Previously:
"Sakura..." Sasuke said, noticing her first. His glowing red eyes narrowed into a dark and dangerous glare when he saw her wounds. "Who did that to you…?"
"..." Sakura stared at him with wide eyes, stunned. "Sasuke-kun?" She knew it had to be him, but she barely recognized him in his current state.
"Who was it?" Sasuke demanded, lowering his head slightly as he scanned the odd group gathered before him. His eyes stopped on Biki when he saw the way he was restraining April and how terrible she looked. "Was it you?" he asked darkly, glaring so intensely at the sound ninja that it made him shiver.
'This bastard…!' Biki thought, gritting his teeth as he glared back.
"..." Dosu stared at Sasuke, astonished. 'The cursed seal is wrapped around his whole body...'
Zaku smirked. "We did it!" he said. He didn't know what was going on, but their real prey was finally awake!
Chapter 53: Granted Power…!!
Everyone stared at the revived Uchiha with a mix of awe and trepidation. His chakra was so strong that it was physically affecting the environment around him, creating an air current that spiraled around him and kicked up flecks of dirt.
'Seriously… What in the world happened to him…?' April wondered with beads of sweat sliding down her face, deeply concerned. His Chakra felt completely different. Was that really Sasuke? 'What happened while I was out!?'
"Sasuke-kun…" Sakura said. "Your body..."
Sasuke glanced down with his Sharingan at the hand that was covered in black marks from the cursed seal Orochimaru gave him. "Don't worry..." he told her. "Despite how it looks… I feel power overflowing from within me. I feel… great… He gave it to me."
"Huh?" Sakura said, echoing April's thoughts.
"I finally understand it..." Sasuke said, turning his attention to their enemies. "I am an avenger… Even if I must eat the devil's fruit… I am on a path where I must gain power..."
Sakura stared at him. What… What was he talking about…? Sasuke…?
Zaku and Biki both furrowed their brows and scowled at him.
'Huh? Devil's fruit!? This isn't One Piece….!!' April thought, bewildered. She was so mentally and physically exhausted from pushing her already weakened and impaired body to its limit that her powers of reasoning were beginning to suffer, and all she could think of was anime. What was this craziness!? Was she unconscious again?
'I see… As I thought, the mark on his neck that Sakura girl was talking about was this cursed seal… But… he actually got up from it...' Dosu thought, amazed.
"Now… It was you guys, right?" Sasuke asked again, glaring fiercely at the sound ninjas, focusing particularly on Biki, who was till holding April down. "You have exactly three seconds to let go of her."
"Hmph," Zaku huffed.
Dosu furrowed his brow and braced himself for a fight.
Biki smirked and tightened his grip on April, making her wince.
Sasuke launched himself forward and swung his leg at the defiant sound ninja's head.
"!!" Biki's eyes widened, startled when he felt a sickening crack when Sasuke's foot came in contact with the arm he raised to block the attack, and he was sent rolling away harshly across the ground.
Sasuke winced from the effort it took, but stood his ground.
April stared up at him with wide eyes. He looked even worse up close.
"!!" Ino gasped. 'Huh?'
"Ino, this is bad! You'll get caught up! Return to your body!!" Shikamaru shouted at her as he grabbed her real body and ran for the bushes. "You come too, Chōji!! We're hiding!!"
'Not good!!' Ino thought, immediately seeing his point. She formed the hand seal to free herself from the jutsu. 'Release!!'
"Uu… Nn..." she groaned, wincing at the pain when she returned to her real body and felt the damage that had been transferred to it. Her own body was better off than Kin's had been, but it still hurt a lot.
"Oh, good! You're back!!" Shikamaru said, relieved that she had made it.
"Uuu..." Kin groaned, her face screwing up in pain as she regained control of her crippled body.
Biki picked himself up and glared at Sasuke, making direct eye contact with him in an attempt to freeze him with his hypnotic eye jutsu.
Sasuke gritted his teeth and retaliated by aiming a fierce glare of his own back at him and the other sound ninjas, completely unaffected. "It won't work…" Sasuke stated coldly in a tone colder than the iceberg that sank the Titanic. "These eyes 'see' everything."
'Damn…!!!' Biki cursed, gritting his teeth as a bead of cold sweat slid down the back of his neck. First that jerk with the white eyes, and now this bastard… How could there be so many people here capable of withstanding his jutsu!? No one told him that it would be like this! From what he had heard of Konoha, he thought it would be full of a bunch of soft weaklings!
