Chapter 26

With only a few minutes before Team 10's scheduled clash with Team Gai, the younger team of genin met each other in a preemptive powwow of sorts to hash out a makeshift gameplan now that they had seen all of Team Gai in action (Naruto had previously fought Tenten even though she hadn't been seen in the tournament so he got them up to speed). The anchor point of the brain-trust was Shikamaru and he had only come to one definite conclusion on their chances next round.

"We're screwed." Shikamaru said calmly and completely serious, nodding as he was certain of his statement, "We're completely, totally screwed."

Ino's jaw dropped at Shikamaru's blunt dismissal of their chances at victory, "What the hell do you mean we're screwed? We can't be screwed! Goldie-kun tell him we're not screwed right now damn it!" She said almost desperate to hear a contradiction to Shikamaru. Naruto could only give her a helpless shrug in response, "Why are we screwed?"

"One reason and one reason only." Shikamaru began to logically explain, "It's not Tenten… It's not really Neji even though he's definitely a big problem… because Naruto can beat Neji, and I might be able to as well. It's all Lee."

Ino tilted her head cutely to the side in confusion, "Lee?"

Naruto nodded, understanding Shikamaru's point, "Yep. Rock Lee."

"Why Lee?" Ino asked, honestly wanting to know exactly why he was the one they couldn't plan for.

Naruto and Shikamaru both looked at each other before nodding simultaneously, right before Naruto began desperately speaking, his blue eyes quivering, "Lee is so fast! He's faster than me! Way faster than me! He can outrun Shikamaru's shadow all day long and you can't hit a moving target like Lee with your senbon or your clan jutsu Ino-chan! None of us know any genjutsu!"

Picking up where Naruto left off, Shikamaru argued his own point, "If it comes to a team battle then they've got it covered from each side, they know how their team works for them and they can cover Lee to come in close and pick me and Ino off. If it comes down to one-on-one matches then which one of us is going to fight Lee? He'll outwork me and muscle through my plans, and a dogfight with Naruto still has a good chance of him losing. Basically whoever fights Lee is going to get the crap kicked out of them win or lose."

"Okay…" Naruto said, trying to get a handle on the situation, "I'll fight first no matter what, and I'll stay in until Lee shows up. I'll either beat him or I'll lose… but I know I can wear him down enough for the next one of you to win after me."

Ino gave Naruto a deadpan look before adding her own opinion, seeing as how they left her out of the one-on-one deliberations, "Oh Goldie-kun that's so noble… but it's the stupidest idea I've ever heard in my entire life. We're picking one-on-one fights and I'll fight first. I know how to do this. You guys are looking at this the wrong way. It needs a woman's touch." She replied confidently. This confidence only got looks of skepticism from her two male teammates that got Ino to give them deadly serious glares, "I'm fighting first, if you stop me I'm going to poison your food with something humiliating the first chance I get. You know I can."

A squinted-eyed look came over Naruto's face, "Um, Ino-chan? I don't think-."

"I. Fight. First." Ino said with emphasis in her voice and a deceptively sweet tone to go with her smile, "Okay?" For some reason a shiver went down the spines of both Shikamaru and Naruto. There wasn't really anymore time to deliberate as intermission was just about over and it was showtime once again.

XxX

(On the Field)

During the coin toss, Neji just kept staring at Naruto with a smirk while Naruto tried to glare him down. He just wanted to beat that smug look right off of his stupid little riotous, high and mighty son of a-.

"Heads." Jei said, stopping Naruto's train of thought on mushing Neji's face into the sand in the Zen-garden… sand that probably had the remains of four people scattered in there somewhere. Heh, that would show him, "The older Konoha team gets to pick the conditions for the round."

"One-on-one." Neji said, sounding as if victory were assured by breaking up what had seemed to be a well-oiled machine of teamwork.

A nod came from Jei, "Alright, go pick your reps for the first fight." He instructed before both teams stepped away from each other.

Team 10 took this moment to address Ino fighting first one last time, "Ino-chan." Naruto said, stopping her and putting his hands on her shoulders, "Are you sure you want to go first?"

Instead of instantly answering, Ino frowned at Naruto and looked between him and Shikamaru before answering, "Do you really believe in me that little?" She asked, getting both of their eyes to widen, "I've been training hard to get better too just like you have for situations like this." She said, gesturing back towards Team Gai, "What's the point of letting you get all beaten up for no reason while I just sit off to the side? I've done enough of that thank you. This will be fine. I know what I'm doing."

With that, she got herself out of Naruto's very loose grip and walked towards Jei, leaving Naruto and Shikamaru to walk back to the viewing area by themselves, "Man I suck." Naruto said to himself, "For so long I've been thinking about how to get stronger to protect you guys and help you out because I thought that was what I was supposed to be on the team for. I didn't stop to actually think about how either of you felt about it."

"Neither of us ever particularly liked the idea of letting you do the lion's share of the fighting Naruto. Remember the mission to back up Team 7 in Nami no Kuni?" Shikamaru said, falling in step with his teammate, "You may have thought we died for a bit, but before that we had to watch you get torn apart by Haku in that dome of mirrors without having a way to reach you. That really stuck with us, especially Ino. This 'plan' of hers is something she thinks she needs."

XxX

Ino's eyes twinkled in triumph when she arrived back over to Jei to find Lee already waiting there. Once he saw her he frowned heavily, "I was hoping to face Naruto-kun first." Lee said in a disappointed sounding tone of voice, "He seems to have gotten stronger than when we first met."

"Oh, Goldie-kun is way stronger now than he was when he probably met you." Ino replied nonchalantly, "But sorry to say, you've got to fight me first if you want to get to him. I don't plan on making it that easy for you either."

Even if he wasn't fighting the person on this team that he was the most excited to face, a fight was still a fight, and Ino seemed to not be willing to hand him his victory on a silver platter, "Very well then Yamanaka-san. If you are to be my opponent then I will fight you with all of my strength."

'I'd honestly rather you didn't.' Ino thought to herself as she set herself into a special looking fighting stance. It was basically her regular stance that she used before, the Academy style that allowed her hands to be free for hand-seals, but this variation had her hands set in a way that slightly crossed them in front of her body, almost as if she was preparing for a preemptive block. It didn't seem like she was ready to trade strikes with anyone and it didn't look as if she was going to focus on her ninjutsu either.

"Quarterfinal round matchup, fight one: Rock Lee of Konoha vs. Yamanaka Ino of Konoha! Begin!"

Lee set himself in his stance, coiled and ready for whatever Ino's first move would be as he was prepared to fight a reactionary battle due to not knowing much about her fighting style. He was most certainly not prepared for Ino's hands to fly up to the back of her head in order to undo her ponytail and shift her posture into that of a pinup pose, complete with a cute and seductive wink at Lee.

"You don't really want to hurt me do you Lee?" Ino asked in her sweetest voice while keeping her pose, "I'd really rather we just put all of this silly fighting behind us, so how about it? If you quit I'll quit. That's fair, right? I'd be in your debt." Lee didn't seem like the kind of guy that spent much time around girls other than his teammate and she certainly didn't seem like Tenten would ever use this tactic.

It was just unfair, because even with Naruto's six months of building up a tolerance to Ino's charms this strategy always got him in the end without so much as a fight. There was no way Lee could resist it if Naruto couldn't. It was the closest thing that Ino would allow on that team to Naruto's Oiroke no Jutsu.

