Naruto: Return of the Templars

Disclaimer: I in no way own either Naruto, Starcraft, or any affiliated characters, worlds, races, etc. But my plan is in motion. Soon Blizzard will have no choice. They will bend to my demands. And it shall be mine. Soon, Oh so very soon. he he he he!

A Naruto/Starcraft 1 and 2 Crossover

"Normal Speech"

Demon Speech

'Demon Thought'

'Normal Thought'

Internal Speech

Internal Thought

Chapter 3: Preliminary battles, Shiny new toys and... Fan girls?

Hiruzen Sarutobi was a powerful man. Respected, Loved, Praised, and in some cases Feared. But right now he was none of those. The God of Shinobi wasn't present in this room. Only a tired old man with far too many secrets. "Naruto you know I can't do that." Naruto slammed his fist on Sarutobi's desk splintering the wood. A move that reminded Sarutobi of Tsunade and her legendary temper. In Naruto he saw a similar temper, barely restrained, just waiting to be unleashed. Sarutobi sighed but nodded "alright your right. I should have done this from the get go. You three had best sit." Sasuke and Anko complied and took the aforementioned seat. Hinata and Naruto remained standing. Naruto, out of anger, Hinata, out of fear of passing out the moment she let go of Naruto's hand. She had as of yet to say anything the entire time the group of four had been together. And that didn't look to be changing anytime soon.

Sarutobi shrugged. "Okay before we begin I must stress this point. What I am about to reveal is an S ranked secret known only by seven people. Myself, the Elders of the Council, my student Jiraiya, Naruto, and of course the man who this secret involves. If any of you reveal this information without my express consent you will be punished. By the full force of shinobi law. Is that in any way unclear?" Sasuke Anko and Hinata all shook their head showing that they understood. Naruto just continued to glare at Sarutobi. Who merely sighed. "Alright. The truth is that Itachi is not as guilty as you were led to believe. Yes he killed his clan. But he did so under orders. Orders from the Village council." Sasuke's face slowly slipped into a look of horror, right before he blew up. "WHAT? YOU ORDERED HIM TO SLAUGHTER MY FAMILY? WHY? WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT?"

Naruto placed his hand on Sasuke's shoulder. "Whoa Sasuke, cool your jet's there's a reason behind this." Sarutobi nodded. "Indeed there is. The fact is, Sasuke, that your clan was in fact planning a coup against the village. Your father himself was leading it. In order to prevent as many losses as possible the order was given to remove the conspirators by whatever means necessary. Now I only wanted those involved in the Coup wiped out. The elders however had other ideas. They wanted the entire clan wiped out. That way Itachi could restart the clan anew, only this time with the village in control." Sasuke's anger continued to build. Sarutobi merely continued. "However we got lucky. Itachi and I discovered the Elders intent in time. That said, Itachi Jiraiya and I came up with a counter plan. And it worked. To the council, and the village's knowledge, you and Itachi are the only remaining members of your clan. This is not true however. Naruto if you would."

Naruto nodded. "In reality you and Itachi are the last two remaining Uchiha." he took on a maniacal grin. "Well, the last two males above the age of three that is. That and the last two bearing the name of Uchiha. In truth only about a third of the clan was wiped out. And that was only the male populace. The rest are all alive and well." Sasuke fell into his chair in disbelief. He wasn't alone. His head shot up. "My mother..." Naruto grinned "Is alive and well. Last I heard they were heading to a small region outside the elemental nations. Using the name Hayabusa if memory serves." the hokage nodded. "The Hayabusa clan, lead by Mikoto Hayabusa. They're actually living not far from your first big mission. They live in the remnants of what was once Uzumaki No Sato. Or the village hidden in the whirlpool." Sasuke sighed. They were alive. Naruto chose this moment to speak again. "Of course you three, I, the Hokage, Jiraiya of The Sannin and Itachi are the only ones who know. And we want to keep it that way. Which means Sasuke that you need to keep up the appearance of an avenger. As much as I know you don't want to live that life anymore, you have to keep up the appearance. This includes making it appear that your curse mark is still bothering you. We'll make it seem like it wasn't purified. Or at least not completely. But unfortunately I'm going to have to pretend to be affected as well. This means we can't fight at our best. We have to just scrape by."

