Author's Note: For my question in chapter 18 about whether byakugan could see through the ground, someone answered that it couldn't, but another said the other way. Well, I'll just take the first one (it couldn't see through ground) based off the manga/anime in which Naruto managed to trick Neji by staying underneath the soil.
At last I have the determination to move my writing from the papers to computer.
And there are some actions here. Hope you'll like it If not, that's your own problem. He3x
Part Nineteen
"Ma'am, there's a group that has already reached the tower," a chuunin informed his black haired superior with a troubled look.
Anko looked up from her dango on her hand, quite disbelieving to hear the news. "What?' she turned around, eyes narrowed. The chuunin blushed when he saw her indecent clothes, but she didn't seem to care about it, or if she did, she didn't show it. "What do you mean?" she barked out and commanded another chuunin that was in charge of the security camera to show her the display of the cameras on the tower.
"That one," the first chuunin pointed out at the screen. "Camera 23," he said. It showed them each member of team 7 went to separate direction in which only the female member followed a jounin.
One of the jounins that were summoned by Team 7 popped in the room. "Anko-san, a group has reached the tower," he informed.
Orochimaru's former apprentice turned and nodded. "Yes, I already know of that," she pointed at the screen.
"Then you already know they summoned Kaji and I," he stated.
"Yes, I kno—wait, what did you say?" she stared at the black haired shinobi.
"That the group summoned both Kaji and I?" he asked hesitantly. The shinobis on the room looked at each other.
"You mean that they-" she pointed at the screen. "-summoned both of you?"
"…Yes."
"But that mean—" a chunin started.
"—that they have 2 scrolls each for Heaven and Earth," another one cut off. The jounin nodded.
A shinobi in the corner whistled. "That would be a record time," he commented.
"How were they able to retrieve TWO pairs of scrolls and arrive here in such short time?" she demanded.
"Unknown, ma'am. We didn't install any security camera in the forest, but we did hear explosions and screams from the forest not long ago."
"Are you implying that this team had something to do with it?" she asked, narrowing his eyes.
The jounin shrugged. "At this point of time, we're unable to confirm or deny it, but we plan to inves—"
"ANKO-SAN!" a chuunin slammed the door open, running with all his might. His face was grim and uneasy, telling her that whatever he had found was bad. "We found 3 corpses of Grass genins outside the village with their face's skin peeled off."
The black haired kunoichi looked up with a frown. All thought concerning team 7 vanished, replaced by the incident. "Escort me there," she commanded.
At the scene
Anko touched the lifeless body's scrapped face. It seemed as if their skins were completely ripped off of their faces. 'This jutsu…' Anko frowned.
"It seemed that they have died days ago," one of the lead ninjas covered his nose to block the smell of the rotten flesh with disgust.
"If they had died days ago, then who are they?" the others didn't need to ask him who they were, as they had already known about them.
"Intrudes, saboteurs…the list is endless," another answered.
"Orochimaru," their black haired leader clutched her palms tightly. "I know this jutsu. It's his. Report back to sandaime, I'll hunt him down."
"What? But Anko-san—"
"DO IT NOW!" she barked out her order. The ninjas looked at each other and nodded, before they vanished from her sight.
"Orochimaru," she growled out in hate.
Back to Naruto
Naruto closed his eyes. Images continued to flow from his foxes that had accompanied his shadow clones. He (or rather his clones) had destroyed some scrolls. One of them was team 10's scroll. Naruto smirked when he remembered it. This particular genin team didn't really have anything special within them.
True, Ino's family's jutsu was interesting but she was too slow, so her technique wasn't much of use for real fight. Chouji wasn't really good at anything aside from eating and Shikamaru's shadow jutsu wasn't exactly useful for fighting against enemies that were coming from different directions. The pineapple haired style boy was too lazy to train his technique and unfortunately for him, his supposedly superior intelligence couldn't help him much here. Uzumaki Naruto was unpredictable. And the worst opponent you could have was an unpredictable one.
Flashback
"Shikamaru, how can we escape this mine field?" Ino gulped as she asked her genius teammate. The genin sat and closed his eyes.
