Chapter 23: The Third Test Begins
The ten genin stood on a temporary stage in the middle of the arena, the audience surrounding them. At the top of the center stands sat three Kages; Hokage, Kazekage, and Raikage.
Naruto looked around at all the people who came to watch, 'so many, a lot more than last time… did they make the stadium bigger while I was gone?' Naruto thought.
"Hey, boss, when we fight in the finals don't hold back, 'cause I won't," said a voice behind Naruto.
He spun around to see Konohamaru smiling at him, "Right," Naruto said nodding and smiling back.
"You've all been announced, the first match is between Soel and Link. All others head to your designated watching area," Neji said pointing to a side door.
The eight genin not fighting walked off to the door while the shaven head Cloud ninja and the girl Grave ninja stayed behind, 'so he's Soel and she's Link,' Naruto thought as he walked through the doors.
As the genin walked up the stairs they couldn't see the fight, but they could hear the cheers, oohs and aahs of the crowd. When they finally reached their designated area Soel was beaten rather well and on one knee while Link had her chain in one hand and was walking towards him.
Link stopped walking and flung her chain out, it hit Soel in the side of the head and knocked him back, a deep gash where the chain had made contact with his head. Link started to wrap her chain around herself again as Neji ran up to Soel.
"The winner, Link!" he yelled out as two medic ninja ran out with a stretcher to get Soel. "The next match will be between Coe and Dozez," Neji said to the audience.
Link was already through the door when the announcement was made, and she apparently didn't care about the other matches. The Cloud girl jumped down from the genin area at the mention of her name, 'that's right, she's Coe,' Naruto thought, then he began to look around, 'which ones Dozez?' he asked himself.
Shortly there after the doors below Naruto opened and the Grave ninja with the scarred left eye walked out. He walked up to Coe and Neji and waited. "Ready? Begin!" Neji said jumping back a bit.
Neither moved for a moment, then at once they both did, Coe threw several kunai at Dozez who dodged them as he performed hand seals. He stopped his seals as he backed up to a tree and stuck his fists into the ground. An instant later a hand of earth came from the ground and reached for Coe.
Coe dodged the hand and another came out. She managed to dodge it as well, but more and more came, each one pushing here closer and closer to the wall of the arena. Then two hands came at her at once and she barely managed to clear both while a third closed fist came out from the arena wall. Coe saw it in time and jumped over it, as she did she threw more kunai at Dozez, finally having a clear shot of him again.
Dozez pulled his arms out of the ground to avoid the kunai as Coe landed on the closed fist that came out of the wall. "You missed," Dozez said.
"So did you," Coe said with a laugh.
Dozez raised an eyebrow as the fist Coe was standing on opened, causing her to fall, and closed an instant later catching her. From mid abdomen down Coe was trapped, although she still had here hands, she couldn't reach any more weapons.
"Damn it," she yelled and began making seals.
Dozez followed suit and managed to finish his first causing rocks to fly at Coe and disrupting her seals. Dozez started making seals again, but these were the same as he used at the beginning and he dug his hands into the ground again. Another fist bigger than the one currently holding Coe came from the earth and grabbed both her and the fist. Once the larger fist had a hold of Coe all the other ones crumbled back into dirt.
"Do you surrender?" Doze asked, his hands still in the ground.
"No," Coe said trying to break free.
The grip of the fist tightened, Dozez was about to ask again when Neji stepped it, "That's enough, this fight is over, Dozez is the winner," He said.
The fist turned to dust and Dozez walked back to the genin area. Medic ninja's came over to Coe, but she managed to walk over to the medic area. "Next we have Link against Naruto," Neji yelled out as Dozez and Coe walked off to different ends of the arena.
"Alright!" Naruto yelled as he jumped down from the genin area.
Link remained silent but jumped down as well. They walked over to Neji and stood to oppose each other. Neji gave the command and jumped back. Once he was gone Link's chain whipped out towards Naruto. Naruto ducked away pulling out a kunai and threw it at her. Link deflected it with her chain and began whipping it back and forth in front of her as she slowly walked towards Naruto.
"Shadow Clone!" Naruto yelled putting his hands in the familiar signal and countless clones appeared around him and Link.
Link was startled slightly by the sheer number of clones, but quickly gained her composure back. At once all the clones attacked her and she managed to fend them all off. None got closer than two feet before they were hit and dispelled by her chain. With one vast swing of the chain the last three Narutos were proven to be clones and vanished, but the real one was nowhere to be seen.
