Chapter 59 continue of the battle

Naruto was pretty happy with his win as he got back to the others. Granted pulling off that summon had been tough, he still wasn't calling up the type of toad he needed all the time, but this time the gamble paid off. Plus that new wind jutsu that Jiraiya taught him really worked out well. He was feeling really good about himself and if this didn't show the kinds of skills to impress those Hyuga elders that he knew where watching, well what else did he have to do to impress them? Naruto knew that in this exam not only would he be judged for being a chunin but also by the elders of Hinata's clan. But then again, Naruto never once backed away from a challenge, he would do it like with any other challenge. Rush forward without a care and win through sheer will and guts.

"Hey nice job out there," Kiba said to him and for Kiba it was very satisfying seeing that Mist ninja get defeated. He still could feel the metal of that sword cutting into him from before. It had been the worse injury that he had ever gotten and in fact scared him a bit. But he had been training himself to get stronger after that defeat as well. He had seen the power he could come up against, and he swore never again to get defeated like that.

Naruto chuckled as he scratched the back of his head, "It was nothing, I just kicked his ass is all."

"Well at any rate that was a very good performance out of you and Sakura," Kakashi said as he stepped towards his son. "You both should be proud."

"Thanks," both genins said at once hearing this.

"I just hope I can go on, I think is used up a lot of strength for that match," Sakura sighed as she went to her pocket. She could feel the small medical supplies that most carried only she had a few extra things. That training with Hinata, she had learned a few things from the other girl. Healing ointments were very nice to have as she pulled one out and tossed it to Naruto. "Here, Hinata helped me make it and you look like you could use a few."

Naruto looked at the small thing and he did apply it, if only for show. He knew that the fox would heal any damage soon but it was best to make it seem like the ointment had worked. He gave it back with thanks as he noticed that Ino was nearly kicking Shikamaru down the stairs to get him to his match. It was kind of funny to watch the two of them, as Ino nagged him about getting down there and that he better win.

"Man, you'd think they were married or something," Naruto muttered.

"I wouldn't know about that," Choji said as he munched on a bag of chips. All excitement was making him hungry after all. "He says that he wouldn't want another women nagging him all the time."

Those that knew of his mother could see what the boy was getting at, then again he was a mirror image of his father, who had married such a woman. It was a bit of a joke that the Nara males were secretly submissive masochist. At least that's what you'd say behind their backs, lazy as some of the males were, you still didn't want to piss them off.

"What do you think?" Shino asked Neji who were both watching as the fight between Temari and Shikamaru started off. Both boys had personal reasons for fighting in this match. Shino however had lost his chance as Naruto took had taken revenge for Kiba's injuries, he didn't mind that though. That ending was better than anything Shino could have come up with anyway. But Neji was still hoping for a fight with Temari after how she had humiliated and hurt Tenten.

Neji was carefully watching the fight, he could tell that both fighters seemed to be the type to plan things out. They were both strategists, something that surprised him about Skikamaru when he saw it in the last part of the exam. But while Shikamaru was laid back and let his opponents do all the work, Temari was the total opposite. She preferred to take the initiative and that's where this fight was going. She was pushing him back all the time with her wind as she had the range on him. Already he had tried his shadow technique but she knew that what his range was. She had drawn a line in the dirt letting her know how far to keep back.

"It doesn't look good for him," Neji commented.

"Yes, but looks are often misleading," Shino said cryptically.

Neji was about to ask what he meant when he saw it, the Nara's shadow had reached beyond the line that Temari had drawn. At first Neji thought that Shikamaru had been holding back but he did it again. It was then that Temari, Neji and Shino all saw that the shadows were being strengthened by the sun going down. Shikamaru was playing for time, if the sun went down far enough then his shadow would reach her no matter what she did.

"Impressive, but can he keep it up?" Neji asked.

"That remains to be seen." Shino said as they watched on.

Temari knew that she was going to have to get this annoying guy down before his plan could be finished. The younger boy was keeping himself hidden from her wind attacks, she couldn't get in closer and the farther away the less power her wind attacks had. It was very annoying for her, especially since she still had the invasion up next. She couldn't waste too much on this boy but she also refused to lose to him either. It was then that he came out as he threw something up into the sky. It was a make shift parachute with a kunai and his shirt. She didn't understand but she went for the attack anyway.

