Gaara appeared from the top of the beast's head. His pupils were gone, only showing the whites of his eyes.

"Thank you for entertaining me so far. In return, I'll show you the true power of the manifestation of the sand." He sounded like an insane person as he said it.

He muttered something to himself while holding a hand sign; suddenly, the giant beast became lively.

"Yeah!! I'm finally free, baby!" It shouted.

Disgust painted across Neji's face. "Are all Tailed Beasts like that?"

"Beating that giant thing is impossible!" Sasuke said as he stared up.

Sakura sighed, "Even the 4th Hokage gave up his life trying to stop the Nine-Tailed Fox." She gazed at the beast sadly, "If only I'm stronger."

"We need a strategy, but-"

Shukaku interrupted the Hyuga, "Hey, what are y'all doin' there? Scared?" It laughed and swung its huge arm at the trio.

The white tigress stood in front of them and punched her front paws onto the ground. Giant crystals that shined under the moonlight cracked open the surface of the ground and formed a barrier that looks similar to a fan. When the beast's hand came in contact with the crystals, it cracked, but protected all of them from being swept away.

The beast was a bit surprised and it wasn't happy about it. The sand spirit's hand hit the crystal carrier again and successfully broke it. The huge pieces flew towards them but Raimu gathered all of them into it's mouth before shooting the pieces like bullets to the monster.

Much to their dismay, it did no harm to the beast. Shukaku laughed at how weak the trio were.

"None of our jutsus will do anything on something that huge." Sakura stated.

He sighed, "Even so, we can't give up. The village is counting on us."

The Hyuga thought silently with his chin resting on his hand. He recalled their fight before the sand spirit grew into this giant monster.

"Sakura, how was your fight with Gaara before we arrived?"

She closed her eyes as she tried to remember. "Temari, Kankuro and I joined forces to attack him straight on, but he easily blocked the attack and swung his arms at us. While they distracted him, I chopped off his tail before trapping him in my jutsu. His tail is like his third arm."

"Then his tail should be his weakness." Neji concluded. "Remember Sasuke? You burned his tail and his sand immediately melted."

"You could be right." The Uchiha agreed.

"We'll use the trees to hide us. Go!" Neji ordered.

All three prodigies rode on their tigers as they head for the beast's tail. Meanwhile, Shukaku turned his head everywhere to look for them.

"Have y'all ran away?" It bellowed. "So pathetic!"

Sakura grabbed her arm in pain, her wound felt like it was in fire. The tigress stopped and purred in worry, trying to turn it's head back to look at the injury; but the pinkette pat her head and said, "It's fine, let's go." Sumire nodded and continued her journey.

She rubbed the blood off her eyes to have a clearer vision. The boys were already ahead of her, but not too far. They reached the beast's back cautiously, careful not to be slapped by its tail that was moving around as the beast talked to himself.

He's one talkative Tailed Beast. Sakura thought and recalled two of her classmates who were equally as annoying.

"Let's attack the start of the tail together in full force." Sasuke suggested.

His teammates agreed and did their hand signs.

"Fire Style: Dragon Fire!"

"Water Style: Raging Waves!"

"Cherry Blossom Style: A Thousand Swords!"

Meanwhile, Aka shot flames out of his mouth and Sumire shot crystal bullets to the tail.

Shukaku roared at the attack, it definitely hit a sensitive spot as it was angrier than before. Its tail dropped onto the ground and melted into sand.

The beast turned around as its body started dripping fine sand, it was losing its form.

"How dare you!" The Tailed Beast urgently swung his arm at the six of them.

They flew into the air and dropped in different places. Shukaku walked around, in search of the bodies and found the two boys. It grabbed the both of them and wrapped his hands around the heirs.

Sakura was extremely aware of what had happened, but she was far to weak to reach there in time. The beast's next words made her heart drop.

"Sand coffin!"

And she blacked out.

However, her body was floating on air and her eyes were glowing a bright pink colour. Shukaku's hand were chopped off and the two boys were safe from the sand.

That pinkette was no longer Sakura.

The ground rumbled and the beast looked around in confusion, unsure of what was happening. Tree started growing from the cracks of the ground and pink flowers bloomed rapidly on the stems. It was a sea of pink, a sight to behold. It looked almost like snow beneath the blue night sky.

They held the monster down and tried to drown it under the bed of cherry blossom flowers. 'Sakura' steadily neared the beast and swung her arm. The flowers gathered and copied the motion, hitting the Tailed Beast. The flowers that represented her left arm crushed the beast and sand poured out from its body as though it was bleeding. The seemingly possessed pinkette crossed her arms like an 'X'. The cherry blossoms gathered from different places and stabbed the beast. Pink flowers mixed with sand poured out of its injury.

The branches of the trees tore Gaara away from the sand, immediately making the sand fall in waves. The beast from earlier was no longer visible as he disappeared into the sand.

'Sakura's' eyes were still glowing as she stared down at the red head. He looked up at her with different emotions crossing his mind at a time.

"Gaara!"

Temari ran towards her younger brother with Kankuro close behind her. They tended to Gaara and brought him on Kankuro's back to the village.

The pinkette's eyes stopped glowing and revealed a familiar pair of emerald coloured eyes. But it closed instantly and she fell onto the soft bed of cherry blossoms.

Once the situation in the village calmed down, they were broken with the news of the Third Hokage's honourable death. Orochimaru had escaped with his minions with a search team on his trail.

When the sand siblings arrived, they had informed the top ranking ninjas to pursue the trio prodigies who were injured. Kakashi led the team as he worried for his squad. What amazed them was the sea of pink flowers, the scale was far too big for a Genin to accomplish. The silver head knew something was wrong, nothing seemed right.

They quickly recovered the three prodigies and their tiger-nins. They were still conscious, just tired and a little bruise here and there. Sakura was in the worst shape as she battled the longest and she was depleted of chakra. Whatever that took over her had consumed her chakra to the bone.

Once everything was cleaned up and every villager had settled down, the sun had already rose above the horizon.

Inside the Hokage tower was a heated discussion about the next Hokage.

==

Dedicated to Illy567 for adding this story to your reading list!

A continuation of the battle I newly added to the story.

~Joelle

Published: 15 May 2018