But for everything there was always an anomaly of some sort, and Lee seemed more confused than dumbstruck, "I do not understand Yamanaka-san, why would I concede to a draw when the battle has not even begun yet? And are you stretching after the fight has begun?" Lee shook his head and let out a chiding laugh, "Bad form. Very bad form."

Ino was surprised enough to drop her jaw at the lack of appropriate response, "You're supposed to fall to your knees at my charm!" She yelled at him in return, "Damn it if Goldie-kun had enough skill to make a subtle breeze with his wind chakra to blow my hair around you'd be putty right now!"

"Don't blame me for that crappy idea Ino-buta-chan!"

A growl came from Ino, "That's it, fuck it I'm pissed, let's fight!" And in one motion from the place of her hands behind her head she drew a senbon from a wrist-band that she hid underneath her left arm warmer and launched it directly at Lee with her right hand.

That was the go ahead for Lee to begin moving and he did so with gusto, trying to take advantage of Ino's wasted throwing motion once he avoided the small needle. But there was no wasted motion in Ino's throw, and she was able to get her hands back into her ready position just as he was upon her. Ino shot a leg out to catch Lee in the stomach, but he was too experienced at taijutsu to hit so easily as he simply moved out of the way of her straight kick and swept her standing leg out from under her knocking her to the ground.

The moment she hit the ground, Ino had already reached back underneath her arm warmer to let loose another senbon and her attempt to throw it forced Lee to pause in his attempt at an overhead ax kick that would have been directed at her. With the opening from Lee's hesitation, Ino rolled backwards to get back up before he launched another attack and jumped away from him.

"You cannot get away that easily!" Lee said as he rushed forward towards her again. He didn't get close enough to attack her again however, as Ino grabbed a small smoke bomb from her supply pouch and threw it at the ground directly underneath herself. It exploded in a cloud of blue gas and forced Lee to immediately stop his advance once Tenten yelled out to him.

"That's not smoke Lee, that's some kind of poison! Stay away from it!"

Lee immediately jumped back while holding his breath to keep from inhaling any of the gas at all, but was forced to dodge three more senbon flying at him from the cloud. He honed in on an Ino running away from him out of the cloud to get more distance and he took the long way around to cut her off and avoid the poison cloud.

The moment he really got past the cloud however, Ino jumped out past him perpendicular to his movement with an obviously poisoned senbon in her hand ready to give him some amateur acupuncture, showing that the Ino he had originally intended to pursue was merely a Bunshin.

Unfortunately Ino's movements weren't fast enough to catch Lee off-guard even though he only saw her coming from his peripheral vision.

Lee used his hand to block Ino's senbon hand downward, throwing her stumbling past him off-balance. He followed up by attacking with a counter spinning back sweep that knocked Ino off her feet and sent her spinning off into a corner pillar of the stone bridge set at the stream, "Konoha Reppuu (Leaf Gale)!"

Ino hit the pillar with her body, racking her body with pain as even from an attack such as that, just a leg sweep, there was incredible technique and momentum behind it, "Ugh." She sat up against the pillar with a wince as Lee came back in to attack her. His first punch missed and smacked off of the pillar and Ino's retaliatory strike was blocked and returned with an elbow to the side that sent Ino stumbling in that direction, 'His style is way cleaner than Naruto's. When I miss I pay for it right then and there.'

If you made a mistake when fighting Naruto his main objective would be to first try to grab you somehow, and if you knew how to defend yourself you still had a chance to avoid damage, one more mistake though and you'd wind up in quite a bit of physical agony if he managed to get a hold of you. On the other hand Lee would hit her the exact moment she screwed up, and unlike the spars with Naruto his punches were intended to break her.

'I've got to get away.' Ino thought to herself, barely able to defend against Lee as he battered her even through her attempts to block him. As she was being pummeled even around her tries to prevent such with her arms, Ino kept taking steps back. This eventually led to Ino stepping off of the edge of the flat ground and falling into the stream trench, "Damn it!" She yelled as she shakily landed on the surface of the water.

"You cannot run now!" Lee said as he jumped down into the trench as well and faced off with Ino as they both stood on the surface of the water.

While Lee seemed fresh and in his taijutsu stance ready for more combat Ino was bruised and rather thoroughly beaten as well as breathing heavily, 'Okay, maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all.' She planned on getting herself out of that damn moat the moment she could until she really got a good look around and a light clicked on in her head.

Running away was never going to work despite the fact that in Shikamaru's own quoted opinion Team 10 specialized in it, or more specifically 'hiding and running away'. The further she ran Lee would always catch up to her, so her best chance was to pigeonhole him so that lateral movement wasn't as much of an issue. If she could do that then she could find a way to poison him, she just knew it.

And this was the best place for it and the only real opportunity she would have.

Ino moved to the right, but Lee jumped in front of the direction she would have wound up taking, cutting off what he had thought would be an attempt by her to run away down the length of the stream. This was what Ino wanted though, as it made it so that if Lee tried to dodge to the sides there was only so far out of the way he could move without hitting the moat walls.

Once she saw Lee take the bait, Ino formed the ram seal to build up her chakra as she took a deep breath to focus it in the back of her throat, 'Let's see you punch your way out of this!' "Dokugiri (Poison Mist)!" Ino opened her mouth and spewed out a yellow poisonous fog directly at Lee, wide enough that he wouldn't be able to dodge it, and it expanded upwards so that he would not be able to jump over it.

XxX

Both Naruto and Shikamaru were watching Ino with rather proud looks on their faces. Ino's training for that jutsu partly consisted of building up a powerful natural immunity to the poison that she exhaled. Even after learning the process to execute the jutsu at the start of the month she had to adjust her body to handle storing the poison, something that was very hard on her for weeks at a time as she had to directly ingest the ingredients for her own poisons.

This was all done to make her little area of focus just a bit more practical for use in battle. She had done it for them.

"Lee!" Tenten yelled in alarm once she saw Ino fire her poison mist from her mouth, "He can't dodge that! He'll die!" Neji didn't respond, he simply stared at the unfolding battle in front of him impassively, though one could see the subtle tightening of his muscles showing his focus on the outcome.

XxX

Back on the battlefield, Ino's poison cloud settled over Lee's body and Ino stood staring and waiting for it to disperse so that she could see if she had won or not. She was ready to apply her antidote if the need arose immediately after she was called the winner of the match, 'I knew I could do it somehow.' She thought to herself as the air in the moat cleared out… and Ino almost lost her concentration on water-walking once she saw what awaited her, "You've got to be kidding me!" She yelled.

Why did she yell? Because Lee had gotten down on his hands and knees and had dunked his head underneath the water to avoid the poison. He suddenly pulled his head out of the water and stood up while taking a deep breath, "Ah, that was a close call… you are very skilled Yamanaka-san. I was right not to underestimate you."

There was no way Ino was going to let herself lose after everything that it took to get him down in the moat in the first place and she'd be damned if she was going to let her prey escape. He had to get close to defeat her, thus he had to be the one to stay close. She was the one dictating the field of the battle and she was keeping it down there where she had a chance at hitting him with something.

"It's not over yet!" Ino said as she made a small chain of hand-seals and inhaled deeply again, "Dokusei Tanki-sha (Toxic Spitfire)!" Ino fired a barrage of several blue poisonous projectiles from her mouth at Lee, forcing him to back off and run away to avoid getting hit with one. Ino wasn't done as she remade the seals and fired another set, keeping Lee in a constant state of retreat.

