Hey everyone, here's the new chapter of "The Sparring Tournament"! I was so happy when after I posted my chapter I got so many reviews of people saying that they couldn't wait for Natsu and Shikamaru vs Erza and Sakura! I love it when people write reviews, I hope I get reviews more often in the near future :D Enjoy the next awesome battle!
Chapter Four: Fight Four, the Fire Dragon and Shadow Master vs The Pink Menace and The Red Terror
Here's the list again:
1: Ino
2: Zoro
3: Alphonse
4: Gray
5: Usopp
6: Shino
7: Chopper
8: Lucy
9: Lee
10: Franky
11: Edward
12: Sai
13: Natsu
14: Shikamaru
15: Sakura
16: Erza
17: Brook
18: Nami
19: Kiba
20: Robin
21: Wendy
22: Neji
23: Naruto
24: Sanji
25: Chouji
26: Luffy
27: Tenten
28: Hinata
It was time for the fourth battle, but of course, Shikamaru couldn't be the referee since he's one of the participants who will be fighting.
"I'll be the referee for this match." Gray offered and everyone agreed. Gray offered it, being fully aware that Erza might scare the crap out of him if he made even one single mistake, but the chances of that happening are very slim so he dicided to take the risk.
Natsu was of course fired up as always "Yeah, I finally get to fight! And now I can have my rematch with Erza!"
"Don't you dare underestimate me Natsu, I could lead to your defeat." Erza protested.
"I don't care! I'll kick your ass anyways!"
"Not that subject again…" Neji complained (again).
Sakura walked up to her partner for this match "Let's show these guys some girl power!" she said, pumping up one of her fists and pulling on her gloves.
"Yes, let's show them." Erza agreed taking her battle stance.
Zoro looked towards the scary redhead and smirked 'Now I'll finally get to see how good she is with her swords.' He thought.
Tenten thought almost the same thing 'Can't wait to see her different kinds of armor and weapons!'
Natsu looked at his battle-partner "Hey lazy guy, let's kick their asses! I wanna win this entire thing!"
'Lazy guy?' "Sure, I probably won't be able to win this entire tournament, but I'll try to get as far as I can." He agreed.
"Wow Shikamaru is motivated….kinda…." Naruto remarked. "Go Sakura-chan!" he then cheered, of course he would, he likes, no loves her. (If you guys forgot, this takes place during the time that Naruto forgot to ask Konohamaru to leave for a training journey, if you guys read "The Tale of Naruto Uzumaki, which you probably all do)
"Alright you guys! The Fourth Match: Natsu and Shikamaru vs Erza and Sakura! Begin!" Gray exclaimed and jumping out of the way so he wouldn't get burned, hit with a super powerfull punch, punctured or controlled by shadows or completely destroyed by Erza.
Lucy opened her eyes "W-what did I miss?" she asked, sitting upright.
"Nothing, your friends Natsu and Erza are just about to fight and so are Sakura and Shikamaru." Chopper anwered, now being back in his normal form (yeah I never mentioned before, but when he woke up he was back in Brain Point)
"Really?! I HAVE to see this fight!" 'Who should I cheer for? I want to cheer for Natsu, but Erza might kill me if I do that… Should I even pick sides? Erza's my friend too. I'll just root for Natsu without saying anything, just to be on the safe side.' She thought.
For a while, no one did anything. They were just waiting for someone to do the first move. Natsu quickly grew impatient and did the first move.
He aimed for Sakura, since Erza has her Flame Empress Armor. "Fire Dragons Roar!" he exclaimed and shot a blast of fire out of his mouth, straight towards Sakura.
She barely managed to dodge 'Holy crap, that could have knocked me out in an instant! And burned me to a crisp too!' she thought.
Erza, of course changed into her Fire Empress Armor.
"Wow!" Luffy exclaimed with stars in his eyes and it was awesome enough to make him drool. 'This is even more awesome than Sogeking!' (Don't think the wrong thing, he isn't a pervert, he's just drooling because of the overwhelming awesomness)
'So this is one of her armors. From the looks of it, it seems to be fire-resistant and so is the sword. Interesting' Zoro thought.
