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Minutes before the start of the first match...
In the Kazekage's office, steam from the freshly poured tea rose slowly into the air. Far from the constant murmur and noise of the village, three of Sunagakure's most influential figures meticulously observed the scrolls of reports laid out on a wide wooden table.
Daigo, wearing his formal Kazekage robes adorned with intricate embroidery representing the desert winds, kept a serene gaze on the records of casualties, injured, and qualifiers.
Beside him, Rasa, with a remarkably relaxed posture and a faint smile that was a far cry from the usual political coldness he typically projected before ambassadors, took a sip from his porcelain cup before breaking the silence.
"I must admit that the incoming report caught me completely by surprise, Daigo," Rasa commented, placing the cup gently back on its saucer. "Of all the delegations that crossed the Demon Desert in this test, I never expected Konoha's team to be the first to take a life in direct combat. Honestly, I thought the Leaf kids would uphold that strict doctrine of containment and preservation of life that Minato and his Kage predecessors so fervently preach."
"Team 7 has proven to be far more pragmatic than they appear on paper," Daigo replied, sliding a scroll sealed with red wax toward the third man in the room. "Especially after that grueling encounter they had against Daiku amid the dunes—it seems to have made them take things much more seriously."
Sasori, who remained standing by the window looking out over the village, took the report without making a sound.
"The detailed medical report from the tower confirms that the Aburame from Konoha, Shino, had to be evacuated in extremely critical condition," Sasori added in a measured, technical, and professional voice. "The compressed air blades executed by your daughter Temari destroyed over eighty percent of his symbiotic bug colonies and inflicted severe internal lacerations in his chest cavity. At this very moment, he is in intensive care at the village central hospital; the doctors assure he will survive, but his participation in this exam is officially over. As for our Team D... they lost a member during the fourth night after an ambush executed by Konoha's Team 7. The other two survivors are hospitalized—one with broken bones and the other with electrocuted nerves."
"That is an entirely acceptable price for an exam of this magnitude and demand," Rasa chimed in, settling back into his high-backed chair. "What truly deserves our attention is the report drafted by the sensors deployed along the northern border regarding the Uzumaki boy."
Daigo nodded slightly, connecting the key pieces of the various tactical reports.
"We are not talking about an uncontrolled release out of rage or desperation," Daigo noted with a reflective tone. "The Nine-Tails' chakra flow detected by our sensors during the second and fourth nights was extraordinarily stable, dense, and perfectly directed. That confirms Minato has been personally training Naruto in the conscious and progressive control of that power. We don't have an unstable or dangerous vessel wandering through our desert, but a high-level strategic weapon in full development."
"And as for our diplomatic 'visitors'..." Sasori subtly shifted his eyes toward the side balconies, where the jōnin mentors of the rival villages were beginning to take their seats. "Kakashi, Kitsuchi, Killer B, and the others keep watching. They have been sending their reports to their respective villages through standard messaging channels without making a single move outside established protocols. They know full well that any attempt at espionage or sabotage outside their assigned perimeter will bring the ANBU down upon them."
"Excellent," Daigo said, standing up and elegantly adjusting the sash of his ceremonial hat. "Karin has performed flawlessly tracking the surroundings with her sensory ability. She has displayed the sharp insight characteristic of a true Uzumaki and that tactical acuteness she undoubtedly inherited from you, Sasori."
Sasori cracked a barely perceptible smirk at the corner of his lips.
"She is merely fulfilling her duty as a kunoichi of the Sand. I wouldn't want to see Team A lower their guard now that the eyes of the Feudal Lords and the high command are on the battlefield."
"No one will lower their guard today," Rasa concluded, rising from the table and stepping alongside his old friend. "Come on, Daigo. It's time to give the official signal to the contenders."
In the present...
"Deidara of Iwagakure versus Kankurō of Sunagakure! Both contenders, descend to the center of the ring immediately!"
The powerful, firm echo of Malenia's voice thundered authoritatively against the imposing sandstone walls of the colosseum.