Lee dodged Ino's poison shots deftly as he kept moving further out of her range of fire far enough for her to stop shooting, "Once again I have to curse my lack of ninjutsu Gai-sensei." Lee said to himself lowly. He was worked in a funnel. The closer he would get to Ino the easier it would be for her to hit him with one of her poison ninjutsu. And here he thought all Yamanaka ninja used their mind techniques to win.

"Lee!"

At that moment the booming voice from the crowd sounded out over everything else once more and Lee obviously knew who it was after spending well over a year and a half training directly under him, "Gai-sensei?"

"Take 'em off!" Gai shouted confidently, "I'll allow it so that you can continue showing everyone just what you're made of!"

Hearing that he was allowed to 'take 'em' off' put a huge smile on his face and he immediately bent down to do just that. Ino figured that they were talking about something else entirely, "Ew! No, you do not take 'em off! You leave 'em on! I don't want to see you go commando in that jumpsuit!" When Lee stood straight back up holding a pair of ankle weights Ino blinked in surprise, "Oh. Nevermind… but what are a few pounds of weight going to do?"

"That is much better." Lee said to himself happily before throwing the weights out to the sides. Once they hit the walls of the moat they smashed holes into them, showing just how heavy the weights were, "Now let us finish this Yamanaka-san." Lee said as he began to unwrap the bandages from around his hands.

Ino was now on the defensive more than ever, "You should have thrown those at me if you wanted a decent attack!" Ino shouted, "You aren't going to even get close to me again as long as we're stuck in-!" Before she could even finish, Lee ran at her faster than he ever did before, 'He gets faster?' Not giving up, Ino went back to the well so to speak and fired her poison rounds from her mouth, but Lee dodged them as if they were nothing. Getting desperate to stop him, Ino grabbed at the arm warmer on her right arm and pulled it back to reveal five wrist and forearm mounted devices; small barrels mounted on leather straps with strings at the back for Ino to pull to force them to fire.

And fire Ino did, shooting five senbon simultaneously down the moat of a stream at Lee in a manner that one would find it horrifyingly difficult to dodge.

But Lee did dodge, and dodge did he ever. Because the next thing Ino knew, just as she had started building up the chakra for her poison gas attack to keep him from getting closer to her he blurred right out of her sight and was right in front of her. Before she could even gasp in shock he had kicked her just as hard as she figured a mule would find a way to, possibly harder because she was flying through the air, 'No it's not over yet… it can't be.'

Ino made a move to try and turn herself around in mid-air to land better, but Lee was flying through the air with the same trajectory as her, following closely directly underneath, "Kage Buyou (Shadow of the Dancing Leaf)." Bandages began to wrap around Ino's body and constricting her from moving or trying to escape, "You are a very talented kunoichi Yamanaka-san, but our battle is over."

Lee then caused then to tilt directly upside down as he grabbed a tight hold of her and began rotating them.

XxX

In the stands, Asuma jumped up from his seat the moment he saw Lee hovering underneath Ino, "Gai, did you teach him how to open the gates and then tell him it was alright to use it on my genin?" He asked tensely, "He could kill her with that!"

"I know Asuma." Gai said seriously, "But he wouldn't have gotten close to her any other way as long as they were down there. She's smart enough to keep him back until she found a way to defeat him. It was necessary."

That didn't explain anything, nor was it what Asuma wanted to hear at all. But starting a fight in the crowd with his comrade wouldn't solve a thing, and besides, Ino was a ninja. She was prepared for something like this to happen.

XxX

The moment Lee started hovering beneath Ino it was quite clear that there was only one attack that would be worst-case scenario for her in that kind of position and they could see it in slow motion as if even they had Sharingan, "She can't break that…" Shikamaru muttered to himself and like a shot both he and Naruto were off running out of the room and down the stairs to get out to the field as fast as they could.

XxX

'I can't break free! I can't even move! There isn't any space for me to work the seals for a Kawarimi!' Ino thought to herself as she took a deep breath and braced herself for impact, '…Damn it.'

"I'm sorry to use one of the Eight Gates on you, but… Omote Renge (Front Lotus)!" Lee slammed Ino and himself top-first into the surface of the water, submerging them both in the water with a crash that sent water flying high into the air from the force generated by Lee's attack. The crowd let out a respective groan due to the rather brutal looking maneuver and seemed to be waiting on their hands for the combatants to surface.

After a few seconds, Lee emerged from the water to stand back on the surface and dragged Ino out as well before placing her over his back and getting both of them out of the moat and back onto land. Taking a few steps he set a motionless Ino down and walked away from her before heaving a sigh.

"Yamanaka Ino is unable to continue. The winner of match one is Rock Lee of Konoha!"

Lee gave a thumbs up and a bright smile before Naruto and Shikamaru ran over, beating the medics to Ino.

"Ino/Ino-chan!"

Her eyes shot open as Shikamaru helped her sit up so that she could spit out the water in her lungs from being stuck underwater and cough. Shikamaru pat her on the back to help her cough the water out, "Take it easy alright." He said once her coughing started to die down, "It's over."

Ino's loosened and thoroughly soaked hair obscured most of her face from view, though her voice was weak when she tried to speak, "That really hurt… *cough* …so bad…" A weak smile pasted itself across her face, "Luckily my neck broke my fall."

'If it was on the ground instead of in the stream that would have killed her.' Naruto thought to himself. Ino wasn't going to be walking herself back up to the viewing box, that was for certain. Naruto looked up from Ino who was being looked over by the medics to Lee who was standing a ways away getting his second wind. It didn't look like he was going to switch out at all, "Lee's really dangerous… I'm-."

"-You're going to take Ino to the medic bay." Shikamaru said, cutting Naruto off and getting him to turn towards him suddenly, "I'm fighting next." He threw one of Ino's arms over his neck and helped her stand up so that he could walk her over to Naruto.

"W-What?" Naruto stuttered out as Ino was more or less dumped on him so that he was forced to keep her upright. He shifted her about so that he could hold on to her the same way Shikamaru had been, "Shikamaru are you serious? You're going to fight him?"

"Yeah… and you're taking Ino to the back because she doesn't really trust anyone to watch her vulnerable body except you." Shikamaru said as he shooed Naruto away, "Now get off the field. Two minutes are almost up."

Apparently the medics doubled as field security because they then began escorting Naruto off of the field. Without much of a choice left in the matter, Naruto moved Ino so that he could carry her piggyback-style to keep her from having to try to help him move her. A frown was evident on his face as he left the field, leaving Shikamaru out there with Lee.

"-ot… -im…"

Naruto heard Ino speak too softly for him to make out what she had said, "What was that Ino-chan? I didn't hear it." He asked, turning his head back to get a better view of the girl he was carrying.

Ino just weakly shook her head, not particularly up to talking anymore. It didn't matter anyway, not to anyone other than her at least, 'I got him…' She thought to herself as she set her head on Naruto's shoulder and decided to get some rest and heal now that she was eliminated, 'At least I got him.'

XxX

Genma was the next up to referee the upcoming fight and gave a mental time check before looking over at Shikamaru, "Are you going to get over here anytime soon kid? It's time to start."

A dry yet irritated look came over Shikamaru's face at Genma's question, "After what I've seen since round one from both him and every other fight start in this tournament ever I don't have to be anywhere near him to start, and if you think I'm going to walk over there and stand right in front of that guy to start this fight then you must be as dumb as I look."

A twitching eye from Genma was his response at first, 'Finally one of these kids picked up on it. The whole field is the starting point. He didn't have to be such a brat about it though." Genma then began the fight announcement, "Match two: Rock Lee of Konoha vs. Nara Shikamaru of Konoha! Begin!"

