NHRK Chapter 60

This was a match against two very different styles.

Sakura almost looked like the younger, and dare he say it, prettier version of Tsunade. Her style mainly consisted of overwhelming her foes with her strength and brutal power. Her healing prowess also gave her quite the durability for she would heal any wounds inflicted upon her, up until she ran out of chakra, and with the amount of…boosts Naruto had given her, that was becoming less and less likely every single week.

Hinata, on the other hand, was graceful and flexible beyond comparison, so different from the rigid style often seen by her clan. She was hard to hit, and struck back with deadly efficiency. When she once relied on disciplined forms, she now had fluidity between her every movement. Her palms now also held two twin heads of lightning dragons, a surprising affinity gained after their night together.

The two sparred many times over his tutelage and it showed when they were almost evenly matched. They knew each other’s habits, strengths and weaknesses, and exploited each to a degree that most Jonin would be hard pressed to replicate.

They were ready, Naruto knew. One would have to be a fool to not pass these two even after their brief exchange.

They were already far more than just chuunin.

Hinata and Sakura separated from their exchange, neither being scratched but both breathing heavily.

It was understandable, really, as a single cleanly landed strike from either of the two was a meeting with the shinigami.

Hinata got into her personal juken stance once more whilst Sakura did the same with her own stance.

They reengaged, and the crowd gasped.

For this time, their speed was blistering, and all but faint blurs were seen in their exchange. It seemed that they have taken it up a notch/

“Shannaro!” Sakura growled as she just missed Hinata by an inch and slammed her fist into the ground, making yet another crater and causing a small earthquake in the stadium.

People panicked at first but once it died down and they saw that the building wasn’t going to collapse on them, they cheered once more.

In the midst of all that rubble and clouds of dust, when the two separated once more, they weren’t free of scratches. Hinata was bleeding from various different places, scratched by the sharp rocks of the impact. Sakura’s arm is now limp, the very same that hit the floor just a moment ago, injured not by the impact but by Hinata’s quick retaliation from the near miss.

Hinata had tagged her once, just slightly in the arm, but with the lighting that now coursed through her veins, that single strike was enough to deactivate all the meridians on Sakura’s right arm.

Sakura began to heal and unblock those meridians but Hinata did not allow her to, for she struck again.

This time however, the lighting was gone, extinguished but thin, almost invisible wires of water. Naruto knew from experience that those water wires could cut through a tree like a knife through butter.

Those very wires attached to Hinata’s deadly taijutsu?

The crowd gasped as it seemed like this was the end of one Sakura Haruno, looking defenceless against the mysterious jutsu they have yet to see in action.

But Sakura clenched her teeth and Naruto smiled.

There was that tenacity he loved about her.

She dug her fingers into the very earth and roared in effort.

Many inhales were heard as Sakura seemed to lift the very earth.

And she did.

She lifted a thick layer as if it were a giant carpet, and pulled it down again, sending a wave of rocky hills towards the approaching Hyuuga.

Hinata jumped into the air to avoid it but that was what Sakura wanted as she’d taken the time to drag out a large piece of rock from the earth and threw like it didn’t weigh several dozen tons.

Hinata’s eyes widened as she swirled in the air.

The Hyuuga clan members gasped. Performing an eight trigrams revolving heaven on the ground was a feat to be celebrated even by the older members of the main branch–it was a difficult technique to create a dome of fine strings of chakra.

To execute it perfectly, one would need a solid foundation and balance on the ground.

To do it in the air?

It should be impossible. There was no leverage, no force, no–

Hinata did it with ease, and more than that, the fine strings of water attached to her fingers revolved around her.

Not even small dust particles remained on the boulder that was thrown at her.

It was already a fight the audience would never see again in their lives from genin. Unless it was wartime.

So they treated the spectacle with great enthusiasm.

This time, their roar of approval was almost deafening and even Naruto could feel the thrill in his bones.

Sakura had spent that time fully healing her arms and they were once again on even footing. She had repositioned herself and the members of the Hyuuga clan gasped as she was precisely where she needed to be to be in the one blindspot of a Hyuuga’s eyesight.

In Sakura’s newly healed arms was a spear made of earth, her extraordinary elemental manipulation skills on display with her immense chakra control.

Then she threw the spear like a javelin, shooting it so fast that the loud bang of breaking the sound barrier rang out a moment later.

Sakura would never do such a thing in normal spars, as even if she could heal Hinata of whatever grievous wounds she gave her afterward, it wasn’t like her to cause pain to her friends.

But this was an exam to showcase their capabilities, and they both had Naruto’s assurances that should anything go wrong, he would hold on to their souls and resurrect them later.

It was a terrifying ability of his, but it did comfort them in what they had to do.

Even still, Sakura did not truly aim her spear at Hinata’s body, but slightly to the left of her shoulder, as if showing that she could have ended the fight there if she wanted to.