Sasuke looked confused. "Scrape by? What do you mean?" Naruto scratched his head. "Well from what I saw, quite a few teams made it through. Which means there's likely going to be a preliminary to cut down the number of contestants." Sasuke just stared at him. "And you'd know this how?" Naruto grinned. "Simple I've watched previous exams. There are usually no more than twelve contestants at a time. And the final rounds are always one on one. So as a result, the numbers need to be cut back to save time during the finals." everyone stared at Naruto as if he'd grown a third head. "What, do you honestly believe that with all the prank's that I've done? That I wouldn't learn a thing or two about the inner workings of village politics? I know full well that several important people will be attending. Possibly even the daimyo, especially with you in the exam Sasuke. I hate to say it; put the council will likely promote you just because of who you are." Sasuke growled and shook his head. "No. if they did that than I would turn down the promotion. I won't accept it unless I earned It." the room grinned. And Sarutobi nodded "good. That attitude proves that you've already matured during this exam. And that you actually have a shot at earning the promotion. Not through your name. But by your actions."

Naruto nodded. "Yep. Well now that that's settled, why don't we all get some rest? We can work out the specifics after the prelims." they all nodded, and the four visitors departed. Sarutobi sighed and reached into his desk. He quickly reopened his book to where he left off, and started to giggle.

Naruto and Hinata continued to walk. Until Naruto stopped. "Hinata I have to ask you something." Hinata only nodded. "Why did you hug me back there?" Hinata blushed a bright red. "Uh w-w-well y-you j-j-just s-seemed so s-sad at the t-t-time. I-i-i t-thought that m-maybe y-you could use some c-c-comforting." Naruto smiled. "That's not the only reason is it?" Hinata blushed so red that she glowed, but she gave a small smile and shook her head. Naruto chuckled and lead her back to her room. Once they reached the door and turned to Hinata and said. "It's Okay Hinata I understand what you mean. Oh just so you know." he grinned mischievously and kissed her on the cheek. "I like you too." and with that he walked away. Hinata was glowing like a light bulb, but had a huge grin plastered on her face. She calmly entered the room and closed the door. She walked over to her bed and lay down. Just before thinking 'He kissed me, and said he likes me. Naruto-kun likes me.' and with a final massive grin... she fainted. But was happier than she'd ever been.

Two days later.

After two days of waiting the contestants of the Chunin exam were all gathered in some kind of arena. There was a massive electronic billboard on the wall, above a pair of massive stone hands in the Ram sign. On either side were a set of stairs leading up to a balcony surrounding the arena. The Hokage stood on a pedestal flanked by the Jonin Sensei's of each team present, and the rest of Konoha's Jonin populace. The hokage stepped forwards and began the speak. "Welcome all of you. And may I say, Congratulations on passing the second part of the Chunin exams. Now I know all of you have worked hard to get here. But let my start by explaining the true purpose behind the Chunin exams." this caused confusion amongst the gennin gathered. Kiba broke the silence with. "What do you mean true Purpose? I thought the purpose was to be made Chunin?" the Hokage nodded. "While it is true that the exams determine who becomes a Chunin, the real purpose is as a replacement for war." again the gennin broke in murmuring voices at this.

Just as the hokage was about to continue, he was interrupted by a sickly looking jonin with a katana across his back. "Pardon me Hokage, if I may?" the hokage nodded and stepped back. "Alright everyone my name is Gekko Hayate. And I will be the Procter for the third portion of the Chunin exams. Now before we begin I'm afraid that, because there are so many of you, that we're going to need to have a set of Preliminary rounds." Kankuro spoke up from the far left. "What? Preliminaries, but some of us just got here!" several of the gennin nodded. But Hayate continued. "Yes well like I said there are simply too many of you here. And we need to trim down the numbers. Now these matches will be one on one Tournament style. so if anyone doesn't feel up to it, they may drop out now without disqualifying there teammates." a hand went up quickly." sorry but I guess that means me. I used too much chakra during the second part. And during the first, that sound attack's left me deaf in one ear. I'm going to have to drop out." Hayate nodded.