'OMG this is so awesome! I wish I had something like that!' Tenten thought, being super exited.
Erza started running towards Natsu "You have to go first."
"Shit!" Nastu cursed, he barely managed to dodge the creepy Erza's attack.
Sakura decided to do something as well, she decided to take on Shikamaru because he could be a big problem to those who don't know about his IQ and his shadows. She started running towards her target and pulled back one of her fists, but she was also looking out for his shadows. She first landed a punch on the ground to crack the Floor since it might lower the reach of the shadows because they have to go either around or through it. The ground also started cracking furter, closing in on Shikamaru.
"Wow that's some frightning brute force." Al commented.
"Yeah it's even more terrifying than Winreys." Edward agreed.
"What did you say?!" Winry ''asked'', pissed off. (Run Ed, run! XD)
"N-nothing." He muttered, 'shrinking' in fear, becoming even shorter than he already is.
Shikamaru's eyes widened, he didn't finish his strategy yet. He quickly dodged the cracking ground, but he still hadn't lost his concentration. As soon as his feet were on the ground, the shadow user started his jutsu, but not on the person everyone expected him to use it on. The shadows were heading straight for Erza, who was still attacking Natsu, who she still hadn't hit even once. Natsu had definately gotten stronger since last time she fought him. Erza of course was so caught up in her fight that she didn't expect to be attacked by someone else, but that was exactly what happened. Erza was captured by Shikamaru's Shadow Possesion Jutsu. Erza was just about to finally hit Natsu, but she was stopped just in time by the jutsu.
Erza's eyes widened "Wh-what is this?!"
Natsu was also shocked of course, he had a sword barely an inch away from his face. "Holy crap, what's that?!" he wondered, noticing and pointing at the shadow beneath Erza's feet.
"Shit!" Sakura exclaimed 'Damnit, I should've seen this coming! Now I'm screwed!' she continued to think.
"This is my Shadow Possesion Jutsu." Shikamaru started. "It's one of the jutsu of my clan. Every move I make, you'll have to make too. So don't hurt my current partner, will ya?" he continued while stepping forward, making Erza to do the same.
"Wow, that's awesome!" Natsu exclaimed. "And thanks but…. I WANTED TO KICK ERZA'S BUTT!" he complained.
The surrounding spectators sweatdropped.
'That's Natsu for you…' Lucy thought.
"Ehm, well sorry, I guess…" Shikamaru apoligized. "But now it's time to win this!" he exclaimed, which is something unusual for someone as lazy and demotivated as Shikamaru and started running, making Erza do the same. The problem for her and Sakura of course was that unlike Shikamaru, Erza was running towards Sakura. Shikamaru then forced Erza to hold her sword ready to slash Sakura.
Naruto had a worried look on his face 'Shikamaru better not hurt Sakura!' he thought.
Sakura managed to dodge the attack, but barely.
"Man this is weird! Damnit I have to get out of this!" Erza cursed under her breath.
Natsu decided to let go of the fact that he isn't kicking Erza's ass right now and decided to join in. He started to attack as well.
"Iron Fist of The Fire Dragon!" he exclaimed and tried to hit Sakura, which he did, since Sakura was too concentrated on dodging Erza.
Sakura landed hard on the ground, but in general she was fine. "Man that hurt…"
"C'mon Sakura-chan, you can do it!" Naruto exclaimed.
"Uhm, thanks Naruto…" Sakura sweatdropped but then smiled 'Supporting as always'.
A little reminder for everyone, like I said, it's during the days that Naruto forgot to ask Konohamaru to come with him on a training journey in The Tale of Naruto Uzumaki, so they aren't together or anything.
Sakura got up again, making Naruto smile, being glad that she was alright. And started running towards Shikamaru.
'To stop Erza, I have to stop the one controlling her.' She thought, thinking the obvious.
