Yuki's P.o.V.
As I decsended the stairs to reach the battlegrounds, I wasn't nervous. When my team and a few others cheered for me, I was perfectly calm. When I heard Ayame's voice telling me I could do this, that's when I started to get eager. And when I finally reached my spot in the middle of the room and the cheers died down and I was face-to-face with my opponent when I was downright excited. I recognised the girl as the teammate of the one ninja whose leg was broken and quit the preliminaries. If memories serves, her name is Shirai and her other teammate's name is Kito. Her hair was shoulder-length brown and held back with a Tsuchigakure headband. Her clothing consisted of red and black flexible-looking fabric that formed a loose-looking shirt and pants. The was a smirk on her tanned face and a glint of readiness and determination in her piercing blue eyes.
"Yagami Shirai, Yuki no Amegakure," our proctor announced, more as if he was presenting us rather than trying to get our attention. "The match ends when one of you either give up or are unable to continue. However, I will end the match if and when I see fit. Do you understand?"
"Get ready to get your butt kicked," Shirai said in place of answering the question. "I'm not a wimp like Kito, I won't give up! So get ready, Ame-freak." I blinked. I turned to the proctor.
"Yes, I am ready to start." Was all I said, not even acknowledging that Shirai had spoken.
"Begin!" He called and took a large step back.
Without skipping a beat, Shirai lunged for me, already wiedling a kunai. I dodged her easily enough, tapping her shoulder with my knuckles and making her come off her balance. She flipped over and skidded to a halt ten feet away from me, not a single hair out of place. I wasn't extremely familiar with Tsuchigakure's jutsu, but I did know that they manipulated that earth around them to subdue their enemies, so I had to watch my step. Literally.
"Come on," Shirai taunted as she erected herself. "Aren't you going to take a swing at me? Or are all Ame-nin cowards?" I just looked at her.
"An important rule of being a ninja," I said in a monotone voice, "is to show no emotion. Mistakes are made if irrational anger replaces rational decision-making. Or do they not teach that where you're from?"
"Shut up!" She growled, her teeth bared. Again, she sprinted towards me, her fist raised as she bolted in my direction. I easily grabbed her wrist in this hasty gesture of hers and twisted her around bodily until she was on the ground on the other side of me, another teen or so feet away. There were a few hoots from the crowd, one of them was unmistakably Ayame.
"If you haven't learned this stuff, I would be more than happy to teach you." I was using her own strategy against her, trying to make her as angry as she was trying to make me before. I've heard that Tsuchigakure ninjas are impulsive. I hope that's true.
Shirai glared at me as she stood up for the second time. She was getting frustrated, I could tell. I managed a quick glance out of the corner of my eyes to where Gaara should have been standing. Ridiculous, right? I was in the middle of a battle that could decide my future as a ninja and I'm worried of what some mysterious boy I have no ties to is thinking of me in that moment. Completely ridiculous. But he was watching me - I saw it. As if he were waiting for me to turn around and look at him. As if he'd expected it. He's so confident.
In that brief second I tore my eyes away from my opponent, Shirai managed to make a few hand signs I didn't have time to register.
"Earth Abyss no Justsu!" She yelled.
I felt vibrations under my booted feet. I looked down as the earth split in half right before my eyes. A thick crack appeared between my feet, suddenly opening up to create a trench beneath me. I had to wonder how she managed it as I leaped up and away from the site. I did two backflips to get away from my impending doom. Skidding backwards to a halt, I decided it was time to be on the offense.
I raised my hands to my face and blew cold air on my finger tips. I could see the pale blue air heave out of my mouth as it coated the pads of my fingers, encasing them in a layer of ice. I thought I heard a gasp or two of astonishment, but that may have been my imagination. I fashioned my icy fingers to a point, making them leathal weapons. This whole process only took a few seconds, it only sounds like it takes a long time because the author is just trying to fill up the word count. I mean. What. As soon as I finished making my ice deadly, I flung an icecicle towards Shirai. She dodged it easily enough, but she didn't manage to move out of the way of the other one I threw right after the first one. It grazed her cheek, spitting out droplets of her blood as the cut opened.
Just wait, I told myself. Shirai let out a wail of pain as she gripped the side of her face. Even from the distance I was at, her left cheek was already starting to look bruise-purple.