"Anyone else? No? Good. Now when the board up there shows your name, come down and we'll begin the match." the board activated and spiraled through the names until it fell on... "Sasuke Uchiha vs. Akado Yoroi. The rest of you please clear the arena." Naruto walked past and patted Sasuke's shoulder on the way by. Sasuke nodded back at him and turned to his opponent. ((An: okay a heads up. I pretty much suck at writing fight scenes. so please bear with me.)) Sasuke glared at his opponent and feigned a flash of pain from his shoulder. The Gennin across from just chuckled. "You're clearly not at your best. Why don't you save yourself the humiliation? And give up now." Sasuke just growled and settled into his Taijutsu stance. Hayate looked back and forth between the two combatants before dropping his arm. "Begin."

Akado went through about a dozen hand seals until his hands glowed blue. And then proceeded to charge at Sasuke. Who merely smirked and dodged the rather obvious hand thrusts. His smile vanished however when he got grazed and noticed a drop in his chakra. 'Shit, that's what weird technique of his does. It drains my chakra. Damn, can't take too many hits from that.' with that thought in mind Sasuke exploded into action. And vanished from sight. Akado glanced around trying to locate him. Right until he felt a foot apply itself to his chin launching him skywards. He reached the apex of his flight and floated there briefly. That was when he felt Sasuke poke in the back from beneath him. "Heh got you; you won't be draining anymore of my chakra thanks." Sasuke wasted no time. He spun around Akado and launched a back fist at him. It was quickly blocked by both Akado's arms. Sasuke just grinned and spun to the other side nailing him in the kidneys with a punch. This spinning around and attacking him last for about three seconds, during which Sasuke landed five devastating blows. All while falling. He ended with an axe kick to Akado's stomach and called out his Technique. "Barrage of Lions."

The final blow knocked what little wind Akado had left, straight from his lungs. The resulting impact from the fall coupled with Sasuke's kick rendered him unconscious. "Akado is unable to continue, Sasuke Uchiha wins." this was met by general applause. Kakashi made to go down to Sasuke, but caught a glance from the hokage, and a subtle shake of the head. He gave an equally subtle nod back, and stayed put. Sasuke made it up to the balcony and was immediately congratulated by Naruto and sakura. Unfortunately Ino decided to try to offer her congrats as well. Only to be stopped by a glance from Naruto. She shivered slightly; Naruto's eyes glowed a subtle blue and exuded raw power. He shook his head. Ino gulped slightly and stepped back. Naruto nodded at her and pulled the power from his eyes. Only for something odd to happen. His head suddenly felt like it was cracking open. "Ah shit, what the hell?" the rest of team seven looked at Naruto oddly. Sakura asked. "What is it?' Naruto shook his head and grunted. "I don't know. It feels like someone suddenly took an axe to my skull. And my eyes. They feel like someone set them on fire." Kakashi was suddenly worried. What Naruto's was describing was the exact same thing that occurred to him. Shortly after he had the Sharingan implanted.

Then he remembered his talk with team 7 just before coming here. They said that Naruto had entered Sasuke's mind, in order to remove the soul from Sasuke's curse mark. And that it had been hiding in the room containing the power of the Sharingan. "Naruto look at me." Naruto complied and what Kakashi saw confirmed his fears. Naruto's eyes had changed. His iris had gone black, and he now had an ice blue tomoe in each eye. To make matters worse, his pupil had become a slit, like when Naruto was channeling the Kyuubi's chakra. But like the Tomoe it was ice blue. "Naruto, it appears that your little jaunt through Sasuke's mind has caused some changes." Naruto was worried. "How bad?" Kakashi pulled out a mirror and showed Naruto his reflection. "Shit. I was afraid of this." Sasuke and sakura were confused until they saw Naruto's eyes. Sasuke suddenly understood. "You gained a doujutsu. It looks almost like the Sharingan. Except for the slit pupil and the different colors." sakura finally twigged. "So... you mean that Naruto's visit too your mind did this too him?" Naruto nodded. "Yeah. When I was in there we had to go into the part of Sasuke's mind where his bloodline was. Now normally that isn't enough to do this. But I think the Kyuubi may be somewhat responsible. As she's the originator of the Sharingan."

