11 Chapter 11: Sensei versus students
"Fight you!?" Ieri exclaimed. "Are you mad? We're only Genin! Why's our task to defeat a special Jonin, just to keep our position as Genins."
"Yeah, that's right. We just ain't on that level yet." Nero added.
"Oh, don't worry. You can go at me all at one and you don't need to win to pass." Genma explained. 'I agree, it would be a bit unfair if they needed to win.'
"All at once? You sure, you can handle that?" Yatora asked with genuin interest, as he didn't know how strong special Jonin or Jonin are compared to him.
"Sure. And use all your weapons. I will too." Genma said and jumped a few meters back, creating distance and opening the fight.
"Ieri, we need to fight as a team." Nero advised his friend.
"Sure, I know that too." Ieri said, playing over the fact, that she wanted to immediately engage in one-to-one combat. But now, as he heard Nero talking, she regained the small portion of rationality within her and waited for Nero to tell her what she had to do.
"Yatora, would you team up wi-" Nero started to ask Yatora , but was disrupted.
"Don't even bother asking him. Why would the almighty and powerful Yatora team up with us?" The kunoichi asked in a sarcastic voice.
"I'm willing to team up with you for this fight." Yatora said with a cold stare towards Ieri. If he had feelings, they would surely been hurt by what she said, because of the truth of her statement. In a real fight, Yatora would never rely on his teammates, but this was no normal fight. It was an exam and Yatora believed he figured out, what the exam was all about.
Genma already knew about their individual strength thanks to the previous exam, so this fight couldn't be about individual strength. And there's the fact, that the village have put the newly appointed Genins into teams of three instead of letting them be a one-man-show. That only allowed the conclusion of this being a exam to test their teamwork. Thus, although he didn't want to, Yatora decided to team up with his fellow Genin, even if it was just for this fight.
'I wonder if Nero figured out the content of this exam as well or if he's just convinced, that he's not able to do anything in this fight on his own' Yatora thought, as he announced that he's going to team up with the others.
'Did I estimate him wrong? No, can't be! He's too much like him to not act on his own! He must have some ulterior motives!' Ieri thought.
"Huh" Nero said surprised, but caught himself again quickly and acted as some sort of team leader. "Then we need a strategy. Anyone an idea?"
"I will engage in close combat and you'll support me with some range attacks. Just make sure to not turn me into yakiniku in the process." Yatora said with a cold expression. That was not a request, but an order.
"Aight. Sounds like an amazing start." Nero said, starting to spam his handsigns, molding his chakra within him and spitting out a flame, that turned into a Fireball bigger than Ieri's, but not as big as Sasuke's.
It was aimed at Genma who tried to jump over it, which was expected by Ieri who threw a kunai at the point, where their sensei was now, before he even jumped.
Genma smiled and spitted out his senbon from his mouth to deflect the oncoming kunai. The fire ball had already passed under him and exploded upon the contact with a stone behind him, which lead him to try and land on the ground again.
"Lightning Iaido" someone said with a cold voice.
Before Genma's feet touched the ground, a sword shot towards him and nearly sliced him in half. Yatora overcome the distance between them in a mere second and unsheathed Pacific with a powerful attack.
Genma was hardly able to parry the attack with a kunai that came from god knows where due to the sheer speed of the attack and its surprise effect. Upon the clash between the two weapons, Genma jumped back with a backflip using the force of the katana.
Genma regained the feet on the ground and smiled. "You guys are amazing." Technically, Genma was able to let them pass now, since they displayed the ability to work as a team, but he was curious as for how far they would go.
"You praise us like we've already passed." Yatora said, as he walked slowly towards his sensei, performing a handsign with one hand. "But we're only getting started."
An aura of dark blue electricity formed around Pacific, as Genma pulled out a second Kunai out of his pocket.
Ieri and Nero ran around the duo, trapping their sensei in a triangle formation.
Yatora dashed towards Genma aiming his sword at the opponents stomach.
Genma tried to parry the attack with his kunai yet again, but this time Pacific sliced cleanly through the hindrance. Genma, who was not expecting the sharpness of a blade reinforced with lightning, reacted and evaded the attack a little bit too late, which gained him a scratch near his ribs.
But he was able to duck under the kunai and shuriken coming from the sides. Genma threw his kunai at the shoulder of Yatora, who was not yet able to regain his posture after the attack. Yatora leaned towards the side, evading the kunai, but also giving Genma the time to jump back.
'I see, kunai's aren't sufficient. Never would've guessed I would be forced to use that.'
Ieri's jaw dropped, as she saw what Genma drew out of his pocket next. She persuaded herself into thinking, that the possibilty exists, that there could fit two kunais into the pockets of Genma's pants, but what she just saw broke the rules of reason.
Genma pulled an almost two meter staff out of his pocket, that was similar to the Bo used by the Akimichi clan. But instead of being a regular staff, it looked more like a thin pipe, having a hollow inside of it, just like a bamboo.
"Ready for the next round?" Genma asked, as he put another senbon from his pocket into his mouth.
Yatora didn't took the time to answer and immediately dashed back into the action. With his staff, Genma now had a longer attack range, which meant that Yatora couldn't let Genma keep the distance, they had now, as he wouldn't have an opportunity to attack with the limited range of Pacific.
He dashed in and immediately started launching an immeasurable amount of light attacks. 'Sushizaki Style: Infinity' Genma deflected every attack, which looked like an easy task for him. But it wasn't, proven by the fact, that he wasn't able to counter attack.