If he wasn't already far enough away, Shikamaru turned tail and immediately began running away from Lee without even bothering to try and attack him directly.

Caught off-guard, Lee took a second before taking off in pursuit of Shikamaru. If he could outpace Ino then he could do the same to Shikamaru far more easily, even as exhausted as he was from using the Omote Renge. He felt slower than he should have felt without his weights, but as far as Lee was concerned he had just burned out his muscles beforehand with the use of the gates. He was merely tired.

Eventually he caught up to Shikamaru just outside of the forest area and cut him off by stopping directly in front of him, his back turned to Shikamaru, "You will not be going any further." Lee said, turning around and standing in his taijutsu stance before he looked down and realized something, "And neither will I. I am aware of your shadow ninjutsu Nara-san. If I get close enough to try and hit you I will be well within the range of your shadow. So the best way to ensure my own victory is to stay away and keep my own distance."

Shikamaru had a bored expression on his face and his hands in his pockets, "Sure. Whatever you want to think chief."

"But…" Lee said, immediately afterwards, "If I cannot attack you I cannot defeat you. So I must engage you in order to win this fight. So prepare yourself!"

Shikamaru just shrugged in response, "Alright. We can do that too." He took his hands out of his pockets and prepared himself for action.

"But…" Lee continued, once again about to contradict his previous statement, "I still have to think of a way to get close without getting caught in your shadow." He then looked around at the trees and the foliage around them, more specifically behind him, "Haha!" Lee exclaimed victoriously, "I have the advantage! You have nowhere to hide your shadow in an effort to ambush me. Therefore all I have to do is keep an eye on the shadow at your feet!"

Shikamaru nodded as if Lee's plan made sense before he spoke again, "How long has this been going on? I sort of lost count. Hey, proctor guy, how long has it been since the fight started?"

Genma shifted his senbon around in his mouth impatiently, "This 'fight' if that's what you want to call it has been going on for over three Kami-forsaken minutes." He could appreciate a chess match of an encounter, but this was far from that. It was like both sides were stalling… or Shikamaru was stalling. Lee was just being weird, "Why does it matter?"

No answer was given by Shikamaru who just rubbed the back of his head and spoke to himself, "Really? Well I guess this thing's been dragging out for long enough." He ignored the crowd's jeering of 'we agree' and he suddenly formed the rat seal to force his shadow to stir, "Kagemane no Jutsu (Shadow Possession Jutsu)!"

"I appreciate your straightforward approach Nara-san, but-!" Lee tried to begin moving to avoid Shikamaru's shadow, but his body parts felt like lead, "What? Am I already captured?"

"Nope." Shikamaru said, "Ino just managed to get you with one of her senbon before last round ended. But it wasn't anywhere vital so it took a while to begin taking effect. There wasn't any reason to try to make you fight if you weren't going to attack me, so I just waited it out." He said as his shadow shot out towards Lee with intent to capture.

XxX

Naruto looked over at Ino who was sitting on a nearby bench getting rest and took note of the serene smile on her face, "You got Lee Ino-chan? When? You didn't hit him when you were attacking him."

"I didn't." She admitted, "But he dragged me out of the water after he piledrove me into the stream didn't he? And they didn't call the fight yet so it wasn't really cheating."

Tenten looked at Ino in surprise, "You actually poisoned him! Give me the antidote!" Her teammate was down there with a toxic substance running through his system.

Ino shook her head, "There is no antidote, it was just a paralysis serum that wears off in a few hours. It makes your body feel like you're playing tug of war with an ox just when you try to move an arm or leg, and I stabbed him with two of them. He can't outrun Shikamaru's shadow like that."

XxX

"Gotcha." Shikamaru said once his shadow got a firm hold of Lee's, "And that's checkmate. Give up or I'll make things get way worse for you. If you couldn't move before there's no way you can possibly move now."

'I have come all this way. I cannot just surrender like this.' Lee thought as he began to focus his chakra inside of his body, 'I refuse to lose!'

Shikamaru was unaware of the buildup of power beginning inside of Lee and tried to reason with him, "You fought hard and you beat Ino, that's something you can go out on, leave the rest to your teammates. I'm not sure I can hold back on my next move without killing you."

"I will not lose!" Lee shouted at the top of his lungs, surprising everyone in the arena that thought it was Shikamaru's victory for sure, "Kyuumon (Gate of Healing), open!" Lee's body underwent a vast increase of stamina that seemed to thoroughly revitalize his body and forced his muscles to improve back to the way they were when he defeated Ino, this allowed him to get the feeling in his body back, but it wasn't enough, it just meant that he was back to normal, "Seimon (Gate of Life), open!"

Shikamaru immediately went on alarm after hearing Lee shout. Once he opened the next gate he could immediately begin feeling the strain on his person to keep control over Lee. Luckily he had been training to keep a hold on stronger opponents like Naruto, and the Seimon only made it so that Ino's poison was useless in his system and he had enough strength to begin defending. It was still cause for great concern, "What the hell is going on?" At this rate, the hold on Lee would break, and the fact that his skin turned red once he opened the last gate didn't give him any solace either.

It wasn't fast enough for Lee's tastes though as he continued to struggle, and the moment he realized that brute force could break Shikamaru's shadow he decided to go for broke himself and open all of the gates he was able to, "Shoumon (Gate of Pain), open!"

"He has more?" Shikamaru asked, visibly sweating to keep a hold of Lee. If his hold on the Kagemane no Jutsu failed then he didn't want to know what would happen to him, 'Come on, there has to be a way to work this out!' He had to think of a way to win, there had to be something.

XxX

Asuma was on the edge of his seat, just watching with rapt attention and horror as Lee seemed to keep getting stronger and stronger. There was no way Shikamaru could deal with that, no matter how smart he was. It was brute force in its purest form, too much for Shikamaru to overcome with only the use of his mind.

"Gai how many gates did you teach him to open?" Kakashi asked accusingly, "This is insanity, giving that much power to a genin. You know how dangerous the gates are." For everyone, the user and especially the target. Shikamaru could be beaten to death if he was hit the wrong way by Lee. It just didn't seem fair by any stretch of the imagination, even used by a kid that had no talent for ninjutsu or genjutsu.

"You wouldn't understand. So I don't care about your judgment. Lee needed this." Gai said, confident in his decision to do so until Asuma grabbed him by the front of his flak jacket and pulled him close to look into his dangerous eyes.

"Lee got lucky with Ino, but if Shikamaru gets killed just because you wanted to give your student a nifty little world-beating kinjutsu I'll make you pay for it myself." Asuma said with barely restrained rage in his voice, "I can overlook once, with one gate. This kid knows how to open four gates!"

"Five…"

"What?" Asuma said, more or less demanding Gai to repeat himself, "What did you just say?"

"Lee can open five of the eight gates." Gai said, not bothered by Asuma's grip on his clothing, "He still has one left to open. There isn't any sense of fair play here Asuma. This battle is serious."

XxX

From her seat, Tsunade could only shake her head, "A genin being taught to open the Eight Gates… that's sheer irresponsibility. It's over."

There was no feasible way Shizune could argue the point against her. It was clear how much power was radiating off of Lee, more than enough to finish Shikamaru, 'But opening that many gates tears your muscles after its use.'

XxX

"This… is… so… troublesome…" Shikamaru grunted out, struggling to keep his focus. He had a plan… not much of one, but it was the best shot of him not getting turned into human paste by Lee's fists, "I hate my job!" He was wasting his chakra just trying to keep this monster from breaking free.

