73 Naruto : Uchiha : Chapter 73

He was sure his eyes and mind would be spinning after that alone had he been the one performing it. But he was left flabbergasted when Naruto started back flipping away from Orochimaru's prone form in complete and total control.

The blonde stopped in a slight skid, on his knees he looked up at Orochimaru still in complete control of is senses.

...

'Orochimaru' as Naruto had expected from the strange sensation that he had felt as soon as his heel had made contact - dissolved into a pile of mud.

"That was a great substitution…" Naruto praised his opponent out loud, it truly was remarkable he had the presence of mind to substitute. So as to evade any surprising follow ups from his vulnerable blind spot even if he hadn't expected one such as this in the first place.

His caution had saved him from an ending blow only a minute into the spar…

"He's good…" he thought inwardly, standing up and dusting his palms off the dirt while looking around the empty clearing cautiously.

He had wanted to get this over with quickly, but another part of him wanted it to last longer. The inner part of his that craved for the thrill of combat…

The ground underneath him started becoming soft, alarms went off in his mind and he jumped up - for which he was glad for a moment later.

The whole ground underneath where he had been standing a few moments prior, turned into a small river of mud - one that would have immobilized him and would do so a moment later if he didn't do anything soon.

Quick as a wink, his hands blurred through lightning fast hand seals that were too hard for anyone to follow. His index finger and thumb curled up in front of his lips for the jutsu, that quite frankly had become almost instinctual to him.

"Fire Style : Grand Fireball Jutsu!" he exclaimed. Breathing in a huge amount of air, he blew out a huge ball of inferno to scorch all the mud underneath his feet.

The flames hit the swamp dead on target. The mud, letting out a hiss of steam, hardened down the ground almost instantaneously. On top of which, Naruto landed a second later and instantly was on guard seeing all the steam now covering him.

"I guess they forgot about the no ninjutsu part…" Duy pointed out, Sakumo bobbed his head up and down in agreement with his teammate's words. But it was just like Naruto to not even care for rules. He had seen that small smirk of pure joy on his face right before that opening fire jutsu came from the Uchiha.

The boy was enjoying it to the fullest and couldn't care less about rules right now he mused, though couldn't help the smile that broke on his lips within himself.

The two boys on the branch looked by their side only to see Tsunade looking on with narrowed eyes into the steam to see any signs of the fight. And both smiled seeing her far too engrossed in spectating to care about the world around her right now.

They were of the same mind as her a moment later…

Naruto's ears picked up on the small buzzing sound by his left, while his eyes caught onto the subtle shift in steam from said direction and plucked his hands into his leg holster almost involuntarily off his instincts.

Throwing out some deadly metal stars with an expertly executed flick of his wrists that would have made any shinobi proud. His shuriken met the incoming ones with accuracy that wasn't humanly possible in this hindsight to most shinobi many years his senior.

But he wasn't an Uchiha for nothing…

Though, much to his surprise - he didn't hear any metallic clangs as he should have. That did confuse him quite a bit as his aim was as immaculate as they came, so he had aimed his shurikens with the utmost perfection. Then how the hell…

His Sharingan did catch onto the slight glowing objects heading straight for him, the glow wasn't perfectly blue which meant…

"Shit!" only by a hair's margin did he dodge the shuriken's heading straight for his right arm. Even after dodging it completely - and he was damn sure he had dodged it cleanly. His right bicep received a deep slash.

"This damn steam is annoying me now!" the Uchiha glowered inwardly, his opponent wasn't the only one who knew Wind Release…

His hands clasped themselves in the Bird seal. Letting his chakra coat him, he let it burst out a moment later after mixing it with said element to make a huge gust of wind go off all around him. Nothing much, not that he needed as much right now.

But it did blow away the steam surrounding them completely…

Naruto looked on in front of him, clutching his right bicep that bled profusely and stained his right sleeve scarlet as tightly as he could. Only to see Orochimaru smirking ever so slightly in triumph.

The boy had after all landed the first blow…

"Should we stop now?" Orochimaru asked, his voice containing more of a taunt than worry and Naruto's crimson eyes narrowed in on him dangerously.

Was he mocking him?

