Naruto was bored as he watched some of the fights that went through after Usagis and found them to be.. lacking. Shikamaru beat some music note headband wearing girl who used senbon with bells. The girls strategy wasn't obvious to most til the end but Naruto had seen it for what it was. With the utilizations of sound based jutsu and the foci being the bells on the senbon the plan was to disorientate the Nara and wear him down to submission but he had to give Shikamarus intelligence due. As he ensnared the girls shadow with a clever use of the Kagemane no jutsu and made her smash her own head against the wall to knock her out he winced. "And that ladies & gents is what I call a probable concussion if not a fractured skull judging by how loud that crack was" the blonde said as he saw the oi-nin cart off the unconscious girl after the Nara was declared winner.
"Twenty ryo on a concussion" Tenten said holding up the corresponding note.
"Fifty ryo says concussion and skull fracture."
"Hundred on compound skfarwfracture."
Naruto began jotting down names of the ninjas, the bets and their wager amounts ignoring the incredulous stares of the council and his father. Closing the notebook he sealed it up before he took the money and stored the money in a separate seal. "All proper monies will be dispersed at the completion of the preliminaries. All bets ars final. No bitching, whining or moaning if you lose. If you lose and try to get a forceful refund from me I will run you through with my sword and send your dead body back to family with a rather disgracing note stabbed into your forehead. Capiche?" he asked looking around at the ninja who nodded. It was then he realized he had more than just the betters looking at him. "What are you waiting for? Randomize the next damn match already! We aint got all fuckin day" he said with a rather snappy glare.
Tenten sighed as her and Temari were the next match. "Great..." she muttered to herself. A chance to prove herself and she had to go up against her lover who was perfect counter. In her sulking she missed the brief exchange between Naruto and her girlfriend.
Temari slipped something into Tentens back weapon pouch and gave her ass a subtle squeeze that went unseen by everyone save Naruto. "Compressed wind paper bomb. We both need this win but I need it a little more for appearances sake love. Near the end I have a wind jutsu that will send you flying toward the ceiling. Activate the paper bomb before you hit, it'll disperse most of the blow and cushion the damage you do take. I'll make it up to you later. Trust me" she signalled silently with her hands that looked like she was stretching her digits to almost everyone.
Tenten nodded her head slightly in understanding. "You better" she mouthed silently as they faced off.
Naruto didn't take bets on the match already knowing the outcome before it would happen. Feeling a tug on his pants he looked down and saw the little bunny Usagi had been coddling earlier. Kneeling down he offered a hand for it to sniff amd chuckled as the rabbit nuzzled its furry little head against his fingers. "You know you're going to worry Usagi-san running off like this little one" he said picking the little summon up like a small child. While idly stroking its fur he noticed his teammates look at him oddly as the all kunoichi team came over with a worried Usagi asking everyone if they saw her little summon Usa-chan. "Easy Usagi, shes right here chilling with me."
Usagi looked at Naruto and sighed in relief as a smile came to her lips seeing the baby summon poke its head up from the blondes hands. "Sorry for the distraction Foxy. Little Usa-chan is a handful sometimes. Being the baby of the litter shes a lot more prone to wander than her siblings. I can take her off your hands if you want" she said reaching for the little summon only to yelp at her finger being bitten. Little Usa-chans teeth might not be sharp yet, sharp for a rabbit anyway, but being bitten was never a pleasant experience. "Bad Usa-chan, that was mean" she said scolding the baby bunny who snuggled its tiny furry form into Narutos hands contently. As farw as she could tell her summon found the blondes warmth comfortable even if he did smell like a fox and it should alarm the summons sense of danger & self preservation.
Naruto snickered softly under the glare and shook his head. "Its ok, shes no hassle" he said scratching under Usa-chans chin making a furry foot thump happily on his hand. "Besides we aren't going anywhere anyways. Why don't you and your teammates join us. Until everyone finishes their matches and the finals matches are selected we're stuck here anyways. Pleasant company is always a welcome thing right guys?" he asked looking to Naruko and Nora who gave non-commital grunts and wary looks. "Don't mind them, they're still mad at me about what happened in the forest."