She saw him using his shadow again but smirked as her arms were already swung back for her own attack. Only to freeze as see saw two shadows, a circular one of the object he threw up into the sky. Then his shadow touched it and it suddenly had new life as he came further than she had ever seen it. She mentally cursed, she didn't know that another shadow would actually 'feed' the shadow's power. She jumped out of the way knowing what would happen when that thing touched her.

It chased her on the ground as she focused on just keeping away from it, just for a bit to be able to get out of its reach. As soon as she did she could counter and take him out as he was fully exposed now. When he stopped she smirked, now it was her time. She pulled back and then was just about to use her fan when her body froze. She couldn't move, she looked down in shock but the small shadow line hadn't touched her.

"What's going on?" Temari demanded.

"Every can cast a shadow, even if it is just a little bit, even things like a grove in the earth can cast a shadow if the sun hits it the right way." He told her in a bored tone.

Temari looked to her right and her eyes widened. There next to her was a long grove cut into earth by one of the previous battles. When Sakara's aqua tower had been used it had cut a line into the ground. With the sun as it was now the slight depression in the ground cast a small shadow along the edge. She looked to see a thin trail of shadow coming out of the groove and attached to her foot. She followed it and although its path, she had to squint but she could see a second trail by his feet going into the groove. Temari gritted her teeth as she wondered what this boy would do to her. She remembered the sound girl, this boy could make her do anything now.

"Well get it over with," Temari told him preparing herself for the worse.

"Eh, no real point now," he said lazily. "I'm nearly out of chakra so I think I'll call it quits. Hey proctor I quit okay?"

Genma blinked a few times, "Are you sure kid?"

"Yeah, besides who cares about being a chunin and fighting a girl is just too troublesome," He said.

When the announcement was made that Temari was the winner it was shocking to the audience to say the least. Well there was at least one vocal out burst from the crowd.

"Shikamaru you idiot!" Ino yelled down at him. "Why the hell would you give up? If you think I was hard on you before then you don't know anything, when this is all over I'm going to make sure you're not going to be such a lazy bum anymore!" Ino went on and on and for a moment Shikamaru was wondering if he made the right choice or not as the blonde kept on nagging him.

Shino vs Neji

With the last battle over it was time for Neji and Shino to take the field. They stood across from each other. There was no malice between them like in any of the previous fights, they had both made up their minds to do their best out of respect for the other. Neji got into the gentle fist stance as he activated his Byakugan. Shino stood his ground as he lifted his sleeves, a large amount of black bugs swarmed out towards that Hyuga prodigy.

Neji knew enough about Shino's clan to have an idea of what he could expect to happen. With his eyes activated he could follow the insects as they swarmed around him. With speed that made his limbs seem like a blur of motion to most watching, he sent his hands out attacking each and every bug. The gentle fist style, was something that all Hyuga trained in. There were moves that were meant to strike over a hundred times in a manner of seconds. So attacking at the speeds to defend himself from Shino's horde of chakra eating insects was no problem.

The Aburame boy would not be deterred by this as he only intensified his attacks. Keeping to the long range that was his speciality it was his hope to simply keep the other boy at bay and slowly chip away at him. But this was proving more difficult than he had first thought. The problem was that Neji wasn't letting any of his insects latch on. Shino had never faced an opponent that could defend against his attacks like this. Most would just avoid the insects, but Neji stood his ground, never giving an inch as he kept a perfect defence.

Well, Shino was about to test just how effective the Hyuga prodigy had.

Up in the stands, Hinata with her father and sister were watching the fight with interests. Hinata watched in amazement at how Neji was able to keep Shino's bugs from attacking him. Being on the same team as Shino, she knew how hard that was from sparring. She knew that she didn't have the skill her cousin was displaying. She was proud of her decision early to forfeit her match to him. Looking at him now, she knew she had made the right choice. He deserved to go this far and she hoped that one day she could match Neji in skill.

"Father, he seems to be doing very well." Hanabi commented watching the fight. "Shouldn't Uncle be here to see this?"

"He's here," He told his youngest as he looked to see where his twin brother was. Given the nature of the chunin exams security was always important. Several of the Hyuga clan were used to look for traps, hidden weapons and other such things in the crowd of people when they entered. He looked up across the field to see his twin by the stair entrance watching his son. He couldn't see the expression on his younger sibling but he knew it had to be prideful and with good reason. Neji was the strongest of his generation in their clan, even among the rest of the village.

