Chapter 14.1- Gamer of the Desert

When I squared up against Noel, the last thought on my mind was how to make the fight interesting, how to turn it into a spectacle of some sort. I had no need to waste my energy figuring that out; it was practically guaranteed. I was to face off against the strongest genin at the tournament. If the show wasn't good, then that would be my fault.

When the referee started the fight, Noel wasted no time in blurring across the arena, rushing at me to engage in taijutsu, as if I would ever allow that to happen. This time, I didn't hold back in my hand seal speed as I flipped through them, ending in a bird seal and focusing on my chakra. Multiple bullets of air screamed across the arena, slowing down his approach and forcing him to dodge and change directions suddenly. That did little to completely halt it as he came either way. The first punch was waved to the side as I backflipped to gain some space. As I landed on the ground, it was with my legs as much as it was with my hands as I slammed my palms down, pushing my chakra into the earth beneath us and forcing it to obey my will. Spikes shot out of the ground, forcing my opponent to also jump back to avoid being impaled by the attack. He kept dodging as two massive bullets of fire followed his escape. I was never more thankful for my nature than when I unleashed my ninjutsu. With the amount of chakra I'd pumped into those three jutsu just now, the average chunin would have been on his last legs.

Me? I was just getting started. Noel jumped into the water, but what did I care that a water release user was in the center of his element? Before this fight, I thought it would be a problem, but now I knew it didn't matter. He would never compare to me in a battle of raw ninjutsu. As I thought, my fingers flashed and moved through hand seals, ending on the bird seal again. I tried to snipe him in the water with the wind bullets I could create. I sent them screaming into the water blindly, but from the lack of blood pooling on the pond, I'd failed to make contact. When Noel surfaced and stood on the pond, he looked messy. His hair dripped down to his shoulders, upset from its previously slicked-back style. His outfit, in many ways the traditional Cloud nin outfit, was riddled with holes and tears that told me my attack had gotten closer than I'd previously thought. My gourd exploded into action, and the sand pooled next to me as I prepared my next move and his inevitable counter-attack. He would not remain on the defensive forever. Even I could see that as clear as day. He could not maintain a defense if I did not relent.

He spread his palms out at me, and the smile on his face looked bittersweet. Two disks of light formed around his palms, and I waited for the Storm Release. This was sure to be a fight to remember. "Storm Release: Laser Circus," he shouted for the heavens to hear, and suddenly, the world was bathed in light. The disks in his hands served as a launching base for an actual swarm of laser beams. My eyes failed to track how many there were, and a bit of Naruto trivia told me he'd be able to control where each single laser struck. This was worlds beyond what he'd shown off prior to this point. I guess I wasn't the only one holding back.

Since my sand was already at my feet, it was time to put Gaara's famed ultimate defense to the test. The sand spun as it woke and did my will. A dome of sand surrounded me, protecting me from all sides. I waited for the outcome as the lasers struck the sand and penetrated with the ease of a hot knife passing through butter. The lasers passed through me with similar ease.

XXXXXX

Well, fuck. I guess the answer to whether my sand could provide any protection from Noel's Storm Release was answered. I sighed as I focused on my chakra and exploded out of the ground, another clone forming from the sand around me and following my will. We jumped out in unison and spent a few seconds floating, staring right at the Cloud nin. At the apex of our flight, our seals completed, and we released our jutsu in unison. The clone channeled a good portion of its chakra into a massive Great Fireball, and I did the same with the Great Breakthrough that fanned the flames. The fireball, previously the size of an elephant, positively ballooned in size as it came in contact with the wind release attack. I'd never practiced that particular combo before, but we all knew it would work. I had underestimated how well, though.

Noel did not bother attempting to block the attack with his water release. Instead, he used his shunshin to escape from the vicinity instantly. That was probably the only thing that saved his life as the fire attack landed on the pond and surrounding ground before exploding. The wind from the explosion pushed both me and my clone backward, but I was able to keep us steady with some tendrils of sand. It was actually impressive how much damage that had managed to cause. When the dust settled, there was no pond. Much of that entire half of the arena had been devastated by the explosion.

I smiled at the result, and only my clone keeping an eye on things allowed me to dodge out of the way of a quickly moving laser that almost tore a hole through my skull. I saw through his eyes as Noel cursed to himself in a whisper before weaving hand seals from his position hidden in what little remained of the forest.