Right now, they were stalemated, but Genma would've won that contest, as he had more experience and endurance. Yatora who knew that waited for an opening created by his teammates, which he got just moments later.
Genma leant back to avoid a flying Fuma Shuriken coming from Nero, where he was awaited by a small fire ball from Ieri. Genma lost his balance, which was the moment Yatora waited for.
'No Style: Piercer'
He thrusted his sword into the leg of his sensei, who, upon being hit, turned into smoke, revealing a piece of wood.
'A substitution. when did he do that?' Yatora thought as he started to rapidly look into all directions.
"Behind you." Genma's staff hit Yatora's head from behind, leading him to fall over, but he caught himself before hitting the ground and turned around, seeing his sensei already engaging into close combat with Ieri.
The powerful attacks launched by Genma were hardly able to be evaded by Ieri and she had to take some blows, before her Genma was distracted by the flaming shuriken coming from the left and the electric serpent coming from the right.
He jumped back, which lead the shuriken to miss him, but the serpent just changed directions and was aimed against him again.
'What a troublesome technique' Genma thought, as he quickly launched a weak Fireball. The Fireball stroke the sea serpent which lead both the Jutsus to dissolve.
He spitted his senbon on the caster of the lightning technique, who defended against it with his sword, and brought his special Bo to his mouth, while turning towards Nero.
Using his staff as a blowgun, he fired senbon-like projectiles made of fire on his student who evaded the first few by stepping to the side, but was hit by the others into his leg making Nero unable to stand.
Genma then was attacked by a sword from behind, but was able to defend against it with a quick movement of his staff.
Yatora, who expected his attack to hit, couldn't react to and was overwhelmed by a kick towards his liver performed by his sensei, making him unable to continue fighting.
"And now to you." Genma said, as he walked towards the last member of his team, putting his staff back into his pocket, cracking his knuckles.
After a short beating of Genma, Ieri declared her defeat.
After a while, the Genin were able to stand again. They were ordered to gather in front of Genma.
"I'm happy to tell you, that all of you have passed the exam." Genma said with a smile on his mouth, which was already filled with a senbon again.
"We passed!?" Ieri exclaimed surprised.
"But we lost? Sensei, that doesn't seem right to me." Nero said looking at the wound above his knee. The wound has already stopped bleeding thanks to the heat of the attack.
"As I said, you never needed to win to begin with." Genma said with a genuin smile. "You displayed great ability to work as a team and have proven your individual strength. Who knows? You might have won if your little plan worked out?"
"You knew it?" Nero asked impressed.
"Of course. I knew since the beginning, that you would try to get me close to the water."
"That's why your first move was a jump away from the river?" Yatora asked. He was overwhelmed. 'That's supposed to be only a special Jonin. How much stronger are top tier Jonin or Kage then?'
"So let me give you advise. I'm starting with you Ieri. You were great at anticipating were I would end up, which came up for the lack of power in your attacks. And your Taijutsu leaves much to be desired. I would advise you to either expand your knowledge about Taijutsu or learn a Technique that ensures you to always have enough space between you and your opponent. I hope, I don't even have to say, that you definitely should add stronger moves to your arsenal. Currently you are the one, that adds the least amount of value to our team."
"Understood" Ieri said dejected, as she knew that Genma was right.
Nero wanted to defend his friend, but restrained himself as he knew, that the things Genma said were only going to benefit here from now on.
"Next is you, Nero. Your Fireball's strength is impressive and you always knew when you are needed to create an opening or anything similar. Every attack of yours would've given me lethal wounds, if they'd have connected. You should learn a variety of Jutsus, especially wind Release, since you were unable to use any of it during our fight."
Nero nodded. There wasn't anything to add.
"Lastly you, Yatora. You impressed me the most. I think you are the strongest Genin I've ever seen. You should be around weak chunin level in terms of sheer strength. Your prowess in Kenjutsu is remarkable and your Lightning Release was very powerful for your age. But since you never came close to water, you weren't able to fight at full strength. And you should always have your eyes on your opponent. A more experienced Ninja would've noticed my substitution. But that's nothing you can train. It just comes with experience. That means the only advice I have to give you now, is that you should think of a possibility to use your water release, when you're not close to water."
"I already have a way to use my water release to every given time." Yatora pointed at the scrolls on his belt. "Two of them are completely filled with water."
"Oh, that's no bad idea. But I'm curious. Why didn't you use them earlier?" Genma asked.
Yatora thought of the idea to lie to him, that he forgot in the heat of battle, but decided to reveal th truth. "Honestly, I was just curious as for how strong a special Jonin in a fair one to one combat situation compared to me is. If the fight would've been much longer after our one-on-one ended, I would have used the scrolls."
Genma smiled. 'What an interesting young prodigy.'
"We're going eating now and before you ask, you have to go. We're talking about the upcoming weeks and your trainings, as well as missions." Genma said, leading his students to Yakiniku Q.
[A/N: I'm planning to end the first arc in this series in the next chapter, maybe two. I'll call it 'New world-arc' as it was Yatora's start in the new world. Following the end of this arc, there will be two arcs, that are completely AU, until the Chunin exam starts, which will be the next arc from the series. This was my first time ever writing a real fighting scene with magic and stuff, so I'd appreciate a little feedback to how it was and what I can improve on]