"Tomon (Gate of Limit)!" Lee shouted at the top of his lungs, "Open!" The chakra rolling off of Lee's body was clearly visible, and then he did something terrifying, he crossed his arms in front of his chest as if Shikamaru's shadow wasn't even binding him, "This is it!" He then disappeared from Shikamaru's sight as if he had teleported.

"I surrender!"

Lee reappeared directly in front of Shikamaru with his fist cocked back, his body showing the full benefits of the five opened gates complete with the totally white eyes. He didn't let the punch go however, "W-What?"

"I give up." Shikamaru said, stepping back away from Lee with his hands up in a placating gesture, "I'm not going to get kicked to sleep permanently when I know I'm beaten. You win." He then turned his back and started walking away casually, "I'm done."

Lee stood stunned as his body still blazed with the effects of the Eight Gates.

"Winner of match two by way of verbal surrender: Rock Lee of Konoha!"

XxX

"It figures that a team with a failure on it would have a coward on it as well." Neji quipped in regards to Shikamaru's sudden surrender and no one there had any room to argue to the contrary. This left Naruto all alone with the series currently being three-on-one.

Said blonde didn't even bother to respond to Neji's shot at him as he was down the stairs and out the tunnel the moment he heard Shikamaru say that he surrendered. He sprinted over to the site of the last battle, and ran directly into Shikamaru, "What the hell am I going to do to beat that?" Naruto said in a low yell.

"Nothing." Shikamaru said plainly, "Just listen to me and do this." He said before pulling Naruto close to whisper in his ear. By the time he finished, Naruto's eyes were wide and he nodded dumbly, "Now stick to the gameplan… no bravado or hero tactics here." With a firm pat on the shoulder he walked past Naruto back up to the observation area.

Naruto himself instead of charging out to begin the battle the way he was about to simply began walking his way up to Lee who was still teeming with power. By the time he got to face off with Lee he had a calmly lucid look on his whisker-marked visage.

"Are you ready?" Sekka asked as it was his turn to referee the next match.

"Yes." Lee said firmly, ready to uncork the assbeating of a lifetime on Naruto once the fight was started.

Naruto looked between Sekka and Lee, 'This better work Shikamaru... Tenten and Neji don't look like they're coming down, but why would they when Lee is like this?' Naruto stayed silent before turning to Sekka and cocking his head curiously in a fake-ignorant ruse, "Huh? I'm sorry did you say something?"

Sekka raised an eyebrow, "I'm asking if you're ready."

"No." Naruto said crossing his arms resolutely, "I'm not ready. It hasn't been two minutes so I don't have to fight yet."

XxX

The cigarette that had been placed in Asuma's mouth as a way of relieving his stress at the current scene dropped unceremoniously once he heard what Naruto said. He turned to Gai and saw a look of pure horror on the man's face and a grin sprang to Asuma's own.

It wasn't over yet.

"Yes!" Asuma shouted at the top of his lungs, "Yes! I don't know which one of those two little bastards thought of that one but yes! Oh Kami yes!" He turned to Gai and stuck up his middle finger in his face, "That's what I think of your Eight Gates Gai! And that's what Shikamaru and Naruto think too!" He started walking around his aisle with his hands up in the air in victory as if a giant had just been slain with a slingshot, "Kami I love my team!"

"But… but…" Gai looked absolutely mortified as he realized what had happened, "…That's not fair. That's completely unyouthful."

Still in the middle of his impromptu victory dance, Asuma still had enough time to stop in front of Gai and taunt again, "Well there isn't any sense of fair play here Gai, this is a battle!" He said mimicking Gai's earlier words, "That's what you get for bringing an explosive tag to a fist-fight! If the fists don't get close enough to fight and the tag goes off anyway who does it really hurt? Nobody!"

Kakashi looked at Gai's ghost-white face, loving the silence, and then back down at the battlefield, somewhat impressed, "Teamwork even in a series of one-on-one fights? Good stuff." The masked jounin said appreciatively.

XxX

In the viewing area for the other fighters there was a sort of stunned silence over what Naruto had just said until Neji let out a sigh, having seen the entire battle with his Byakugan, "That will be it for Lee." All eyes turned to him as he unhappily spoke again, "He will lose this battle… even if we switched out to save him he won't be any more use for the rest of the round if he even recovers enough to be a factor tomorrow."

"Are you kidding me?" Sasuke said, his Sharingan was on just so that he could even attempt to keep up with Lee after seeing Lee's first move once the other gates were activated, "Right now I can see the chakra flying off of him clearer than anyone else here and Naruto can't beat that. If he can even take one punch from that and get back up that would be amazing."

"True." Neji said, "But whatever Lee did to fully power out of the Nara boy's shadow technique and the girl's poison is damaging his body, and it is only temporary, meant for a quick burst before leaving him. I can see his chakra clearer than you can. I can see it coursing through his entire body, in places where it shouldn't be as intense, careening from his actual chakra gates themselves."

Tenten didn't really understand what Lee had done to gain so much strength, he could probably pummel a jounin into powder as he currently was, but she could understand what Naruto was doing, "Oh you've got to be kidding me. He's stalling."

Even the odd man out of the Konoha genin, Kabuto seemed interested in the turn of events, "He can't do that. Can he do that? Stall?"

After staying silent long enough to think about it, Sakura seemed amazed by the revelation, "Of course. At the beginning the proctors said that in the case of one-on-one matches there was a two minute period maximum between for people deciding if they wanted to switch out or not so that teams could deliberate. That was more so that people fighting back to back battles could rest, but they never said that fresh fighters couldn't use it either."

Neji nodded seriously, "He doesn't have to fight Lee or even try to outlast Lee while he is using these powers. He just has to waste as much of the clock as he can. It took thirty seconds for Uzumaki to get himself down to the field. It took fifteen seconds for him to get the scope of this plan from Nara when they were talking, twenty more seconds for him to walk over to the proctor and Lee… he had fifty-five seconds of stall time by the time he was even asked to begin."

"Yep."

Everyone turned around towards the back of the room to see Shikamaru sitting on the same bench as Ino resting his hands behind his head comfortably while she sat next to him still very injured, but smiling nonetheless, "Since I was going to lose anyway there's no reason to get put in traction before tomorrow trying to hold back a freight train when you can just let it run its course."

XxX

"I can do that right?" Naruto asked before pointing down at his foot to make up a fake excuse, "Because I think I've got a rock in my sandal and I want to get it out. I need a little bit more time to make sure I'm good to go. As long as I'm ready to go when two minutes are done it's cool right?" 'Please say yes.'

'You sneaky little…' Sekka said, trying to fight off a smirk, "You have thirty-four more seconds and the fight will start whether you're 'ready' or 'not'."

Naruto nodded and a smirk was unable to be hidden from Naruto's face as he remembered Shikamaru's words to him before he walked out to meet Lee.

Just listen to me and do this. Nothing. You don't do a single thing. Before every fight they ask if the competitors are ready, which means that they won't start the fight if you don't consent before the time limit for the rest period expires. Use that. Lee said that he opened one gate to attack Ino, but that power only lasted for one attack, and did you see how tired he was afterwards? He can't hold that form of his forever, and you're going to draw this out for as long as you can because once it dies off he'll be completely exhausted. Now stick to the gameplan… no bravado or hero tactics here.

'We don't fight fair.' Naruto thought to himself as a method of reasoning out his own actions as Sekka counted down the last fifteen seconds prior to the fight starting, 'Everything in this exam is a weapon. The field, even the rest time is a weapon.' Lee's skin color turned back to normal with only a few seconds left and as Shikamaru said, he was completely spent. It was evident in his eyes that Lee had nothing left to give.