Kankurō did not hesitate for a single second. He leapt down from Team B's balcony, landing on the sand with a dull thud that kicked up a small curtain of golden dust. With a fluid, highly practiced motion of his shoulders, he unbuckled the tough leather straps holding Karasu to his back. The puppet, completely wrapped in thick white linen bandages, dropped beside him with a dry clatter of metal and wooden joints that echoed menacingly throughout the arena.
Opposite him, Deidara chose not to use the stairs or execute a conventional leap. The Stone ninja simply dropped from his platform with his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his red tactical vest, touching the ground in a relaxed, almost nonchalant posture. He adjusted the long blonde bangs covering the left side of his face and let out a small, mocking chuckle through his nose.
"So I'm up against a puppeteer, huh?" Deidara said, finally pulling his right hand out of his pocket. In the exact center of his palm, a mouth with sharp teeth and a tongue was rhythmically chewing a piece of white clay. "Flings of wooden and rag toys against a true artist is a total lack of respect toward my presence, hm. I promise you this fight will end so fast you won't even have time to twitch those pathetic little chakra threads."
Kankurō didn't fall for the provocation or reply with empty insults. His eyes, framed by the aggressive kabuki face paint, narrowed to the limit as he meticulously analyzed every movement of his opponent. In a death match between a puppet specialist and a long-range attacker, the slightest miscalculation in line of sight, deployment speed, or reaction time meant an instant death sentence.
"You talk too much for someone who relies on molding lumps of clay with his hands like a little kid," Kankurō retorted in a taunting, steady voice. His ten fingers subtly extended into the air, sprouting thin, invisible threads of blue chakra that instantly connected to Karasu's internal mechanisms.
"Begin!" Malenia roared from the edge of the ring, taking two steps back to give them full space.
In the exact microsecond the order cut through the air, the built-up tension exploded completely.
Kankurō snapped his wrists upward. Karasu's linen bandages unwound violently in midair, revealing the grotesque face with three red eyes and the puppet's terrifying mouthful of blades. Karasu crossed the distance separating them at a dazzling speed, propelled by the powerful springs in its limbs and Kankurō's steady flow of chakra. From its elbow and knee joints, four sharp, polished steel blades deployed, gleaming with a thin coat of fast-acting purple poison.
"Fast... but way too easy to predict, hm," Deidara analyzed without losing an ounce of his composure.
Without showing the slightest panic, Deidara spat two small spider-shaped clay figures from his palm straight onto the arena floor while executing a backflip to dodge Karasu's first lethal thrust. The white clay spiders instantly came to life upon touching the sand, skittering at a absurd, erratic speed straight toward Kankurō's legs.
"What kind of jutsu is that?" Kankurō thought, noticing the abnormal glow of chakra gathered within the small clay bodies.
Kankurō's survival instincts went off like an alarm. Instead of keeping Karasu on the offensive to pressure the Iwa ninja, he yanked hard on three chakra threads with his left hand. Karasu surprisingly fragmented in midair: its torso detached from its limbs and interposed itself right in front of Kankurō as an emergency defensive maneuver.
"Katsu!" Deidara shouted at the top of his lungs, forming the Snake seal with his free right hand.
¡BOOM!
A deafening blast of smoke, orange flames, and a violent shockwave thundered through the entire arena. The two clay spiders detonated a few inches from Karasu's reinforced wooden shield. The sheer force of the explosion severely cracked the puppet's torso and blasted a hail of stone debris and scalding sand toward Kankurō, forcing him to cover his face with his forearm as he slid back several meters, tearing up the ground with his ninja sandals.
In the area reserved for the jōnin mentors, Kitsuchi observed the scene leaning against the wall with his arms crossed, nodding slowly.
"Deidara hasn't changed a bit," Kitsuchi remarked in a deep voice. "His fighting style aims to force the opponent to fall back from the very first second. His chakra clay requires minimal hand seals and generates enormous destructive pressure. If that Sand kid doesn't learn to read the patterns of those clay figures, he'll burn out before he can close the distance."
