Chapter 45 (Patreon)

“I give up.”

Just when everyone thought Shikamaru’s victory was assured, he raised his hand and surrendered.

The spectators stared in disbelief.

Some of the shinobi watching, however, thought highly of his performance. He had shown that he could plan ahead, weigh his choices, and recognize when to withdraw. Those were qualities a chūnin needed to lead a team.

Naruto had a different take on it. Shikamaru had lost the match, but he’d gained a future wife. That seemed like an excellent trade.

Only Sasuke’s match against Gaara remained.

Kakashi’s habit of arriving late seemed to have rubbed off on Sasuke. Neither of them had shown up yet.

Angry shouts rose from the stands. Many spectators had come specifically to see the young Uchiha fight, and he was still nowhere in sight.

Even the Third Hokage was growing irritated. Just as he was about to announce Sasuke’s disqualification, Orochimaru, still posing as the Kazekage beside him, intervened again and secured another ten minutes.

The minutes dragged by. Just before the final extension expired, leaves whirled into the arena.

Sasuke and Kakashi appeared amid them, making quite a show of their arrival.

Sasuke had changed into a new outfit. The two stood back to back with their hands in their pockets, their weight resting casually on one leg.

Seeing Sasuke arrive, Gaara started down the stairs toward the arena without a change in expression.

Naruto knew Gaara was about to kill the two men in the stairwell who wanted to force him to throw the match. He took Shikamaru back to the contestants’ balcony by walking up the wall, avoiding the stairs entirely.

Gaara was a bomb waiting to go off, and Naruto had no intention of setting him off ahead of schedule. Events needed to unfold in order, without any needless complications in Orochimaru’s Konoha Crush.

Once Gaara entered the arena, the match began.

Sasuke threw two shuriken, which Gaara intercepted with a sand clone. Sasuke immediately punched the clone apart and continued toward Gaara himself.

Gaara raised a wall of sand to block him, but Sasuke suddenly circled behind him.

It was the same movement Rock Lee had used during the preliminaries. Sasuke drove a punch into Gaara’s face, shattering the sand armor covering it.

In the stands, Lee and Might Guy cried out in surprise.

Sasuke kept attacking, and Gaara continued blocking with sand.

Then Sasuke slipped past the sand again. With one fluid turn, he drove a kick into Gaara and sent him flying backward.

Gaara began forming hand seals as he retreated, his expression growing more vicious and cold. Sand rose around him, closing into a thick sphere.

Sasuke tried to strike it, only for spikes to burst from the sand and stab him. Forced back, he stopped to study the barrier.

Gaara created a floating eye of sand—his Third Eye—to watch Sasuke’s movements outside. Within the sphere, he kept muttering and forming hand seals, his behavior becoming increasingly erratic.

After another probing attack, Sasuke realized he couldn’t break through that absolute defense by ordinary means.

He quickly retreated to the arena wall and formed hand seals with both hands, preparing Kakashi’s signature ninjutsu.

Lightning Style: Chidori.

Then he sprinted toward Gaara. The crackling lightning pierced straight through the sand sphere and wounded him inside.

Gaara was stunned by the sight and taste of his own blood. He had never seen himself bleed before. The shock drove him into an even greater frenzy, and he began screaming over and over.

Sasuke struggled to pull his arm free. As he dragged it out, an enormous claw emerged with it, resembling one of Shukaku’s—the One-Tail’s.

The sight made him tremble.

Then the sphere crumbled into loose sand. Gaara reappeared, clutching his wounded shoulder and breathing heavily.

In the stands, Kabuto, disguised as an ANBU operative, finally made his move.

He formed hand seals and cast the Temple of Nirvana Technique, spreading a large-scale genjutsu over the spectators.

Most of them fell asleep. Only a handful of shinobi remained awake.

Naruto’s Sharingan flashed briefly, and he broke free of the genjutsu.

At the same time, the two guards accompanying the false Kazekage threw two smoke bombs. In the confusion, they overpowered the Third Hokage’s guards and discarded their disguises.

Orochimaru held a kunai to the Third Hokage’s neck and forced him onto the broad rooftop.

The Sound Four took positions at its four corners and quickly activated the Four Violet Flames Formation, sealing the rooftop off from the outside.

The Hokage’s guards rushed to rescue him. Those who tried to force their way through the barrier were thrown back the instant they touched it, their bodies engulfed in flames.

The attack involving the Hokage and the false Kazekage served as the signal. The Sand and Sound shinobi lurking outside Konoha immediately began moving.

They summoned an enormous snake with three heads and used it as a battering ram. It smashed through Konoha’s outer wall and rampaged into the village.

More than a hundred shinobi from Sunagakure and Otogakure rushed in and engaged Konoha’s defenders.

The invasion had come too suddenly. Only a small number of Leaf shinobi managed to intercept them in time, and the outnumbered defenders immediately began suffering deaths and injuries.

Back at the exam arena, Naruto leaned against the railing of the contestants’ balcony and watched the chaos below with interest.

He was so excited that he unconsciously licked his lips, looking remarkably like Orochimaru for a moment.

Kankurō and Temari had left the balcony and joined Gaara on the arena floor. He had spent a great deal of chakra and was still in a frenzy.

Baki, their jōnin instructor and the commander of the Sand’s invasion force, stood in front of them, facing Genma Shiranui. The referee held his usual senbon between his teeth.

Baki couldn’t risk releasing the One-Tail while Gaara was so unstable and short on chakra. He also needed to be sure Gaara could regain his senses and bring the tailed beast back under control afterward.

He had no choice but to order Kankurō and Temari to take Gaara somewhere safe, let him recover his chakra, and help him regain his composure.

Genma calmly shielded Sasuke behind him. When he saw Gaara being taken away, he sensed that something was wrong and told Sasuke to pursue them.

In the stands, Kakashi, Might Guy, and Rock Lee were about to go to the Third Hokage’s rescue when Kabuto and a large group of Sound shinobi blocked their way.

Lee had escaped serious injury in the preliminaries thanks to Naruto’s intervention, so he was able to fight alongside them.

Seeing Gaara leave and his prized student Sasuke chase after him alone, Kakashi looked toward Naruto on the distant balcony.

Naruto had already vanished.

After a brief discussion, Kakashi and Guy asked Sakura and Lee to wake Shikamaru. Kakashi then summoned Pakkun, his talking ninja dog, to accompany the three of them after Sasuke.

Their task was to catch up to him and bring him back safely.

Kakashi could already tell that something was wrong with Gaara. He feared Sasuke and the others might not be able to handle him.

Naruto, meanwhile, had left to prepare a generous gift for Konoha.

He had Orochimaru and Sunagakure to thank for making it possible.

Not long after Kankurō and Temari fled with Gaara, Naruto’s double, disguised as a masked woman with red hair, intercepted them.

She appeared without warning and knocked Kankurō and Temari back with ease. Then she reached out, touched Gaara, and vanished with him.

Only Kankurō and Temari remained, staring in shock.