Then something happened, Shino had started to use a very large amount of bugs to swarm around the Hyuga prodigy. Neji had no where to move now as the swarm started to envelope him. He sighed watching this, no matter how good he was at the gentle fist, there was just no way to defend against that. At least that was until Neji not only surprised him but everyone else there. A blue sphere came into play as Neji seemed to rotate on the ground.

"Kaiten," He muttered in surprise at the technique. It was an advanced move that normally only the main house could master. It was the fact that a branch family member could use that, and at such a young age, was just unheard of. "It seems that Neji is more promising then any thought."

"I think I saw you use that in training, what is it?" Hanabi asked her father.

"Something that I think even you're uncle didn't expect." He told her.

That was true, on the other side of the stadium where he was stationed for security, Hizashi watched as his son used a move that only adults could perform. No matter what the outcome of this match he was already proud at what his son had accomplished. Although he was wondering how he had trained himself to do that. Neji certainly didn't ask for help. Well it would be something to ask him later when this was all over with.

Tenten smiled as she watched Neji perform the move, she had been training with him for the whole month to get to this point. She felt glad that she was able to be of use to Neji getting stronger. He had even thanked her saying that he couldn't have done this without her. She felt her cheeks flush a bit remembering his words. Truth was, spending a full month with him just the two of them had been very nice.

Back on the field, Neji was still fighting Shino. Although he had been hoping to hold that move back until later, it was his only trump card but Shino had forced his hand. That said a lot about the mysterious shades wearing boy. Well he would have had to use that at any rate, he looked around his feet. There was a wide circle that was perfectly made into the earth and many of Shino's bugs lay on the ground unmoving.

Shino had never seen or heard of anything like this before, he never knew that the Hyuga clan could do something like that. It was very impressive and very effective. He took stock of the battle so far. Close combat with a Hyuga was suicide so that was out. Mid to long range was where he excelled at but with that ultimate defence Shino couldn't see a way past it. Plus he had lost too much of his colony in this battle. If he went on like this he would kill off his entire colony and to his clan that was unacceptable.

To his clan, the insects were as much a part of them as an organ. They lived in symbiosis, giving them a home and food while they gave the clan power. But that also meant a great responsibility towards their safety. Some risks were just unacceptable.

Shino thought it out as he raised his arm and looked to the Proctor. "I submit this battle."

"You sure kid?" Genma asked.

Shino nodded and Genma was forced to call the match over. Shino knew that as he was now, he couldn't beat the other boy. He didn't have anything that could get past that defence and he would only loss his colony and chakra in the process. It was the only logical thing to do, to pull back from a losing fight. There was no dishonour in this and he felt that it was the right choice at the moment.

The Hokage looked on pleased by how things were going, so far the Leaf genins were both proofing themselves in both skill and honour. It was nice to see the younger generation doing so well.

"I hope that you don't mind your daughter winning like that," The Third said to the Kazakage next to him.

"Not at all, although that isn't the kind of victory that one can be proud of." Was the response he got from the masked man sitting next to him.

"Yes well the Nara boy obviously thought things through. There is no shame in admitting your limits, in fact not knowing them could lead to much worse than losing a simple fight." The Third commented as he saw Shino also seemed to know this lessen well.

"I suppose but those that aren't strong enough to win, aren't suitable for the battlefield as they will only die anyway."

The Third paused as he felt a sense of familiarity with this conversation. It was not unlike the kinds of talks he used to have with people like Danzo or his own student Orochimaru. He knew that the Kazekage was a bit of a cold and distant man. But had he recently decided on that line of thought as well? It was a bit depressing thought that someone like a Kage would go with that line of thinking. That had been the reason why he had passed his student over for the position of Hokage to Jiraya's apprentice Minato.

Then again given what was about to happen today, maybe he shouldn't be totally surprised by the Kazekage's new attitude. The Hokage thought back to all the work he had done yesterday to prepare for the coming storm.

-Flashback to Yesterday-

The Hokage was in his office as he had finished writing the last of the orders to be sent. The final exam would soon take place and he needed to prepare. He had a few different piles of orders, each one for a select group. The first pile was to his ANBU forces, the next would be for the Jonins and Special Jonins, the one after that for a few of the chunins that he felt would be trusted with a few special missions. Lastly was a pile for the jonin senseis.

There wasn't much time left, but the planning had been in the works for some time.

"Are you sure we have everything set up, Hokage-sama?" Asked a man in a cloak with the hood pulled up so you couldn't see the face within it.

"We've been planning for awhile now, but you can't plan for everything. This is the best we can do and hope that to any changes that occur we can handle."

