Behind the Waterfall

#30 Fights

Looking over the arena, Tsunade watched as the spectators slowly returned from their break, as the hour came to a close. Naruto had announced that there would be a small break before the next round would begin as he wanted to make sure that the fighting field was flattened out a bit and the fires from the previous fight were put out, so that no one would have an advantage because of it. 

"Who do you think will win this?" Jirayia asked, having moved to the Hokage's seat as he was not here at the moment. 

"I don't know. I am sure, that Shikamaru will forfeit this one, since he has put most of his chakra into the first fight, but other than that I don't know who will win the fights, they all have their own strength and weaknesses, it just depends on who will take advantage of them the best." Tsunade replied, watching the eight remaining candidates as they prepared for the coming fights. 

"Where is the Hokage?" A girl's voice came from her side, making her jump a little, before she had herself under control again. Looking over, she saw the green haired proctor standing next to her, Fuu was her name, if she recalled correctly.

"He is on his way back, can I give him a message?" The sannin asked. 

"It's alright, Naruto will come by when he is back." Fuu replied, vanishing in a swirl of leaves.

"What was that about?" Jirayia asked, as they watched the girl reappear next to Naruto in the arena, the boy smiling at her as they talked.

"I don't know, but Naruto will tell us when Hiruzen is back." Tsunade combed her hair, hearing the door of the private booth open. Jirayia made way for the Hokage as the four leaders came back from their break, Hiruzen nodding at Naruto, who had looked up at the booth, as a signal to let the fights continue. 

"Temari, Shikamaru, come down to the arena." Naruto announced as the two genin made their way to the arena. 

"No changes, have fun." The blonde stated before jumping away and starting the fight. 

He hadn't even touched down again when Shikamaru's hand went up and the boy announced his surrender. The crowd let out a shocked roar, but the seasoned shinobi watching knew why he had done it and respected the Nara for that amount of self control and understanding.

Temari also seemed to be happy with that circumstance as she walked back to the other contestants smiling.

"Hokage, may I have a word?" Naruto's voice came from behind the seats as Fuu called Gaara and Ryumao to the arena. As with Fuu, Tsunade jumped slightly, but she wasn't the only one this time, even the Hokage seemed surprised to hear the teen's voice as he turned around.

"What is it?" The old man asked. 

"I wanted to ask you if it would be okay to place the semi finals and the finals tomorrow. Depending on how long the fights this round will go, it will already grow dark when we finish and also the contestants most likely will not have much chakra left, resulting in more boring fights in the finals." The blonde explained, earning a curious look from the Hokage. 

"Well, I don't see a reason why not." Turning to the three leaders that were in the booth as well, he asked if any of them had a problem with the delay, earning a no from all three of them. 

"Alright, then you can do that. You can announce it at the end of the round, I don't want the genin to know, since they will go all out, knowing they can recover overnight." The Hokage ordered after turning back to Naruto. The blonde didn't reply as he vanished, appearing next to his green haired partner, who had just started the next match. 

"I really worry about that boy coming out on the battlefield in the future." The water daimyo stated, as the sand began to shift again in the arena. 

The last remaining genin from Kusagakure stood no chance, as Gaara's sand went wild easily destroying the barriers that the boy put up. But he did not give up, even when the sand had caught him and started to envelop his legs, he kept on kicking and even managed to shake the grains off of him a few times. However, he kept on getting slower as his chakra was running low. He didn't even get a chance to scream as he jumped away from one wave of sand right into another, the yellow mass swallowing him whole.