"!" Dosu flinched under the Uchiha's intense gaze and at the immense power he could feel welling up inside of him. 'This… This is...' Staring at Sasuke, he couldn't help but feel as though it was Orochimaru himself staring back at them. "His chakra is too large!!" he exclaimed, startled. 'How… How can it be this much?' He noticed that even Biki seemed wary, to the point where he wasn't even attempting the risk of approaching Sasuke to get back to April. And if that psychopath was scared enough to abandon his prey, then you knew it was bad!
"Dosu!! No need to be afraid of this half dead freak!!" Zaku said, clapping his hands together as he prepared to attack. The fact that he was able to repel Biki with one kick meant nothing to him since they all knew Biki's taijutsu was the worst.
"No, Zaku!!" Dosu shouted, alarmed. "Don't you realize?!!!"
"!!" Sakura gasped as Zaku finished his hand seal and thrust his palms out in Sasuke and April's direction.
'Extreme Slicing Air!!' Zaku thought, unleashing his most powerful attack yet. Everything in front of him was obliterated in a violent explosion of air and sound.
"Ugh!" Dosu grunted while he shielded himself. The immediate surrounding areas around Zaku's attack were flooded with powerful torrents of wind in the wake of his ultimate jutsu.
"Whoa!!" Shikamaru, Ino, and Chōji cried, covering their ears while they ducked behind the bushes for protection.
Zaku panted, staring straight ahead as the dust and debris cleared, revealing the huge crater he had carved into the ground and the almost completely destroyed tree roots of Team 7's shelter. He had angled his attack so it would be lined up to take them all out at once. There was nothing left of the leaf ninjas. Not a single trace. "Heh!!" he laughed with a cocky smirk. "I've blown him away!!"
"Blown who away?" Sasuke asked.
"!!" Zaku gasped, eyes widening in shock, as he turned his head to look in the direction of the sound of his voice, startled when he realized that the leaf ninja was standing right next to him.
Without even bothering to look at him, Sasuke sent Zaku flying with a powerful one-handed blow. Not a single member of his team was hit by the sound ninja's attack. He had managed to move them all to safety before that could happen.
"Guaa!!" Zaku cried, grunting in pain as he hit the ground and skidded through the dirt.
'Fast!!' Dosu thought, astonished. The Uchiha had acted in the blink of an eye. 'And while carrying those three...'
Sasuke quickly formed his hand seals, taking a deep breath. 'Fire Release: Phoenix Flower Jutsu!!' he thought, unleashing a volley of fireballs at his enemies.
"!!" Zaku and Dosu gasped in alarm.
"!" April furrowed her brow, noticing they were larger than before.
"So what?!!" Zaku yelled, thrusting his hands out in front of them, unleashing another air attack to counter. "I'll blast them away!!" For moment, he thought it had worked when the flames began to die, but it quickly became obvious that wasn't the case. "What!?" he exclaimed in disbelief as he realized several bladed weapons were still spinning toward him. 'Shurikens inside the flames?' he thought, raising his arms in desperate attempt to protect himself. He hadn't accounted for them. It was too late to avoid it. "Ahhh!!!" he squeezed his eyes shut, wincing in pain when the shurikens hit his arms and sliced his sides.
Before he had a chance to recover, Sasuke was already taking advantage of that moment of vulnerability and sliding in for another attack, keeping his body low to the ground.
"!!" Dosu flinched in alarm when he spotted him. "Zaku, below!!!" But the warning came to late.
"… Huh?" Zaku said when his wrists were grabbed by a speeding blur. "!!" he gasped in shock and his eyes widened at the pain he felt in the instant his arms were suddenly twisted behind his back, while a foot planted firmly in the middle of his back simultaneously forced him down onto his knees. "Ugh…!" he groaned, trembling as his body screamed in protest from having its joints stretched to their utmost limit.
Sasuke's head was bowed while he stared down at his opponent, with his bangs covering most of his face. He smirked.
"..." Sakura and April stared at him, unnerved by the darkness behind it.
'His chakra type is totally different from at the academy…' Ino thought warily, shocked, as she watched from the side with Shikamaru, while Chōji hid his face in his hands. 'This is Sasuke-kun? What's going on?'
Sasuke's smirked widened, and his teammates caught a glimpse of the unsettling look in his eyes. Something was very wrong with him.
'This isn't normal… He's acting strange!' April thought, extremely worried and confused. Sasuke could be arrogant, but she had never seen him enjoy hurting an opponent like this before. 'Those marks seem like bad news… What are they!?'