This time, when the lasers shot out, I was ready. The sand all around me rose to my will. Not just my will. Our will. Clone Gaara worked with me with frightening symmetry (it was almost like we were the same person) as we sent a tendril of sand spearing at each individual laser. I could never have hoped to track all of them on my own, but just half? That was easy. What was different about our approach this time? Each tendril was chock-full of my chakra, transformed into wind nature and shaped in front of each tendril like a spear tip. Just as I expected, they tore through the lasers, making it look easy as they did so. Noel was forced to shunshin from his position again as the sand tore that part of the forest apart as we searched for him and tried to end things. When he moved away from the attack, we did our best to keep track of him with our eyes, but at some point, we could no longer follow his movement. He was fast, and as I barely leaned away from a punch that would have cleaved my head from my shoulders, I added that he was strong to that assessment. Clone Gaara tried to get him from behind, but he simply was no longer there before he kicked right through my clone's impulsive guard, almost dispelling him. I scowled as I found my feet again and jumped right on him, with a kunai clutched in each hand. I ducked underneath a haymaker, using my height to force him into an uncomfortable taijutsu exchange, and keeping us close to prevent him from using his superior reach to his advantage.

Don't get me wrong, Noel Yatsuki was not my equal in taijutsu. He was far superior. The only thing allowing me to even keep track of his movement was the fact that my clone kept an eye on the entire battle to

 prevent me from being caught off guard, and I was doing my best to shove as much chakra into my brain as safely possible to improve my perception. Another advantage of being a jinchuriki was that more often than not, I crossed the limit of 'safe'. Only my healing factor prevented the fight from ending on account of me falling to the ground brain-dead.

I jumped into his line of sight, attempting to shove one of my kunai into his left eye. He leaned backward to dodge, and I used the opportunity to stab down with my other kunai. The steel plates on his gauntlet screeched as he waved my kunai away with one of his hands. I avoided a standoff by flipping that same kunai into the air and spitting a blast of air that sent it sailing right for his head. As he dodged and retreated, I followed him, keen on preventing him from gathering his composure and making this fight any harder than it already was. Even on the backfoot, it was all I could do to ensure he remained there. A single slip-up, and I'd be either dead or lost. In spite of that, though, I was smiling. I was having fun for one of the first times since I woke up in this body. What I felt was not an emotion. It was something deeper, more primal. My body sang to be in combat, to lay everything on the line in every exchange as my opponent tried to kill me and I returned the favor.

Of course, all things were destined to end. Out of nowhere, Noel began to move even faster. I could see he loved to be pushed like this, as he slowly began to overwhelm me, and I went from having him on the ropes to being in that position. I narrowly escaped death from a sudden kick to the head by a shield made of sand that rose from the ground at my clone's direction. He took that as his cue to jump into the fight. Facing two of us, he held back a bit less, and he moved faster than either of us could react to. Only instincts trained from combat with Baki, who was similarly superior to us, allowed us to remain alive and intact as he turned his attention to us. As we fought, we silently strategized between ourselves on what to do next. That's why we were able to come up with the perfect plan in seconds.

As Noel spun into a roundhouse kick that was sailing straight at my head, Clone Gaara jumped right into the path and clutched on to that same leg before collapsing into sand. I took charge of the sand instantly, using my chakra to amplify its weight and prevent Noel from retreating as I swarmed him with sand, capturing him in a sand coffin.

"Surrender?" I asked, stretching a hand to control the sand while taking deep breaths as the tension began to leave my body. He just smiled at me placidly.

"Surrender?" he asked, repeating my question.

"Oh. I should be the one asking you, Gaara of the Desert," he said before his chakra suddenly began to skyrocket. A single explosion sent all the sand flying off of him, and similarly sent me flying off, only caught by a platform of sand. I searched for him through the dust, and what I found sent my heart dropping to share space with my stomach. I'd never seen that jutsu in this life, but after watching the anime, reading the manga, and also reading fanfiction for years, I'd recognize that jutsu anywhere. The jutsu that allowed the Third Raikage to tangle with the Eight Tails on equal footing. The jutsu that the Fourth Raikage used to survive multiple encounters with the world's most notorious killer of men, Minato Namikaze. The pinnacle of the lightning release. The Lightning Armor. It sent his hair that had flowed around his face spiking straight up, and I watched in a mixture of awe and dismay as he took his first steps in that glorious form.

A/N; First part of the new chapter. Are you not entertained?