Sasuke nodded. "It makes sense. We were in the room with my bloodline, and our minds were connected. Plus it appeared as if the room was already unstable. So after you summoned her into my head and she ate Orochimaru's soul. Well the knowledge needed to flow somewhere. You were a convenient out lit. Especially since you hold the Kyuubi." Naruto nodded back. "Exactly. Because of the seal, there's always a minute amount of her chakra in my coils at all times. So the genetic knowledge, that I acquired by accident, reacted with the Kyuubi's chakra. And this was the result." sakura and Kakashi nodded in understanding. It wasn't intentional, just an odd set of circumstances piled on top of each other. Coupled with general bad timing all around. Kakashi piped in. "so what are you going to call it?" Naruto shrugged. "No clue, need to see what it do first." they all nodded at that. They were jerked out of their little meeting by a large gust of wind and a sickening crack. They all looked down at the arena and realized that they had missed several matches. "Temari of the sand wins by knockout."

The board spins through the next set of names. "Would Sakura Haruno and Ino Yamanaka please come down?" Naruto glanced at sakura who nodded back her understanding. They were trying to make it seem like they hadn't changed much. This meant that she needed to act like a total fan-girl yet again. she sighed and went down too the arena.((AN: this fight was epically stupid on a massive scale, and I refuse to write it. anyways it happens the same as in cannon. so if you don't know. than watch the bloody series, or read the damn manga.)) "Double Knockout. No victor." Naruto and Sasuke just sigh. And knew that it was exactly how it would have ended anyways. Sakura hadn't actually trained at all since wave. But when they saw her being carted off, they watched her eyes open, and saw the fire burning there. They couldn't help but smile. That was all about to change. "Uzumaki Naruto Vs Kiba Inuzuka."

Kiba howled when this was announced. "Awooo we got lucky Akamaru. We got Naruto, chyh there's no way we can lose to an idiot like him." Naruto growled, until he felt Sasuke's hand on his shoulder. "Crush him." Naruto nodded and leapt over the balcony. He landed in a crouch and rose smoothly to his feet. Kiba and Akamaru followed suit. But Kiba botched the landing and fell flat on his face. Naruto just smirked and removed his jacket. Revealing the golden bracelets on his arms. This drew many eyes; they finally took stock of Naruto and noticed something off about his demeanor. This wasn't some punk kid playing ninja. This was the real deal. Naruto did some stretches and walked to the center of the arena. His hair covering his eyes. Kiba mistook this for fear and sneered at Naruto. Naruto didn't react at all. Not until the proctor started the match. "Begin." Naruto's head snapped up and Kiba got his first look at Naruto's new Doujutsu.

"The hell? When did you get that? You're not from a clan. KAI"

Kiba tried to dispel the genjutsu. Only for nothing to happen.

"You can't dispel what isn't there Kiba. Theses eyes are very real. And they can see your future." blue light engulfed Naruto's arms and legs. When the light cleared his bracers and greaves were in place.

"And your future is... Defeat."

Kiba snarled and lunged, trying to wipe that smug look from Naruto's face.

Naruto sidestepped the attack with ease and fell back into his stance. Kiba flipped over and replaced his momentum into his next lunge. Naruto deflected the attack and sidestepped again. This time following up with a punch to Kiba's short-ribs. Kiba grunted from the impact and clutched his side.

"Oh I'm sorry. Did I hurt you? Maybe you should take a break."

Kiba snarled and lunged at Naruto. Naruto decided enough was enough. He ducked under Kiba's blow and swept his legs from under him. Kiba fell flat on his face. Naruto than made a small jump to where Kiba slid to. Kiba flipped himself over in time to see Naruto's Psi blades blaze into life and descend upon him. Kiba closed his eyes and waited fro the hit. Only to hear metal impacting stone next to his left ear. He opened his eyes and glanced to his left. Naruto's blade was imbedded into the floor, and there was a small impact crater under his right fist. The blade from his left was poised to strike.