Tears formed in Sakura's eyes. She could already feel him slipping away. She remembered the words Orochimaru left her with.
"Sasuke-kun will seek me..."
"Hehe… So, you're proud of these two arms?" Sasuke taunted the restrained sound ninja, applying more pressure to his already strained joints.
"!" Zaku furrowed his brow, cringing, as he glanced up at him warily. He didn't like the way he said that.
Without further warning, Sasuke pulled up on his arms and pushed down on his back.
"!!" Zaku gasped, his eyes widening with fear, when he realized Sasuke's intentions and how helpless he was to stop him.
Sasuke grinned widely at the expression of suffering on his victim's face as he increased his level of discomfort.
'…!!' Sakura and April furrowed their brows, and their eyes widened in horror, startled.
SNAP!
"AWWW!!!!" Zaku screamed in agony. With one final, merciless jarring, Sasuke had dislocated both of his arms.
"!!" Sakura, April, Dosu, Shikamaru, and Ino gasped, while Chōji risked a peek to see the source of the snapping sound and what had made everyone so anxious. He regretted it immediately.
"Uu… Uuuu..." Zaku moaned in pain as Sasuke let him drop to the ground, twitching.
'This...' Sakura thought, tears welling up in her eyes, while April continued to stare at Sasuke in shock.
"You're the only one left..." Sasuke stated ominously, turning his head to look over his shoulder at Dosu with a menacing glare.
"!!" Dosu shuddered and suddenly became aware that Biki had already fled, taking advantage of Sasuke's preoccupation with torturing Zaku to escape on his own. Dosu gritted his teeth, wishing he had thought to do the same. At the moment, he envied the psychopath's lack of conscience. He could tell by the sinister look in the Uchiha's eyes that the only thing awaiting him now was a promise of immense pain… and death.
"I hope you let me have more fun..." Sasuke said darkly with another smirk, turning around fully to stalk threateningly towards him.
"…!!" Sakura gasped, biting her lip. 'This isn't...' Images comparing his current appearance and behavior to the Sasuke she knew and loved flashed through her mind. The cute way he sometimes blushed a little when he sulked. His usual confident smirk, free of the evil she sensed in him now. Her blood ran cold when the image of the current Sasuke overlapped with the memory of Orochimaru's wicked smirk. The evil in him reminded her of that man…!!
'This… This guy…' April thought, frowning and clenching her fists, while her mind also replayed memories of the terrifying boy in front of them, remembering his annoyed expression and cocky grin. The arrogant but playful way he teased Naruto. The pure fear and paranoia in his eyes when he grabbed her after she refused to hand the scroll over to that bloodthirsty, homicidal grass ninja. This exam was changing him, and not necessarily for the better. She was also enraged over Sakura's injuries, and dislocating that sound ninja's arms could be justified strategically since it would prevent him from being able to attack them again, but… the depraved delight she saw in those glowing, red eyes the moment his joints snapped out of place, the moment he screamed, was beyond savage. Sasuke could be a jerk, but he was never purposefully cruel. He had never been the type to take pleasure in someone else's suffering, even when facing an enemy.
'This isn't Sasuke-kun!!' The two girls thought together.
"STOP!!!!!" Sakura cried, finding the strength to throw herself at Sasuke and wrap her arms around him from behind.
Sasuke's head snapped to the side, and she was hit by the full force of his glare. Sakura's eyes widened in fear.
"!!" April gasped, grimacing as she tried to force herself to move, too, worried how he might react in his current state. 'Damn…!' she cursed internally, trembling all over from the futile effort. 'At a time like this…Why can't I…!?'
"Please..." Sakura begged him quietly when she found her voice again, tears running down her bruised face. 'Stop..."
April could feel a lump forming in her throat as she watched Sasuke continue to stare at Sakura for a moment that felt like an eternity. Ino had been wounded while using her mind control jutsu. The sound kunoichi was attacked by her own teammates. The guy who used combined blasts of air and sound to attack could no longer use his arms and was crippled with pain. Naruto was still unconscious for reasons unknown to her. Lee was also out cold, but he had obviously been wounded while fighting the sound ninjas, because of the blood around his ear. Sakura had been beaten black and blue. And she was barely holding onto consciousness herself. She was with Sakura. This fight had claimed enough victims. They couldn't let Sasuke lose himself. Letting him continue was too dangerous. He had to be stopped before he did something he couldn't come back from.
"..." Ino stared, also watching with mixed feelings and great concern for both Sakura and Sasuke.