"Chouji," he opened his eyes and looked at his fat friend, not that he would say it out loud in front of the plump genin. "I want you to use your rolling tank jutsu and clear our path."
"WHAT?" Ino shouted in disbelief. "Are you out of your mind?"
"This is our only chance, or have you forgotten about what had happened earlier?" he scowled. "We used stones and threw them to clear the traps and we thought that it was safe. We didn't think there would be traps that could only be triggered by specific weight. Small stones didn't work and do you see any big stones around us?" he challenged. "With his jutsu, Chouji is safe. He can deflect arrows or shurikens or kunais."
"But what about explosive?" she replied scathingly. "So far, we had seen easy traps that we can easily dispose, but after that…" she drawled. "It was as if whoever built the traps is testing us."
Shikamaru realized that she was right. There are flaws on his plan. Nonetheless it was their best chance.
"Chouji…do you think you're up to it?"
"SHIKAMARU!" Ino cried in disbelief.
Chouji stopped eating and looked at his best friend with a serious look. "As long as I make sure I move fast enough," he finally answered.
"CHOUJI!"
"Good. Then let's do this," Ino was on the verge of crying.
"I don't want this. Why can't we just give up?" she asked hoarsely. She didn't want to see her teammates died because of some stupid exam.
"Because we're shinobi. That's why," Shikamaru said.
"Don't make me laugh! You feel that being shinobi is too troublesome. What changes your mind?"
"Nothing. I still think it's too troublesome," he said without looking at her. Shikamaru nodded at an unsure Chouji who looked back and forth between them.
None of team 10 members noticed the fox crouching behind a tree nearby. Its eyes glowed in the darkness of the shadow.
"Rolling tank, huh?" a naruto clone watched as his traps were set off by Chouji. "A tank indeed," he gave a hand sign to order the 5 other clones to attack them directly. He didn't want to build stronger traps, as he had no doubt they wouldn't be able to come out of them alive. Sandaime would kill his ears off with his incessant yelling, if he ever killed a fellow Leaf-nin. The clone snorted and raced toward team 10.
Ino and Shikamaru were running, following the Akimichi boy from safe distance. "…It's fortunate that there isn't any explosive trap around. But I'm still stay true to my belief. I don't want to sacrifice our lives for a mere exam. Do you understand me, Shikamaru?" she said in anger.
The boy sighed. "I understand," he didn't want to anger her further. It was too troublesome. "Ino," the girl looked at him. "You said that it seemed like whoever built these traps were testing us, right?" she nodded confusedly. "If what you thought is right, who do you think want to test us?"
"…The examiners?" he nodded.
"Perhaps to see whether we're worthy or not to become a chuunin," the lazy genin sighed. "It's too damn troublesome." Both genins looked up when they heard Chouji's alarmed cry.
"CHOUJI!" they sped up. When they stopped running, they saw Chouji was unable to move as his body was trapped by steel nets. The two quickly rushed to his side. "Are you okay?"
The fat genin coughed. "I think so. Help me, please?"
"Alright, hold on," Ino reached for her kunai. Shikamaru caught her wrist and shook his head. "What're you doing?" she demanded.
"It's steel net," he reminded her. "We just have to let out Chouji from belo—" Shikamaru leapt away and brought Ino with him. A barrage of kunai pierced the ground they were standing on a second ago.
"Did we set off a trap?" the blonde girl voiced her question.
Shikamaru shook his head. "No, there is someone attacking us."
The blonde girl gasped. "Another team?"
"Or an examiner."
"Uh, guys?" Chouji called. "There is someone behing you," he said with a small voice.
A shadow dropped between them and kicked Shikamaru in the shin and threw Ino right in front of her trapped teammate. The kunoichi stumbled and winced when she sprained her ankle. When she looked up she was surprised to see a fellow blonde Leaf-nin. "Naruto?" she growled. "Shintenshi—" a hand grabbed her neck from behind, followed by a kunai on her throat. "Cho-Chouji! What're you doing?" she stammered in shock.
