Chapter 25

Today the final rounds were going to start for the Chunin Exams. After about two months of it being on hold, I spent it training and preparing for the next wave of assassins who would try and come for me. 

A lot has happened in the past month. Hayate ended up getting murdered and now Genma is in charge of the final rounds. 

I was walking with Kurenai and Asuma down to the arena. We decided we were going to watch the match together and I was rooting for Naruto of course.

We took our seats and I could overhear everyone talking about how they couldn't wait to see Sasuke's match or Neji's match. I even overheard some talking about that Sand ninja named Gaara. 

The Kages from the other villages were watching from a booth higher up and the competitors stood in the middle of the field. Two of them were missing though, that red-headed kid and Sasuke. 

This reminded me of the time when my team and I were competing in these rounds. I also remembered when Rin teased me for being jealous of Kuroshi's teammate because of how she kept using her "feminine charm" against Obito. Her words exactly.

I smiled a bit at the memory and snapped back to reality when everyone started clapping. I joined in too.

I looked around seeing that Naomi was sitting with her family and they weren't too far away from us. She nodded at me and I gave her a small smile and turned back to face the competitors. 

The first match was Naruto and Neji. 

I have to admit, I was a bit worried for Naruto since he's facing Naomi's little brother. From what Naomi told me, her brother was, even more, harsher than she used to be. He also inherited most of her strength too. She told me she helped train him. 

"He won't win," I overheard someone say. "There's no way he'll be able to win against a Hyuga,"

I rolled my eyes at how rude they were being towards Naruto. Yeah, I was worried, but that doesn't mean I'll doubt his skills. Jiraiya trained him, so I knew his skills improved way more than before. Jiraiya was able to train me pretty well, so I had some faith in him.

Naruto threw two kunais towards Neji first thing, but Neji caught it and caught the others that were being thrown at him. Naruto then attempted close combat, but then he realized that it wouldn't work against Neji since he knew how to hit chakra points.

I could tell Naruto was growing a bit weary at how many times he was dodging and being pushed away. 

Neji suddenly caught him off guard and hit him in the chest, then hit him in the right shoulder with his two fingers. I recognized that move. 

Naruto was smirking confidently and said something to him that I couldn't hear from here. He made hand seals and four clones appeared. They managed to land a few hits on Neji, but Neji was able to beat all four clones with his palm.

Neji was glaring at Naruto, but I couldn't tell what they were saying since we were sitting high up here. I did recognize that look though, but Neji's look was more intense than Naomi's was.

I glanced over at Naomi and she looked lost in her thoughts. I knew her relationship with Neji was strained, she kind of told me that things changed once her father had died and how her brother didn't take his death very well. 

I turned back around to face the fight and saw that Naruto had an army of clones attacking Neji, but Neji spun around quickly and knocked all of them back with a powerful force of chakra. I realized Neji was using the same move that Naomi knew, which was the Eight Trigrams Sixty-Four Palms. 

I winced when I saw Naruto getting hit by those. I knew exactly how that felt. I was also worried about him, since I tend to worry about him a lot. 

Genma started walking on the field to declare an end to the match. Neji was clearly taunting Naruto and he somehow managed to stand up straight. I widened my eyes with surprise.

He glared at Neji, who was shocked that he managed to stand up after that attack.

Naruto's chakra started radiating around him, and it was red. I knew immediately it was the Nine-Tails. He was able to break the closed chakra points open and moved quickly behind Neji. A lot of the spectators that were rooting against him shut up and were shocked.

I smiled seeing how Naruto was able to get back on his feet. 

They both threw weapons at each other, which collided with each other and fell to the ground. Both Naruto and Neji leapt towards each other to deliver the final blow and they hit each other's fists once they got close enough. 

The collision of chakra caused an explosion powerful enough to shake the arena. 

The dust cleared and two man-sized craters were dug into the ground. Neji crawled out and I could tell the explosion left him a bit shaken up. Naruto lied down unconscious and I grew worried seeing that he was knocked unconscious.

Everyone, including myself, gasped when Naruto suddenly burst out of the ground and punched Neji in the chin. Neji went flying up in the air and the "Naruto" in the crater dissolved into nothing, revealing the real one he dug out of. 

"And the winner is Naruto Uzumaki!" Genma called, seeing that Neji was lying on the ground, exhausted.

