Chapter 14: Chapter 14: The preliminary round
"Okay, let's start the first match. The names of the two who will be facing each other will appear on the screen above me." Hayate said.
The screen glowed and green letters appeared on it and after a few second spelled out the names:
Yoroi Akado vs Sasuke Uchiha
Sasuke smirked.
"Why did it have to be the first match?" Hinata looked at her teammate in concern. "Are you sure you can fight?"
"Yeah." Sasuke nodded.
"Make sure you don't lose, cuz if you do I won't be able to kick your butt in the finals." Naruto grinned.
"Hn."
"Okay, Sasuke…Yoroi…you stay here and everyone else, go up the stairs and clear the area so we can start." Hayate announced.
It seemed like Sasuke had this in the bag but only minutes later Naruto was gripping the railing as Sasuke groaned getting pinned to the concrete floor by Yoroi whose hand was on his forehead sucking out his chakra as Sasuke desperately tried to get lose. He managed to escape Yoroi's jutsu but only by activating his sharingan which caused the mark to begin to take over his body. A disguised Orochimaru licked his lips in satisfaction seeing that his mark is working but seconds later him and Kakashi watched in amazement as Sasuke managed to stop the marks from spreading down his arm and the black flame marks that were covering his neck and arm receded back into the mark on his neck.
Minutes later Hinata and Naruto watched in relief as Hayate pronounced Sasuke as the winner after he pummeled Yoroi to the ground with his leg.
Sasuke was about to fall on his back from the lack of chakra but he was held upright by Kakashi. "We need to seal away that mark." Kakashi almost whispered to Sasuke's surprise. "He knows?" "Now." Kakashi added.
"I want to watch the rest of the matches."
"Don't argue with me. That mark could spiral out of control at any time." Kakashi frowned.
Sasuke snarled angrily. "Fine." And with that the two disappeared in a puff of smoke.
"Where'd they go?" Naruto blinked frantically.
"Do not worry." Gai walked up to them along with his three students. "Kakashi will take good care of him."He smiled revealing his sparkling teeth.
"He better not make him quit because of that mark." Naruto said quietly.
"I'm sure he won't." Hinata placed her hand over Naruto's.
"Yeah, you're right. He's too proud of us." He smiled at her and she smiled back.
"Okay, time to announce the second match." Hayate said loudly.
________________________________________
After Shino's bugs blew the overconfident Zaku away and Kankuro cracked Misumi's bones, the board showed a very surprising matchup:
Sakura Haruno vs Ino Yamanaka
The two looked at each other in shock before they frowned in determination and headed down the stairs. The fight started off and continued with the two exchanging punches for a while before they stopped for a bit after Sakura slapped Ino.
Naruto looked at the two from above. "What happened to Sakura's hair?"
"You…you didn't notice it before?" Hinata looked at him in surprise.
"No…" Naruto frowned realizing that he wasn't looking at her at all like he usually would, he was surprised to realize that he pushed himself away from her. He looked at Hinata who met his eyes and blinked in surprise, her cheeks reddened a bit. He gave her a sheepish smile and shrugged.
"Guess I was paying too much attention to you to notice…" He said softly and winked at her making her blush even more and she looked away tapping her fingers together.
Ino's yelling drew their attention back to the match and they both watched in shock as Ino cut her ponytail and threw her hair towards Sakura making the strands disperse in the air and float down to the floor.
The fight was a final straw between the two as they thought that they were finally going to reveal who is better but that will have to remain a mystery as the fight ended up being a double knock out.
________________________________________
After Temari defeated TenTen and Kin got overshadowed by Shikamaru (get it?), the board was about to spell out the names of the next match.
Shikamaru slowly walked back to his team. "That was clever." Naruto added as Shikamaru walked past him. The clever tactic to unnoticeably get Kin near the wall so that she knocks herself out was a genius idea indeed.
"Yeah, but it was a drag…now let's if you're more clever than you look."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Naruto pouted.
Shikamaru sighed and pointed to the board. Naruto turned towards the board and his confused expression changed to a happy one as he saw the names on the board:
Kiba Inuzuka vs Naruto Uzumaki
"Alright! Finally! It's my turn to kick ass!" Naruto pumped his fist in the air.
"Look Akamaru, it's us against the kid! This is gonna be easy!" KIba ran down the stairs.
Naruto looked at Kiba and smirked as he saw him looking at him. He turned to Hinata. "Wanna give me a kiss for good luck? I mean, I don't need it but…" He trailed off with a smile.
Hinata giggled before leaning in and kissing him on the cheek.
Kiba blinked and frowned at the sight. "No way…" His eyes followed Naruto as he jumped over the rails and landed across from him with a grin.
"I've been waiting forever for this! Sorry Kiba, don't take it personally if I blow you away."
A vain on Kiba's forehead pulsed. "Argh! That's what I wanted to say, only not so politely!" Amakaru barked in agreement.
"Now wait a minute, what's the puppy doing here? Is that even fair?" He turned to Hayate.
"A dog is not considered as a second ninja, he is within the rules."
Naruto grimaced at him "Ehhh… whatever, fine with me." He then turned to his opponent. "You'll need all the extra help you can get."
"Such big words for such a little squirt." He them feed a small brown pill to Akamaru and he took one himself.
Naruto tuned to Hayate again. "Hey, that's cheating!"
"Food pills are considered a weapon, they're allowed."
Naruto stared at him in disbelief. "The heck are you even here for then?!"
A drop of sweat appeared on Hayate's brow as he blinked in embarrassment.