The man nodded with a sign, "I just hope she doesn't kill me when this is all over."

"She's a professional she knows what kind of sacrifices we have to make as a ninja." The Hokage told him.

The man seemed to wince at a thought, "Yeah but she's going to be pissed. Plus I didn't like being locked away all this time either." The man coughed into his hand. "It was damn cold at night and I think I caught a cold in the underground areas that Ibiki uses for torture."

"It was one of the few places where no one would find you," The Hokage got up and handed him a scroll. "You're orders are here, I'm having my ANBU deliver the rest."

"What of the traitor?" The man asked before he made to leave the office.

"He's been watched by our best and also been fed as much false information that I believe he will take without becoming suspicious."

-Present-

Now the Hokage looked down at the arena full of people, many didn't know what was about to take place. In fact even he wasn't sure what was going to happen, he had only to guess what was going to happened today and plan around that. But at any rate the operation would have already started, first with the ANBU teams making sweeps through the village, and the chunins would be already started with their work. The children and civilians were top priority of course. The old man just hoped that they could lessen the coming bloodshed.

Lee vs Dosu

"Now it is my turn!" Lee shouted out as he couldn't wait for his time to fight.

"That's right Lee, show them your flames of youth!" Gai yelled out to his protégé.

"Yes Gai-sensei!" Lee shouted out as he literally jumped off the railing into the arena to the surprise of everyone.

"That idiot, he might break his legs if he's not careful," Tenten shouted out as she raced to the edge to look to see Lee running out towards the field. She was a little dumbfounded as she had expected his legs to break under the strain of that fall. After all, with all those weights he puts on, she had expected he should have buried himself into the ground from a fall like that if he wasn't careful. She looked at her sensei with a questioning look.

"I had him take the weights off for the day, he won't need them with all the battles ahead," Gai told her.

"You could have warned me," She said dryly.

"For what reason?" Gai asked her perplexed. She just muttered something about wishing she could switch teams for a time. She felt that she could use a vacation from her sensei and over active teammate.

Tenten felt a presence coming up at that point. She looked to see Neji finishing getting up the stairs from his match with Shino right behind him. She smiled seeing him walk up towards her. "Hey, nice match and it looks like all that training paid off."

Neji gave her a small smile, "Thanks to you. I wouldn't have been able to pull off a Kaiten without your help as you know."

Tenten blushed from the compliment.

Naruto of course saw how close the two seemed to be. They were standing very close to each other and they were perfectly relaxed. He had seen this enough times to know something was going on between them now. He had a feeling that Neji might have liked the bun haired girl, hence all the messing with him. It was funny seeing Neji get all jealous. But now it seemed that Tenten might feel something as well. Well this was just too good an opportunity to mess with.

"Hey, you two were alone for a whole month together right?" Naruto asked them.

"What is your point Hatake?" Neji asked feeling a bit annoyed at the ruined moment. He always used Naruto's last name when he was annoyed with him.

"You two didn't get into anything…perverted with each other when no one was looking where you?" He smirked at them as this caught the attentions of many around them. Especially when the two teens blushed, not because they had actually done anything, just that Naruto had said something might have happened.

"Oh are you two dating or something?" Ino shot up, finally over her slight depression/anger at Shikamaru's loss. "I think that's so cute, damn it why is everyone starting to hook up but me?!"

"Oh, looks like I missed out on some fun with just girls," Anko smirked at the two young genins. "Maybe next times we should bring boys out for some joint training. I know Hinata wouldn't mind a month alone with Naruto here."

"I wouldn't mind that either," Naruto muttered more to himself and ignored Neji's hostile look at him for it.

"No!" Gai shouted out almost in horror. "Don't tell me that they have fallen to the perverted nature of the unyouthful while out of my sight."

Sasuke grunted as he looked at the pair. "If she did, she could do better than a branch member."

"What was that Uchiha?" Neji narrowed his eyes and the implications to that. Sasuke only smirked back smugly. He had a feeling that Tenten might be spoken for now, oh well it was only a passing interests anyway. But that didn't mean he didn't want to miss out on messing with the Hyuga boy. It was one of the things he felt that Naruto had right, it was fun messing with Neji.

"Hold it," Tenten said seeing a fight nearly breaking out. She gently grabbed Neji by the hand to lead him away from a possible incident that could get him disqualified for fighting outside a match. "Come on let's just sit and watch Lee."

They didn't notice that they had kept their hands together until the match had started to the surprise of both of them.