"Give, or I finish it."

Naruto's voice sent chills down Kiba's back. This was not the Naruto from the academy. He gulped. "Procter I forfeit. I underestimated my opponent, and cannot hope to continue at this time." Hayate nodded.

"Winner by Forfeit, Naruto Uzumaki." Naruto stood up and pulled the power from his gauntlets. The light in the gems vanished quickly, followed quickly by the blades. And with a quick thought, the gauntlets vanished in a flash of blue light, along with the greaves. Naruto held out his hand to Kiba, who smirked and took the offered appendage. Naruto hauled him to his feet and Kiba just chuckled. "Heh, I guess this is what everyone meant when they said my hotheaded attitude would bite me in the ass someday." Naruto just smirked. "You aren't the only one. They used to say the same thing to me. Remember?" Kiba laughed at that. And headed towards the stairs with his arm over Naruto's shoulders for support. His ribs still hurt from that punch. Nothing was broken, but it was sure as hell bruised. "Yeah they did, heh man. Back at the academy we were bleeding terrors weren't we? Us the two hotheads, Choji always eating, and Shikamaru always cloud gazing." Naruto just grinned. "That we were my friend. But now we have a chance to do things differently. To be terrors of a different sort. The kinds that make our enemies piss themselves in fear, at our sheer awesomeness." Kiba just laughed and bumped knuckles Naruto. "You got it buddy. You got it." he let go of Naruto and joined his team. Shino nodded at him in appreciation, and Kurenai just sighed in exasperation. Hinata, as usual, only had eyes for Naruto.

Hinata watched as Kiba and Naruto chatted on there way back to their respective teams. She was glad neither was hurt. Once Kiba rejoined them, Naruto looked at her. She gasped at his eyes. They were somewhat terrifying to look at, but there was no Malice in them. The black iris, gave a sinister feel to his eyes. This was accented by the slit pupil and single tomoe mark. Naruto looked confused. "What's wrong Hinata? Something on my face?" Hinata shook her head. "n-no N-N-N-Naruto-kun, i-i-it's y-your eye's." Naruto looked at her strangely. "Huh? Oh! Right that, Geez I totally forgot. I just awoke this before my match with Kiba and... Heh heh heh, I uh. I kinda don't know how to switch it off yet." Hinata nodded in understanding. It was a common problem with people unused to using Doujutsu. Once they learned how to activate it, it was somewhat difficult to de-activate it. Kurenai piped in. "there should be a constant flow of chakra going to your eyes. Just cancel the flow and pull the chakra from them." Naruto nodded and closed his eyes. He felt the flow and slowly pulled it back. He slowly felt his eyes change. When he opened them again Hinata smiled and Kurenai nodded. "Good job, you did it." Naruto sighed in relief and grinned.

Before heading back to his team however he turned back to Hinata. "Uh say Hinata?" she looked at him. "Uh, when this is over. Would you like to, uh. Heh heh heh. Uh you know... Go out with me?" Hinata went from pale to bright red in 0 seconds flat. A huge grin plastered itself on her face and she just nodded. Naruto smiled back. "Great, I'll uh... Se you later then." she just nodded again. Her grin refused to die until... "Hinata Hyuuga VS Neji Hyuuga. Would both fighters please come down?" her face went from ecstatic to terrified, just as fast as she had gone from normal to atomic blush. She felt a hand on her shoulder. She looked behind herself and saw Naruto standing there. He merely nodded at her and said. "Do your best Hinata." she nodded and made her way down to the arena. While she did that, Naruto stared at her opponent. He could feel the malice rolling off of him. All of it aimed at Hinata. He growled at this. As he watched, the male went into some spiel about fate, ((Insert Neji's fate rant here.))And how weak she was. Naruto's anger threshold, while normally insanely high, was eroding faster than Tsunade's luck. Finally he'd had enough and snapped. He stomped up to the railing and yelled down into the arena.