The Akimichi boy replied. "Unfortunately, I'm not your dear friend, Chouji," the voice that came out of Chouji's mouth wasn't his. "Don't worry, you'll soon follow his fate," images of Chouji being killed flooded her mind. She didn't want to die! With a chop to her temple, she dropped to the ground unconscious.
'Chouji' freed himself from the steel net quite easily. A kunai whizzed past his face. "You're not Chouji."
The figure that resembled the fat boy laughed. "Isn't it obvious already? A simple henge and both of you are easily fooled. You Leaf-nins are so stupid," the Chouji look-alike laughed mockingly.
'Leaf-nins? Does that mean he isn't Leaf-nin? Then why use Naruto's form? Oh, I see. A distraction." Shikamaru looked up. "What do you want?" He asked, the gears on his mind were moving.
Both of his opponents snorted. "What kind of question is that?"
"A stalling question," Shikamaru smirked as he watched them unable to move. "Kage mane no jutsu, success."
"Oh?" Naruto arched his eyebrow. "So, you're one of those shadow users. Nara family, I presume," he said offhandedly, as if he didn't have a care of being held by his opponent's shadow. His eyebrow arched further when his and his comrade's hands reached for their kunais and threw them toward Shikamaru, or more precisely on the figure creeping toward the lazy genin.
"If you think I forget about your teammate for a second, then you're wrong," Shikamaru smirked, though inwardly he was shaken up by his first kill, but he knew he had to save his teammates. Now the problem was to make them wake up before he was depleted of chakra and freed the ninjas. The other ninjas didn't seem to be bothered by the death of their teammate in the slightest. To his surprise, Shikamaru found the dead ninja's body burst into smoke.
He froze and his eyes widened when he felt someone whispering near his ear and a hand covered his mouth. "And if you think you can outsmart me, you're quite mistaken,' the man behind him injected a clear blue liquid via syringe into his neck. Shikamaru's eyes started to drop before darkness overtook him.
'I'm sorry, guys. I had failed,' was the last thing the lazy genin able to think.
"Well, that was fun," 'Chouji' reverted back to his Naruto clone's form. The other clones nodded with a smirk.
"It sure was," another said triumphantly when he discovered the scroll and burned it.
"Ok, so how many teams still survive the test till now?" 2 other clones landed on the ground, followed by a young black fox.
"Um, let's see…" a clone took out a paper and scratched team 10's name on it. "Team 8, Gai's dream team, Ichibi's team, that suspicious Yakushi fellow's team, that creepy grass genin's team, the Sound team, a rain team, and another Leaf team."
"We're so not going against that weird (not to mention, creepy) Grass genin's team. And uh…do you guys think we're hallucinating or something? Because the destroyed clones kept telling me they were being ass handled by a freaky bone manipulator, who seemed to be the teammate of that weird ass."
"Huh? I thought that bone user is from a rebelling clan from the Mist, not Grass," another clone looked at his comrades. "And that clan was said to be eliminated by the Mist's army."
"A deserter?"
"Probably."
"Oh, well. So that Grass team is out of question. What about the other rookie genin team?"
"The one with those Inuzuka, Aburame, and Hyuuga as members?" the others nodded. "Because Shino is an aburame, we've got to do something to his bugs that are potentially dangerous for us, clones," because the clones relied on the given chakra they had to stay in real world, "Uh, and can someone tie them down?" he indicated to the knocked out members of team 10. "And shove them somewhere else?" a clone volunteered. "Thank you. Where are we again?"
"We need to handle the bugs."
"Ah yes, that. I think we've stored a super insecticide on the scroll, but it will be difficult because of the others' ability. They have the sight and smell. What can we do to trick them? Anyone?"
"Set an explosion trap and blow them to Kingdom's come!" one of the clones suggested energetically. "Imagine the blood, gore, flesh parts, bleeding limbs!" he laughed maniacally.
"…" the other clones looked at one of them who suggested the idea in silence. Even the fox was staring at the laughing clone. "He must be one of those defect products. Put him out of commotion," 2 seconds later the faulty clone poofed out under the other clones' assault.
"Perhaps we can use metana and roast the bugs. That Hyuuga girl won't be able to see the gas."