"Well Foxy" Hera snickered at Usagi pouting at her like she was trying to scold her friend and teammate for using the nickname without permission "you did knock them out"
"-and put them into a stasis seal" Aris continued.
"and spent four days with the enemy fighting off the other competion to ensure you passed" the two girls finished together in unison. Looking between themselves they punched each other making each other plummet into craters on the balcony.
Naruto resisted the urge to palm his face as he set little Usa-chan on his shoulder, the baby bunny making a comfortable snuggle corner just under his shirt between the soft material and his warm skin with soft fluffy head & ears poking out cutely. "You two are not twins. You do not have a right to do the creepy twin speak thing where you finish each others half-cocked sentences or ideas" he said with a pointed look. He noted Usagis soft sagely nod in agreement while Hera and Aris gave pouting glares at him.
"Spoil"
"Sport!"
Around his hand Naruto gave another look as he didn't resist the need to facepalm himself this time. "Usagi, can you do me a favor and thwack your teammates upside the head for me? Its bad enough I have a fellow genin in my village idolizes his sensei enough to copy everything about him even.." He shuddered killing the thought of Gai and Lee before it could fully develop. Seeing the girl nod and hop, he snickered internally as it was adorably cute considering her summons are rabbits, thwack her teammates he thanked the white haired girl with a pat on the head. Despite some people staring oddly and more than a few kunoichi glaring thinking he was being a chauvinistic man and patronizing her with the action he ignored them as did Usagi. She understood he meant the gesture in its innocent intent, not a rude or patronizng way that most shinobi would use it on their counter-parts. "Thanks bun bun."
"Anytime Foxy. The twin speak thing is creepy anyway" Usagi said as she looked back to the match in time to see the brown haired girl hit the ceiling in loud crash of smoke obscuring her from view before she fell to the floor.
"Winner Temari of Suna."
Tenten was banged up pretty good, her clothes were ripped in several places from wind jutsu though none of the rips were anywhere thst might be prone to accidental indecent exposure, and her clothes were bloodied but for fighting someone who was her complete foil she had done pretty well. Temari had her fair share of scrapes, bruises, bloody wounds and ripped clothes but definitely less so than the brown haired kunoichi. Playing the stoic but good natured sport card Naruto watched the blonde offer Tenten a hand up, an offer rhe girl accepted before they both hobbled off to be treated. The next few matches were snoresville for him as the went by predictably, such was the predictability he knew he would make a fortune off bets. By the time his match came up he was already up about the cost of a B-rank mission though no one but him knew that. Yet.
Chouji had lost his match in under five minutes with heavy reliance of his families jutsu being his downfall, right on the money with Narutos bet. Shino made quick work of his opponent by fooling him with his clans bug clone technique before the clone was busted and the kikaichu bugs drained enough of the opponents chakra to knock them out, once more in line with Narutos bet. Kiba narrowly won his match thanks to Akamaru making him nearly lose since the Kiri ninja had used the fog technique to obscure Kibas vision. It was Akamarus nose and attacking from an unseen angle allowing the pup to bite deeply into the boys neck that made him surrender. Nora was still an unknown to him so while he didn't place a bet on Nora he made note of her wide repetoire of earth jutsu she had that she pulled off well in tandem with her clan attacks performed with her nin-ken.
"Naruko Uzumaki-Namikaze vs. Ju Mei."
Naruto watched the match with some interest as his sister faced off against the other Kiri genin who hadn't forefeited at the start of the preliminaries. The clash of swords was rather slow and clumsy under his gaze but to most of the genin around him they were in awe at the 'speed'. While it was clear Ju Mei was a talented budding kenjutsu specialist he spotted the inherent weakness in the girls style right away; she telegraphed her lead and next move with her footwork. He could even see Naruko figured it out with her shift in attack. "This match is over.".
"What do you mean its over? Its barely begun" Nora said looking bewdered.
