43 Chunin Exams Part 5

Kankuro and Sai faced each other, as a fierce battle went underway, Sai pulled out a scroll that had dozens of weapons drawn on it, there were ink swords, kunai and short scythes with chains attached to them, as they sunk into the ground it covered the battlefield in rain of stray weapons; however none of them managed to hit Kankuro.

"Where were you aiming?" Kankuro shouted with a smug expression, however as he did so Sai jumped forward grabbing the ink half scythe. Sai charged at Kankuro who pulled out a Kunai charged back at Sai himself. The two clashed back and forth a few times, when one of the Ink swords moved on its own.

Kankuro was surprised as he thought "He turned the battle into a melee to make me think that the weapons were just for him to pick up, when I was sure that was all he was capable of he strikes. This kid is scary better not hold back." Letting the ink katana pierce through his chest, Kankuro smiled as he grabbed hold the ink weapon.

"Why didn't you dodge?" Sai spoke with his eyes widened, but as soon as he said this he had figured it out! He quickly moved forward while cutting the puppets head off and dodging the real Kankuro's attack.

"Good instincts!" Kankuro revealed himself as the wrapped up bandages fell from his body, many people exclaimed and Kibo explained that he was a puppeteer. "He uses small treads of Chakra to control a puppet made from many dangerous materials."

Kakashi was surprised by Kibo's intelligence once again, not many people knew of Sunagakure's puppets, when Kibo reminded him he's always in search of good forging materials, and that he went through many of Konoha's records to find out what different kinds they have encountered over the years.

Kankuro made a hand sign as the puppet that looked like him changed shape, it resembles a three-eyed, four-armed humanoid structure, and wore a large brown poncho that hid most of its frame. The puppet had jagged teeth and a spiky brown hairstyle that protruded from the top of its head and covered the framing the sides of its face.

The construct quickly began unleashing a barrage of poison tipped Kunai out from underneath the cloth in great number, Sai dodge around using his Chakra to manipulate the ink weapons as if they were on autopilot, blocking every projectile launched at him. Kankuro changed his hand signs as the Puppet known as Crow began spewing poison mist over the battlefield.

Seeing this Sai pulled out a scroll and quickly painted a giant fan, with a single flip of his finger the ink fan blew the poison gas towards Kankuro. Kankuro changed his hand signs again as Crow began sucking up the smoke, it than floated next to him as he said "You pretty good, but if you don't want to die, you should give up now."

Sai lifted a brow, and smiled before insulting Kankuro with a straight face, "I'm sorry but, someone as weak as you isn't capable of taking my life." Sai pulled out two large scrolls of an Ice, and Fire Giant that looked like different colored Yetis. The two ink beasts leapt out of the page and charged towards Kankuro making him frown.

Kankuro pulled out a scroll of his own after saying, "Come on out Black Ant." a puppet appeared out of a summoning circle, it has a much longer head than Crow with a bucket-shaped face sporting two sharp red horns and six arms; its facial features include three eyes similar to Crow, with a dark and disheveled hairstyle. The puppet's overall body-frame somewhat resembled a large barrel that was entirely covered up by the large black cloak covering its torso.

Black Ant flew forward towards the ice giant and opened up its barrel like torso and swallowed the ink construct with ease, hundreds of bladed weapons stabbed in through the slots of the wooden prison turning it into an Iron Maiden. The construct howled out as it reverted back to its ink form.

Crow broke off into section as massive saw like blades appeared from out of its body, and began hacking away at the fire giant, as it too lost its form turning back into plain ink.

However during this step Sai had used a substitution Jutsu with one of the ink weapons he placed on the roof earlier without Kankuro noticing. He then dashed over behind Kankuro during his puppets attack on his two Yetis and as soon as they struck out; Sai made his move.

Appearing behind Kankuro, Sai placed a real sword up to his throat, although he only had the back of the blade resting on Kankuro's skin, Sai knew that he won, and so did Kankuro. "Curtains falling puppeteer!" Sai said as he made an exaggerated pull of the blade, Kankuro laughed and threw his hands up. "I lose!"

Kankuro returned next to Gaara and Temari and received a cold glare form Gaara, "You're a pathetic disgrace, your part in the missions over. Baki will escort you out of the village before we begin." Gaara looked to Baki and nodded, while Kankuro sighed. Luckily Kibo had spotted this as he was watching Gaara's reaction and read his lips; he then quickly made a shadow clone before instantly dispersing it.

"What was that about?" Karin asked, as the rest of team 7 felt confused, "An update." Kibo responded simply, Kakashi then asked "The real you is here right?" Kibo laughed and said, "Yes I'm still the main body."

Ino cheered loudly as Sai made his way back up the steps; just about everyone including team 7 thought he was a worthy challenge, and that he would be a terrible opponent to fight against. He walked by Sasuke and gave him a smirk, Sasuke who was confused was quickly filled in by Sakura. "But I don't like Ino like that." Sasuke responded to the information given to him, "Yeah but Ino does. . ." Before Sakura could finish she heard the next challengers being called out.