"What is - "
"Frostbite," I said, feeling the shadow of a playful smile on my face. "The thing about my ice is, I can make it as deadly as I want. That was a neat trick you did back there, but how many times can you do it without tiring yourself out? Me, I can make as much ice as I want for hours without running low on chakra, but you're already getting slow. Don't tell me you used your most powerful move first." I shook my head as Shirai's flushed, discoloured, bleeding face. "That's quite foolish."
"Boo!" A voice called from the crowd. I glanced up and saw a boy leaning over the railing. He was also wearing a Tsuchigakure headband. Her teammate. "You got this, Shirai-chan! Time to open up a can of Whoop-Ass!"
"You can do it, Yuki-chan!" Ayame's voice rang out, too, trying to overwhelm the other ninja's voice. "I wanna fight you in the next round, so you better win this!" I couldn't help but let a chuckle escape my lips in spite of myself. I was planning on beating Shirai anyway, but the idea that Ayame wants to fight me was another good motivator. I don't know what it quite is about this village, but I think I'm starting to like her.
"Well, that settles it," I sighed, holding my other three ice-encased fingers up. "Let's finish this. I'd really rather not break a sweat." I'll admit, I was getting pretty confident now, especially with the crowd starting up again.
"Don't be so smug," Shirai said, lowering her hands from her face. "I've got more tricks up my sleeve than you know, you little - "
"Let's try to keep the language clean, ladies," the proctor said in an almost uninterested voice. I blinked. A group of kids are mercilessly attacking one another and he's worried about our profanity? That's not weird at all.
"Get ready!" By the time Shirai had warned me, she was already weaving handsigns and had a new look on her face that was a combination of anger, excitement, and anticipation. "Hidden Jutsu: Meteorite Explosion!" She clapped her hands above her head in a singular, loud slap.
The earth beneath my feet shook again. I looked down, almost expecting the same trick she used before, but instead, circles appeared into the ground like invisible cookie cutters chopping at the floor. Shirai looked at me with those vicious blue eyes of hers, as if she was already watching me get destroyed, as the cut-up pieces of earth lifted out of the ground in the form of short, jagged columns of dirt and clay. There were several gasps from the crowd and a swear I heard come from an older man - probably her sensei cursing her for using the hidden jutsu. It was more than likely forbidden.
"Run." His voice came out of no where and I heard it as clear as a bell. It was low and rough, protective, and more than anything it was angry. I don't know how I heard him - whether he screamed it or I imagined it - but his words stuck in my head, regardless.
I took Gaara's advice and leaped backwards as one of the levitating boudlers broke off in half and hurled its way towards me. When it crashed into the ground, its fragments scattered everywhere, hitting my bare arms and abdomine with enough force to break skin. I felt the burn of open wounds as I skittered to a hault. I looked down briefly at the multiple wounds on my stomach. I didn't think anything was lodged inside of me, but it stung enough to feel like it. I looked back up at Shirai, her hands still pressed against each other above her head.
That has to be the pose to keep the justsu going. If she breaks the attention, so will the jutsu. All I had to do was get close enough to her so I could separate her hands without getting smashed to bits. Easier said than done. But it's now or never.
The other half of the bould was about to be thrown at me as it wound backwards. I had to make my move. Before I knew it, my feet started sprinting under me, sending me straight for Shirai. She beared her teeth and released a shout as the massive rock came my way. It was directly in front of me, the only thing in between my opponent and myself. So I did what any rational ninja would do.
I Leap Frogged it.
As it got closer and closer, I directed chakra to my legs to give them more power as I sprang up and over the incoming projectile. I placed my hands on top of it for only a moment as I sprung off the boulder itself and fired my body to Shirai's. There was a split second when we made eye contact the I saw her world shatter in her eyes. In that moment, I knew that she knew the game was up. And I had already won.
We collided. With a gasp, Shirai crashed to the ground on her back, her hands coming apart to break her fall. Except she couldn't break her fall. As he hovering rocks fell back in their place, and Shirai was groaning in pain as she stood up, I was already there. I punched her already cut-open cheek, making her stumble back, but not fall. She stood and moved to hit me back, but I was on top of her, viens pumping with adrenaline. I punched her again and again until I saw blood dripping down her chin. I spun around and gained enough velocity to kick her in the stomach and send her flying against the far wall. But that wasn't enough. She was too determined to quit after something like that, but I wanted to win.
