My New Life is Harder Than Expected(Naruto SI-Waifu Catalog) (Patreon)

Chapter 6

(A Month Later)

“Winner! Uzumaki Kushina!”

With that announcement came the roar of the crowd up in the stands as Kushina cheered loudly and waved to the crowd.

“Well, that was easy.” Izumi quietly whispered as she looked down from the competitor’s box.

“What did you expect? Genin are usually not that much stronger than Academy students these days.” I whispered back as I leaned against the railing.

“I guess it’s easy to forget how strong we’ve gotten in the past year.”

“Yea-Whoa!” My response was cut short as I felt someone jump on my back and heard a loud squeal in my ear.

“Did you see me Akari? Huh? Did you see? I was all like ‘swoosh’ and then ‘bam’ and then he went ‘whoaa’ before fainting like a sissy.” Kushina asked me excitedly as she made exaggerated noises and gestures with her hands.

“Hahaha yeah. You were great Kushina. You’ve definitely improved this past month.” I chuckled and held her thighs to make sure she wouldn’t fall off.

“Hihihi, that was nothing ttebane~ Wait until you see my real moves.”

“That’s great and all but get off of him already Kushina. It’s Akari’s turn next.” Izumi said with a deadpan.

“Oh! That’s right!” Kushina exclaimed in surprise before jumping off my back and slapping my back with a grin on her face. “Give them hell Akari!”

“Good luck, not that you’ll need it.” Izumi said with a smile offering me her own encouragement.

“Thanks girls.”

Giving the girls a smile, I jumped over the railing down onto the arena when I heard my name being called. Standing across from me was some random Suna ninja who was currently glaring at me.

Ignoring him I instead used the small time before the match started to stretch my body letting out a slight groan at my bones popping. I was currently wearing Rimuru’s black and grey outfit after he had become a demon lord with the Senju Clan symbol stitched on both sides of my sleeves.

“Now let the fourth match…Begin!”

Immediately after announcing that I had to turn my head to the side and dodge the kunai thrown my way. Before my opponent could make another move though, he suddenly grunted in pain before falling unconscious revealing a Doton: Kage Bunshin behind him that dissolved into mud a second later.

Thanks to having both Trace and Information Defense I was basically undetectable to everyone unless I wished otherwise. The moment the fight had started, I had created the clone and had it go underground and wait for the opening move before striking.

Turning to the surprised proctor, who was none other than Gekko Hayate, I raised my eyebrow at the man who seemed surprised at how quick the match had ended.

“W-Winner! Senju Akari!”

There was silence for a moment before the whole arena erupted in cheers and applause with dozens of people chanting my name.

Raising my hand and waving a bit only seemed to invigorate the crowd. Even with all the noise around me though I could clearly hear one voice above all others yelling her lungs off.

“YEAH! GO AKARI! I KNEW YOU WOULD KISS THAT PANSY’S ASS!”

It was Kushina of course, whom was currently waving her hands in the air trying to get my attention with Izumi beside her also cheering, just not nearly as loud as the redhead.

Chuckling at Kushina’s enthusiasm, I performed a quick Shunshin and appeared beside them immediately getting pounced by both of them.

“Looks like we will have to face each other in the semifinals.” I commented with a smile bringing the girls closer to my arms.

“I always expected that anyways. Just make sure to not go easy on us, okay?” Izumi said looking up at me sternly.

“Yeah! I’ll be super mad at you if you go easy on us, so you better not!” Kushina added also looking up at me and giving me a pout.

“Haha, don’t worry girls I wouldn’t dare.”

Our turn arrived sooner than we expected and now I found myself facing Izumi who now stood across from me in a relaxed stance.

“Let the match…Begin!”

None of us moved after the signal was given as we just stared at each other with a smile on our face. Then letting out a small laugh, I got into a Taijutsu stance with Izumi doing the same while also activating her Sharingan. I unfortunately couldn’t activate mine in public yet as the Hokage wanted me to wait until I was a Jonin in order to announce both my Uchiha heritage and my Mokuton.

“Let’s see how far you have truly improved Izumi.” I muttered lowly before we both disappeared from sight and reappeared in the middle and engaged in a Taijutsu fight.