I stood up and cheered loudly for him. Naruto heard me and looked at me, grinning widely. 

Everyone else joined in with me, applauding and cheering for him. He held up a victory sign and whooped loudly.

"I can't believe he really did it," Asuma remarked. 

"And against the prodigy of the Hyuga clan too," Kurenai added.

I smirked at them. "You don't underestimate the Uzumakis,"

"I guess not," Asuma replied with a chuckle. 

Naruto left the center of the field and the crowd was still riled up, excited for the next match.

Sasuke was supposed to be next, but he wasn't here for some reason. 

"Hey, what's going on here?" Someone in the crowd shouted angrily. "Hurry up and start the next match already!"

"Sometime before nightfall, please!" Someone else added.

I was curious as to why Sasuke wasn't here. He's holding up the exams.

Genma disappeared for a bit, to speak with Lord Hokage, then came back and faced us.

"Listen, everyone," He said. "One of the competitors from the next battle has not arrived yet, so we're going to postpone this match briefly and simply jump ahead to the next one,"

"Will the next two competitors please step into the ring? Kankuro and Shino?"

This Kankuro guy ended up forfeiting and the win instantly went to Shino. The crowd was obviously pissed off about that. 

"That's weird," I said out loud. "I wonder  why he would just forfeit like that,"

"I don't know, but it does seem strange and a little suspicious," Kurenai replied. 

The crowd's loud booing distracted me and I saw that they were throwing soda cans towards Shikamaru since his laziness was making them mad. I sweat dropped and Asuma sighed at his student. 

The girl was obviously impatient, so she attacked before Genma could even say "go". 

Shikamaru held his hands up with each fingertip connecting and was holding his head downwards while closing his eyes.

"What is he doing? Is that some kind of hand seal?" I asked.

"It's something more like a hermit," Asuma answered.

"A hermit?" Kurenai looked at him.

"That kid, he's like an old man. He like to take things slowly. I mean really slowly. That's why he's so good at games like shogi, he's always challenging me to a match. Whenever gets stuck on a movement, he does that thing with his hands," Asuma said.

"What does it mean?" Kurenai looked over at him.

Asuma looked at us. "He's working on a strategy. All of the times we played, I've never beaten him,"

Kurenai was confused and I was too.

"This isn't a game of shogi though if he doesn't move any time soon, that girl is going to end up attacking him," I said.

"Strategy on a board game is no different from strategy on a battlefield, and all great generals know that. Shikamaru's got the mind of a great general, you just watch," Asuma replied.

Kurenai looked over. "I saw his test scores when we grouped the genin. His were no better than Naruto's, maybe even worse,"

Asuma took a puff of his cigarette. "He says the act of pencil to paper is such a drag and is too much work for him. He'd rather just take a nap than a written exam. He might be lazy, but he is so good at strategy games. I made him take an IQ test. Of course, I had to deceive him into thinking it was another game,"

"Well, what happened?" Kurenai asked.

He took another puff of his cigarette. "As I suspected, his scores were almost off the charts, beyond 'genius'. The kid has an IQ over 200,"

"Two hundred?" Kurenai gasped.

"Really?" I asked, in shock.

Shikamaru almost beat his opponent, but then he just gave up.

"What the hell? Why did he just give up?!" I asked loudly.

Everyone in the arena was taken aback by Shikamaru giving up and started booing him. Now, it was time for Sasuke's match and a few people in the crowd started arguing about whether Sasuke or Gaara would win. 

It felt like forever, but Sasuke finally showed up and he seemed different. Something about him changed.

Kakashi was behind him. "Sorry we're late. You wouldn't believe the traffic,"

"Traffic?" I muttered and shook my head at his excuse. 

"Alright, the rules for this match are the same as the preliminaries," Genma said. "The match continues until one of you dies or admits defeat. However, I can stop the match, but that's solely my decision."

Sasuke's match was pretty interesting too. He actually managed to land a hit on Gaara and Gaara shouted something about blood.

Suddenly I felt sleepy and started drifting off. Kurenai was shouting my name and my eyes shut. 

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I'm back now. Sorry if Neji and Naruto's match seemed rushed, I have to go through the matches on a different story and I wanted to get closer to an important part coming up soon. I'll try my best to update some more tonight. I tried to make this chapter a lot longer. 

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