Beautiful.

But he was going to feel like a bastard after this was over.

"Seven, six!" Sekka voiced out loudly before beginning introductions with six seconds left of stall time, "Match three: Rock Lee of Konoha vs. Uzumaki Naruto of Konoha! Fight!"

"Sorry Lee, but I'm not losing here for any reason!" Naruto said as a form of apology for the plan to defeat him. He ran towards Lee who seemed barely able to keep one eye open but was still standing up. Lee's arms were down as now that the effects of the gates had worn off, Ino's paralysis poison had come back in full effect.

The first move from the blonde was a simple stepping thrust kick that even then Lee was able to catch with his lowered hands, but he found that Naruto's foot was stuck in his grasp due to Naruto's fighting style. Before he knew it, Naruto had jumped his other leg off of the ground and planted it firmly, shin and ankle first, across the side of Lee's head. The single kick left Lee loopy and on increasingly wobbly legs as Naruto backed off.

Naruto grit his teeth as he ran forward one more time and jumped towards Lee, drilling him in the head with a high-speed single-leg jumping knee strike, "Kakeyapakto (Flash Mallet)!" For extra purpose he grabbed a hold of Lee's head and pulled it towards the knee in midflight for added impact. And that was what it took to finally put Rock Lee down.

Sekka kneeled down by Lee and revealed that he was unconscious. His eyes were open but dull, and his body twitched as it tried to move, almost as if he wanted to keep fighting, but due to the paralysis poison he was unable to actually do so, as if a medic-nin would actually let an unconscious man get up to keep fighting anyway, "The winner of match three: Uzumaki Naruto of Konoha!"

Naruto didn't react to the cheering this time, he simply crouched down and turned his eyes up towards the competitor's box. There wasn't anything to celebrate yet. It took two of his teammates to put Lee down, because he didn't do a thing himself.

Tenten walked out from the tunnel next, a serious look on her face as Lee was being tended to by the medics.

As she walked over, Tenten placed a hand on her hip while Naruto was still crouched, "You sure you still want to fight?" She asked him, "You're all alone now."

"Ino-chan didn't get taken down and Shikamaru didn't burn Lee out just so I can stop now that it's two-on-one." Naruto replied, standing back up straight as he pulled his goggles around his forehead down over his eyes, "Besides, I told you I'd beat you didn't I? Now I don't have to look for you later just to fight again."

Tenten laughed softly at his statement, "Bring it on Naruto-chan."

Both Naruto and Tenten were ready to go as they were set in fighting stances before Jei even made it over to referee the fight, "You both ready?" He got a pair of nods from the two genin, "Match four: Tenten of Konoha vs. Uzumaki Naruto of Konoha! Begin!"

"Last longer than five minutes this time why don't you!" Tenten shouted as she grabbed a kunai and threw it directly at Naruto immediately.

"Kage Bunshin no Jutsu (Shadow Clone Jutsu)!" After making his hand-seal to create them, two clones appeared with one pulling Naruto out of the way to take the kunai hit for him. The second clone returned fire with a kunai of its own that Tenten countered with another kunai toss of hers before using her other hand to deal out a shuriken that dispelled the clone.

Playing up a theme from their last battle, Naruto made fifteen more clones to attempt to surround Tenten for an organized attack attempt, but she hadn't gotten any slower from their last encounter. Even so, as she took the time to dispel his clones with weapons to keep them from getting around her it gave the original a chance to move in and try his luck up close and personal.

This was perceived as Naruto to be a bad idea once he was suddenly forced to get directly back in order to avoid a whip cracking in his face. Naruto jumped away and stared at Tenten who was now holding an actual bullwhip in her hand.

"A whip?" Naruto asked out loud incredulously, "Who carries a whip? Ever! For anything!" There was having a lot of weapons, and then there was venturing into the realm of the absurd. There were many, many jokes of a Jiraiya-esque nature he could have been formulating in his mind at the moment, but then there was the part of him that was terrified at the thought of getting hit with that thing, 'I am not getting hit with a whip today!'

Tenten scoffed in return, "Do you really think I'm going to let you swarm me with ten-million clones again like the first time we fought? I'm using one hand for the whip, the other to throw stuff at you and keep your clones the hell away from me until I can whip you into submission." She finished with a crack of said whip for emphasis.

There was something wrong with the way that last portion was worded but for the life of them they weren't thinking about that at the moment.

At once, Naruto made the hand-seal for more Kage Bunshin and formed a platoon of thirty clones flanking him before he made the gesture to send them after Tenten. Said girl swung her whip at the legs of the attacking clones, but they dodged by jumping over it. Once they did so however, Tenten started quickly backpedaling and using her free hand to pepper the clones with a ranged shuriken attack while they were in the air and falling back towards the ground. The ones that survived quickly learned that her swing with the whip before had been to lure them into the air intentionally as she masterfully kept them back, retreating all the while as she dispelled the bold attack attempts of Naruto's clones.

Even if he pulled his machete out he would never get close enough to use it so that was out for close quarters combat. She wasn't letting the clones surround her so he couldn't bombard her with distance weaponry, and she was forcing him to chase her because if he backed off to try and change the area of the battle he would still be playing into her hands. The further away from her he got the better off she'd be in the long run as long as she could see him.

He wasn't significantly faster than her enough to flank and overwhelm her that way either.

'Are you telling me that even after all this time she's still got my number?' Naruto thought to himself as he stayed far back enough to keep out of range of the whip but close enough to continue chasing her until he thought of something. Tenten would periodically throw weapons at him, but with the shuriken and kunai sent his way he could see them and block with the wide flat of his machete, 'Come on, calm down and think. What would Shikamaru do?' The last thing he wanted to do was panic and make a mistake that would turn things from bad to worse.

Well first of all they were out in the open, running nearby the stream, so the first thing Shikamaru would have done would be to angle the fight over towards places where he could hide and take cover. Easy enough. So without a word, Naruto began running closer and closer to the streamside still blocking Tenten's weapons before jumping the divide of the stream with the assistance of a suddenly created Kage Bunshin to shove him and make sure he made it.

Tenten narrowed her eyes at the two Narutos running perpendicular along the stream and threw a barrage of weapons at the one she figured to be the clone, forcing it to trip up and clumsily fall into the stream/moat in its effort to avoid the weapons while the other continued to pursue her on the other side of the stream, "The further away you get from me the easier you're making this you know. I've been throwing with my right hand."

"So what?" Naruto said as he continued to give chase, subtly and steadily trying to gain more distance towards the forest off to the side.

A grin came over Tenten's face at the asking of Naruto's question, "I'm left-handed." With that, she tossed the whip in her left hand to her right and that left her dominant hand free to do as she pleased.

"Motherfucker!" Naruto shouted as he could see the deadly, deadly metal projectiles flash into Tenten's left hand. No more time to mess around and try to guide her there, it was time for a tactical retreat as he turned on the afterburners and made tracks into the forest to avoid the aim of the sure-shot kunoichi. He suffered a few cuts in his clothes before he managed to get out of her sight, but better those than him.

"Aw, don't run Naruto-chan!" Tenten said as she jumped the stream herself and went into the forest area intent on turning Naruto into a human pincushion, "I won't hurt you that bad."

"I am not running away!"