"Narukos already figured out how to tell how Ju Mei will strike next. Watch Ju Meis feet." Naruto saw the Inzuka raise an eyebrow quizzically. "Just do it" he said exasperated. "Her foot work is sloppy at best and completed untrained at worst even though her fluid motions say she practices with her sword. She practically screams her next move by how sloppily she moves her feet. Despite Naruko not yet having a proper style to her name she recognizes how to read how her opponent is going to strike by the general movements of their foot work." Around him several people nodded in understand noting with critical eyes seeing just how sloppy Ju Meis work truly was.
"You're pretty smart Foxy. You ever think of teaching?" Usagi asked as she stood on her tip toes and offered a carrot to her summon who nestled out of Narutos shirt and nibbled on it.
"Eh, maybe. Its too safe in my opinion. I'm a bit of an adrenaline junkie bun bun" Naruto said shrugging the shoulder that Usa-chan wasn't resting on.
'A 'bit of an adrenaline junkie' is an understatement kit and you know it' Hitomi snorted in Narutos head. 'You snuck into that mutant tigers cave a couple of weeks ago and poked it awake with a stick enraging it before running away for the hell of it! I mean getting an adrenaline kick is all fine and well but you push it a bit too far sometimes. You're going to give me a heart attack one of these days with your stunts!'
Naruto sweatdropped mentally at the rant. 'No offense kaa-chan but you're a pure chakra construct. You don't have a physical heart to have a heart attack. Even when I summon you you're more or less in the body of a really durable shadow clone so don't try that argument either' he thought back in retort as he heard Naruko be called the winner of her match, Ju Meis sword knocked out of her hands and Narukos sword held to her opponents throat.
'Cheeky kit. Giving your mother lip like that I should smack you upside the head with my tails' Hitomi thought with a pout.
'Shes right brother, you do take it a little far too often' Naruko thought adding her own mental two cents. 'If you knew the word restraint we wouldn't be getting grey hairs. I mean come on, you might live for an adrenaline high but that doesn't mean be stupid about it.'
Naruto pouted at the two pronged attack as Naruko settled back up in the wings. This just wasn't fair. Why was he being attacked for wanting to live the fun side of side of life?! 'You two just don't know how to live on the fun side of life!' he retorted childishly.
"Naruto vs Yoroi! Come on down to the arena!"
The blonde boy shook his head and jumped over the railing with little fanfare ignoring the stares. Taking a moment to observe his opponent he felt there was something wrong with this match up. It wasn't the Yoroi kids appearance but his chakra felt wrong somehow. He barely heard the "Hajime!" around his thoughts before dodging back from a palm strike. "Yare yare, that wasn't very nice" Naruto said in a lacksadaisical tone like he was scolding a child.
"We're ninja if you haven't noticed. We don't do nice" Yoroi said with a twitchy brow. Kabuto had told him Orochimaru wanted the Namikaze brats alive but the boy set his hairs on end. There was something wrong with him and his sister. Their chakra seemed tainted and foul for some reason, more so than those who have Orochimarus curse seals.
"Oh I wouldn't say that. Oi-nin are quite nice. Well as long ss you don't do anything to piss them off. Piss em off and then all bets are off." Naruto dodged another strike and deflected a kunai slice with the metal plate on the back of his gloves. 'Thank kami I pulled these out and on during Pandas match' he thought seeing the serrated edges kick up sparks as he drew his sword. "You see there was this one time I was training in here in the forest. Had a grand old time cutting through trees like paper." One slash met Yorois kunais as the male charged at him and tried a taijutsu combo on him. "Then I got bit on the ass by this giant wolf. Had to be the size of a bear."
Up in the stands Naruko palmed her face. Why for the love of Kami was he doing this now?! It was inconsequential and distracting but it was like he didn't care about about the small details of his life being known.
"Your brother is equal parts genius and stupid blondie" Nora said nodding her head. She saw Narutos idea to distract with something so innane as plausible to give him an edge but somerhing that was 'embarrassing'? Now that was srupid genius at work right there.
