Finals Start
Finally the day all of Konoha had waited for was there. The finals of the chunin exams would be held today. There were many famous clan names in the finals, though none was more famous than the finally revealed son of the fourth Hokage. Naruto Namikaze, formerly known as Naruto Uzumaki, who had already started making a name for himself and many nobles and wealthy clients wanted to see him in action. Then there were his teammates Sasuke Uchiha, last member of the Uchiha clan in Konoha, who promised to become one of the strongest Uchihas of all times and Sakura Haruno. Sakura had grown from a normal civilian-born kunoichi into an aspiring medic nin, some were already seeing the next Tsunade in her. Rumours that had spread over the village said that the whole team was exceptionally strong now thanks to the training the Godaime Hokage had put them through in the six months he had trained his team.
Then there were the heirs of the most important clans of Konoha. Hinata Hyuga, Shino Aburame and Kiba Inuzuka, even if the last one wasn't the heir of his clan, he was the son of the clan head, then Shikamaru Nara, Ino Yamanaka and Choji Akimichi. Those nine Konoha nins would face the three children of the fourth Kazekage from Suna. It promised to be a great spectacle. The tickets had been sold out before a week was gone. Security precautions were at an all-time high and the guests were asked to identify every single member of their protection details.
Among the audience were lots of ninjas of Konoha, there of course were the senseis of the three teams that had qualified. Kurenai Yuuhi, sensei of team eight, Asuma Sarutobi, sensei of team ten and finally Kakashi Hatake, Godaime Hokage and sensei of team seven. All three were proud to say that their three rookie teams had been the only ones to get into the finals, despite having been seen as the underdogs in the exams and some thinking that the genin weren't ready for such a challenge yet. They had proven beyond any doubt that they were the best of their generation.
Right now the genins that were hoping to get promoted were standing in the arena, facing the spectators. Kakashi's coronation to Hokage had been done two days ago. They wanted to have that part done before the invasion took place. It would be too much of a hassle to deal with the aftermath and have to succession to worry about. So right now Kakashi Hatake ruled Konoha as the Godaime Hokage.
From left to right there stood team seven, the Suna team, team eight and then team ten. All of them were looking up to see the ones that had come to see the finals. Some of them had changed their style of clothing. Naruto had finally donned his new outfit with his special red cloak that was modelled after his father's infamous white cloak. Under it he wore long black pants that were fixed at his ankles with black bandages. A long-sleeved black shirt sat under a blood red vest. On the back of his cloak, in black, there was a stylised Uzumaki swirl, though upon looking closer you could see that the symbol was made of the Kyubi. The white Namikaze twister was on his right shoulder. Sasuke had changed from his blue shirt and white shorts to a totally black outfit with short sleeves and shorts.
Sakura had changed her outfit most. Thanks to the month with Shizune she had got a good idea how a powerful kunoichi fought and how she tricked her opponents. Especially a medic nin. So Sakura now wore a red and black short battle kimono over a black fishnet shirt. She also wore black leggings and red kunoichi boots that went to her shins. Team ten looked like they did before, as did Kiba and Shino, but Hinata too had changed her outfit. She didn't wear the baggy jacket anymore, but a tight black body suit under a lavender battle dress. She still wore black shinobi sandals.
Kakashi stood up from his seat; he sat between the Kazekage and the Sandaime Hokage, and addressed the audience.
"Welcome everybody to this year's chunin exam finals in Konoha." He said. "The twelve finalists that you see down in the arena have proven to be the best of this year's candidates in the first two tests. Now you will all see their skill in one-on-one fights. I want to introduce to you these promising genins. From left to right, we have Sasuke Uchiha, heir of the Uchiha clan of Konoha, next is Sakura Haruno, daughter of a civilian councillor of Konoha. Next in line is Naruto Uzumaki Namikaze, son of the Yondaime Hokage and heir of the Uzumaki clan of Uzushio. Next we have the three children of the Yondaime Kazekage, Kankuro, the oldest, then Temari and last but not least Gaara. Next in line is Kiba Inuzuka, son of the head of Konoha's Inuzuka clan, followed by the Aburame clan heir Shino Aburame. Next is the heiress of the Hyuga clan Hinata Hyuga. Next to her you see Ino Yamanaka, heiress of the Yamanaka clan, then Choji Akimichi, heir of the Akimichi clan and on the far right, Shikamaru Nara, heir to the Nara clan of Konoha.