"But Inuzuka will smell the gas," another interjected, as the clone who had volunteered to take care of team 10 had come back. "Not to mention the chance of team 8 are roasted along with the bugs are high."
"Just want to remind you that our mission is to take them out of competition, not to bet them down. We can just set traps to separate them and pick the scroll from whoever gets his hand on the scroll," the one who had just arrived told them. "And get the hell out of there," he added.
The others blinked. "Now, why didn't we think of it sooner?" they shrugged. "Ok, so what about the other teams?"
"Boss/oyabun (the real Naruto) wanted to deal with Ichibi himself, not to mention that his team will arrive at the tower soon despite our traps and they already have the second scroll anyway."
"Gai's team?"
"Bos, hadn't had the chance to play with the Hyuuga boy since Wave mission."
"But that doesn't mean we can't test his team," another said wickedly. "Just take out the Sound, rain, and the last Leaf team then. Who are they, anyway?" he asked about the members of the Leaf genin team.
"Nobody of importance. And also take out that insufferable glassed smiling git too. He's so annoying. His fake smile and his talk."
"And he's suspicious," another one said.
"He's suspicious or not isn't our business. That's Leaf's," a clone reminded the others sarcastically. "But I agree that he's definitely an annoying son of a bitch."
"Ok, so that leaves…boss' team, Ichibi's team, the Grass team, and Gai's team to pass the second exam. I'd like to say to weed the others, but unfortunately we can't do that because Gai's team doesn't have the scroll yet," they sighed. "Let's just throw out all other Leaf teams. Riku, ask the boss for more ammunition, please," he told the yipping fox who quickly scrambled toward the tower. "Ok, let's move out!" all remaining Naruto clones disappeared out of sight.
End Flashback
When the second team was over, there were only 3 more teams that passed it. Team 7, Gai's team, Gaara's team, and surprise, surprise a crippled Kabuto's team who was currently glaring daggers at the yawning blonde boy (hey, Orochimaru wouldn't show his tail, and had given Kabuto his scroll, which fortunately for the glassed boy was the opposite of his scroll). Sasuke ans Sakura stole a glance at the growling team and understood what had happened to them.
"Is there something wrong?" the ninetails vessel asked them, earning him a louder growl. Naruto whistled cheerfully with a foxy grin. "Hey, where's the creepy Grass team? I thought with their skill they'd be able to pass the exam," he noticed Kabuto shifted on his spot, even though the question wasn't directed at him. Now that he mentioned it…this Kabuto fellow's smell…there was the creepy nin's smell on him, quite recently, he might add. But why wasn't he died?
Sandaime looked at Hayate, the one who would be the examiner this time. "Only 4 teams?" Hayate nodded. "What about the others?"
"either dead or (cough) incapacitated in the infirmary," the examiner coughed again. "Some (cough) genin were demanding us to tell them why we set up so many traps in the forest when it's supposed to be an exam without non-genin's interference."
"Traps? But we didn't set any trap, or did we?" the Third frowned.
"We had told them that (cough) but they didn't believe (cough) us, claiming that there were too many traps in the start of the exam to believe it was other teams' attempts. I believe you already know the real culprit (cough) though."
"…Naruto?" Hayate nodded and coughed again. Sandaime turned at Naruto who gave him a cheeky wink. The Konoha leader sighed in exasperation.
"Why did he (cough) weed the others (cough) when—as far as I know—he wanted nothing to do with being a Leaf-nin?"
Sandaime fidgeted. "Em…that's probably because I promised him that if he could complete this exam, chuunin or not, I'd give him permission to wander out of Konoha on his own, like the sannin do."
"Is it (cough) temporary?"
The Third shook his head. "No. A permanent one. Basically I gave him a free reign to exit Konoha whenever he felt like it."
The sickly man snorted. "It's no wonder that he was motivated enough to take them out to (cough) reduce competitions."
"…I suppose. Let's just start the preliminary!" Hayate nodded and went to the arena below.
