Confusion, uncertainty and a batch of other things ran down Mana's head when she saw a fellow Konoha ninja present in front of her, looking to be in full combat preparedness and ready to bring her back. Did Lord Sixth not grant her full permission to act upon her discretion, she did send him a quick intel report together with the last message sent out with a hawk, could that have been it?

"Why are you here?" Mana asked just to push the inevitable pressure of making a decision a little bit further, just stall for time until she figured what to do next. It would have been quite dangerous to attempt and engage Yushijin all by herself, even if Thumb was by her side, she was an unreliable ally at best.

"I already told you, I am on a mission authorized by Lord Sixth to bring you back," Yushijin replied with a bit of edge to his tone, he clearly noticed Mana's attempts to bargain for time and did not appreciate it. If she was to get this situation under control Mana needed to work it smarter, although… She was so tired, sleepless and beginning to grow hungry and thirsty to the point where her chakra network was starting to strain itself lightly just to keep her going like this.

"I thought I had Sixth's full permission to act in Shukuba's best interest until the criminal organization was disbanded. Was my intelligence flawed or forged?" Mana continued to inquire, at this point she didn't even abandon the possibility that her fellow Konoha ninja was a transformation, someone wearing his shape and robes, then again, who in this pleasure town could have known enough about her to know not only about Yushijin but also about the unpleasant sense of guilt that Mana felt towards Team Fir?

"I don't know. Lord Sixth was looking for people to bring you back, I volunteered." Yushijin grinned with half of his face, his grin was brimming with confidence, he felt almost excited to confront Mana this way. His stance, the confidence in his face, this had to be Yushijin, he felt excited about the opportunity to get to fight Mana officially.

"That is interesting, I cannot seem to sense your presence even when you're in front of me." Mana bent her head to the side in curiosity, extending her sensory abilities to their absolute peak and yet failing to pick up anything but the chakra of a civilian irradiating from Yushijin. She would have long since dismissed her colleague had it not been for this one curious detail.

Yushijin pressed his hands together in a hand seal position, releasing whatever technique he was using. As he did so, a chakra signature started flowing freely like it had just toppled a massive dam and was about to drown Mana's senses, attempting to overwhelm them completely. Fortunately enough, it was not nearly powerful enough to do so, even given Mana's novice mastery of her sensory at that moment. Yushijin's unleashed chakra signature was still a bit below Mana's, regardless, it was impressive for someone his age and rank to have his signature at these heights for Mana did engage in special chakra level training almost regularly with her meditation and exercises of chakra control and flow.

"I guess this new jutsu I've learned has something to do with why I was selected." Yushijin's pride could not keep his grin contained. "Now leave this village behind and come home."

"Answer me this, before I answer your request, was your mission treating me as a potential rogue ninja? Does Lord Sixth treat me as someone who has abandoned the village?" Mana wondered.

This was an important question, the answer to it determined the rest of Mana's life, possibly. If the magician was treated as a rogue ninja – that meant that Mana's reports back to the village had never really reached the Konoha Aviary and were intercepted, which caused this miscommunication. If Lord Sixth considered not Mana's status, but her actions, dangerous, that would have been a different matter entirely.

"No, you are not considered a possible rogue ninja. As far as Lord Sixth briefed me, you have not left the village, as far as loyalty goes. I am under orders to bring you back alive." Yushijin replied. His face was an iron wall when it needed to be and a pitch black fog of mist when it was appropriate, Mana couldn't tell if he was telling the truth or lying. Yushijin had grown very good at keeping a cold and emotionless face when he wanted to… It was even a little bit commendable, really.

"Well then…" Mana turned her nose and face down, pocketing her hands inside her coat and calmly walking forward. From what her sensory could tell her, as the magician's eyes remained closed, Thumb was trembling in her boots a little and refused to move. Mana almost felt a little bit offended that despite being confronted by a ninja of relatively same or similar skill, Yushijin clearly intimidated the woman far more than Mana did. "This is pointless."

Yushijin swung his sword at Mana's back, aiming to leave a wide and deep enough gash to cut her down immediately if she was cocky enough to lower her defenses. The magician crouched down, she had expected the youth to react this way from the beginning, his pride would not take being antagonized and belittled this way. Just like that, she had Yushijin played… That would tip the scales to her favor whereas in an even battlefield they would have been relatively equal.

"Can't you see this, you idiot? Lord Sixth just sent you for the show." Mana spoke up as she stood back on her feet and gently gained some distance from her colleague. While the first strike attacking her exposed back was easy to read, the rest of his attacks would at the very least deserve being seen and analyzed by Mana visually as she would have stood no hope against Yushijin if she looked down on his tremendous skill.

Talking was beneficial to Mana when Yushijin was busy talking or enjoying this clash with Mana he would not be nearly putting in as much forethought and sheer fighting ability in his attacks as he would be distracted.