They were all surprised and immensely relieved when his expression seemed to soften slightly, and the strange black marks covering his body receded. Sakura had gotten through to him.
'The cursed seal is disappearing...' Dosu thought, astonished. 'Looks like we're saved...'
"!?" April gasped, the crease in her brow deepening with concern when Sasuke's knees suddenly buckled.
"Ugh..." Sasuke groaned, collapsing into a sitting position on the ground, taking Sakura with him. His body felt heavy, as though all of his strength had abandoned him.
"Sasuke-kun!!" Sakura exclaimed, doing her best to support him and hold him steady.
"!" Dosu was startled when something dropped and hit him on the head from above. He looked down and saw that it was their Earth Scroll. He glanced up at the tree tops. He couldn't see him, but it seemed Biki hadn't completely deserted him after all. He grabbed the scroll and straightened up to face his dangerous opponent, holding it out in front of him. "You are strong..."
"!!" Sasuke and Sakura turned their heads to look at him, surprised.
"Sasuke-kun… We can't defeat you the way you are now," Dosu continued carefully. He squatted down to set the scroll on the ground. "This is our compensation for settling this… Please, let us leave."
"?" Sasuke, Sakura, and April were taken aback by this turn of events. For the enemy to suddenly offer them their scroll… with this, they would have a complete set! It seemed too good to be true.
"This may seem convenient, but there is something we must find out now," Dosu said seriously, collecting his incapacitated teammates. "But I will promise you this… If there is another situation where we will meet in this exam, we will neither run nor hide."
"!" Sakura heard the way Sasuke was panting and saw that he was glaring at the sound ninjas. But, more importantly, she also saw the strange mark that Orochimaru had put on his neck again. "Wait!!!" she shouted at Dosu, who paused his exit to look back at her. "Who is Orochimaru?!! What did he do to Sasuke-kun?!!! Why to Sasuke-kun?!!!"
'Orochimaru…? Who is that?' April wondered, frowning and furrowing her brow in confusion. She had never heard that name before. Did they run into another enemy while she was unconscious? Was that person somehow responsible for whatever happened to Sasuke and why Naruto was out cold?
"I don't know..." Dosu answered Sakura's question honestly. "We were merely ordered to kill Sasuke-kun."
'So they were targeting Sasuke… because someone ordered it…?' April thought, her frown deepening with concern. It sounded like this someone was the Orochimaru person Sakura mentioned, but, like she already asked, why Sasuke?
'Telling us to kill Sasuke yet going ahead of us… Then not killing Sasuke-kun, but doing this cursed seal… What is your reasoning…' Dosu silently questioned Orochimaru's motives, trying to figure out what he was thinking, while he continued on his way, dragging his injured teammates away with him. He needed to find Biki.
"..." Sakura and April watched them leave, their heads filled with more questions than ever.
"Hey! Are you guys alright!?" Chōji called out as Team 10 came running over to check on them now that the coast was clear.
"This sucks, but Ino, you take care of Lee!" Shikamaru said.
Neji Hyūga observed the scene playing out below from his perch in the tree beside Tenten. 'That chakra was abnormal… Is the Uchiha clan that strong…?' he wondered, furrowing his brow.
Sasuke was holding the wrist of his trembling left hand, staring at it with wide eyes. "What happened to..." What happened to all of that strength he felt earlier? "What am I..."
'Sasuke-kun...' Sakura thought, concerned.
'Sakura… Sasuke...' April thought, still concerned, as her eyes fluttered closed, unable to keep them open a second longer now that the immediate danger had passed.
Shikamaru and Chōji stood over April and Naruto. Even after passing out, her brow was still furrowed slightly with worry for her teammates and from her own discomfort, while the sleeping idiot had a silly grin on his dumb face.
'I'll protect Sakura-chan...' Naruto thought while he dreamed, blissfully unaware of all of the trouble the others had experienced, and they danger they were all in.
'It sucks that she passed out again, but I guess it can't be helped...' Shikamaru thought with a frown. He didn't know what happened to them before they encountered the sound ninjas, but it was obvious that April had been through a lot. She looked so pale and weak, he had to lean down and check to make sure she was still breathing and had a pulse. It was amazing she could fight in that condition. "What should we do with him?" he asked aloud, glancing at Naruto, who looked annoyingly healthy in comparison, apart from some minor scratches. "Kick him awake?"
"Can I do it?" Chōji asked. He still owed Naruto for the last time he stole one of his chips without asking.