It's been 4 days.
I have been monitoring Sasuke -and Anko- for basically the entire time.
Since neither of them have gained tanned skin, yellow eyes, or a tendency to spout about The Power Of Darkness (TM), I think that it's mostly safe to assume that my little impromptu soul-ripping/cursed-seal-removal worked without... unfortunate side effects.
Which is great.
Still going to be keeping an eye on them.
Shikamaru, Ino and Chouji arrived at the tower on the second day. They were followed less than an hour later by Hinata, Kiba and Shino.
Kabuto's team, and the team from sound came in on the third day, slightly over four hours apart.
Neji, Tenten and Lee came in on the fourth day, and were subsequently the last team to come in.
7 Teams in total.
Too many teams passed.
Seems like the preliminaries are still going to be a thing.
I completely ignored Hayate's speech, instead looking through the room that the preliminaries were hosted in.
And the one thing I couldn't help but notice was the distinct absence of Orochimaru. This time around, it seemed, he wasn't masquerading as Team Sound's sensei, who, instead, was a short, dark haired woman with a bored look on her face.
I cast my senses out, but I couldn't find Orochimaru's Heart or Soul. Which wasn't exactly that much of a surprise, since I wasn't familiar enough with him to find either easily, despite the... uniqueness of Orochimaru's Soul.
Which was... a little worrying, but it also meant that he wasn't anywhere nearby.
"Sasuke Uchiha and Yoroi Akado."
I turned my attention back to the stadium just in time to catch Sasuke land on the ground, followed shortly by Kabuto's teammate.
"Begin!" Hayate called, before jumping out of the way.
Neither Sasuke nor Yoroi moved, both of them waiting for the other to do something.
Yoroi moved first, however, darting from his place at a fairly fast pace towards Sasuke, preparing to attack.
Of course, 'fairly fast' meant precisely nothing to Sasuke, who darted backwards, throwing a Kunai at Yoroi.
Who dodged.
Not paying any attention to the Kunai.
Poor guy has no idea what's about to happen.
Sasuke smirked, his Sharingan flaring in in eyes, and promptly vanished in a puff of smoke, a masterful usage of Kawarimi that left him directly inside of slower opponent's guard.
Three strikes came in an instant, the first being a palm strike to to Yoroi's chin, followed by an elbow to the stomach as Sasuke used his smaller height to his advantage, and finally completed by another palm strike, this time to the sternum.
Yoroi hit the ground, breathless, and an instant later, Sasuke was standing over him with a Kunai to his throat.
I nodded, completely unsurprised.
Kid had practised that tactic on me more than enough to get it down pat.
"Winner, Sasuke Uchiha!"
"Gaara and Shino Aburame."
Shino shuddered.
"Proctor, I forfeit."
Huh.
Anticlimatic, but a painful death was coming Shino's way if he didn't.
But then...
I looked to the right, watching Team Gai.
Who's fighting Lee?
"Winner, Gaara!"
"Naruto Uzumaki and Kiba Inuzuka."
Kiba grinned, leaping over the railing to the arena, followed by Akamaru. "Ha! Hear that Akamaru, we get to fight Naruto again!"
Naruto rolled his eyes, but the grin on his face remained. "Looking to lose, eh Kiba?"
"You wish! We're a hell of a lot stronger now, so we're going to beat you into the ground!"
"Like you did when we fought in the acad- oh wait, you never managed to beat me!"
"Fight!" Hayate yelled.
Kiba instantly threw Akamaru a soldier pill, leading to the dog's fur becoming red.
"Really Kiba?" Naruto called. "You've tried this before, it never works."
Kiba grinned. And I wasn't exactly an expert on canine expressions, but it sure looked like he was smiling.
Kiba made a hand seal, Akamaru leaping onto his head. "Inuzuka-Style: Human Beast Combination Transformation:-"
He isn't-
"- Double-Headed Wolf!"
He is!
Kiba and Akamaru burst into smoke, enough smoke to fill the entire room.