"That's what it looks like to me." Tenten commented, putting the whip away since its use had run its course, "I won't miss again the next time I throw. I'll be locked onto you." She saw a motion to the side of her from the brush and threw a shuriken, hitting whatever it was as a puff of smoke came up from the place, "A clone. So this is all one big ambush." A few more rustling leaves in the trees and in the bushes resulted in Tenten hitting them nearly effortlessly as she slowly stalked through, "At this rate you're going to lose half of your surprise attack squad before they even surround me."

A nagging feeling in the back of her mind told her to duck immediately, and it was a good thing that she did because two of Naruto's clones were behind her. With a swing of their wind-chakra circulating machetes they cut through the nearby tree and felled it with one swing. Tenten filled them with metal in immediate retaliation, ridding herself of them as well. She really wished she'd never sold him that thing.

And like a scene from a movie, Naruto's clones began advancing wantonly on her direct position, using the trees for periodic cover once they saw their clone brethren begin to fall. The gate had slammed shut on the trap.

"We've been through this already once before Naruto." Tenten said in between her extermination of his clones that were getting closer all around, "Did you think that just by being around trees that would change anything?" She asked before stopping her technically perfect barrage of accuracy to place two scrolls upright on the ground, making a few hand-seals after doing so, "The venue might be different but song is still the same, Soushouryuu (Twin Rising Dragons)!"

She had apparently improved on the jutsu since the last time. This time the smoke expelled outward in a gust of air that obscured the clones' initial vision and stopped their advance for a moment. At that point the scrolls released smoke and unfurled into the air in a spiral of dragons just like before, and also just like before, Tenten jumped between them as high as she could and began throwing unsealed weapons at her multitude of targets.

Her aim was impeccable. Everything hit at least one Kage Bunshin, there were times when weapons took down more than one. When the clones started trying to take cover behind the trees she had an answer for that too, she started throwing kunai with explosive tags attached to make a nice little explosion that took out multiple clones at once. The trees knocked down by the explosive tags still hit clones as well.

Even when she ran out of things to throw in her supply they kept on coming though. It didn't seem like he was leaving anything to chance with his Kage Bunshin assault this time, but she had something for that as well, "When I said that it was still the same I might have lied a bit." She said revealing that she had wires attached to her hands that were connected to the weapons. She then started to spin around as the scrolls fell to the ground. The momentum from her spinning forced the attached weapons to do the same and they cut through anything that thought she had spent her entire payload of weaponry.

With one thing left to do, Tenten cut her own ties to her weapons, sending them flying in all directions one last time with a flourish before she landed on the ground in a crouch. The forest area had been utterly devastated. She had knocked down at least five trees with her explosive tags and had cut deeply into many other trees with her larger weapons.

This time unlike the last time she fought Naruto and was fooled by his Henge, she took note to make sure that all of her weapons were impaled into something, either the ground or a tree. When he last fooled her he had been a fuuma shuriken that had been laying flat on the ground, she should have seen that back then. This time there was nothing out of the ordinary. Nor was there any sign of Naruto or any Kage Bunshin.

'I got them all…' Tenten thought to herself, 'But Naruto isn't here. Did he run?' Naruto didn't run away, he merely got far enough away to be able to observe things that happened so that he could react accordingly. He wasn't there though. Either he had the best camouflage known to man or he was no longer in the forest area, 'I didn't let a single one get away. I aimed at the back first when I started my jutsu in case any of them tried to leave.'

The crowd was even slightly confused at the lack of Naruto as they muttered amongst themselves about where the young man could possibly be. Most of them had a great vantage point of Tenten's attack in the forest and saw her decimate every single replica without fail. There was no Naruto.

'Where is he? I can't fucking find him!' Tenten thought angrily to herself, picking up a random katana that she had used to chuck at and skewer several clones during her previous barrage, 'I just killed upwards of one-hundred Narutos and not even a single one of them was really even the real Naruto. How did I lose track of him? Let's backtrack.'

She exterminated the multitude of endless Naruto clones in the woods.

She fought off the attempt to lure her into the ambush forcing a premature springing of the trap.

She jumped the stream and chased Naruto into the woods in the first place out of his fear of getting a kunai tossed up his butt once she started aiming with her dominant hand.

He ran on the opposite side of the stream from her after getting help from a clone to make the jump go smoother, possibly in an attempt to get ahead of her and cut her off.

An analysis of the situation forced her to stop thinking backwards once she replayed the events of the moat-side pursuit in her head. Naruto made a clone that helped him jump it with no effort so that they could pursue her. This made one Naruto right behind her and one on the side of her across the moat. She got rid of the clone chasing behind her that tried to dodge a projectile attack and fell into the stream trying to avoid her. That impact would have dispelled any clone with as fast as they had been running and as hard as he would have hit the surface of the water tripping up at that speed so she looked past it, focusing on the threat of the real Naruto.

…Or what she thought was the real Naruto. She had been around the real Naruto quite a bit during his time before actively becoming a genin back when they had trained in the same area. He had shown that there were times when he was very clumsy when things weren't serious… that had to translate over to a battle at sometime and apparently then was that time.

…Because the Naruto that had fallen into the moat was the real Naruto.

"Son of a bitch, I can't believe it…" Tenten muttered to herself, taking an angry slash at a tree that stripped some of the bark off of it. At that, she immediately made to backtrack to the moat to pick up his trail again, "I hope the fall knocked him out…" And once she landed on the surface of the water in the moat she could see orange in the distance. Running towards it she saw that it was Naruto's short-sleeved windbreaker. She threw a kunai at it only for it to be revealed as the actual article of clothing and continued down the stream.

Further down the way she saw Naruto, sans windbreaker, floating face down in the water. The need to win was higher at the moment than concern for her friend as she drew a shuriken and threw it at him.

Hey, if he was already unconscious and drowning a shuriken in the back wouldn't be that much worse would it?

But when Tenten hit her mark that Naruto face down in the water burst into a puff of smoke. Further down the line of the twisting stream she saw a flash of orange that vanished once she looked up at it, "He's luring me." Tenten then set out to pursue Naruto and take him down before he figured to jump out. Much like Lee earlier if he was stuck in the moat he would be a far easier target.

As she reached the place where she saw Naruto last she came upon another windbreaker floating on the surface of the water. Again, Tenten threw a weapon at it before she reached it but then paused and covered her face when the piece of clothing detonated, 'A proximity explosive tag?' If she hadn't been trying to hit anything out of place with a weapon she would have run past the vest and the tag hidden underneath it been caught in that explosion, 'Oh you sneaky bastard.'

XxX

"Hey!" Ino said in an offended voice once she saw the explosion. Sakura had helped her over to the railing so that she could watch the fights, "He blew up his top! I made him buy that for himself on our first day as a team! Doesn't he have any consideration?"

Shikamaru rolled his eyes, "You make it sound like he doesn't have seven more just like it."

"That's not the point…" Ino said with a pout.

XxX

Tenten kept chasing him through the moat, getting close enough to see him just around the bends of the moat before it straightened out near the bridge. She tried taking aim and hitting him with something to at least slow him down but the bends of the moat walls and Naruto's attempts at running serpentine were effective enough to keep her from hitting him at a distance. Luckily his use of zigzagging allowed her to get closer faster. Naruto simply kept running without turning back until he passed underneath the bridge.

Tenten ran underneath it as well until Naruto abruptly stopped and turned around, holding his hand out, "Stop!"

Surprised by the force of his yell and the fact that he was finally stopping to face her, Tenten did just that, holding a katana at the ready, "Done running?"

"Kind of." Naruto admitted as he slowly made four slightly clumsy hand-seals, further putting Tenten on guard for whatever he had in store, "I'm done running because you lose. Fuubaku Houjin (Sealed Bomb Square Release)!"