"Alright, listen up!" Hayate shouted loudly to gain attention, before he went into another coughing fit. The genins sweatdropped. "Because there are still (Cough) too many of you to enter the last exam (cough), the tournament, there will be (cough) a preliminary right now. This time you won't need (cough) your team to pass. It will be your own individual strength that will help you to pass. Since it's allowed to kill here, if there's anyone who wants to resign, you should do it now," he looked around him, but no one raised his/her hand. "No one?" he asked for confirmation.
Kabuto gave a meaningful glance at the sound jounin instructor (A.K.A Orochimaru-yaro). The snake man smirked and shook his head, telling him that he should continue the exam. Kabuto nodded in understanding, knowing that he was still needed to keep an eye on Sasuke's team. Beside, he had a score to settle with Sasuke's blonde teammate, for his goddamn vile traps.
One of Kabuto's teammate raised his left hand. His right hand was bandaged heavily and so was with hi face, though it wasn't for fashion sense (if it was, it would be the worst fashion sense he had) but necessity. The young genins (and some Leaf jounins) sweatdropped at the sight of what could be described as 'half-mummy'.
"I quit! I don't think I can continue with my current condition…" yes, everyone could see why he thought he wasn't fit enough to continue. The referee nodded and with that the so-called Leaf-nin headed to the infirmary to get his wounds treated.
"Anyone else?" he asked (and coughed again). No one raised hand. "Then the preliminary will be started, but before that is tere any question?"
Tenten raised her hand. "Just one. The number of the participants isn't even (there's 11 participants), what will happen then?"
"The preliminary is a match between 2 genins and indeed the number isn't even. One of you will have the chance to pass the exam without fighting." There were cries of complaints from the genins. "The names of the duelers will be determined by computer randomly," the explanation was greeted by growls, but they no longer shouting outright. After looking at the disgruntled genins, Hayate nodded at the leader of Konoha. "Then let the match begins!" The ninjas immediately went to the balcony and let Hayate, as referee, stood alone on the duel arena.
A panel above the statue inside the tower opened to reveal a blank screen. The computer started to pick up 2 names randomly. The screen flashed the genins' names for a moment before stopping. "First match: Akado Yoroi Vs. Tenten," Lee immediately cheered for his female teammate.
The match was a short one. Yoroi even with all his chakra draining ability was unfortunate to have the weapon mistress, who was a log-ranged attacker (though she could be a short ranger attacker too) as an opponent. He couldn't get close enough to her to use his ability and Tenten easily won the match.
"Winner, Tenten," Hayate declared, earning him a loud cheer from Konoha's Green Beast junior. The computer picked 2 other names. "Second match: Haruno Sakura Vs. Kankurou." It was needless to say that Kankurou 'slaughtered' Sakura. With her lack of training (despite her determination) and lack of attention from his sensei, she was easily defeated. Her bunshin could only help her for a few minutes, before gaara's big brother caught up with her tactic and rendered her unconscious with a quick blow to her stomach. Kankurou didn't even need to use his doll against her. It was fortunate that Kankurou was more tolerant toward woman or he'd kill the pink haired girl.
"Winner: kankurou. Next match: Temari Vs. Uchiha Sasuke."
"Two of your team members fought against the sand team. Who do you think will win this time?" Gai grinned as he asked his so-called eternal rival.
"Hm? You're saying something?" Gai cried out in outrage.
Temari jumped and landed on the duel field, followed closely by her black haired opponent. The blonde girl unfastened her weapon from her body and brought it down to the floor. She wasn't going to take chance against the Uchiha genius.
Sasuke was left on his spot wondering just what kind of weapon she used. Judging from the clanging sound and the small crater it created, the weapon was made of metal. Both genins were staring at each other without a twitch. It seemed that the kunoichi was getting impatient, as she spread her weapon to reveal a huge steel fan, and attacked Sasuke with a wave of her weapon.
Sasuke brought his hand to cover his face, as the wind tried to blast him off. He focused his chakra on his feet and latched to the floor to avoid being blown away like a rag doll. Deciding to test her at first, Sasuke dashed toward her and showered the older girl with kunais, but she merely knocked them off course with her wind. He attempted to get close to her to engage her in taijutsu battle, but she kept trying to blow him with her wind attack.