A few meters away, Guren adjusted the gloves of her uniform, observing the flash of the detonations with analytical eyes.
"The clay mass acts as a catalyst for dense chakra," Guren chimed in. "However, Kankurō has more puppets for battle; this will come down to whichever one finds an opening to land the final blow."
Below, within the dense cloud of smoke that was beginning to clear, Deidara was already elevated in the air, hovering more than three meters off the ground atop a medium-sized clay bird he had molded in a matter of seconds.
"Not bad for a guy hiding behind a wooden dummy, hm," Deidara taunted from above, holding three more small clay birds between the fingers of his left hand. "But your reflexes aren't going to hold up against a continuous carpet bombing. Let me show you what true art is!"
Kankurō readjusted his combat stance, feeling the scorching heat still emanating from the previous blast. Karasu reassembled at his side with a dry metallic click, though its chest structure showed clear burns and cracks in the wood. Even so, Kankurō smirked beneath his paint marks, reaching his free right hand to the scroll holster at his waist.
"My art wasn't made for you to appreciate or judge, Stone idiot," Kankurō muttered, unrolling a second scroll directly onto the arena floor. "It was made to kill you."
With a quick puff of white smoke, a second puppet appeared on the arena floor: Kuroari, the capture puppet, designed with an elongated body, six articulated arms, and a massive hollow cavity in its torso.
Deidara, from his elevated perch on the clay bird, narrowed his eyes with mild interest at the Sand ninja's new addition.
"Another puppet? You don't get the lesson, hm. No matter how many toys you pull out of those scrolls, wood is only meant to turn into ashes and splinters before my creations."
Deidara hurled the three small clay birds from above. The sculptures spread their wings and glided at high speed, executing evasive maneuvers in the air as they dove toward Kankurō in parabolic arcs.
"Chakra Shield Mechanism!" Kankurō shouted.
Instead of trying to dodge the aerial attack, Kankurō concentrated a large amount of chakra into Karasu's arms. The wooden segments of the puppet's forearms fanned open, deploying a circular shield of dense blue chakra that intercepted the three explosive birds head-on.
¡BOOM! ¡BOOM! ¡BOOM!
A triple detonation shook the center of the ring, engulfing Karasu in a ball of fire and dense smoke. The shockwave caused the chakra barrier to falter, but the puppet's framework managed to hold its ground thanks to the firmness of Kankurō's control threads.
On the mentors' balcony, Kakashi Hatake raised his eyes slightly above his headband, taking in the synchronization of Kankurō's movements.
"Impressive chakra control," Kakashi analyzed calmly. "Deploying a chakra shield directly through a puppet's joints requires absolute precision. He didn't just block the blast's impact; he used the white smoke as tactical cover to prepare his counterattack."
"Yeah! The Sand kid won't back down or bend, the puppet moves without a single creak or end!" Killer B exclaimed, adjusting his sunglasses as he tapped out a rhythm with his fingers on the railing. "The clay artist flies sky-high, but if he gets cocky, he'll hit the pavement and die! Fool, ya know!"
Without Deidara anticipating it, straight from the heart of the explosion's smoke, Kuroari shot out at surprising speed, propelled by hidden steel cables hooked into the wall's glass pillars. Kuroari used the cables' tension to catapult itself upward, matching the height of Deidara's clay bird.
"What the hell...?" Deidara gasped, watching all six of Kuroari's limbs swing open at ninety-degree angles, revealing spinning saw blades at every joint.
"Black Secret Technique: Two-Step Crisis!" Kankurō yelled from below, manipulating ten chakra threads simultaneously with surgical precision.
Kuroari spread its arms and locked around the clay bird's body, attempting to trap Deidara inside its reinforced wooden chest. The spinning saws began slicing through the bird's clay mass, destabilizing its flight and causing it to lose altitude rapidly.