Underneath the bridge where Tenten was still standing, there were tons of explosive tags, slapped to the sides of the walls in the dark underneath the bridge to mark the starting point of his trap and out in the open where Tenten was standing, just on the side walls instead, "What is this?"

"If you move then the tags will detonate." Naruto said with a grin on his face, "…Or I can do it myself if I make a single hand-seal, so…"

Tenten stared at Naruto with a hard look before sighing, "Fine. I quit. Now deactivate these things already."

"Not until I hear someone say it's over." Naruto said, looking up at the top of the moat wall at Jei.

The Kumo-nin looked at Tenten who nodded slightly before he projected his voice over the arena, "By way of verbal surrender the winner of match four is Uzumaki Naruto of Konoha!"

"Now let me out already!" Tenten said angrily, not liking the idea of being surrounded by so many explosive tags. There really were a lot of them, "Why do you have so many of these things?" She was now also regretting the fact that she was the one that gave him ink and sealing paper.

Naruto made a reverse ram seal to deactivate the trap and shrugged, "Because it's the second easiest thing I know how to make. I learned how to do this jutsu in a book." He walked over and began stripping the tags off of the wall to reuse since he deactivated them and had two minutes to do so.

Tenten frowned at being defeated but lost her ire as she watched Naruto and a few clones diligently take down his explosive tags. She got herself out of the moat and waited for Naruto to jump back up before addressing him, "I want a rematch when this is over." She said suddenly.

Naruto had been walking over to Genma who was set to call the last fight when he heard Tenten call out to him. He couldn't help the cheeky grin that came across his face as he turned back towards her, slightly lamenting the loss of his orange windbreaker top as now he was left with his long-sleeved blue shirt meant for winter wear, "Tell you what, come back in five months and challenge me again to see if you're any better… and you owe me something cool."

"What?" Tenten said indignantly, "Five months? And what do you mean I owe you something cool? Are you freaking kidd-?" She then stopped herself before she began to laugh. She started laughing harder and harder as she started walking away back towards the entrance tunnel to get off of the field, 'Stupid kid. He really beat me just like he said he would.'

Well Tenten seemed to be taking the loss well enough. At least it didn't seem like she was necessarily mad at him for it. That was good, he didn't want to make a friend mad just because he had beaten her. But the smile quickly dropped from his own face as he realized there wasn't really anything to smile about. He still had one fight left in order to advance.

The crowd began to cheer as it was the first series of matches that went this far. All others became rather one-sided after a time, while in this one the momentum seemed to be swinging from one side to the next. The next match would decide who advanced further.

It was one Naruto that was more or less still fighting fit against Neji who was supposed to be Konoha's best genin.

Both of them locked eyes, Naruto on the ground level of the arena and Neji up above in the competitor's box before he turned around and walked out of Naruto's sight to come down to fight. This was just what Naruto wanted the entire time; him vs. Neji.

Hey You're Not a Genius. Who Cares? Read This and You Won't Suck at Fuuinjutsu (by Jiraiya)

The mental portion of your combat readiness

The psychological part of our lifestyle is pretty important too. It doesn't matter how good you are, if your mind is in the wrong place you will be beaten by a genin even if you're a jounin.

One thing about it is overthinking your fights. If you overthink something long enough you're almost guaranteed to suck at it big time. Think about every single written test you've ever taken… I know I do. That should be a good example of performance anxiety, when you are fully capable of doing something but the nerves just screw you over. If you were given a test on the spot about something you couldn't possibly know anymore about you would kill it, but if you were given a week to prepare for the exact same test and you were told that if you failed it you could never be a ninja you would completely blow it, or at least not do as well.

The same thing works for fights. You do better in a random ambush than you would do if you were marching towards a pitched battle that you know is important.

To prevent overthinking anything like the consequences of said pitched battle that you spend two days travelling to, simply refrain from thinking of the consequences of the battle. Throw your rationality right out the door. This is harder than it sounds because you'll be thinking of your life, the life of your comrades, what could come if you lose the battle, all sorts of things. It takes practice with smaller things before you stop caring about losing.

I'm not saying to not be prepared; get your shit together for certain, make sure you're prepared, know you won't quit on yourself or your friends when the going gets tough, but as long as your bases are covered and there's nothing left to do but fight you should just go ahead and go about your business. A fight is a fight, so don't make it any bigger in your mind. Remember, your life is small and meaningless. The world's going to keep on turning with or without you sleeping in the ground.

Also learn to trash talk and have pre-fight intimidation practices in case you ever end up in a faceoff, because the less sure you can make your opponent feel of their chances the smoother things will more than likely go for you. Develop a thousand-yard stare that could pierce iron, learn to verbally cut your opponent to tatters and shoot their spirit from the skies, get a war dance or a grandiose pose that signifies that you are awesome and that your enemy will not win that fight.

Another thing to not do in order to keep your own sanity: avoid paying attention to your opponent's own prefight battlefield rituals, because some of that stuff gets abundantly weird. I'm talking twisting their own nipples weird or licking their lips with an abnormally long tongue weird. Don't be that guy, and for your sake don't pay attention to that guy, because the last thing you want to do to a guy like that is get close enough to fight him.

Who knows what he'll do to you if you give him the chance?

Jutsu List

Dokusei Tanki-sha (Toxic Spitfire). C-rank ninjutsu, offensive, short-to-mid range. This technique kneads the chakra in the body into a chemical substance that mixes with the saliva and is then ejected through the mouth, to be sent flying at an opponent in an unpredictable manner. It is a dangerous ninjutsu because if an opponent is hit with the attack they will find themselves poisoned by the chemical that makes contact with them as it will even easily soak through clothing and harm with direct skin contact, but the true purpose of this jutsu is a feint meant to disguise smaller and harder to see senbon that are spat at an enemy simultaneously in a straightforward manner. The poison spit direct the opponent's true attention with their strange and dangerous trajectory and intimidating appearance, but the real threat are the poisoned senbon that are harder to see and pay attention to.

Yamanaka Ino's Personal Poison Supply Color Correspondence and Usual Carrying Amount

Blue: Sleep (Adequate Amount/Easy to Create)

Red: Hallucinogen (Sparse Amount/Many Necessary Ingredients)

Yellow: Paralysis/low effect (Abundant Amount/Easy to Create)

Purple: Fatal/slow acting (Adequate Amount/Easily Procurable Ingredients)

Black: Fatal/fast acting (Very Sparse Amount/Difficult to Create/Many Rare Ingredients)

?: Interrogation serum (Not Yet Designed/More Research Necessary)

?: Love serum a.k.a. Glorified aphrodisiac (Not Yet Designed/More Research Necessary/Currently Debating the Uses, Merits, and Ethics of Creating)

Kakeyapakto (Flash Mallet). D-rank taijutsu, offensive, short range. This taijutsu attack is a run followed by a quick and sudden jumping/diving knee strike to the face/head of an opponent. Rather simple in theory and execution, it uses the speed of the motion and the original force the user is able to generate with the attack to focus the point of the knee into a blunt smashing object. The potential damage of this attack is very high. A skilled Nebaiken practitioner can use this technique to chain into more complex maneuvers in case the strike is blocked.

Fuubaku Houjin (Sealed Bomb Square Release). Ninjutsu, barrier ninjutsu, fuuinjutsu, supplementary, short range. An array of exploding tags are placed around an area that can be detonated with a hand-seal and should their opponent attempt to move to exit the trapped area, the tags explode. The tags can be shut off by the controller.