Chūnin Exams (XVI).

"You first teammate retreated and forced me to rush after him, the other one did the exact opposite, and now you chose to just stand still. You're an interesting bunch, aren't you?"

"If one strategy doesn't work, you obviously try another one until something does."

Yugito's lips twitched. "Neither of us will win if we stay like this, though."

"Maybe I don't want to win," he said with a tilt of his head. "Just having a draw with you would be pretty good already, don't you think? Both of us would win the tournament in that case, from a certain point of view."

"Tempting," she said before suddenly throwing up her arms. "But I think I must decline."

"Nezumi Kedama!" (Mouse Hairball)

When she spit several small balls of fire towards him, the technique didn't look very special at first. However, the real problem appeared when he tried to dodge them; rather than just flying past him, the now mouse-formed balls of flames changed directions and pursued him, forcing him to continue backing away.

"Don't take your eyes away from your enemy!"

Itachi noticed that his opponent's nails had changed and were now 30 centimetres long when he dodged her slash by a hair, but he didn't have time to think about it before one of the flame balls crashed into him with a small explosion.

A second later, a murder of crows flew towards her, blocking her sight and making her jerk back with wide eyes. Then, before she had the chance to do anything about her situation, she instinctively fell into a crouch to dodge a kunai that came at her from behind. This one was shortly followed by others until she found herself deflecting weapons that came at her from every direction with her claws.

Having experienced the tendency of his team to use explosions whenever possible, she jumped into the air before he had the chance to blow her up while her vision was so limited by all his birds. Her prediction became true just a second later when the place she just came from was consumed by the result of several small explosions.

Yugito had no time to celebrate her foresight, however, for she suddenly found herself under attack from two sides by him and one of his clones.

She tilted her head out of the way of one kick before redirecting the leg with her shoulder to bring the clone out of balance while simultaneously blocking a kunai from the real him with her left claw. Then, she set out to slash the still unbalanced clone into pieces only to stop her movement when she saw a kunai with an explosion tag thrown at her from below. Catching the weapon before it could hit her, she ripped the tag off and threw the weapon at the clone she had just been about to attack. This made Itachi abandon his own attack, giving her the time to block another kunai slash before she put the tag on the still extended arm and kicked him towards the other clone to get them both away from her.

The explosion ripped both of them apart.

The fight didn't stop there, though. She had barely landed on the ground, a good 15 meters away from him, when two hands broke through the ground and grabbed her ankles. Itachi instantly rushed forwards to exploit her momentary confusion, only for him and the clone in the ground to be hit with a stream of electricity when the blonde's body transformed into lightning.

Suddenly it was him who needed to jump back to avoid two hands that came through the ground, shortly followed by their owner that wasted no time in jumping after him.

"You guys are seriously starting to annoy me with all those clones and explosions," she said with a growl as she slashed at his head.

Itachi had no breath to spare for a reply before he was forced to tilt his head back to avoid being hit by her claws. Afterwards followed a short Taijutsu bout that made him very glad that he had a Sharingan; careful not to cut himself, he redirected her right arm before attempting to use his short stature to sneak through her defense. Not deterred at all, she simply stopped his attack by swinging her knee up to knock him out. He jerked back, barely able to avoid this counter, only to be instantly forced to block several more slashes from her claws while simultaneously backing further away in an attempt to get out of her range.

Yugito was moving faster than when she fought Yukio or Anko and her claws gave her more range than she had before. That might have been to his advantage if he could fight like Anko, where the additional range would have been more of a disadvantage than anything else, but that was unfortunately not the case. For all that he had seen her fight with his Sharingan several times before, his body was just not able to make the same moves as her. The only reason he could keep up at all was that he could predict her movements with his eyes, but even that had its limits.

That became obvious when she suddenly found an opening and sent him flying with a kick to his chest.

Itachi managed to regain in control even when the breath was knocked out of his lungs, changing his position mid-air and landing on his feet instead of crashing into the ground. Even so, he was still dragged for several meters before he came finally to a stop just ten meters away from the two small bodies of water in one corner of the arena.

The entire sequence had lasted little more than three seconds, but it had been enough time for his opponent to create three clones and surround him.

Escaping was not an option, so he started to rush through hand seals instead.

"Katon: Hibashiri!" (Fire Release: Running Fire)

Releasing a stream of fire towards the ground in front of him, the flames instantly started to move on their own to encircle him with a protective barrier. A second later, three of the bodies dissolved into lightning when they came into contact with the fire. The fourth one, the one that must be the real Yugito, ripped a hole into the wall with a slash of her claws that sent knives of compressed air towards it.

Before he could react, she closed the distance between them in less than a heartbeat and stabbed him through his chest with one of her claws.

This time, she wasn't prepared for the explosion.

When the cloud of dust lifted, they knelt in a similar position just 10 meters from each other. However, the difference was that his breathing was notable harder than to begin of the fight while hers was still calm. Not that he was already exhausted, his stamina was better than that, but he was definitively starting to feel the strain on his chakra and body.