"Gotcha!" Kankurō cheered, clenching his fists to slam the puppet's compartment shut.
But Deidara, far from panicking, flashed a unhinged grin.
"You fell right into my trap, Sand insect, hm!"
Before the walls of Kuroari's torso could fully close around him, Deidara thrust both hands into his clay pouches and disgorged a massive amount of white clay straight inside the capture puppet. The bird he was riding began expanding grotesquely, swelling like a balloon about to pop.
Kankurō's eyes widened as he realized his rival's intention. If Kuroari shut Deidara inside, the resulting explosion would completely obliterate the puppet, and the shockwave would travel straight back toward his own hands and defenceless body.
From the Sand mentors' platform, Baki adjusted his head cloth, keeping a stern composure.
"What will you do now, Kankurō," Baki muttered quietly. "Will you abandon your puppet to save yourself, or create a counterattack to save it?"
Kankurō reacted in a fraction of a second. He severed the chakra threads connecting him to Kuroari and performed a backwards flip, seeking cover behind a nearby stone pillar.
"Short-range C3... KATSU!" Deidara screamed from within the smoke.
¡BOOOOOOM!
The largest explosion of the fight so far illuminated the entire arena with a blinding glare. The force of the blast was so brutal it cracked the sandstone floor and sent a pressure wave vibrating through the protective glass of the upper balconies. Burning wooden fragments from Kuroari shot out in every direction like artillery shrapnel.
Dust and suffocating heat thoroughly blanketed the center of the ring. The jōnin mentors watched the gray cloud with utter focus.
Inside the curtain of smoke, the scratchy sound of footsteps on heavily scorched sand could be heard.
Deidara landed on the ground, coughing slightly from the smoke but keeping his arrogant smirk intact. His tactical vest showed a couple of scrapes from Kuroari's saws, but his body was completely unharmed.
"An interesting attempt, hm," Deidara said, scanning his surroundings. "But turning your precious toys to ashes proves wood can never compare to the art of true detonation."
However, when the smoke finally cleared completely, Deidara's smirk froze slightly.
Kankurō stood about ten meters away. His second puppet, Kuroari, lay wrecked on the ground, reduced to charred splinters.
Yet Kankurō was far from defenseless. Karasu remained right in front of him, and from its open jaws spewed a dense cloud of purple poison gas that quickly spread across the ring, propelled by a small internal ventilation mechanism.
"You destroyed Kuroari... but you swallowed the bait whole," Kankurō said in a cold, calculating voice. "That flashy blast forced you down to the ground and kept you stuck in the center of the arena. Now you're trapped inside my poison gas range."
Deidara took a step back, feeling the air around him turn heavy and suffocating. The purple mist already blanketed more than half the arena floor, sealing off his ground escape routes.
"This poison doesn't need to be inhaled to work," Kankurō continued, flexing his fingers to position Karasu between Deidara and the clean zone of the arena. "It absorbs directly through the pores of your skin. In less than two minutes, your muscles will begin to paralyze and your lungs will collapse. Let's see if your 'art' can save you when you can't even move your hands to weave a single seal."
From the mentors' area, Baki nodded approvingly at his student's tactical execution.
"Sacrificing a puppet to maneuver the enemy's position and channel the kill zone. That is the true doctrine of Sunagakure combat," Baki stated firmly.
Kakashi slipped his hands into his pockets, observing the dense shade of the purple gas.
"Contact poison is one of the hardest tools to counter without a medic on the field," Kakashi noted. "The question is whether Deidara will try to clear the air with a large-scale blast or if he has a defensive technique saved up."
Below, surrounded by the purple haze creeping up his legs, Deidara stopped smirking. His blue eyes flashed with a cold, intense rage. He plunged both hands into his clay pouches, chewing at a furious pace.
"Paralyze my muscles? Trap me in a cloud of poison?" Deidara growled, his menacing voice echoing across the arena.
"I'll show you that true art surpasses any dirty trick of the Sand..."