Chapter 170: The Finals, Effect and Game Plan

Chapter 170: The Finals, Effect and Game Plan

__________ POV Narration __________

A few more days passed before the finals of the Chunin Exams started for good.

The arena was just the same, but tensions were quite high.

The first fight was not quite as difficult to predict in the eyes of the people, however.

The Number 1 and 2 in the Dark Brotherhood had to stand off against each other. It was clear that the one ranked higher would win, right?

But where the question truly stood was whether or not Uzumaki Takehiko really had it in him to defeat either one of them.

"He struggled so much just with Number 7 right? How exactly is he going to beat 2 or 1?"

"Eh, I hear he defeated 4 or 5 or something during the preliminaries, maybe it was just a bad match-up?"

"Who knows? Not like we've seen that match. Maybe he struggled even more back then?"

The atmosphere was bustling once more, and speculations rose from all of the guests and viewers.

Every word, every jeer, every mocking insult or belittling phrase. All of them were like a small weight, all added one on top of another, all falling onto Takehiko's head, who stood off to the side and listened to everything.

The public had somewhat lost their trust in his abilities due to his previous performance, but he knew he had a chance to redeem himself.

Still, the fact that he had gotten pushed to that point by someone much younger than him was just plain demoralizing.

His only real ray of hope was the fact that his teacher, the Uzukage, still trusted wholeheartedly that he'd win.

Still, his morale had gone down drastically, and the haughty attitude he carried around the arena had all but vanished, so Ume's efforts hadn't been for nought.

Well, they would've meant something regardless, as she had done a great job of representing the Brotherhood on the stage, she had made both her father and siblings proud.

But now that Takehiko was actually affected by the difficult of his fight with Ume, Ken felt more content with the situation, as knocking the genius down a few pegs had been the plan all along.

'Moving on from that... I wonder how this match is going to go...'

Ken's senses scanned over the arena, where the two opponents were already standing, facing each other with quite a bit of distance in between them.

They were both dressed similarly, the only difference being that Morita carried two blades on his back, whilst Tatsukio carried only one on his belt.

They were both hidden underneath their clothes regardless, but Ken was well aware of their fighting styles.

In a battle between the two of them, Ken already knew who was most likely to win, but not in that exact sterile environment.

At the end of the day, the assassins of the brotherhood were trained to fight in all kinds of terrains, but they all excelled in places where they could hide, misguide and ambush their opponents, essentially turning fights into assassinations.

Tatsukio was certainly the faster of the two, his skillset better suited for confrontations like these, but Morita was also well accustomed to his speed, and he had a larger repertoire of techniques, gained through a lot of hard work.

Whilst one spent time creating and polishing a technique to perfection, ai. the Flash Step of Tatsukio, the other spent that time enlarging their repertoire of Jutsu and techniques.

Of course, this weakness could only be exploited because Morita himself was no slouch, being as fast as a top-level Jonin in reaction time.

Morita's next move was also something to be expected...

"Water Release: Bubbles Technique..."

The Number 2's free hand moved quickly and formed a few quick handsings before he brought a finger to his mouth and blew out... Bubbles?

Yep, around a hundred small bubbles rushed out of the assassin's mouth, they immediately filled the air around him, forming something like a cloud around him.

Some were close to the ground, but they never did touch it, instead, they seemed to be controlled by the user, who made them hover in the air around him.

"I've spent a long time thinking about ways to counter your technique... This is the best I could come up with." Morita sighed as he looked at the bubbles surrounding him with a smile.

Soap Bubble Ninjutsu was a branch of ninjutsu from the Water Release nature transformation. And normally one would need a special tool to release the bubbles.

But Morita had already prepared for that, requesting modifications to his mask, allowing it to act as that tool.

Tatsukio's smile couldn't help but become wider as he also eyed those bubbles. He immediately tested one of the bubbles, sending a kunai towards it in an instant.

The moment the metallic tip of that small kunai made contact with the bubble, it burst, and a small explosion was released, breaking the Kunai apart and sending pieces of it flying back at Tatsukio, who simply hopped to the side to avoid them.

"Interesting..." The one-legged devil muttered before immediately starting to circle Morita using his flash step, likely looking for any blind spots or openings.

Eventually, he spotted one, but he stopped himself before rushing in.

'There's no way he would fail to defend himself from that angle... He's just baiting me into a death trap.'

Both Number 1 and 2 were experienced, and they knew each other's fighting styles and way of thinking well enough.

So the situation turned into a momentary stalemate...

Ken, from the top of the arena, couldn't help but smile underneath his mask.

'Let's see how this plays out...'

________________________________________

Hope you liked the chapter! Didn't try to make it longer than the new usual, it just kinda happened.

Anywayy, was slightly hungover when writing, still have festivities to attend to tho, so don't have the time to edit much

Story Shoutout: Transcendence: The Versatile Demoness

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