Dosu was not very happy, already his teammates had lost and it was only luck that he managed to get this far. Given the strength of the teams he had seen so far, already his two teammates were taken by Orochimaru for some reason. Apparently they still held some kind of usefulness or so he said. He didn't know what his master had in plan but with their failures, they had to do something to make up for it. Apparently another Sound person had been chosen as well, one of the spies that had slipped into the village.

Dosu put all those thoughts out of his mind as the green glad genin raced up to meet him.

"I am glad to fight you, please let us have a most youthful and exciting match!" Lee said giving Dosu a thumbs up.

Dosu only looked at the boy like he might be mentally handicapped. Then again he did remember how fast the kid was in the match against that Suna guy. Well no matter, all he had to do was get close enough to use his sound weapon and then the fight would all be over. The battle was started and Dosu channelled chakra into the metallic sound weapon. He would need it ready to go at a moment notice.

Lee wanted to get this fight started, he was all fired up and couldn't wait for the next fight. He charged his opponent and Dosu was only just able to get his weapon up in time. The sound waves came out and Lee's balance was taken away as he stumbled to take a knee. The world spun and he felt his stomach was about to empty itself.

Dosu knew that this fight wouldn't take long, there was no way to counter the effect of his weapon when he landed a blow with it. It seemed the boy didn't have anything in his ears to counter the sound. Even if he had a physical blow would have done the same. He got closer as he prepared to crush the boy's skull with his gauntlet when something surprising happened. Lee's body shifted as he quickly gave a kick to Dosu's chin making him stagger back. Not to mention it had been painful and also gave him a slight ringing in his ears. He looked up to see Lee getting back onto his feet, although his legs were shaking a bit.

He didn't understand it, he knew that the effect of his sound had worked there was no way the boy was faking, so how was he still standing let alone still fighting?

"What the hell, I thought that guy made weird sound things that you can't stand after or something," Ino said as Lee started to fight back.

Sakura looked to Gai as an idea came to mind, "Gai-sensei, does Lee have anything blocking his hearing?"

"Oh no nothing like that," Gai smiled proudly. "You see Lee had to learn how to fight against his senses. This genin can make you feel as though the world is spinning from the sonic attacks to your inner ear. Now if sound travels through the body you can't defend against that with just plugging your ears. So for a whole month I made Lee fight while dizzy."

"Uh…I know I'm going to regret asking this," Naruto started knowing the insane ways Gai liked to train. "But how did you train him to fight while dizzy?"

"Why it's simple, I spun him around and when he was dizzy enough I relentlessly attacked him. When he got better, I spun him some more and kept at it for a whole month." Gai said proud of his way of getting around the Sound genin's attack. "Now Lee's body fights almost automatically when in that state."

"Gai, you're really too much as times," Kakashi sighed as he palmed his face.

Although Gai's training was to most insane, it was also highly effective. Dosu had never fought anyone that could fight like this. He tried to use the boy's body as a way to carry the sound, he threw a punch with his gauntlet weapon and it had hit. Lee had blocked the blow and so Dosu had sent the vibrations through the boy's hand. He knew it traveled up the arm and attacked the inner ear.

But to Lee, after all the training he did, he could now fight through the disorientation. He hit the bandaged face of the other genin with his other hand sending the boy flying. Dosu had never been hit as hard as this boy. His blows were like iron, plus his speed was totally insane. A normal person shouldn't be able to move that fast. Lee's moves were so hard to see at times. He had been counting on his sonic abilities to get him through this match, he never once dreamed the boy could actually fight while disoriented.

Lee came at him with such speed that Dosu barely had time to react, he put up his arms to defend himself. Lee shot out a fast and devastating kick, without the weights to hold him back the blow was amazing. He landed a perfect hit to the device that Dosu used and shattered it. Plus the bone in his arm along with it as the boy howled in pain. He gently gripped his arm and looked up in time to see a foot slamming into his face.

Dosu was sent flying from the blow and when he landed he didn't get back up.

"Well I guess there's only one left," Naruto said looking to Sasuke who had that ever so confident look on his face. "You up for this?"

"Of course," Sasuke said to him. "Just watch me, I didn't train my ass off for you to show me up."

Naruto only grinned back, he couldn't wait to see what Sasuke did. Although looking across to see Gaara entering the field did make him nervous. The kid was seriously messed up and he just radiated killing intent it seemed. He just hoped that whatever happened things didn't get too intense.

Next up Chapter 60: All Hell Breaks Loose