I wanted to win so badly, I was blind. I couldn't stop myself if I wanted to. I wanted to go to the next stage. I knew I could do it. I've spent months training for this exact situation and I wasn't about to let it slip from my fingers. More than anything, I wanted to fight Ayame. She was strong, I could tell, so I wanted her to challenge me. Even if I couldn't beat her, I wanted to fight with everything I had. So I took it further.
When Shirai was leaning against the wall for support, I coated my fingers with ice for the second time. Shirai was fully against the wall, I chucked all of my hollow ice daggers at her, grunting everytime I did so. Each dagger pinned a piece of her clothing to the wall - five parts on her shirt and five for her pants. I was lucky her clothes were so loose. When I ran out, I relaxed all of my muscles. My stomach and arms still hurt from the first assault and I needed to rest them.
"Don't bother moving," I warned her breathlessly. "If your bare skin touches any of those, you'll get immediate frostbite. And more movement only makes it spread more."
Like I said before, I knew she wouldn't give up. She started struggling and in seconds, she was screaming in agony. I sighed.
"Remember how I told you I could make them as deadly as I want without breaking a sweat?" I asked and she looked at me with pained, furious eyes. "I wasn't lying. Just give it up. Unless I have to end you entirely to make you realise you've lost."
It was silent in the room. I could hear my own laboured breathing in the quietness. I was staring Shirai down with harsh eyes and she looked back at me with equally intense ones. I narrowed my eyes at her.
"I will do it," I warned in a low voice. With that, she finally broke, her saphire eyes shimmered.
"It's not fair!" She screamed, her voice echoing off the walls in wails and sobs. Tears streamed down her dark-toned face that was scrunched in despair. "I wanted to win! You should have died!"
"Winner: Yuki no Amegakure," the proctor announced, already at my side and gesturing to me. There was an explosion of cheers and whistles and shouts. I looked over at Ayame who was beaming from ear to ear, sticking up her thumbs and mouthing See you in the next round. She hadn't gone yet, but she was pretty confident. "Yuki, will you?" I turned to my proctor, who was gesturing to Shirai.
"Oh, of course," I said. I hurried over to Shirai and tapped all of the daggers with my index finger. They all melted and as soon as they did, Shirai began to fall forward. I caught her and put one of her arms over my shoulders. "Sorry. No hard feelings?"
"Easy for you to say," Shirai scoffed. She rolled her eyes, but looked back at me, "Give me your pudding in the infirmary and I might call it even." I nodded.
"Deal."
The cheers continued as I placed Shirai on the medic ninja's gernie. They hauled her away and I hurried back up the stairs. Shirai had made a mess during our battle, so the higher-ranked ninja were cleaning it up, granting us genin a brief intermission. People held up their thumbs and told me I did a good job as I passed.
"That was so wicked!" Ryo said when I finally reached my team. I glanced over at Gaara from the corner of my eye, but something was wrong. His face was contorted, like he was in pain. And there was a hint of something else, too, but I couldn't quite put my finger on it.
"Good job, Yuki," said Momo, relieved. She had been biting her nails, I could see it in the chips of her polish. I bowed.
"Thank you, Momo-sensei."
"Oh my Kami, Yuki," Himeko gasped, pointing at me. I looked down and saw crimson fluid shining on my skin. "There's so much blood! Go to the infirmary and get checked out!" I held up my hands in mock-defense.
"All right, all right," I said. "I'm going. Thank you."
"You are very welcome, now go," Himeko waved me off. I turned around and headed for the top of the stairs, but a body blocked my path.
"Oh," I said in surprise. I looked down at his Suna-attire, now having blotches of misplaced red. "Gaara. I'm sorry. I got some blood on you." I looked up at him and gasped at his face. There was horror, pain, fear, anger, and even hunger in his twisted expression. I didn't know what I had done, but the next thing I knew, Temari was standing in betwen us.
"You better scram, kid," she warned with serious blue eyes. "Now."
"I was planning on it," I said back to her. I walked faster as I passed her and Gaara. A chill shot through my spine as we made eye contact. It looked like something was trapped behind those orbs of his, like an animal wanting to break out of its cage. I kept moving. I didn't look back.
But what the hell was that?