A loud, deep, guttural growl filled the room, dispersing the smoke enough to unveil the form of a giant two-headed dog.
One that took up more than half of the room in sheer size.
Naruto blinked. "Okay, that's new."
Both of the two heads grinned.
"Well, I was hoping to save this for later, but okay."
'Naruto' promptly burst into smoke, the Shadow Clone dispelling.
Both of the dog's heads blinked, before simultaneously looking upwards.
Naruto smiled, sitting on the ceiling, holding a large scroll in his hand.
"Hi Kiba."
Naruto's hand slapped the scroll.
My vision twisted for an instant.
And my eyes widened as I saw what was contained inside the scroll.
"Bye Kiba."
A torrent of water burst out -too quickly to be from just gravity-, slamming into Kiba and Akamaru's combined form with just a little too much force, forcing the dog down into the ground.
The torrent ended just as quickly as it started, leaving the combined form wet, angry, and standing in ankle deep water.
The dog's two head looked up, glaring, just in time to catch Naruto as he threw a pair of sparking poles into the dog.
The wet dog.
Ah.
Poor Kiba and Akamaru.
The dog lit up as the poles hit it, electricity sparking violently, breaking the combination transformation nearly instantly.
Kiba and Akamaru fell, hitting the ground, the fall softened just a little by the water. Just a little, not much.
Another Naruto -the real one, this time- caught the poles before they could hit the water, quickly sealing them away, before catching the scroll from the Naruto on the ceiling, planting one end into the water.
A seal appeared, and the scroll promptly began to suck up the water once again.
Naruto left it there, walking over to Kiba and Akamaru.
"Man, I am so glad I picked up fuinjutsu, because I have no idea how I was going to get you out of that transformation if I hadn't."
Kiba coughed, a low, wheezing sound.
"Winner, Naruto Uzumaki! Medic!"
Well, I can't say that I expected Kiba to pull what he did.
Although, I can say that I expected Naruto's reaction to it; completely overpower the problem with a plan made up on the spot, before the problem even has a chance to do anything about it.
He was, perhaps, just a little bit too fond of doing that.
Lee fought Zaku.
Zaku taunted Lee, Lee babbled about the Flames Of Youth(TM).
The fight started.
Zaku had to be carried out by the medics, after suffering a major case of Rock Lee.
Shikamaru fought Misumi.
Misumi never stood a chance.
Temari fought Tenten.
That went about as well as it did in canon.
Dosu fought Choji.
That also went about as well as it did in canon.
Kankuro fought Neji.
Neji turned on his Byakugan, realised that 'Kankuro' was actually a puppet, and then proceeded to display exactly why fighting one of the Hyuuga clan in close quarters was a terrible idea.
Kankuro got carried out by the medics.
Sakura fought Ino.
It went significantly better for Sakura than it did for Ino.
She actually managed to not get a double knockout.
That's... good for her, I guess.
Hinata fought Kin.
Hinata more or less waltzed directly to Kin, dodging her Senbon and completely ignoring her sound genjutsu, and then Jyuken'ed her until she stopped moving.
Hayate declared her the winner, and then she pulled her earplugs out.
Smart girl. Kind of wonder exactly how she knew that Kin uses sound-based Genjutsu, though.
I gave her a congratulations as she walked back to her team, and she held an utterly radiant smile for basically the rest of the preliminaries.
Which was both good, and rather saddening.
That a simple congratulations could get that kind of a reaction out of her...
The preliminaries ended with Hinata's victory, so Hayate had everybody draw lots.
Long and short of it;
Sakura is going to fight Hinata, Naruto is going to fight Neji, Sasuke is up against Temari, Shikamaru is up against Gaara, and Lee is up against Dosu.
In a month.
One long, full month for everybody to prepare for battle.
And, in turn, one long, full month for Orochimaru to do whatever the hell that he was doing.
I'd feel a hell of a lot better than I am now if I had any idea where the man was. But I didn't, and that was the problem.
I really do not like not knowing where the guy is.