"Sakura Haruno versus Ino Yamanaka!" Hayate called them to the center floor. The two looked at each other remembering their childhood, when Ino said, "You should just give up Sakura. You've never been on my level." Sakura shook her head as she got into a fighting stance, she looked at Ino before saying, "Your wrong if your thinking I'm still that shy little girl you first met, I'm a fully fledged Shinobi now." Sakura used the Flicker Jutsu and appeared beside Ino, in response Ino freaked out and tried to punch at Sakura. However this turned out to be her down fall, Sakura grabbed her arm, and pulled her in locking up her joints. Then before Ino could say anything else she placed her hand on her head and used the mystic palm technique to induce sleep.

Ino fainted as she shocked the crowd; even the Hokage nodded his head. "I haven't seen such good control over the Mystic Palm Technique since Tsunade's protégée Shizune. Perhaps I should send her a letter, and inform a talented seeding has appeared."

"Tenten versus Temari!" The two girls faced each other unfortunately things happened in a similar fashion as the original time line. Tenten was a bit stronger when it came to physique, but Temari's large supply of Chakra, and her fierce wind Jutsus managed to overcome Tenten's weapons. Neji and Lee shook their heads as they comforted their ally's loss.

"Shikamaru Nara versus Kin Tsuchi!" Like before it followed the original time line, Shikamaru could be heard saying his usual what a drag line because of being annoyed by having to fight against Kin, they had a brief encounter with them in the forest of death, but after being played and led around by Shikamaru's tactics, the danger caused Dosu to tell his team to back off.

Now that they were facing one on one instead of a team; Kin figured that he didn't have the advantage anymore. The match played out as usual, Kin used bells tied with strings to distract Shikamaru, the bells produce a Gen-Jutsu, disorienting Shikamaru and giving her an opening to attack him with senbon.

Shikamaru snapped out of it and altered his shadow's shape while directing it to his opponent, under the cover of the strings she was holding on to. After ensnaring her without anyone noticing, he then threw a shuriken at her, while releasing her from his shadow at the last moment so that she could dodge. Kin knocked her head against the wall behind her, rendering her unconscious.

Ino woke up and realized that not only had she lost to Sakura she missed Shikamaru's match, "Man what a drag, now I got continue fighting. Maybe I should just give up." As he was thinking this Asuma slapped his back, while shouting "Good job, kid!" Then Kurenai smiled and said, "Yes you did good, I'm always surprised by your intellect. If you ask me Shikamaru has the best chances of becoming a Chunin this year."

The rest of team 8 congratulated him as well, when the next names were called, "Naruto Uzumaki versus Kiba Inuzuka!" Naruto jumped down while shouting "Alright! It's about time!" Kiba seemed to be happy, although Naruto showed he wasn't dumb, he didn't show off his power when they went to school, in fact because of Kibo constantly forcing him to increase the gravity on his suit, he showed a lack luster performance when sparing. Kiba thought that Naruto scoring max marks at the end of the year was some kind of mistake, so he went into the match with allot of confidence.

"We're gonna kick his butt Akamaru!" He shouted as he faced Naruto, Naruto on the other hand frowned, "Don't be so cocky Kiba, or you miss the beating I'm about to give you." Sarutobi was particularly interested in how powerful Naruto has become, he looked on fondly at Naruto as the match began.

Naruto flickered making Kiba jump back; he reappeared behind him when Akamaru flipped around and started jumping out after Naruto, after the dog bit into Naruto, a puff of smoke revealed he was just a clone. Naruto on the other hand placed his hand on the ground and kicked Kiba into the air. After making a series of clones; they all began beating down Kiba in mid air, while the real Naruto held onto Akamaru.

Kiba fell to the ground completely unaware of how badly his face looked; it had swollen to almost twice his size giving him a pig face. Naruto then looked him in the eye and said, "I win!" Kiba knew Naruto held back, and lowered his head in shame as he returned to the top of the balcony. Naruto jumped back when Guy shouted, "Kakashi did you teach Naruto Tai-Jutsu?" Kakashi shook his head and replied, "No but I know his teacher, and so do you!" Guy turned pale, "You don't mean him? Do you?" Kakashi then nodded his head up and down while saying. "Yep! None other than Chen Roshi himself."

Guy looked to Naruto like he was a monster, then back to Lee, "Lee don't underestimate Naruto, just consider that every Tai-Jutsu skill you know other than the inner gate techniques, he knows as well." Lee looked over to Naruto, with a fire burning in his eyes he responded with a "Yes Guy Sensei!"

"Hinata Hyuga versus Neji Hyuga!" The two names were called out, when they met on the field Hinata was nothing like her previous self, her time with team 7 truly made her bloom as a Shinobi, and thanks to Neji's father being alive and the fact that they were constantly trying to convince the elder's to give the branch family their freedom. With Hinata's father aiding Neji's father, the two cousins get along allot better in this timeline.

"Neji Nii Chan!" Hinata bowed to him, and he bowed back "Lady Hinata!" Hinata puffed her cheeks up and said, "I hate it when you call me that." Neji laughed as he took the stance of the gentle fist style; Hinata did the same, the two face each other down when Hayate called out for them to begin.

Neji moved forward to make the first attack; the two began exchanging fierce open palmed attacks accompanied by powerful shock waves of Chakra. Hinata and Neji seemed equal in their mastery of the Hyuga Clan's Gentle Fist style as they crowds were amazed by their expertise.