New Soul (Naruto Various! x Reader)

Ch. 54: Lee's Hidden Strength: Forbidden Secret Jutsu!

3rd POV

"What the?!" Sakura steps closer to the railings in shock.

Suddenly, Lee gasps from seeing the empty sand clone in Gaara's place.

"An empty shell!" Sakura yelled out.

Guy is starting to sweat, "But how?! We didn't do it!"

"It was when you closed your eyes to pray." Kakashi turns to him.

Guy faces with his mouth agape, along with Sakura.

Zabuza continues, "At that moment, Lee closed his eyes too because of the pain. That's when he did it."

The bowled cut man faces the ground with a growl. Then, he looks down to the battlefield.

Baki, the sand leader widens his eye. 'Gaara.' He sees the hole on Gaara's counterfeit face crackle even more, dropping pieces of it.

Lee is breathing heavily, but then both his pupils shrink from hearing piles of sand rising up from behind him.

"Lee watch out!" Y/n shouted out to him.

He turns his head in a haste and yelps, seeing the sand revealing the real Gaara. The redhead chuckles in a sinister tone, scaring Lee. Beneath the showering sand, Gaara's darkened seafoam eyes stare into Lee's terrified ones and his mouth forms into a sickening smirk.

"Oh no, it's—!" Temari exclaimed.

Kankuro whispers, just as frightened, "So it's happened. Just as I thought. That look in his eyes. It could only mean the demon inside him has been awakened."

The sand boy puts both his fingers together into a hand sign, his smirk stretches even more, from seeing his sand flying all around him. Lee gazes up with a yell, and sees the incoming sand coming straight at him. He crosses his arms into an X to protect himself but more heavy sand slams him to the ground. He slowly and painfully tries to stand up, but he falls back onto his behind with a grunt. His legs shake, before he instantly turns himself around with a growl.

Gaara summons up his wave of sand again, causing Naruto to call out, "Rock Lee!"

"Get out of there!" Y/n can feel her heart constricted from seeing two of her greatest friends fighting each other to the death.

The large sea of sand forms into a giant wave behind Gaara and washes over the tired Lee. He quickly crosses his arms again in front of his face and closes his eyes as his body moves within the sand until he crashes onto a wall. Once he drops down to the floor, you can see Gaara's sand tendrils moving all over the place behind him. Three of the tendrils curl up before zooming in on Lee. Lee's eyes widened with a startled yell but the sand already made contact causing a large dust cloud to appear.

Kankuro squints his eyes in pity. "The poor kid is helpless. He doesn't have anything left. Gaara's just toying with him now."

The redhead is facing the floor with cracks adorned on his pale face. He licks his upper lip with a sadistic smile as he waits for his opponent to come through.

"I don't get it. What's Lee doing just standing there?" Sakura urgently glances at Guy. "With his speed, he should easily be able to get out of the way of those blasts. Why doesn't he dodge them?"

Not looking back at her, Guy replies, "For a very simple reason. He can't dodge them."

"Huh? Why is that?"

Kakashi this time responds, "The Lotus is what you might call a double-edged sword."

"Wha- what does that mean?" The Haruno asked incredulously.