"For show? I figured there was something off about him sending just one chuunin to apprehend and bring back another chuunin but… I did not want to believe it." Yushijin exposed his blade again, taking a fighting stance, by that time their standing about became visible to common civilians who would have missed the duo moving around when Yushijin first attacked.

"Why? Why did you go so far to come here for me to begin with? Didn't you volunteer for this mission?" Mana wondered as that idea still confused her. "Are you still mad at me for what happened in the Forest of Death?"

"Tsk, not that old thing again…" Yushijin showed his teeth. First, in discontent and then again as a property of his enthusiastic grin. "I just wanted a reason to face you and find out truly which one of us was better."

Yushijin attacked with simple sword strikes, his swordsmanship was competent but nothing Mana could not easily evade given her advanced focus on that subject. She had less experience evading a blade than she had evading punches and kicks but beside a much greater skill needed in space management and the lack of ability to trap the blade with her bare hands alone it did not provide an ample challenge to her.

The townsfolk around the two began freaking out. They were not panicking yet, just retreating into corners where they thought the fight was unlikely to move into. This may have been why Yushijin was so limited in his offensive arsenal, for now, he was buying time for the townsfolk to move away and give them space. Not that the two needed that much. Had they remained moving, they could have likely kept on fighting around the civilians, moving fast enough to not even be noticed until they slowed down or bumped into an unfortunate passer-by.

"A reason?" Mana wondered out loud. "What do you mean by that?"

"This whole time when I improved my genjutsu skills, sensei kept on comparing me to you in terms of improvement and promise in the field. I was naturally curious, I never intended to compete with you but when the comparison was drawn… I just can't help it." Yushijin smiled. "I even went as far as to learn a way to suppress my chakra signature from being sensed just so I could fight you better."

"That was foolish, by suppressing your chakra you also depower yourself. When your chakra is suppressed you cannot augment your abilities at all." Mana replied, crossing her hands over her chest as Yushijin's eyes finally noticed the villagers having cleared out somewhat, giving him ample space to attack Mana seriously.

There it was… The magician sensed an invasion, a burst of foreign chakra flowing into her system from her abdomen, moving upward. It was a more advanced method of genjutsu use to the one Mana used, the one she borrowed and mastered from the insects lurking in the deep caves of the Wind Country. One taught to young ninja in the Academy and one Mana knew about all too well, both as a genjutsu user and a chakra sensor.

Yushijin's body froze in place, alongside with a complete stop of every environmental factor around. Horror and bemusement paused in the eyes of the villagers hiding all around, a drizzle of snowflakes impeded and stuck in their place, floating in the air. Time itself appeared to have frozen. It was Yushijin. He was messing with her time perception, such a dangerous ability. Even when she knew all about him from seeing Yushijin fight, Mana still could not stop admiring the youth who had mastered it. She'd like to learn all about temporal perception manipulation from Yushijin if he wasn't so proud of his skill and so adamant about proving his superiority over her.

"Dispel" Mana concentrated on the word, letting a burst of her own chakra blast the foreign invader chakra off through her body's pores in the shape of thin light needles. The girl bent her body back to the point where it almost hurt her back, in a quick and life-saving vault backward that helped her avoid a devastatingly focused and strong slash at her upper body section.

This could have been dangerous. From what Mana recalled, Yushijin did not need to weave any signs or utter the name of his genjutsu as long as he used it on very weak percentage of its full potential. She already just barely avoided having her body cut in two with the usual dispelling method. Had she not mastered every basic technique she had known in the Rabbit Caves before the finals of the Chuunin Exams – she would have been finished.

"I think I understand," Mana spoke up, she needed time to think of a different way she could use to evade a stronger version of this illusion. Maybe if she augmented her endurance she could make these devastating slashes of Yushijin's great-sword more shallow, maybe where it just slightly cut into her flesh but even that was just a temporary solution. "I'm not a very combat-friendly person." She admitted.

"That's right." Yushijin nodded, slightly lowering the tip of his sword but staying in stance. "If I just came up to you, you'd have told me to get lost or just half-assed our battle and lost on purpose just to keep me off your back. I want to fight you seriously, I want to really know who's better. Especially now." He grinned again.

"Now?" Mana felt curious.

"After the Chuunin Exams, I wanted to face you even more. You and I were the only genin of our village that got promoted. Everyone kept talking about how you and Stea stole the show back then… Don't you feel even a bit curious?" Yushijin winked before raising the tip of his blade and preparing to attack again.

"Not really. I understand your feelings, I've met plenty people in my life who would feel similarly but… I just don't really care about which one of us is better. I think there is much we could learn from one another but fighting just to know which one of us is stronger seems stupid to me." Mana admitted with a shrug. She did not want to continue this fight, not only because of the way she felt internally but also because of her fatigue, hunger, and thirst. Chakra was a combination of both physical and mental and her weary had dimmed both to the point where Mana doubted she could even summon her best at will.

