Ch. 23 Drawing Attention

The image Shisui knocking him out with the back of his blade appeared in Chiba's mind as he activated future sight before he threw the rock in the air.

Using the Soru technique and the Flicker step jutsu at the same time, Chiba stepped back just in time before Shisui knocked him out.

There was an akward and tense moment of silence as they both knew that what Shisui did wasn't spar etiquette. The whole point of a spar was to have a mock battle and allow your opponent to unveil his techniques, then counter those technique in order for both parties to learn and grow.

'He's not here to spar or learn something, he genuinely wants to win this thing! He probably wants to mention to Itachi that I lost to him, subconsciously giving credence idea that those alligned with the village, win.

"Your going all out from the start? Bold choice." Chiba said with a slight tone in his voice.

"All out? That was merely my warm up" In Chiba's observation Haki, Shisui seemed to have disappeared and reappear behind him in an instant!

Dropping down to the floor, Chiba heard the loud whooshing of air that came from shisui's blade as he tried kicking Shisui's legs only to strike air as he had already jumped back.

'Im too slow to physical harm him, I need to increase my speed!' Activating his devil fruit, Chiba's body became extremely light as he only had enough weight to remain on the ground. The heavy sword in his hand felt weightless as he activated Soru and flickering body in conjuncture with his Gravity Devil Fruit.

Stepping forward, Chiba looked like he had teleported as his blade stuck Shisui's who blocked it. Jumping backward, Shiusui looked at Chiba with both respect and fear.

He was impressed by how strong a blind child who was younger than him was, but also feared the fact that such a talent child was pro Uchiha clan.

'Its only after activating three movement increasing techniques that I can keep up it Shisui, who is only relying on the flickering body jutsu!'

Thankfully it was only the flickering body and Observation Haki that costed him chakra, as he was still reeling from the slight side affects of eating the Military Ration Pills.

Sensing that he was about to use the Flickering body jutsu, Chiba met Shisui's charge as their blades slammed into one another, forcing Chiba backwards because of how light the blade was.

'I see, using my Gravity fruit on the sword might make it quicker, but it'll lose some strength behind it.... I wonder.....'

Dashing forward, Chiba performed an overhead slash that Shisui attempted to block. As he slashed his sword down, Chiba suddenly increased the gravity on his blade and made it weigh over a 2,000lb.

Shisui felt the heavy weight and saw that the back of his sword was about to slam into him as he quickly flickered away, cold sweats drilling down his body.

'What the hell is going on with this kid?! At first he is relative slow before suddenly matching my speed, then he's relative weak before his sword nearly forces mine into hitting me!' looking down at his sword, Shisui saw that his blade had a small crack in the steel blade.

With his adrenaline rushing, Chiba dashed forward and had his blade meet Shisui's, each clash they became faster and more powerful as Chiba began to manipulating the gravity of his blade with more control and Shisui became more accustomed to parrying these heavy attacks.

With a determined look on his face, Chiba stabbed forward as his weightless blade turned into a blur as it pierced forward in quick succession. Shisui also donned a determined look as he started parrying and blocking Chiba's attack.

The boys had an unspoken rule of only using their chakra on flickering body jutsu, and relying only on the sword for attack. Shisui was known for his mastery of the Flickering Body jutsu and Chiba was known for his swordmanship, this fight revolved around their specialties!

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Walking beneath the blooming Sakura tree, two beautiful figures stroll in the sea of pink pedals.

It was the beginning of fall and the slowly falling Sakura flower was the most beautiful moment of the year for the Uchiha compound. If the people of the village could peer in, they would become envious of the Sakura flower tree of the Uchiha clan.

"Your clan's trees are so beautiful." Sticking her hand out, the woman caught an off colored Sakura pedal that was as red as her hair. The woman, Uzumaki Kushina, was very fond of Sakura flowers. The Sakura pedals reminded her of the first time she talked to her husband, Minato Namikaze.

She was getting bullied by the older brother of one her classmate, she had to rip her hair out of her scalp to escape the older bully's grasps and then she beat the bully to a pulp. She did all of this while Minato watched from above, knowing that she didn't need him to save her

Although she was unhappy that her husband could not accompany her to enjoy the flowers on this beautiful day, she understood that Minato had no choice. She just wanted to comfort her husband who was grieving the loss of his disciple, as she also felt immense sadness at the death of Obito.

She hid her unhappiness as Uchiha Mikoto took time out of her day to show Kushina the Sakura's that were in bloom.