"OI YOU, WITH THE STICK UP THE ASS!" everyone stopped and stared at Naruto. All of them with the same thought. 'Just what the hell was Naruto doing?' "WHO THE HELL ARE YOU TO SAY THAT HINATA IS WEAK HUH? YOU ARE NOTHING MORE THAN A BIGOTTED PIECE OF SHIT. AND A BLIND ONE AT THAT TOO. FATE? WHAT BULLSHIT. LISTEN HERE YOU NIMROD! WE ALL WRITE OUR OWN FATE. AND ANYONE CAN CHANGE THEIRS WHENEVER THEY WANT. HINATA KICK THIS GUYS ASS!" to say everyone was shocked, was the understatement of the century. They were flat out stunned at Naruto's spiel. Hinata however just nodded and turned back to her opponent. Now normally Neji was confident in his ability to beat his younger cousin. But when he looked into her eyes... he had to fight the urge to shiver at the look she gave him. There was no weakness or fear in those eyes. They were, instead, filled with confidence and an unwavering determination... to make him bleed. This warranted only one thought in Neji's mind. 'Oh shit, this is going to hurt.'

As soon as the proctor began the match, the two Hyuuga were engulfed in an extremely heated Taijutsu battle. For a while it looked like the match was fairly even. But in reality, Neji was in trouble. He'd always been told that his cousin was weak, and extremely un-proficient with their family Taijutsu, The Jyuken. However, at the moment, her actions were the exact opposite. Up in the balconies, Naruto had instinctively activated his doujutsu at the start of the fight. He could see that Hinata was dominating the match. And, somehow, he knew why. Hinata wasn't pathetic at the Jyuken, she was simply too kind natured to put her heart into her blows. But at the moment... she was holding nothing back, and that was why she was... Kicking Neji's ass. Naruto just grinned. "Heh. This fights already over." everyone looked at Naruto as if he'd grown a second head. Kurenai almost blew up at him. "How can you say that? Hinata has no chance against..." her rant was cut off by a glance from Naruto. "You're wrong. Look at her, look at how she's fighting. There's no hesitation. No lack of confidence. This is the true Hinata. The one that her family almost killed. This is why I asked her out. Not just because she's cute. Although that doesn't hurt. No, it's because of this inner strength." Kurenai looked at Naruto with confusion. This quickly faded once she actually started paying attention to the fight.

She had to hold back a gasp. This was what she'd been working towards ever since she had first started training Hinata. Total confidence, zero hesitation, and absolute conviction. She winced as Hinata ducked under Neji's palm thrust, and responded with a thrust of her own... right into his groin. Everyone watched as Neji buckled and squealed like a girl in pure agony. Right before his eyes rolled back and he passed out from sheer pain. Every male in the room paled and covered them selves in horror. Naruto just stated to laugh. The med Nin's quickly ran in to take Neji to the infirmary. Once he was gone, Hinata reverted back to her nervous, shy, persona. Once she was back on the balcony Naruto ran up and hugged her. She went bright red and passed out, almost instantly. This merely confused Naruto. "Huh? Did I break her?" Kurenai merely shook her head and took Hinata from Naruto. "No she just fainted. When you hugged her, you fulfilled one of her greatest wishes. It just overwhelmed her a bit." Naruto nodded and stroked her hair affectionately.

Look after her for me will you? I've got to get back to my team." Kurenai nodded in response. Naruto nodded back before glancing at Neji who was now being taken away on a stretcher by the med-nin. Naruto winced in sympathy, Neji may be an egotistical asshole, but he didn't deserve that kind of injury. A Jyuken strike to the balls wasn't a fate he would wish on any man.

The following matches were all fairly boring in comparison. Shikamaru faced off against a sound Nin named Kin Tsuchi and got her in his Shadow possession technique. He then forced her to slam her own head into the concrete wall instantly knocking her cold. Choji went up against that mummified sound Nin with the weird gauntlet and was beaten. Shino's match was a bit more interesting to watch. He went up against the final sound Nin named Zaku. The match seemed fairly one sided to start but ended with the Nin blowing his own arms off after Shino clogged the exit holes in his arms with bugs. The guy in the weird cat suit from Suna went up against a leaf Nin who could dislocate his joints and stretch to obscene lengths. He won by disguising himself as his puppet and using said puppet, which he discovered was named karasu or crow, to break the leaf nin's bones in a crushing grip. The other matches all followed a similar boring pattern until the final match.