Yushijin stopped in place again. His illusion was so treacherous, Mana had no idea but her gut to rely on by just how much he would mess up her perception of time. He could have as much as doubled the amount of time she thought had passed or froze and to her, it would have looked all the same as before. Yushijin's sword slipped through Mana's gentle frame, splitting her into two pieces and making the collapsing two parts of her body spray a profuse amount of blood.

Before Thumb's gasp and disgusted grunt even concluded, the blood and gruesomely split parts of Mana's body turned into flower petals and dispersed all around before beginning to form right behind Yushijin.

"So cocky!" Yushijin yelled out as he threw an unexpected kick behind him, before Mana's frame even completely reassembled itself. The kick, which felt like the strongest thing to ever hit Mana, sent the magician tumbling back, hitting her right atop of her chest and just narrowly too low to hit her in the neck where it'd have crushed her air supply, leaving her powerless and gasping for air for quite a while.

Grunting in pain and fatigue, Mana stood back up before she noticed that both her opponent and the environment around them was frozen in time momentarily. A blade thrust right through Mana's chest, completely impaling her on it as she could not properly time her counterattack due to Yushijin's illusion continuously messing with her time perception. He was using it so often, starting it up and ending it that even when it was over, returning to the normal perception became increasingly more difficult after each of his use of the illusion. Mana's body once again dispersed into a shower of flower petals, she could feel chakra leaving her body like blood being drained out of her through a pipe.

"Seriously?" Yushijin grunted, this time throwing a wild swing of his massive great-sword behind him, this time it was met by Mana's wand, extracted from the seal inside her hat as the magician felt she could not risk escalating multiplying the additional cost of her Flower Petal Sanctuary even more. She used it three times in a row just now and just by doing that, she made each successive use feel almost twice as draining. The Konoha swordsman slammed his shoulder into his blade, shifting the weight to his left leg before forcing Mana off her feet and flying back. She was lucky that her wand was made from just about the sternest stuff there was.

"Goddamn it!" Yushijin cursed, looking at his blunted up and damaged sword. "Just what is that fairy-stick made of?"

Mana grunted in pain and exhaustion as she pulled herself off the ground. She was not ready for this fight, not now, not here. Her opponent was slowly unraveling his abilities to a higher and higher extent and she could not afford to let him step into the serious territory without risking serious injury or death. How would she destroy the Diamond Hand then? The blood-chilling thought of the insurmountable wall that beating both the Rings of the Diamond Hand and Yushijin here brought gave Mana another idea.

"You'll need to fix your sword. Also, I've seen your Fire Style jutsu in the arena during the finals. You'll need a way bigger and more secure space than this to fight in." Mana tried working up some magic.

"Alright, what are you suggesting?" Yushijin grumbled, clearly looking unhappy that the fight he was waiting for such a while was being postponed.

"The Shukuba Museum", Thumb intervened into the conversation, within a fraction of the moment, her face began paling and she grabbed her throat as if she was beginning to feel short of breath. For a second there Mana feared that her Taboo Seals would have set off for some reason but after the woman stopped talking for a while her airway seemed to open up again.

"That seems like the least likely place to be able to let loose in…" Yushijin complained.

Mana felt like Thumb was up to something clever but her own mind could not yet grasp the connection. She curiously stared at the burglar, trying to piece everything together so she could free Thumb from explaining herself. If Thumb spoke about the museum some more, that would have triggered an even more dangerous reaction from her Taboo Seal.

Then she remembered what Itemi had told her about Yokotomo Donyoku, the man was someone who came into his public status as a rich man after finding a treasure in someone's backyard and keeping part of it. Likely he expanded on that fortune through numerous income sources from his criminal activities but… A man like that of a great sense of where to look for treasure and a desire to unearth it, someone who went public with the treasure and was known for it… Of course, he gave it to the museum, he was someone of profound artistic sense. It was possible that Thumb was suggesting that the museum was a place where Mana could find Yokotomo Donyoku.

"Yeah, let's fight in the museum. Shukuba's museum is very unlike other museums that you know. It is entirely privately owned and very well protected, I feel." Mana explained as much as she could put together herself. Thumb had stumbled on the idea to use Yushijin in the fight against the Diamond Hand, leashed on the promise that he could then fight Mana. The woman saw that the magician could not have cared less about the winner so she saw no problem suggesting Mana gambling on that "rivalry" by mixing the Diamond Hand into the occasion.

"Whatever, you still haven't explained about why you said Lord Sixth sensed me "just for show"," Yushijin squinted his right eye in confusion, as he could not stop examining his blunted and damaged blade.

"I'll explain it later." Mana tried to dismiss the matter.

"No, you'll explain it right now or I won't let you out from my sight…" Yushijin objected.