"You can come here anytime if you like. If anybody tries to stop you, just send them my way an I'll sort them out" Mikoto said as she jokingly flexed her muscles.

Kushina smiled at her friends remark, temporarily relieving her sadness and depression before returning back to her melancholy expression.

As an Uzumaki, Kushina was physically stronger than most ninjas ninja and her talent was unrivaled when it came to sealing jutsu. Her adamantine chains were powerful enough to easily seal and suppress the full powered kurama, one of the ten strongest being in the world.

Her strength was around high jonin to low kage, but her strength was meaningless as she couldn't use it. Kushina was the Jinchuriki of the nine tailed beast, making her Konoha's most valued weapon.

Tailed beasts were equivalent to nuclear bombs, there was never a right time to deploy them and they were most effective as a deterrent. It is precisely these reason that Kushina couldn't leave the village, let alone fight in the war.

The existence Kushina and the nine tailed fox is the reason why, even though Konoha lost three kage level Ninja, Konoha is still the strongest village. It was a well known fact that the nine tailed fox, was the strongest of all of the tailed beasts.

"Don't have that expression Kushina, the village just wants to protect you." Mikoto patted her friend on the back, comforting her.

The two of them walked through the Uchiha clan's Sakura trees while talking and sometimes laughing, before they heard a strange noise.

*Tang! Clang! Shwing!*

The heavy sound of metalclashing couldn't help but draw the attention of the two women. They've both sparred with swords before, but this was different! The interval between each clash was less than a quarter of a second before they clashed once again.

Following the sound, the two woman arrived at the training ground and saw two small blurs colliding with one another as they moved at speed they had trouble following.

Uchiha Mikoto's eyes instantly turned blood red as she activated her Sharingan while Kushina could only squint her eyes. While she could see their movements, Kushina had trouble with seeing their faces.

The two women watched in shock and awe at the display of skill that the two boys produced. The two figures almost appeared to be dancing as they dodged, parried and blocked the attacks that were moving faster than the speed of sound.

"That's... Uchiha Shisui!?" Mikoto said allowed for Kushina to understand but it only raised a big question for her.

'If that's Shisui, then who is he sparring with?' Kushina thought.

It made total sense that a genius from the Uchiha clan that had became famous through the use of the flickering body jutsu was that fast, but how could someone who appeared to be the same age keep up with him?

While Kushina was puzzled by this, she didn't realize how awestruck Mikoto was next to her as she realized who Shisui was fighting

'Uchiha Chiba? How can this be! I'm forced to use the sharingan just to perceive his movements clearly?!'

Just an hour ago he was talking to her husband, and now he was sparring Shisui on what appeared to be equal terms? Mikoto was thoroughly shocked as she thought Chiba was just an intelligent and philosophical child who was decent at swordsmanship, she never would have guessed that he could keep up with Shisui's movement's.

It took dozens of seconds for Mikoto to recover from the shock as her Sharingan slowly faded away.

At this moment, Chiba was so caught up in the fight that his concentration slipped for a second and he accidentally increase his Observation Haki range.

As Chiba's Observation Haki swept past her, Kushina seemed to have suffered some kind of shock as her pupils suddenly shrank. She quickly touched her abdomen as she felt the beast residing within her starting to stir.

"WHAT WAS THAT JUST NOW WOMAN!" A malevolent and hateful voice shouted in her mind.

Just now, that inexplicable aura that washed over them seemed to have disturbed Nine Tails as it opened his mouth for the first time in years and spoke.

In the next moment, Kushina was suddenly enveloped in red chakra as the fox connected to Kushina's vision, immediately locking onto Chiba fighting in the distance.

"That kid--!?"

Chiba saw the hateful and bloodthirsty beast staring at him but continued to fight as he knew that it wouldn't escape it's host.

'Enough!' Closing her eyes, Kushina appeared inside of her mind scape and immediately summoned the adamantine chains from her body. They slithered at quick speeds and immediately bound the fox as the red chakra disappeared.

"DONT BE TOO COCKY WOMAN, ONE OF THESE DAYS ILL ESC-" Not giving fox the chance to speak, Kushina chained the beasts mouth shut as she awoke.

Kushina set here eyes on Chiba and under Makoto's confused face, subconsciously asked

"Mikoto, who is the kid fighting Shisui?"

"His name is Chiba, Uchiha Chiba!"

Facing the familiar name, Uzumaki Kushina suddenly remembered where she hear it from.

'The blind Uchiha?!' Kushina felt her interest continuing to pique as she wondered about what and how he did that.

'I need to get to the bottom of this and in order for that, I'll need to talk to him!'