To Sakura’s surprise however, Hinata smoothly predicted where the spear would target and with smooth, flowing motions, she redirected it to land on the wall of the stadium, causing large cracks on the foundation.

Naruto immediately performed an earth wall jutsu to reinforce it, as was his job.

Both Hinata and Sakura reassessed one another, one standing on the ground waiting for her opponent’s next move, the other on the wall, considering what that next move was.

They had both yet to show their true strength, and aside from sleeping with their mentor the past month, they trained with him as well in separate times, or even at the same time with his shadow clones.

They improved yet again, and even high Jonins would have a difficult time keeping up with them.

However, whilst this may be a test of their capabilities, it was in a ninja’s rulebook to never showcase what you are truly capable of until it was necessary. You don’t want to give any potential enemies any more information than you have to, afterall.

At this point, they both knew that they had shown enough to pass…but winning the tournament held other significant meanings to them.

They knew that whoever won this fight currently deserved to be at Naruto’s side the most.

And to them that was worth more than any exam.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Hanabi sat at the stadium stands, next to her father, eyes wide in awe.

What had happened to her sister?!

Truly!

It was more than just night and day with who she saw today and she could tell from the slight change in her father’s cadence of breath, even to the cracking of his ever stoic mask, that he felt the same.

Hanabi felt something within the pit of her gut. There was jealousy, for sure, but it was only a small amount of it.

The overwhelming feeling that passed through her was…vindication, and pride, and joy.

Her sister was showing the world who she was–that she was not a docile, hapless maiden that’s only useful as the clan’s bargaining chip for marriages, she was a warrior unlike any the Hyuuga clan has ever produced or seen before.

She showed the world that she was no one to be trifled with.

“Go Hinata!” Hanabi shouted out from the top of her lungs, almost making her father jump in his seat.

Then, as if she was the first leak of a broken dam, all Hyuga members called out as well.

“Hinata-sama!”

“Go Lady Hinata! Show them the might of the Hyuga clan!”

More and more, voices of unity began through both the main clan members and even the branch members who were in the civilian stands in the distance.

They called in cries of joy, and Hanabi wanted to scoff at them.

How two-faced they were, once scorning her for her weakness only to now kiss her boot once she showed them that they were wrong.

Yet Hanabi could not blame them.

Even scorned, Hinata had always shown them nothing but kindness, and now that she was revealed to be a woman secretly hiding her strength, they had a potential leader once more. A leader who was kind and generous.

Hanabi wondered why she wasn’t feeling envy over her now smaller chances of being the clan heir.

Actually, she knew why.

She loved her sister far more than she loved the clan.

And with that, she cheered once more, without restraint befitting one of her station.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Hinata and Sakura fought within an ounce of their true might, both reaching the limit they’d put on themselves as too much to show.

Yet none had ever seen chuunin candidates so capable before.

They were like seasoned shinobi, from their careful tactics to their clever deceptions.

They clashed time and time again, wearing each other out and coming out the other side just a little bit more scratched.

Hinata’s prowess at her own style was elusive and hard to catch, and Sakura’s expertise in her own taijutsu was also on display with her powerful, air-displacing punches and kicks.

Like watching a knife held upright on its point, Naruto did not know where the fight would tip, who was to be the victor, who was to be the one who stole the show.

Then it was decided in a moment, a mere instance of unlucky coincidence.

The soles of Sakura’s combat shoes had torn off from the force in which she was moving–something that happened very, very rarely with shinobi-build equipment.

It only lasted a fraction of a second.

And it was enough for Hinata to get a juuken strike to one of Sakura’s core meridians in her torso.

Normally, Naruto would let the fight go on, and Sakura would have a way to recover.

But that way was one of the things Naruto knew she wanted to keep hidden.

Hinata knew that too.

When they both separated once more, Sakura made distance before standing upright.

She looked down at her shoes, sighing in a bit of regret, but when she looked up once more, she was full of smiles and genuine joy for her friend, despite her loss.

“I give, I cannot go on any longer,” Sakura said, and the crowd drowned the stadium in the volume of their cheers.

They both made a seal of reconciliation, and they met once again in the middle, this time wrapping each other up in an embrace.

The crowd cheered once more at the show of sportsmanship and Naruto smiled at his students.

“Well done!” He called out to them, unable to help himself, “you’ve both done well, and showed more than enough to impress both me and the world. Be proud! Both of you!”

Then to his surprise, they both leapt into his arms, each placing a kiss on his cheek.

The crowd stopped cheering at the development and Naruto felt his heart drop to the bottom of his ribcage.

The two then left him there, extricating themselves from their own embrace of him and giggled to each other, before going back to the stands.

Naruto would now have to deal with this mess alone.

He blushed before he coughed into his fist.

