ᴅᴇꜱᴛɪɴʏ ʀᴇʙɪʀᴛʜ|ⁿᵃʳᵘᵗᵒˣⁿᵃʳᵘᵏᵒ

Preliminary Showdown!

'Well... that could've gone a whole lot better.'

Naruto sighed as he adjusted the position of the passenger on his back as he jumped off another branch and into the air. Looking back, he could clearly see the almost peaceful expression on one Uchiha Sasuke's face, dead to the world as he slept away in unconsciousness.

Looking back to his front, the forms of Sakura and his girlfriend were only a few paces ahead of him, moving as fast as their bodies allowed them in their weakened states; Sakura more so than her teammate, whose stamina rivaled that of Naruto's.

The blonde beauty glanced back at him, before flashing him a beautiful smile which Naruto couldn't help but smile back. Then the smile left as quickly as it came as he remembered what had happened that morning.

'Damn Sasuke, you lousy teme...' he thought morosely to himself, 'Is power all that mattered to you when we were younger? Is your sole purpose always centered on Itachi all this time?'

'Did our friendship mean nothing to you?'

Chancing a look back at the raven-haired avenger, Naruto was forcefully reminded that the Sasuke on his back was not his own dimension's Sasuke; rather he was Naruko's dimension's Sasuke. 'Get your head out of the gutter, Uzumaki! He's not your dimension's Sasuke!' he admonished himself inwardly.

Ever since he came here, he kept on holding on to the fleeting hope that this Sasuke would be different — that he would understand that fighting for the ones he cared about would make him stronger than fighting for the sole purpose of gaining power. Unfortunately, this Sasuke did the exact opposite, believing that the only way to avenge his clan was through power and power alone.

He thought he hated Black Zetsu, but even he was surprised at just how much he hated the bastard at the moment...

Add to that fact, with Sasuke's mental state as fragile as it was, Naruto wasn't sure he could save the Uchiha Clan from permanent extinction. The only plausible way — in the worst case scenario — he could think of at the moment was saving Sasuke's brother, Uchiha Itachi.

Now, if only he could bring a sample of the man's incurable disease to Tsunade early on...

"So," Sasuke sneered at the three Oto genin, "Which one of you morons wants to go first?!"

After Sasuke had basically challenged the Oto genin team, it had been an all-out slug between the two male members of the Oto genin team and the Last Uchiha, with Sasuke easily coming out as the victor and leaving a broken Zaku and a limping Dosu in his wake.

It was in his power and adrenaline fueled daze, that Sasuke turned his attention towards Naruto himself, fully intending on taking his rightful place as the best amongst the Rookie 9...

At least in his addled mind.

But, his temporary ambitions were put to a screeching halt when the blonde haired boy immediately appeared behind the Uchiha and slugged him at the back of his head, plunging Sasuke's consciousness into the abyss.

Just like the first time around, Dosu immediately called a truce and retreated with his team, but not after leaving their Earth scroll behind which Naruto pocketed eagerly with a grin.

Looking back at his girlfriend and Sakura, he remembered seeing the two of them fussing over Sakura's uneven ends of her pink hair and both girls were carefully trimming them with Naruko's kunai. Once done, Naruto hefted the unconscious Clan Heir onto his back and beckoned them to move, which the girls immediately complied.