“Bring it.” Izumi muttered weaving around my fists and kicks knowing it would be all over if she was hit even once due to my overwhelming strength.

Not that that I would ever seriously hurt her of course and why I had lowered my strength to the point that I would only bruise her at most even if she got hit.

“That’s the spirit~”

We traded blows for a few minutes letting the audience see what we could do before coming to a stop and jumping apart from each other and ending on opposite sides of the arena.

“Excellent, now for Ninjutsu…” As soon as I finished saying that, our hands blurred as we ran through a set of hand seals and ending on the tiger sign.

“Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu.”

A huge fireball was released from our mouths before meeting in the middle and battling for supremacy for a moment before exploding.

Having the advantage in chakra capacity I quickly created a Shadow Clone and together we both ran through hand seals and shouted at the same time.

“Futon: Atsugai!”

“Katon: Zukokku!”

The last thing I saw was Izumi’s wide eyes before an explosion of wind and fire engulfed half the arena causing some of the audience to scream in surprise and some wondering if I had gone overboard and killed my teammate.

With the Tenseigan I had received from Capturing Hinata, I remained calm knowing Izumi had managed to escape the blast radius by jumping towards the arena wall. In fact, like a good shinobi, she had used the distraction from the blast to sneak behind me causing a small proud smile to form on my face.

“Got you.” A whispered voice came behind me as I felt a kunai press into my back.

“Appears so.” I muttered lifting my hands up in surrender.

When the dust from the explosion finally settled down, that was the scene that everyone saw. Silence fell into the arena for a moment before loud cheers were heard at my apparent defeat.

“Winner. Uchiha-

“Rasengan!”

Of course, that was just what I was waiting for. Just as Izumi had used the explosion as a distraction, I had also used it to burrow under the ground and waited for the opportune moment knowing I would remain undetected.

The original me popped up from the ground underneath Izumi with a low powered Rasengan in hand and struck her in the back with the famous jutsu sending Izumi flying through the air with a scream of pain before she landed roughly on the ground and didn’t get back up.

“Ahem. Winner, Senju Akari!”

Ignoring how the crowd went wild, I used a quick Shunshin and teleported next to Izumi quickly crouching down and checking her vitals.

‘Hah, good. She’s just unconscious.’ I thought in relief before quickly using the Mystical Palm Technique or Shosen Jutsu, making my hands glow with green healing chakra, and got to healing Izumi.

Thankfully since it was not a fully powered Rasengan, I was able to heal Izumi in a short time feeling my shoulders sag in relief when she opened her eyes moments later.

“Easy… While I healed most of the damage, I hit you pretty hard with that last attack.” I spoke soothingly helping her get back to her feet.

“Ugh, I’m fine…just a little dizzy. Haah while I knew I couldn’t beat you; I didn’t think I would fall for the same trick as that Suna ninja.” Izumi said with a sad tone.

“Don’t beat yourself up over it, I kind of cheated knowing you wouldn’t be able to sense me. I also used those eyes to keep track of you.” I tried to say in encouragement as we made our way back to the competitor’s box slowly amongst the cheers of the crowd.

“No,” Izumi denied with a shake of her head before offering me a small smile.

“You beat me fair and square. We are Shinobi, it is practically our bread and butter to use all tools at our disposal. Besides I know you also lowered your strength so you wouldn’t hurt me so please don’t feel bad about it. I’m just a little upset I fell for a trick I had already seen you use.” Izumi explained gently to me showing no anger or resentment in her eyes.

“I see.” I said turning my head away not knowing how to respond to that but feeling glad nonetheless that she wasn’t upset with me.

“Haah, I’m fine you idiot. If you really want to make it up to me however, promise to make me some dango and everything is forgiven.” Izumi said with a small roll of her eyes as she poked me in the ribs making me squirm a bit as that was a ticklish spot for me.

“Deal!”

Half an hour later I had to make the same deal with a pouty Kushina who had given me the cold shoulder until I had offered to make her some Ramen for beating her as well.

The fight this time had been more destructive due to Kushina also having absurd chakra reserves. We basically spent the first five minutes just throwing jutsu at each other before I got bored and used Genjutsu on her, with it lasting just long enough for me to get the drop on her and immobilize her.

With the end of that fight, the Chunin Exams finally came to an end with me being declared the winner.