..

..

Him?!

The tomoes in his crimson eyes spun at dazzling speeds, almost blurring out of existence into a black circle. His Sharingan shone bloody crimson even more brightly than before.

Almost in a predatory manner when he fed it the required potent chakra he had been accumulating for a while now, concentrating it all behind the largely developed chakra coils right behind the retina of his eyes.

"Oh boy …" Duy whispered, already knowing what was coming.

"… He shouldn't have taunted him…" Sakumo murmured in continuation of his words, and started concentrating on his dumpling instead of the fight.

Jiraiya though looked up quite confused seeing their disinterested faces.

It was almost as if they believed it was…

"It's over." Tsunade finished his musings out loud, hopping down from her branch to stand by his side. Jiraiya looked on at her with a look that screamed 'stupid', not that she paid any attention to him.

Jiraiya saw her looking intently at Naruto's back. More specifically his bleeding arm that the Uchiha had clutched with his other palm, to reduce the blood loss as much as he could and Jiraiya couldn't quite understand what was going on after this point in the spar.

He did see Orochimaru's eyes going wide and Jiraiya grew even more confused when Orochimaru started swatting away his hands all around him, at nothing in particular.

"Oi! Orochi, what hell are you hitting at?" Jiraiya asked the mentally retarded looking boy, who continued on his stupid looking act of flatting away something they couldn't quite see but he certainly could.

A few seconds later, Jiraiya saw his eyes become glazed before he was falling down sideways like a fallen sack of potatoes.

As soon as he hit the ground, Duy had caught him in a flash of green to avoid his face hitting the ground while Tsunade ran to Naruto's side hurriedly.

The Uchiha in question let out a tired sigh and shook his head, it had taken quite a toll on him. He could already feel the splitting headache striking in, genjutsu could be such a pain...

He opened his eyes in a snap, feeling two palms covering his temples when he felt a soothing feeling wash all over him. His vision focused in, only to gaze into the ever worried golden orbs he had seen quite a few times now in his life now.

It was a worried Tsunade…

"What did you show him?" she asked softly, letting a little of her chakra into his head to sooth his chronic headache.

"Nothing too much, just some butterflies that showered him their poisonous sleeping pores to knock him unconscious…" he muttered, each word causing him to wince with a splitting pulse in his head.

Tsunade massaged his temples in soothing circles, letting her medical chakra doing it's work to sooth his pain and smiled softly seeing him enjoying it quite a bit with a content smile flashing over his lips.

It must have been that B-ranked one he had been tinkering with over the past month, she mused silently and dropped her technique. He could have made it a lot painful though, she knew that much - just a little tinkering here and there and she knew those butterflies could have been anything else.

Anything painful…

She giggled though, seeing his annoyed frown at feeling that amazing relief not being there anymore when she let her medical chakra drop from her palms.

"I have to take care that too you reckless idiot." she scolded him sternly,while swatting his palm away from the bleeding wound. The boy shrunk down slightly seeing her angry face, and didn't say anything more so as to not aggravate her any more than he already might have. And let her work her magic on it...

"What the hell happened to him?" Jiraiya finally asked, seeing Sakumo putting two fingers on the slumped boy's forehead while holding a half ram seal with his free hand to jolt the boy awake with a small pulse of his own chakra.

"I put him under a genjutsu to knock him out…" Naruto spoke with a wince when Tsunade put some drops of an orange liquid on his wound, before tucking back the glass vial in her hip pouch and putting some cotton over the disinfected gash.

She applied some pressure onto it to make the bleeding halt forcefully, and took out a roll of bandage before wrapping it all around his arm in tight circles. Purposefully tightening it each time to see him cringe in pain.

"Kuso! Be gentle!" he almost hissed in pain upon feeling her making the bandage almost painfully tight. She smiled a little before turning it into a lopsided frown.

"Stop being such a baby. If you don't want to feel this, then don't get hurt so stupidly in the first place. It was just a spar, there was no need for you two to get so damn serious!" she chortled him down furiously, putting the final knot down on the bandage and cheekily smiled seeing him nod in defeat.

He really had gotten carried away, but still he had ended it quickly too he mused…

...

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