"The order of the fights has been decided beforehand after the genins passed the second test. The first fight will be between Sakura Haruno and Kiba Inuzuka. Will the other participants please leave the arena?" Kakashi asked and the spectators cheered that it would start soon now.
Everybody but Kiba and Sakura left for the participant's box and the two fighting this battle got into position. The proctor, Hayate Gekko, asked if both were ready and got two determined nods. He started the fight after announcing that there were no rules in the fight besides that it ended when one participant forfeited, died or if he stopped the fight because one participant had clearly won. Sakura went on a distance to Kiba, knowing from her sensei that the Inuzuka were taijutsu specialists combined with jutsus that included their canine partners. As Kakashi sensei used ninja dogs himself she had a fairly good idea about how strong somebody working with a ninja dog could be. While Akamaru was still small it wouldn't do her any good if she underestimated the pair.
Kiba was thinking similarly. After all the training that all three rookie teams had done and the competitions against each other he knew that no member of Team Seven should be underestimated. They had all gone through rigorous training and while Sakura had been weak at the academy that was long in the past. He didn't know who had trained her over the last month, but he would be careful and heed his sensei's advice to not be too brash as it could cost him deeply. He was just glad that he didn't have to fight Naruto though. That would have meant a certain defeat. He had no jutsu or trick in his arsenal that could help him against the blond and he really didn't envy Shino who had to fight first against Naruto.
Sakura made the first move and threw a batch of kunai at Kiba who dodged or reflected them with his own kunai. Sakura started running around him while simultaneously making clones of herself. Too bad that with his nose he would be able to perfectly tell where she was. He wondered though why she was blowing up so much dirt. Then he stopped and grabbed his nose in pain. What had she done? He had to defend himself when Sakura attacked with a quick kick aimed at his head. He avoided the kick and then had to deflect senbons that she shot at him from a launcher at her arm. Nice trick, but not good enough.
"You won't get us like that. Let's up this Akamaru." Kiba said and looked at his dog only to see him fast asleep, two of the senbons that Kiba had dodged stuck in his leg and back. "No, Akamaru."
"So, now we have a real one-on-one. I know that Inuzuka taijutsu is dangerous to face, but if I take out your dog it is a lot less dangerous." Sakura grinned. "Be happy that you are a comrade, otherwise that wouldn't have been a sleeping drug, but poison."
"I'll show you!" Kiba roared, having lost his cool over the loss of his partner.
This was not how he had planned his fight to go. He charged at Sakura, but for some reason he didn't manage to hit her at all. She always just shifted out of the way of his punches, kicks and slashes. It was infuriating. And then her damned grin. Suddenly he stumbled and left an opening which Sakura ruthlessly used to land an uppercut against his chin. He flew back and stopped a little distance away. Then he felt his vision getting dizzy.
"What did you do?" He asked now really having trouble staying awake. "Your senbon didn't hit me at all."
"No, but you inhaled a drug that I set free while we were exchanging blows. You should only have at most ten seconds until you join Akamaru in dreamland." Sakura said. "I not only spread a powdered plant that caused you pain when you channelled chakra into your nose and ears when I ran around you, I also made sure to let you inhale fumes from the bottle on my belt which are scentless, especially after you couldn't use your nose properly. Good night Kiba."
Kiba fell to the ground, asleep.
"Proctor, Kiba won't wake up until two hours are over or he gets the antidote to the drug I used." Sakura announced and closed the lid of her bottle again.
This had worked out perfectly. Her strategy had taken out Kiba without her getting injured or costing her too much chakra. After all, she had to fight more rounds after this and a good strategy was the main element you needed to show to hope getting your promotion.
"Winner is Sakura Haruno." Hayate announced and the audience cheered. While the fight had been short, it had been entertaining how the girl had tricked one of the clan ninjas. "Will Ino Yamanaka and Hinata Hyuga come down here?"
While Sakura walked up to the competitor's box Ino and Hinata left it. Once Sakura arrived there she got compliments from her teammates.
"Good fight, Sakura, really clever strategy." Naruto praised.
"Yes, well done." Sasuke added.
"Thank you. I was surprised that it worked out this perfectly. I had feared he would be more careful after I took out his sense of smell, but it was really easy to send Akamaru sleeping." Sakura replied.
"He didn't expect you to improve that much over the month. You definitely learned a lot under Shizune." Naruto commented.
They then looked down to see the next fight. Ino and Hinata had made their way down and were now taking their positions.
