Naruto : Struggle Of Childhood

Metal

Sakura replied with something that she had learned from Tsunade while she was suffering from a saki induced headache and Jiraiya had been harassing her.

"You know, I like her," Kiyoko, who was standing close enough for Naruto to hear, said thoughtfully, "But I don't think she's going to win...too bad."

Sakura made a series of hand seals.

"Genwaku Sakura no Jutsu!" Sakura said, sounding angry.

No wonder, Naruto thought, these attacks were ones she hadn't used in years. When Sakura was younger she had made a bunch of techniques that had something to do with cherry blossoms, but most of them were weak or just silly looking. Sakura had to rely on those right now, when they weren't really that much help.

"Emi shouldn't have done that," Sai said.

"Why?" Gaara asked.

"Didn't you see her fight with that group of missing nin?" Sai asked, "One of them trapped her and her team in a genjutsu that should couldn't break, but she didn't seem too hindered by the limited visibility that the situation created."

"This girl has a thing with cherry blossoms doesn't she?" Ren asked, "The weakest female character usually uses those kinds of techniques against the boss."

Sasuke looked like he wanted to strangle him.

The field changed completely, even the onlookers, who usually weren't able to see a genjutsu, could see it. Yumi was surrounded by what looked like hundreds of falling cherry blossoms, making it almost impossible to actually see anything. Sakura dashed forwards into the illusion, her fist raised, but Yumi jumped back again, seemingly able to navigate the genjutsu.

"If she could only get one punch in..." Hinata mumbled.

"I know," Naruto growled, "and so does Yumi. She's making sure that Emi can't get anywhere near her."

"But she's a short range type too isn't she?" Haku asked, "Wouldn't that make it impossible for her to attack as well?"

"I wouldn't be so sure of that," Sai said, watching the whole fight, "Just because she can fight short range doesn't mean she's a short range fighter. Look at me."

"Also," Kimimaro added, "We haven't seen her use anything other then the shield. It looks to me like she's purposely wearing Emi down."

Sakura continued attacking, and Yumi continued to back up until she seemed satisfied with something. She dropped a smoke bomb, which covered the entire arena. When the smoke cleared Yumi was a good distance from Sakura, holding a metal tipped whip in her hand.

"It would have been better for you to have surrendered," Yumi said calmly, "Let's begin."

Yumi flicked her arm and the whip shot out towards Sakura. She dodged, jumping to the left with a bit of a smirk.

"You have to be faster then that," she yelled.

Sakura's smirk turned to shock when the whip changed direction and homed in on her, gashing her leg. Sakura landed back in a crouch, holding one leg. It was bleeding badly.

"What?" Sakura hissed.

"Kinzoku Shihai no Jutsu," Yumi said, smirking, "It lets me control where my whip goes. Shall we continue?"