Shikamaru now had a problem of course, he couldn't let Erza get here without moving himself and he wasn't who you could call a person who likes to dodge, run and even move in general, he thinks it's a drag, as we all know. Sure, he had matured some more, especially since Asuma's death, but unfortunately, he didn't mature enough to stop being his lazy self.
'Man, this is such a drag…' he thought, but he still decided to dodge the attack, which also moved Erza, but that didn't change anything. Luckily for Shikamaru, he had enough time to turn to the left and then jump forward, making Erza move closer to him. But that was just what Sakura wanted, she had hit the ground again when Shikamaru dodged her attack. Shikamaru, Natsu and, unfortunately for her, Erza stood in a perfectly straight line. Sakura had put more power and chakra in the right side of her fist, making the ground crack to her right, directly towards her targets and Erza. Shikamaru and Erza got stuck into the cracks in the ground, but Natsu managed to dodge just in time, since he was the one who was the furthest away.
"Damnit, I'm stuck!" Shikamaru cursed, wiggling around as a poor attempt to free himself. And this of course made Erza do the same. (LOL, imagine how that would look like XD Hahaha….. wiggling Shikamaru… and Erza too XD) But shortly after, Shikamaru's Shadow Possesion Jutsu broke and Erza was no longer under the Naras control. (Yeah like that would be any help, she's stuck too)
Natsu then unleashed a powerfull Fire Dragon Roar, which Sakura was barely able to dodge,… again. Sakura then ran towards her opponent with her fist ready to plant itself in Natsu's face and Natsu's fist started buring, preparing an Iron Fist. The fists collided: Fire against monster strength. Smoke formed and rocks started flying around, making everyone cover their eyes. When the smoke started to dissapear, the could see someone falling down and another one barely standing. The smoke completely dissapeared and they saw that the one barely standing was none other than Natsu and the one lying on the ground uncounscious was Sakura and of course, Erza and Shikamaru were still stuck in the ground.
"The winners are Natsu and Shikamaru." Gray announced.
Gray then walked up to Natsu "Hey, you alright there, Flamebrain?"
"Hahah v-very funny. Man now that was what I call a fight." Natsu answered, heavily breathing.
Natsu was about to fall over but Gray caught him with his left arm.
"Natsu!" Lucy exclaimed worriedly and ran towards her parnter and best friend. "You okay?"
Natsu looked up "Y-yeah, just a bit tired that's all." He answered and smiled.
Lucy smiled back, being relieved that he was okay.
Ino ran up to Sakura, who luckily wasn't too injured. The Yamanaka sighed "You show off." But then smiled.
Naruto ran up the two "Is Sakura-chan okay?" he asked worriedly
"Yeah, she's fine, she just has a few minor burns and bruises."
"Is there something I can help with?"
"Yeah, actually there is. Could you carry her to the sidelines?"
"Sure" Naruto answered and lifted Sakura on his back and carried her to where Ino asked him to.
He carefully laid her down in the soft grass of the training grounds. He smiled.
"You sure as hell know how to fight." He joked.
Then he heard someone laughing and saw that it was Sakura.
"Hey, how long have you been awake?" he asked.
"Long enough to know that you carried me on your back and said that I sure as hell know how to fight."
Naruto sighed "At least you're okay…"
Gray and Lucy helped Natsu to the sidelines as well. And Chopper treated and bandaged his wounds. Sakura was of course being healed by Ino. But they forgot something.
"Hey, didn't you idiots forget about me?!" Erza complained, trying to get out of the cracks in the ground.
"Man, this is such a drag. Don't even bother to try to get out of this thing." Shikamaru complained.
Then suddenly, Erza got "a little" pissed off and managed to break the ground open around her, freeing herself.
Shikamaru's eyes widened 'That's the scariest woman I've ever seen….'
Luckily for him, he got pulled out by Chouji a minute later. (XD)
And that was it for this chapter! Hope you liked it! So now I'm going to do a One Piece One-Shot and then the next chapter of The Tale Of Naruto Uzumaki and THEN I'm going to do two chapters of The Sparring Tournament. Next time: Fight Five, The fight between three crewmates and the Dog Friend.
See you all next time!
FanFictionneer :D