"Who do you think will win?" Sakura asked.
"Hard to say. A few months ago I would have said Ino because Hinata had no confidence in herself. But since we started the cross-team challenges she broke out of her shell and her taijutsu is really nasty to deal with." Sasuke commented.
"In the pure skills department Hinata might have a few advantages. The Hyuga clan is known to produce good fighters but she needs to get close for that to work. The Yamanaka clan has its mind jutsus and Ino took up studying poisons which allows her to keep her distance. I think Kurenai sensei also got some genjutsu into Hinata's repertoire. It will be interesting in any case." Naruto added.
Ino looked at Hinata. Had this been when they had graduated she knew she would have won against the timid girl. But now, after seven months the result wasn't sure. Hinata had gained massive confidence through training with her team. And if she got too close to let Hinata hit her with her taijutsu that was it for her. The gentle fist was a devastating style. She needed to fight from the distance if she wanted to have a chance at winning this. So she decided to start off with some shuriken that were laced with sleeping drugs. After Sakura's fight it was a bit boring but it was what she had in that area. Most of her techniques with poisons were still in development as building up the necessary resistances took time.
Next to that she had her clan techniques. But most of them were more suited for interrogation and spying than fighting a one-on-one battle. She was just glad that Asuma sensei had shown her two jutsus that she could use. She was a fire element and while she hadn't done elemental manipulation training yet, she had learned two basic fire jutsus that didn't rely on proper elemental manipulation. Both were D-rank but they were useful. She really regretted her stupidity at the academy now. Had she trained more like her dad had told her over and over again she would have bigger chakra reserves now. Not to mention her dieting. It had cost her. She knew that Hinata was the only girl of her class that hadn't dieted because she was simply too shy to pursue her love interest Naruto.
Ino threw her shuriken and watched how Hinata elegantly evaded them by shifting her body out of the way. That was another point which made fighting Hinata difficult. She was incredibly flexible and devilishly hard to hit. Ino went through handseals.
"Fire Style: Fire bullet." She called out and shot a middle sized fire ball from her mouth.
It was in no way as impressive as the ones she had seen Sasuke use at the academy but they didn't need to be that impressive. Hinata jumped to the side dodging the attack before racing towards her. Ino started a barrage of shuriken and kunai, which Hinata either dodged or deflected with a kunai in her right hand. Ino retreated, knowing that if she got involved in a close-up taijutsu exchange Hinata could land vital hits. But this time she had used other shuriken. They had nearly invisible wire tied to them. Wire that would allow her next trick.
"Fire style: Flying sparks." She called out and shot a barrage of sparks from her mouth.
The wire was drenched in burn paste and therefore allowed Ino to trap Hinata in a net of fire. Well, at least that had been the plan.
"Water gentle fist style: Protection of the sixty four hands sphere." Hinata called out.
Hinata seemed to create a dome of water chakra around her by sending water saturated chakra beams around her. The burning wires that Ino had set up hissed and then went out with steam coming from them.
Hiashi Hyuga was looking at his oldest daughter with pride for a chance. She had worked tirelessly with the children of the clan on this jutsu. First she had simply used her normal chakra for the protection. It had been an impressive feat already. Based on kaiten she had used the principle of surrounding herself with an impenetrable sphere. Her chakra beams as she called it had been formed to be sharp and thin. A true precision technique that could be both attack and defence. She had finished that part around halfway through the training month. Then she had worked on integrating her water natured chakra into it and now he saw the result. The Yamanaka girl was trying to be smart in this fight but he was sure that Hinata would win.
Ino was shocked about Hinata's unique jutsu. She had never before seen anything like that. Then suddenly she felt herself be hit. How? Hinata was still defending against her fire.
"You're within my field of divination." She heard from close to her.
"No, how did you get this close?" Ino exclaimed trying to get away.
"Eight trigrams, thirty two hands." Hinata said and then the hits started raining on Ino. "Two hands, four hands, eight hands, sixteen hands, thirty two hands."
Ino felt lots of her chakra points being shut down. She fell to the ground, knowing that she had lost.
"How did you get close?" She asked.
"I used the steam the extinguishing of your fire net produced to prepare a genjutsu which let you believe that I was still defending while I closed the distance to land my final attack." Hinata answered.
"Winner of the second match: Hinata Hyuga." Hayate declared.
Hinata was shocked but very happy when she looked up into the stands and saw her father nod at her appreciatively.
TO BE CONTINUED...