire before several cords dove in and started to fill his mouth with metal fangs and blood. His eyes were replaced by a small mass of spines and his oily hair fell from his gray head. Slowly, every wire sank into the man's skin, leaving only the very tips of his spines covering his gray form.
Finally, the man stopped moving and his raspy breathing came to a halt. Nightmare stared at the body for a moment before looking back at her opponent then back at her new creation. Her yellow eye flashed for a moment before returning to her opponent.
The Oto ninja gave a short nervous laugh that quickly escalated into a more arrogant laugh. "It looks like your little pet there didn't quiet make it, huh? Too bad." He chortled loudly. Nightmare just gave him a deadpanned look as he laughed is idiot heart out.
Suddenly, the new creature slinked to its bare feet and let out a raspy snarl before turning to face its creator's enemy. The guy's stupid laughter came to a rather abrupt stop as he saw the creature slowly start to approach. It's whole body twitched violently as it walked at a steady pace.
The Otogakure kid jumped backwards to get a bit more distance between him and the abomination. He took out one of his few remaining kunai knives and wrapped an explosive tag around the handle before throwing the deadly weapon directly at his target. The weapon struck home in the monster's right shoulder.
The beast raised its arm to 'look' at the weapon that had struck it and tilted its twitching head sideways in a confused fashion. The tip of the sutra caught flame before unleashing a mighty explosion that rocked the whole tower. While everyone, sans Gaara, had to hold onto something to prevent him or her from falling over Nightmare did not even blink.
The smoke quickly cleared away to reveal that half of the spiked monster's head and upper torso was completely gone. THe guy responsible for the creatures damaged state was just barely able to give a smirk before the sound of tearing flesh echoed through the chamber. This was followed by a mass of barbed wire bursting out of the monster's wounds and slowly knitting themselves together and repairing the damaged tissue.
In less than 15 seconds, the monster's body was completely healed and there was not a single sign of any damage being done. The creature's raspy breathing started up again as it once again started to approach the youth.
The kid tried once again to ready one of his remaining weapons, but the monster did not give him the chance. It shot its arms forward and allowed them to stretch out towards the Oto ninja and grab onto the boy's shoulders. It's sharp claws dug into his soft flesh as he was violently yanked towards the monster. His feet dragged on the ground as he tried to pull himself free from the creature's grip as well as try to not get any closer to it as possible.
His attempts ultimately ended in failure as the monster gave one final hard yank and threw the youth directly at its body. Just as the Oto ninja was an inch away from slamming his chest into the creature's; the being extended every spine on its body to at least four feet in length. Needless to say, Nightmare's opponent was dead the instant several spines went through his skull and whole body. It had happened so fast that the kid did not even know he was dead; his wide eyes were still looking around in complete shock.
Just as suddenly as it had extended it's spines; the monster retracted them back to their original length and allowed the boy's corpse to slump down to the ground. Nearly all of his bodily fluids were pouring onto the floor. The last remaining member of that specific team dropped to her knees in complete and utter shock and fear. Without her teammates, she was completely useless and would most likely be disposed off by Orochimaru.
The monster gave a loud raspy scream before bending over and grabbing the ninja's corpse by the legs and slowly dragged it over to Nightmare. Nightmare's outfit parted and allowed the beast to drag its prey into Otherworld to do Kami-knows-what, leaving a trail of fresh blood behind.
Hayate did not need to announce who the winner of the match was and instead just stayed out of the way as everyone on the balconies made their way back to their positions that they were given before the little preliminary matches even began.
Each of the winners of their respective matches stood in front of their peers and were told to draw a slip of paper that would determine who they would be fighting against in the final rounds. Naruto paid no attention to who the others would be fighting and instead prayed that he would get a chance to make Neji pay for hurting Hinata. And, it was just his luck that he drew Neji's name.
An inhuman smile crept onto his face as he slowly turned his head a little towards Neji. The Hyuuga tried to pretend that he could not see Naruto, but failed at preventing a cold chill from climbing up his spine when Naruto's right eye suddenly became pure white after he blinked, then returned to normal after blinking again.
Venom laughed loudly within his host's mind. 'This is gonna' be fun!'