=====

“This should do.”

Hearing those words I came to a stop, landing on one of the many trees of the Forest of Death after following the Hokage and one of his Anbu for the past few minutes.

It had been a few days since the Chunin Exams and since our team had officially been promoted to Chunin. After receiving my promotion, I had been told to stay behind where the Hokage had announced that he would be taking over my training for the next few months.

Knowing I didn’t really have any choice in the matter unless I wanted to look suspicious, I had accepted and today I had been summoned to his office where immediately upon arrival the Hokage had asked me to follow.

Jumping down from the tree I was on, I landed in front of the Hokage and the Anbu beside him.

“Akari-kun allow me to introduce you to Yamato, whom will be taking over your training when I’m busy with my duties.” Hiruzen introduced mentioning to Yamato beside him who silently removed his mask.

“Nice to meet you Yamato-sensei?” I asked with a raised eyebrow not really knowing the proper title for the man.

“Sensei will do just fine.” Yamato nodded his head in acknowledgement.

“Good, good. Now before we begin, tell me. Have you practiced with your Mokuton since you awakened it?” Hiruzen asked curiously.

“Yes Hokage-sama.” I nodded my head. “Mokuton just comes easy for me so I’ve had no trouble performing any of the techniques I remember reading about.”

“Interesting.” Hiruzen said stroking his beard for a bit before nodding to himself and discarding his robes and Hokage hat, revealing his black battle robes underneath.

“Now I want you to come at me with everything you got. If I’m going to be training you, I need to know where you currently stand.” He stated jumping backwards and settling in a ready stance.

‘Fuck, seems I won’t be able to hide my strength any longer. Not that I was really hiding it but this could bring more attention to me if Root learns what I can do.’ I thought hiding the small grimace from my face thinking of Danzo and Orochimaru, whom I had a feeling would learn about me soon if they didn’t know already.

“Very well.” I finally said taking a deep breath and releasing the tight control I had over my chakra, cracking the floor beneath me.

The last thing I noticed before I focusing completely on the Hokage, was Yamato jumping away from the clearing.

=====

I got my ass kicked.

Since I couldn’t use any other powers except those I had received from my Hashirama TS and those I had learned myself unless I brought suspicion upon me, I had no choice but to resort to Ninjutsu, Taijutsu and Fuinjutsu.

Ninjutsu, I had come to learn meant almost nothing against the man known as The Professor who knew all chakra transformations with a great efficiency and knew all jutsu from the village. Even my Mokuton proved ineffective in the end due to the confined space we were fighting in and my other techniques being too big and destructive.

My Fuinjutsu had also been countered as I didn’t want to reveal my Hiraishin yet and performing seals required a bit of time, something that the old man clearly didn’t give me. Lastly my Taijutsu was also useless as while I was very physically strong, I just didn’t have the speed and experience yet fighting such a strong opponent.

Well, if I was honest with myself, that was just my pride talking. I had lost fair and square.

Today I had learned just how much of a monster Hiruzen was and that I needed more experience fighting while in close quarters. The only positive that had come out of this had been that since I had my Sharingan active throughout the battle, I had copied the Hokage’s Taijutsu style.

“That was splendidly done, Akari-kun.” Hiruzen praised with a smile as he stood in front of me with his hands crossed behind his back.

“Thank you, Hokage-sama.” I muttered quietly.

“What did you think, Yamato?” Hiruzen asked looking to the left where Yamato appeared moments later with a Shunshin.

“I agree Hokage-same. While young, he shows great promise.” Yamato offered his opinion with a nod of his head not looking surprised at my current strength.

‘The old man informed him no doubt.’ I thought offering a nod of thanks to the man.

“Though it seems there are still some areas of improvement. Like fighting in an enclosed space or against someone who can offer some kind of counter to your Ninjutsu.” Hiruzen continued offering me a smile in amusement.

I tilted my head to the side curiously before it hit me. “So, you already knew that Hokage-sama?”

“I had a feeling. I sparred against Hashirama-sama plenty of times when I was young and he even told me that he faced the same problems in the past.” Hiruzen revealed with his eyes looking up in thought for a moment.

“Now enough about that. Let’s begin.” Hiruzen suddenly said with a small shake of the head and clapping his hands once.

“Right.”