"I know I repeat myself, but you guys are really annoying. First it were all these explosions and clones, and now there are exploding clones. Seriously, enough is enough! "

He narrowed his eyes a bit. Something was off about the way she said that, but what was it? "You seem to know a thing or two about clones yourself, though."

"I fight fire with fire," she said with a shrug that, again, looked a bit weird, although he couldn't say why. "Hey, that right now was not one of these weird crow clones, right? Isn't it wasteful for someone with your reserves to use a shadow clone only to blow it up?"

He suppressed a grimace at that.

She was right; the Bunshin Daibakuha (Great Clone Explosion) was rather chakra-consuming. It was especially annoying for him because the technique had done hardly any damage aside from burning some parts of her clothes. Right now, he didn't have too much his chakra left, which meant his initial plan might not be possible anymore if he didn't do something to change the flow of the battle. As it was now, he was just wasting his energy without having anything to show for it.

"Well," she said while standing up with a shake of her head. "It's to my advantage, so I'm not complaining."

With one blow, he suddenly realized what was off about her: although he hadn't injured her, the way she moved and spoke was somewhat lethargic. Not very much, definitively not enough to be obvious, but it was noticeable for someone who looked closely. But when he hadn't injured her, what was causing it...?

Anko!

Did she inject her with some poison? Was that why she hadn't surrendered? But where did she get a poison that affected a Jinchūriki, and why was it only starting to work now?

"Here we go!"

Lethargic or not, she was still fast. Not as fast as in the beginning, he noted, but still fast. Still, if the effect got only stronger with time, he might be able to exploit it if he managed to defend himself long enough. But with his current reserves and the way he burned through them just by keeping up with her, well...

Making a split decision, Itachi quickly took a soldier pill from his pocket and managed to put it in his mouth just in time before he needed both his hand to defend himself. It wasn't one of the stronger ones, but it should be enough for what he intended to do.

"Something like that will not save you," she exclaimed when her fist, which had once again normal-sized nails, connected with his palm.

In the following confrontation, he allowed himself to be pushed back as subtle as he could as to not give away what he was doing. Ducking under her leg when she tried to kick him, he backed away with a flick-flack before throwing a number of shurikens at her that were connected by wire. That didn't slow her down, however, as she simply threw kunai of her own that hit the holes in the centre of his weapons to direct them back at him, demonstrating that she was just as skilled in this area of combat as she was in all the others. Suddenly having his own weapons, including wires, thrown back at him, he had no other choice than to jump in the air and twist his body to avoid them.

Unfortunately, that gave his opponent the opportunity she needed to close the distance. He had just enough time to raise his arms in front of his face before the kick threw him back downwards, right into the water.

While he hadn't intended to reach the water body in this way, it was still where he had wanted to go, so he didn't complain too much. Ignoring the pain from the crash, he used the moment where the water blocked his opponent's view to create a clone that would hide underwater.

Things got more complicated when emerged from the water, though.

"Raiton: Gian!" (Lightning Release: False Darkness)

Itachi's eyes went wide as time slowed down around him.

He instantly knew that he wouldn't be able to escape the body of water before the attack hit it, meaning he couldn't dodge that way. The only possible escape route was up, but that would bring him into the waiting arms of the blonde who would doubtlessly throw him back into the water, making the point nought.

Without thinking about it, he created another shadow clone while suppressing his annoyance at not having enough time to form a less chakra-consuming crow clone. The clone didn't even wait until the smoke vanished before he jumped towards the ground, away from the water, already performing hand seals.

The lightning attack hit an upwards flying torrent of water and followed the stream rather than continuing to fly downwards, reaching its source, which was his clone, just when he reached the ground, releasing all its energy harmlessly into the earth after destroying it.

Then Yugito was suddenly in front of him, sending him flying once again with a kick that made him gasp in pain even though it lacked the strength from her previous attack. It was still enough to make him slide over the water for several meters before he came to a stop on his knees, however.

He looked up, expecting and preparing for another attack, only to find that his opponent was still standing where he left her, leaned forward and with her hands on her knees for support.

"What is-" she started, but didn't get the chance to finish as the clone he had hidden underwater took the chance and appeared right behind her. To her credit, she instantly turned around to defend herself, but the effect of whatever substance Anko had used was finally taking effect; rather than sending a kick at his clone, she toppled and fell to her knees, meaning she was unable to stop his clone's technique.

"Suiton: Suirō no Jutsu!" (Water Release: Water Prison Technique)

He released his breath when he saw her fully enclosed by the water.

She would surely be able to escape the prison if she weren't as weakened by Anko's poison as she was, but not like this. This meant that he didn't need to go through with his initial plan, according to which he would have used a lightning technique he had copied with his Sharingan to shock her while she was inside the water. A relief, really, as his chakra was still pretty low, even after taking the pill earlier. After all, they were used to increase your stamina first and foremost, not to refresh your chakra. While that happened as a side product, the amount wasn't that big. He was already pushing his reserves as it was and the chakra-consuming water prison didn't help things in the slightest.

But no matter. This was his victory.