Yoroi glared behind the dark glasses shading his eyes. This boy was really annoying. Mostkof his attacks were being dodged or hit head on that he couldn't use his chakra draining technique. Dodging a series of swings from Narutos sword he had an idea come to him. Grinning behind the dark blue veil hiding his lower face he managed to slip in the blondes guard and managed a hard combo to his torso taking a fair chunk of chakra with the heavy blows. "Not so talkative now are you blondie?" he asked with a superior tone seeing Naruto spit out blood.
Blue eyes seemed to frost over as he wiped his mouth. He hadn't been trying beford but now Yoroi asked for it. "Katsu." The single command left his lips and he watched apathetically as the male stood fine for a moment. All of a sudden as he began to approach the laughing male he saw Yoroi double over in agony. His skin seemed to begin bubbling and burning as a scream of agony tore out of the guys throat. "You thought your little technique was cute huh?" he asked with an icy tone. One hnad yanked the head up as the other clutched his opponents neck. "You killed yourself moron." He ignored the burning in his hand as he used Hitomis youkai to burn an explosive seal into Yorois neck. "Non-jinchuriki can't handle youkai in their bodies, it kills them slowly and agonizingly" he said low enough so only the dying man would hear. "So I'll grant you mercy." Stepping back he snapped his fingers and walked away as the seal glowed before it exploded outwards. Bits of flesh, bone and muscle blew around staining the stone red with gore as the body dropped to ground dead.
Up in the coucil section Minato and the councilors, the civillian ones, were in shock. Death was expected in the chunin exams but for such a callous display from the Hokages son was horrifying to them. "Hokage-sama did we jus-"
"Winner Naruto! Can I get a corpse removal team out here?"
"Yes. Yes we did and my son was right. His opponent made a fatal mistake in his action." Minatos eyes were indifferent as he scowled deeply. He had hoped to use Naruto barely beating Yoroi as a chance to make the boy see he needed more training from a qualified person,him precisely, to worm his way into his eldest childs good graces. That plan was up in smoke. "Uzumaki chakra is corrosive to anyone who isn't an Uzumaki and Yoroi would have died an agonizing slow death from taking my sons chakra with his technique. Brutal and unnecessary as the gory kill was, that was mercy."
Down in the arena Naruto took a moment to catalogue his injuries for a moment. A few cuts and bruises to his chest from the combo that Yoroi managed to get in alongside a few blood cuts were the teeth of the kunai had cut him but nothing to serious. A poof of smoke filled the arena making him curious.
"What in the name of the idiot sage do you think you were doing toying around like that?!" Out of the smoke a very pissed off woman stared expectantly at Naruto. Her arms were crossed under her considerable bust and the tight dress left little to the imagination making many in the wings of the arena blush.
"That I shouldn't show all my damn cards like we discussed" Naruto shot back defiantly. "Honestly Levi, have a tiny amount of faith in your clans summoner. I mean for fucks sake woman its hard enough to keep idiots from trying to spy on my training to begin with."
Leviathan narrowed her eyes at her nephew and scowled darkly. Yes she was upset with him for toying around so much with his dead opponent but revealing he could carve seals with chakra alone would draw unwanted attention. "Well when my summoner shows a little more respect to those higher in the contract I'll consider cutting you slack" she said slipping back to the rehearsed conversation they'd come up with if she was forced to reveal herself early to the masses.
"When you stop questioning my every move and trust me to not be stupid I might consider being a little more respectful."
Minato looked at the bickering and felt wholly uncomfortable. A single glance around the arena told him he was't the only one. "Naruot move to the.."
"Can it bottle job!" Naruto and Leviathan snapped at once turning their eyes as one upon Minato.
Narukos head dropped onto the stone railing as she groaned.'I will not drink. I will not drink. I will not drink' she thougbt repeating the mantra to herself. Leave it to her brother to make a bigger scene worse when his summon got involved. "This is going to be a long day..." she said kneading her temples as the squabling pair made their way back up the steps to towards them.