"Would Rock lee and Gaara Sabaku please come down?" this match caught Naruto's attention. Both Gaara and lee were enigmas to him. Gaara with his sand shield and lee with his insane Taijutsu. After it started they were all treated to a rather intense, and seemingly one sided, match. Lee seemed to be at a disadvantage until he got the all clear from his sensei to… As he said it, take them off. Naruto's eyebrows twitched at this. Then he was treated to a sign of just how insane the spandex glad duo was. Lee lifted his leg warmers and removed an insanely heavy set of weights. Then things got truly interesting. Lee's strikes were now coming at an incredible speed until… POW… the impact reverberated throughout the arena. Lee had managed to land a hit on Gaara's face shocking everyone. Lee then began unleashing a massive case of whoop-ass upon Gaara for a short time. Everyone was shocked by Gaara's secondary defense. He had a highly compacted and dense layer of sand covering the entire surface of his body in a sort of skin-tight armor. Lee once again shocked the audience by unleashing five of the eight inner gates. But in the end it wasn't enough.

The massive strain from using the gates ended up causing massive damage to lee's body. This was then compounded upon by Gaara. In a last ditch effort to 'Please his mother' Gaara crushed lees left arm and leg. He was fortunately prevented from killing lee through the actions of lee's sensei. However the medics decreed that, due to the severity of lees injuries, lee might never again be a shinobi.

The preliminaries were now over, and the match-up for the finals were decided.

Match 1: Sasuke Uchiha VS. Hinata Hyuuga.

Match 2: Naruto Uzumaki VS. Gaara Sabaku.

Match 3: Kankuro Sabaku VS. Shino Aburame.

Match 4: Shikamaru Nara VS. Dosu of Sound.

Match 5: Winner of match 4 VS. Temari Sabaku.

The hokage then stepped forwards once again." Well the match up's have been decided, you will all be given a month to prepare. This delay is due too two things, first too provide you all with time to hone your skills and develop new ones. And secondly to allow time for the various foreign dignitaries time to arrive. The finals will be held in the main arena in one month's time." He leveled a glare at Kakashi." Do NOT be late."

With that said the Chunin hopefuls all dispersed in order to train.

On the way out Naruto walked up to Sasuke. "I know that during your match you'll have to put in a lot of effort but I will say this. Regardless of our new friendship, cripple her in any way and I'll make what she did to Neji seem pleasant in comparison." Sasuke went pale and shuddered but nodded anyways." Don't worry Naruto, it's a match between two leaf Nin, I doubt we'll need to unleash anything lethal." Naruto nodded in reply to that before Sasuke continued. "Still though watch out for that Gaara character. He worries me." Naruto glanced at Sasuke but nodded. "Don't worry bro." Sasuke arched an eyebrow at being called that but smiled anyways." With my new skills and the training I'll be getting… He won't be able to even touch me."

Having said that Naruto walked off in order to train. Although inside he was apprehensive, he very much doubted he would walk away from his match unscathed. One way or another, I one month's time one of them was going down and the other would leave limping.

End chapter 3.

AN: Okay everyone sorry for the delay on this chapter but life got in the way… along with a hefty dose of writer's block. Now just to clarify a few things. During Naruto's month long training several familiar faces will be showing up. Including the traditional training from everyone's favorite perverted hermit. But also, Naruto will be training with some familiar faces from the Starcraft universe as well. Starting of course with Tassadar but also with a few others. Now as to which one's… well you'll just have to wait and see. Now on another front I have a perplexing dilemma, I have no idea what to make Naruto's nurse seal level two form look like. So if anyone could come with a description or better yet a sketch, then please send me a PM with either the description or the image. Now that this chapter is up I'll be putting a bit more focus on Those Who Defy Fate, so you should see some more chapters for that soon. Oh and one last thing, I'm calling Naruto's doujutsu the Mystic Eye but I need a Japanese translation for it. If anyone can help me out there I would greatly appreciate it. Until next time.

Noctus is Out.