“Ahem–that was very unprofessional of them to do, but I could not blame them for feeling such excitement in one of the most important times of their lives,” he addressed to the crowd, and their shock then turned to amusement and no small amount of jeering as well as jealous cries.

“Well, we will continue with the exam. Will the next contestants–” he tried to say but couldn’t finish.

Naruto’s senses blared, and an earthquake ran through Konoha.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Kurotsuchi bit her lips as she watched from the distance, uniform disguised as Suna shinobi tasked with guarding the Kazekage.

Amongst them was Onoki, her grandfather, and he’d just completed the jutsu that they hoped would potentially wipe out most of Konoha’s forces before the invasion began, or at the very least, cause devastation to a point that it would be distracting to the shinobi as their own civilians were in danger.

Kurotsuchi felt chills run down her spine.

She knew that what they were doing was wrong. Their plan, the chakra seals and the passageway here given by this new Otokage worked too perfectly, and now they were amidst a dominant massacre, attacking at the very heart of their longtime rival’s village before they could even act.

From Iwa’s history, Konoha was made to be the aggressors, the ones in the wrong in their own views.

Kurotsuchi was not stupid, she knew it was propaganda.

Yet some small part of her wished that the things she was hearing was the truth.

Now though, there was no justification for this.

Kurotsuchi’s stomach was about to turn upside down.

This was wrong…

But they had no choice.

Iwa had already fallen.

In the blink of an eye.

They needed this.

It was either take Konoha for themselves, hitting their rival village before they and their allies could retaliate, and claim the territory for themselve.

They could have settled in another country, but any move they made would inevitably draw the attention of Konoha, and they would strike even if they didn’t have their jinchuuriki’s.

Destroying Konoha first was the only option before reclaiming a new home.

A spike of pain lanced through Kurotsuchi’s head, and memories of that terrible night flashed through her once more.

She shuddered, her breath ragged as she tried to regain control of her composure.

‘Blood for the Blood God!’

Kurotsuchi banished those memories away and refocused on the mission.

It was too late now.

This was their only option.

It was the thing she would tell herself when she had nightmares of this day in the years to come.

“Get ready!” Onoki said to his forces.

They did.

The invasion has begun.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Naruto could hear the panic all around him, and the Kazekage acted as well from the stands.

Hiruzen had told him not to worry about his safety, as he had something prepared for what lay ahead.

Naruto was tasked to quickly deal with the releasing of the one-tail as he did in his previous world, only quicker.

Yet Naruto’s senses took on something new. Like a blanket that veiled his sight had been lifted, he sensed the Kazekage’s army.

They’d been prepared to deal with Suna’s forces.

But this was not just Suna.

“Iwa!” Naruto called out, using wind jutsu to carry his voice to Konoha’s forces. “Iwa shinobi amidst the Kazekage’s forces! Be careful!”

From the tensing of shoulders that he could see from the jonin within his sight, he knew that they got the message.

Complications arose, even when he thought he knew the future.

This was just like the burning of the bridge in Wave.

The question now was…why?

Why was Iwa attacking?

Why were they here?

Questions and little answers.

He would save obtaining those answers for later.

Like the disinclined guards of Anbu, Kushina and Haku were at his side. His other students stayed with their teams and jonin sensei as he instructed. They would do well to prevent potential casualties.

Naruto’s arms rose up, and with it, the falling debris that was caused by the earthquake.

Not just the ones in the stadium that potentially could have harmed the spectators, but all the falling debris in Konoha.

He would protect all of his homeland’s citizens.

None would touch Konoha.

Not while he’s still here.

The debris floated into the air, acting like strange islands of a planet without gravity, it all flew into a single point, condensing into that of a small meteor.

Naruto chucked that meteor in the direction where he felt the Iwa shinobi were stationed.

This very scene reminded him of one from the past, where Onoki had tried to catch the giant meteor that Madara brought down on the shinobi forces.

This time, to his surprise, it wasn’t Onoki who dealt with the giant flying projectile.

Han, the Jinchuuriki of the five tails, took his bijuu form and sent a Tailed beast ball towards the small meteor, disintegrating it before it could land.

So by this time, the Akatsuki had yet to make their move, and Iwa still had their two jinchuuriki’s.

Naruto narrowed his eyes.

Complications upon complications.

He sent a message to his human clone, and with a flash of yellow, it was there a moment later.

“Help Kushina deal with the four tails,” Naruto ordered.

“Hai,” the clones said, and Kushina nodded as well.

There were many highly dangerous targets to deal with. The jinchuurikis, Onoki, the Kazekage, Gaara.

He would leave Gaara to the girls–he had enough trust in them now to handle themselves, especially with Sakura and Hinata leading them, though oddly there was no sign of the red haired boy even amongst the stands.

Naruto would need to keep an eye out.

Regardless, even when being pulled in many directions, this was nothing new to him.

He would protect them all.

He would see to it.