Link stopped swinging her chain and pulled it to her hand. She started looking around for the real Naruto, having no idea of where he could possibly have gone to.
The audience was in the same situation as Link, none having the slightest idea where Naruto had gone to. Every eye in the stadium was looking for a sign of the orange clad ninja.
Link walked over to the few trees in the arena. As she passed the first tree a trip wire was set off and several kunai shot towards her. Link managed to dodge all of them and land crouching on a tree branch. As she crouched there she looked around for Naruto, who still remained hidden. Suddenly three kunai shot from a tree in front of Link and dug into the branch she was crouching on.
"Ha, your aim is horrible. You missed," She said starting to stand up. But as her legs straitened there was a snag somewhere in her right arm. She looked down to see all three kunai had hit gaps in the chain links.
"My aims a lot better than you'd think," Naruto said hopping out of a tree, "let's see what you can do without the chain," he said grinning.
"Wow, that's really smart," Ino said from the left hand stands.
"Yeah, when did Naruto learn to think that fast," Kiba asked from behind her.
"He always came up with plans in battle. It's just that they didn't always work, or weren't always used," Sakura said with a smile, the other two looked at her.
"Well, I must say I didn't expect that," Link said dropping her chain and jumping backwards off the branch.
She then bolted from the forest, Naruto following behind. Link stopped near the center of the arena and spun around, throwing three kunai at Naruto. Naruto managed to dodge two, but the third hit him in the left thigh. Naruto fell to his side and pulled the kunai out. He looked up to see Link holding one end of a trip wire with several shuriken tied along it and a kunai tied to the end.
"Well, would you rather have me with the chain or this?" Link asked with a sadistic grin.
"Damnit," Naruto managed to say before the bladed wire flew at him and he was forced to dodge away.
Naruto ran back into the trees, he couldn't do what he did last time, but at least there were objects to hide behind. Naruto sat on a tree branch and watched Link walk towards him, her blade wire weaving back and forth like her chain did, 'she has to be manipulating that with her chakra,' Naruto thought. 'That would make her a wind type. Maybe I could…' Naruto grinned, this could just work.
Link was approaching the trees again, this time knowing Naruto was hiding there, and this time, ready for him. As she got closer dozens of Narutos suddenly shot out of the trees. Link stopped walking and looked around at all the clones encircling her, rather certain the real one was still in the trees.
The bladed wire started weaving around and building momentum to attack when all the Narutos put both their hands towards Link. All their hands were open and their fingers pointed skyward. Link looked at them again, they were in a nearly perfect circle, none were much further away or closer to her than the others.
Each Naruto had the same look on their face, the look of determined victory. Now Link was starting to fear what was coming, she sent the wire out to a Naruto but it was blown off course to the right by a strong gust of wind. But it wasn't just normal wind blowing, it was a spiral gust. It spun faster and faster forming a wall of wind between the ring of Narutos and Link, who was trapped in the center, the eye of the storm.
"Anything you try to sent through the wind will end up flying back at you much faster from the spin," one of the clones said.
Link looked around her at all the Narutos forming the spiral, her bladed wire was useless, even throwing a kunai wouldn't work. But no one could maintain something like this long; eventually he'll tire and be vulnerable.
"What the hell is he doing?" Tsunade asked standing up.
"Looks like Rasengan first stage," Jiraiya said next to her.
"But, that's way too big to be a Rasengan," Tsunade said wide eyed.
"I just hope he doesn't go to second stage, that big it would kill her, him, Neji, it could even get out of control enough to destroy half the stadium," Jiraiya said.
"What if he just bypasses it and goes to a full Rasengan?" Tsunade asked, her eyes on Jiraiya now.
"That big, I don't know if he can. But then again I didn't thing he could do a first stage that big," Jiraiya said.
"What the hell would happen?" Tsunade asked.
"If by some chance he manages to do that he, and everyone else outside the circle would be fine, but she'd be torn to shreds," Jiraiya said.
Tsunade turned to look back at Naruto, "Oh please let her give up, I don't want him to have to go that far," she said.
"He won't. At least, not if he wasn't sure that the village would remain unharmed," Gaara said from the chair next to Tsunade.
Tsunade turned to look at Gaara, but either he didn't notice she was looking at him, or he didn't care. Either way his eyes were focused on Naruto's fight.