The first ten minutes of the fight didn't go so well as Naruto kept getting punched by Kiba and got thrown onto the ground so many times a few drops of blood were starting to leak from his forehead. Kiba was fast so Naruto couldn't find an opening to hit him back so all he could do was to try and defend himself, but no matter how many times Kiba slammed him into the dirt he kept getting up again and each time he got up Hinata gripped the rails harder and couldn't stop a smile from appearing on her face. "I know you can do it." She whispered to herself quietly cheering him on still unsure if she could do it vocally yet but she was sure she will later in the fight as she was confident in Naruto's victory.
Meanwhile, Kiba was getting fed up with the fact that his opponent just wouldn't stay down on the ground so that he could finish him off, even resorting to his Gatsuga didn't help him. Coming up with a better plan he threw smoke grenades at Naruto and large clouds of thick dark smoke prevented the audience from seeing what's going on. Noticing that Kiba had stopped attacking Naruto, Hinata activated her byakugan only to gasp at the sight beneath the smoke.
"What?" Rock Lee suddenly appeared next to her but she ignored his curiosity and surprised everyone by yelling.
"Yes! That's genius Naruto!" She jumped on her toes looking at the smoke in awe while others were looking at her.
"I see…very impressive."Kakashi agreed.
Once the smoke cleared there was no sight of Naruto but three Kibas were standing in a circle looking at each other.
"Woah, that's brilliant." Sakura stared at the three.
"Who knew Naruto could be that smart." Ino agreed. They were both glad they woke up before the fight started.
"Even that exhausted he managed to pull off a perfect transformation, there's no way he should be able to do that!" Shikamaru frowned.
Who knew that this would be such an exciting fight to watch.
"I see what you're trying to pull." Kiba exchanged glances between the two copies of himself. "I admit, you look exactly like me and that threw me off for a moment but I still know which one is not Akamaru. Wanna know why?!" He punched one of his copies sending it rolling on the ground before it lay motionlessly on the floor. "I can smell you, kid." He rubbed his nose. But the confident smirk on his face was gone after the copy dispersed revealing a ruffed up Akamaru.
Kiba's eyes went wide. "No way?!"
Kurenai stared at him in shock. "He fooled Kiba!"
Shino was shocked as well underneath his high collar. "Kiba's nose got them mixed up…but how?"
Kiba looked at his battered canine companion and angrily turned to the second copy punching it as well.
"So it's you! Messing with me!"
The second copy turned out to be Akamaru as well.
"What?!" Kiba blinked. Hearing a loud poof he turned only to see Naruto's fist which dug into his cheek sending him flying.
"When Kiba recognized the fake copy of him Naruto was clever enough to reappear as Akamaru which totally fooled Kiba! Way to go Naruto!" Lee flashed two thumbs up.
"You are amazing, Naruto!" Hinata grinned in excitement.
Kakashi looked at her in surprise. He has never seen that smile on her.
"Shadow clone jutsu!"
Kiba looked up and wiped the blood from his nostril and saw five clones of Naruto, but just as he got up the clones circled him punching him into the air.
"Na-"
Punch.
"Ru-"
Punch.
"To!"
Punch!
Kiba grimaced in pain but just before he could open his eyes the last clone punched him back towards the ground where the real Naruto finished Kiba off.
"Uzumaki barrage!"
Kakashi looked at him recognizing Sasuke's move. "Hm…well, at least he changed the name."
Hayate examined the groaning Kiba then turned to Naruto. "The winner is Naruto Uzumaki!"
"WOOHOO!" Lee pumped his fists in the air.
"Amazing, who thought he could beat Kiba?!" Shikamaru exclaimed.
"Mm-Hm." Ino nodded in agreement.
"That was incredible…" Sakura watched Naruto wide-eyed. "How did he get this strong?"
Naruto walked confidently up the stairs with his hands behind his head and a proud toothy grin on his face. When he got near Hinata she jumped into his embrace. "You were amazing! But you're hurt! Here, let me see."
She untied his headband because the blood was coming from underneath it and there was a gash on his forehead.
"Does it really hurt?" She asked concerned.
"It doesn't hurt at all." He smiled at her.
"But it's bleeding." She pulled a handkerchief out of her pouch and started to wipe the blood off of his face.
"It's alright, don't worry about it." He closed his eyes as she ran the handkerchief over his brow, then she dug into her pouch again pulling out a brown jar.
"What's that?" Naruto asked.
"It's a healing ointment." Hinata answered softly.
Opening it she took some of the white ointment and rubbed it over the gash. She watched in amazement as the gash slowly disappeared.
Naruto put his hand over his forehead and feeling that his wound is gone he grinned at her."Wow, that ointment works great! Thanks Hinata."
Kakashi looked at his student. "It's not the ointment that's making your wounds heal at an unnatural rate…it's the chakra of the Nine-tailed Fox…"
"Don't mention it. Here, take it."She handed him the jar.
"Thanks, but considering that I get injured a lot this is not going to last me that long."
"Well then I'll just make some more." She smiled at him.
He blinked at her. "You made this? Seriously, Hinata you're awesome!" He wrapped his arm around her shoulders making her blush. "I-I'm..a-awesome…"
But in the distance a pair of eyes were glaring at her not feeling like celebrating.
"Silly Hinata…not a care in the world…"
A/N: I've decided to stick with the original match up because I love the fact that Naruto's revenging Hinata (his loved one ;-P) And since Sakura is not into Naruto (yet? maybe? we'll see…) Hinata has nothing to prove against her in my opinion (since some of you thought I should match up Sakura vs Hinata).
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