A flaw in the system

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Sakura stood, body hidden by her cloak. She hopped it'd keep her identity hidden. The arena around her was packed with A mix of civilians and ninja, who had all come to watch the fights. Well, probably not hers, but the other fights. She knew what people thought of her. Half of Konaha thought she was an insane civilian girl who'd get her ass beat, and the other half thoughts she was an anomaly. She had beat the Yamanaka heir and that had raised some questions.

She was the first one in the arena, and that was done on purpose. She'd chatted with genma, confirmed her identity with him, and stood in line, waiting for others to show. And they did. They were few, but she recognised all of them.

The Insane Hyuga,

Shika,

Shino,

The sand siblings

And Sakura.

So far her two teammates hadn't bothered to show up, and frankly she didn't mind much. And just as Genma was about to announce the first match a boy in a bright orange jumpsuit ran in, standing one person away from her. Naruto Namikaze.

Genma had sighed, announcing (in his 'why do i have to be here' voice) that since two opponents hadn't shown up, the first pair would be Shino Aburame and Konkuro of the sand.

The match began and was painful to watch. It was clear that Shino was advantaged, and so when Shino won no one was surprised and the clapping was minimal as expected from such a predictable matchup.

The next match was Naruto Namikaze against the snobby Hyuga. And eventhough people had their money on the Hyuga, a part of Sakura knew that Naruto would win. He always seemed to, somehow. Despite being completely outmatched and out skilled he would still win wouldn't he. Neji had trained harder and for far longer, and yes that didn't justify his cockiness, but she still didn't understand how her blonde teammate won. When the match had been completed, wild applause broke out in the audience. The Hokages son had won, and that too with only one and a half techniques and a bottle of dumb luck. Underneath the cloak Sakura was dumbfounded, and not for the first time she felt resentment towards her teammate. But she couldn't feel that way for long, because it was Shikas match next.

Shikamaru knew that he was outmatched. He'd seen this women decimate the space bun girl and she looked strong. As the match began he quickly began to realise it couldn't go on. He'd either surrender with some dignity or be beat into submission by this she-demon. Of course, Temari would never match Sakura in skill and tactics, but Shikamaru was damn sure she'd match the girl in will power. But then again, the boy thought, Sakura was still scarier.

He wondered, for a moment, whether she was here. She would have to be, right? She was a contestant. But he hadn't seen her. He hadn't seen her for three months, actually. Not since the incident at the river and that's what scared him.

"I surrender." Shikamaru stated, raising his hands up so that Genm could see them. Said proctor man swore under his breath. He now owed Sakura 500 Ryō.

Immediately the crowd went crazy. People were shouting and booing, saying that the Nara boy had just given up without trying. And that really peeved two people in particular off. One was the head of the Nara clan, who sat in silence watching his boy give up on the match. Now, he understood why Shikamaru gave up, he just didn't understand why he didn't show off any of his jutsus or skills. And for a moment he couldn't help but think of his son as a lazy ninja. And the other person was Sakura Haruno. Unlike Shikaku, she wasn't going to let the comments about Shikamaru being lazy and a scared coward pass. So from her place in the stands she made a bit of a scene. Water began to circle her body (emptying out from the bottles in the vicinity) and people began to notice, until there was a deathly silence in the arene. Everyone was looking at her. She didn't take her hood down, but managed to lower her voice and begin to speak.