[The advantage is mine~!]
[Dying, raising flags this hard before the fight's even started]
[Flags all over the place]
[Let's leave Naruto's mom out of it for now—Naruto himself kept pace with Hanabi all the way to the Central Tower, so the raw stats are right there]
[Naruto's own ability is plenty. That absurd chakra reserve alone is terrifying]
[He just doesn't know any ninjutsu, so on the showmanship front he comes off worse than Sasuke]
[Got it, Kankuro is the Hidden Sand's designated chump]
The audience understood Naruto better than Kankuro did.
"This time I'll make you pay!"
Kankuro sneered.
But right then, Naruto suddenly raised his hand.
"???"
Watching from the sidelines, Ibiki Morino flinched on reflex at the sight of someone raising a hand—all the more so when that someone was Naruto, on the same squad as Hanabi.
"What is it?" Hayate Gekko asked.
"Is it really okay for this guy to gang up two-on-one? That's cheating!" Naruto jabbed a finger at Kankuro.
"Idiot, that's a puppet—a kind of ninja tool, about the same as a shuriken!" Sasuke had appointed himself Naruto's personal commentator.
"How's that fair?! What a cheap trick!"
Naruto's gaze shifted to the bandage-wrapped "puppet" over there.
And Kankuro, meanwhile, thought: This is bad.
This blond brat—had he seen through to his real body?
The tactical puppet Karasu was now disguised as Kankuro, while the real Kankuro was the "puppet" wrapped in bandages.
What's going on—why does this guy's gaze keep landing on my real body?!
Something felt very, very off to Kankuro.
Was this kid's perception really that sharp?
"All right then—Ninth Preliminary Match—begin!"
At Hayate Gekko's call, Kankuro moved at once.
He sent the Karasu disguised as himself charging straight in.
"I'm not gonna fight a puppet!"
Naruto vaulted right over Kankuro's puppet and made a beeline for the "real Kankuro" set down on the ground.
"Damn it, he really did recognize me!"
Well, if he'd been recognized, then no more hiding.
Kankuro burst straight out of the bandages.
Then, together with the puppet disguised as Kankuro, he pincered Naruto from both sides.
Kankuro didn't want to fully reveal his puppet's power just yet.
"Perfect—I've already got Karasu disguised as me. No idea how this guy figured it out, but as long as the battlefield's chaotic, he won't be able to tell!"
So when he saw Naruto charging in, Kankuro just lobbed a smoke bomb.
"Naruto picked out the real body straight off? Nice!"
Sasuke was happy for him.
But once the smoke bomb went off, Sasuke started sweating on Naruto's behalf.
Sure, he'd seen through the opponent—but the opponent only had to swap identities behind a screen of smoke and that was that.
"Still, too naive—Naruto can use Shadow Clones too!"
Sasuke was full of confidence in him.
Inside the smoke, the two Kankuros kept shifting and weaving, until there was no telling anymore which was which.
And then—
"Thwack!"
Naruto charged in and sent Kankuro flying with a single punch.
"Nani?!"
Picked out again.
Sent sailing, Kankuro still wore a look of utter disbelief.
And not just Kankuro—Sasuke, who'd assumed Naruto would answer with a Shadow Clone, was equally dumbfounded.
—How did Naruto land that hit?
Kankuro had been certain his puppet's disguise was flawless, never dreaming it could be seen through.
This time, refusing to believe it, he chucked another smoke bomb.
"Hah!"
But Naruto threw another punch and sent Kankuro flying again.
"Damn it, how can you see through my disguise?!"
Kankuro scrambled up off the ground.
"Even if you ask me that," Naruto scratched his head, "only your real body's got chakra flowing through it, right? I'm not an idiot—how could I not tell the difference?"
[Dying, Stephen Chow landing hits by watching the feet, is that it]
[What ancient twenty-year-old meme is this]
[Naruto: you can call me dumb, but you can't call me stupid]
[Dying. Hahaha. But Naruto's sense for chakra really is amazing]
[Hold on—isn't a perception-type skill usually a heroine's support ability?]
[Nani, so Naruto's actually in the heroine slot?]
[What, so Naruto's the heroine?]
[Huh? Sasuke's the male lead, and the female lead is Naruto]
[Wait, where's my Director Hanabi?]
[The wedding officiant]
A smile crept across Hanabi's face.
Couldn't help it—she couldn't hold it in. The "wedding officiant" bit had hit Hanabi's funny bone dead-on.
Good thing Hanabi was always smiling anyway; even if she cracked and laughed out loud, it wouldn't seem the least bit out of place.
Over on the other side, Kankuro had reached his limit.
If his strength couldn't even beat one ordinary genin, then there was no point hiding it any longer.
"Black Secret Technique: Hand Daggers!"
Karasu broke out of Kankuro's "disguise" and revealed its true form. The puppet rushed straight in, both hands unfolding to bare two poison-coated short blades.
"Shadow Clone Jutsu!"
Naruto finally used the Shadow Clone Jutsu.
"Thwap thwap thwap!"
"Waugh!"
In the instant the shadow clone vanished, Naruto's scalp went numb.
Because a shadow clone feeds its sensations back to the original, that poisoned jolt from right before it popped still left Naruto tingling all over.
"You're playing so cheap! Poison-coating them, seriously?! Ref, isn't this against the rules?!"
Naruto was thoroughly annoyed.
"Ah, any means are permitted... ahem, ahem..."
Even Hayate Gekko was left a little speechless.
"Whatever—it doesn't matter. In that case, I'll let you try out my special move!"
Naruto decided he was done playing around with this cheater.
"Here it comes—that chain."
The thing Kankuro feared most was the chain Naruto put out.
Those chains, like tentacles, were tremendously powerful—they could even rip a person right out of his hands, and almost "instant-cast" at that; a seriously formidable jutsu, you could say.
But then Naruto split off a single shadow clone.
And the clone began working something into shape in Naruto's right hand.
Kankuro didn't know what Naruto was doing, but the swirl of chakra in his hand looked awfully familiar.
"It's a bit like that seal-less jutsu Uchiha Sasuke used before—but this one doesn't seem to have any nature transformation."
Sasuke's technique—the one where his punch landed and made the target erupt in flames all over—was still fresh in Kankuro's memory.
But if there was no nature transformation, then it meant this move wasn't all that strong.
"Karasu—Black Secret Technique—!"
Kankuro had Karasu press its attack again.
What Kankuro didn't know, though, was that the moment Naruto started "working up his spinning ball," the Third Hokage and the others out beyond the ring had already stopped being able to sit still.
"The way it's performed is a little different, but this technique... no mistake. It's that move." The Third had recognized it—this was the Rasengan.
And Kakashi looked toward Hanabi. "On a whim, was it... did she really reconstruct this move?"