Sasuke knew that he could use battle of attrition here to win, but he didn't want that kind of winning. After being shadowed by Naruto's strength, he wanted to have a break and actually won by himself for once. He analyzed that she was relying too much on her fan and wind attack and so far there was no variation of her attack at all. But being a teammate of Naruto taught him to expect the worst. The blonde teammate of his always surprised him (and irritated him so much he wanted to kill the blond on his sleep) with his unsuspected traps (it was no longer unsuspected anymore as it was daily occurrence, but he still was picked on by the traps). Sasuke knew that he couldn't gauge his opponent's skill just by watching/fighting her for a few minutes. An idea was soon formed on his mind. It was risky, but it was his best shot for now.
He threw 5 smoke bombs to the floor to create a thick layer of smoke. The black haired boy coughed as he himself inhaled the smoke. Ok…perhaps it wasn't a good idea to use 5 smoke bombs at the same time without mask on.
"A layer of smoke?" Is that the best thing, you Leaf genin, can offer me?" Temari taunted. "I can easily blast it off."
"Then, why don't you?" Sasuke's voice echoed on the field. Temari narrowed her eyes, wondering if it was a trap.
A kunai was thrown through the smoke. Temari knocked it off with her closed fan. The weapon landed 2 meter on her right. She waited for a minute, searching for him, and got fed up when he didn't use the opportunity to attack her. She flicked open her fan and sent a blowing wind. Blown by the harsh wind, the smoke quickly dissipated to reveal 3 Sasukes.
"Bunshin, huh? But it's not going to help you out. Eat this! Kamaitachi!" 5 wind blades were created and destroyed 2 Sasukes, while another avoided it by jumping to the air. There were gash marks on the wall behind him, courtesy of the wind attack. The girl panted a little. "Found you!" she created a tornado toward him, forcing her opponent to jump away. "Come to momma!" a few ninjas raised their eyebrows at the wording. She directed a whole squad of wind blades toward the spot she calculated to be his landing spot. Just as the wind attack pierced him, causing a great joy to the kunoichi who thought that she had killed Konoha's prodigy, a sign that she was stronger than him, she heard a poofing sound from beside her. Before she could react, there was already a kunai pressed on her throat. The pierced Sasuke disappeared into thin air and the wind blade went through his body.
The one she thought as the real Uchiha was actually another bunshin! The real one waited for the perfect moment to strike, disguised as the kunai she had blocked.
"Surrender, now!" Sasuke commanded. With kunai pressed on her throat, Temari had no choice, but to give up, knowing that she underestimated the younger genin and paid for it. It was lucky that it wasn't a real fight.
"Winner of the match: Uchiha Sasuke!"
When Temari was back to where her team was waiting, she glared at her younger brother, who was in the process of opening his mouth. Kankurou immediately closed his mouth. Baki looked at her and nodded, before looking back at the screen, as if he didn't expect her to win against the Uchiha boy. The blonde girl scowled, but froze when she saw her youngest brother's face. There was only one emotion crossed his face and she knew it really well: bloodlust. The read head's eyes were following every movement of the Uchiha heir. Temari shuddered and looked away, glad not to be on the receiving end of his bloodlust.
"Next match: Hyuuga Neji Vs. Uzumaki Naruto!" Naruto raised his eyebrow, before he smirked mockingly at Lee's teammate. Neji was glaring at him, remembering that Naruto had hurt Lee in Wave mission, even if it was during duel practice.
Naruto, however, was feeling lucky. Because he had a chance to beat the arrogant ass down (he didn't think of himself as arrogant), so he didn't need to wait to fight him in the final match (provided Neji passed)
Both participants jumped from the balcony and landed on the arena at the same time. Pupiless eyes promising revenge, while clear blue eyes promising excitation.
TBC…
Okay…I was having trouble with the 5 last participants: Naruto, Neji, Kabuto, Lee, Gaara on who fight who. If I don't like it (Neji-Naruto) I'll change it later when part 20 is uploaded.
Why didn't Sasuke just use his katon jutsu? He was fighting fuuton jutsu, so he had to be careful when he used it so it wouldn't backfired later.
Eh, and don't forget to send me reviews! (Need I to remind you this again? Somehow, I don't think so)