Naruto: Senju Resurrection

Chapter 26

"The ninth match, between Gaara and Rock Lee, will begin shortly," Gekko Hayate says to the arena full of people. "Can you please come down stairs," He continues.

Lee jumps down from the balcony with great enthusiasm. Gaara just sand shunshin down indifferently. They both stood on the opposite side from each other. "Begin!" the proctor starts the match. Lee begins by going full speed at Gaara. "Konoha Senpuu!" Lee screams out his technique as he does it. But it crashes into Gaara's sand defence. Lee jumps away from the counterattack the sand tries to do. Lee runs in again and tries different punches and kicks. Still, nothing gets through the formidable barrier that is Gaara's sand. The sand then mounts another counterattack, but Lee stops it by pulling out a kunai and slashing away at the sand, breaking its formation. He tries another kick, but the sand blocks again. He summersaults away from being crushed by Gaara's sand.

"Is that it? Entertain me a bit more... There's not enough yet! Blood!" Gaara says intensely while sending out a wave of sand towards Lee's position. Lee jumps, but the sand reaches out and grabs his ankle. The sand fling Lee into the wall. But it doesn't stop there. It continues to attack, but Lee manages to get away this time. He runs towards Gaara, and when he comes close enough, he throws punch after punch, but it is blocked again and again.

The sand tries to crush Lee, but Lee is way too quick. It seems these two are in a bit of a stalemate. Neither can really hurt the other. Lee backflips up onto the ram sealing hands that stick out from the walls. "Lee, take them off!" Guy-sensei suddenly screams after explaining that Lee can't use Genjutsu or Ninjutsu to Sakura. "B-But Guy-sensei! You told me only to do that to protect a large group of very important people!" Lee screams back. "That's quite all right! I give you permission!" Guy screams back.

Lee gets visibly excited as he sits down on the fingertips and pulls back his legwarmers. Two stacks of weights sat on each ankle. He pulls them off. "All right, I can move freely now!" Lee screams as he holds the weights on both sides of his body. 'Don't be ridiculous! Like a few weights will help you get through Gaara's total defence.' Gaara's sister arrogantly thinks. Then he lets them go, and the dust cloud that followed from the weights after they hit the ground was up to where Lee stood, roughly 18 meters up into the air. Everyone was astonished. How was he able to move with that much speed.

Sasuke was seething since that meant he had those weights on when they spared before the first exams as well, and he still moved faster than his Sharingan could see.

"Go, Lee!" Guy-sensei screams out. "Right!" Lee screams right back. The speed increase was like comparing a civilian and a Ninja. Like night and day. Lee throws a punch from behind Gaara, and he punches through the sand. Then he was on the other side of the arena throwing a kick. Gaara had no clue where Lee was or where he would pop up next, but his sand somehow kept up. However, the ultimate defence was looking weaker than ever. It only managed to deflect Lee's strikes, not stop them completely. Soon he actually managed to hit Gaara straight on the head with a dropkick. There was a visible crack on Gaara's face. The suna team was shocked; they had never seen Gaara injured before.

Lee stood in his stance, waiting for Gaara's response. A smile was visible on his face. "Youth is an... Explosion!" Guy-sensei scream at the top of his lungs. "Right!" Lee answers dutifully. Fire is almost visible in his eyes as he runs towards Gaara again. Gaara tries to outmanoeuvre him by sending a wave in front of himself, but Lee is too quick and dodges. Before Gaara could turn around to look at Lee, he was already gone. "Over here!" Lee says and punches Gaara in the face when he turns around.

Gaara is getting up slowly. He has never been hit like this before. More and more sand was leaking out of his gourd. The sand armour that had been keeping Gaara's actually face hidden and secure now had massive chunks missing. And his usually stoic face was morphed into a murderous smile. Sand from the ground began pouring back onto his face to mend the broken armour.

Lee still stood his ground. "Is that all?" Gaara asks after his armour is reformed. Lee thinks about what he can do. He then realises what he must do. After getting a visual confirmation from his teacher, he prepares by untying the bandages around his arms and letting them hang down a bit. Then he begins to run. Faster than he has gone today, possibly faster than he has ever run before. He runs in a circle around Gaara. Lap after lap, faster and faster. "Hurry up and bring it on!" Gaara says in his monotone voice. "You asked for it!" Lee screams as he appears before Gaara and kicks his chin hard enough for him to fly off the ground. It cracked Gaara's armour again. Lee uses his arms to take off again. He kicks, kicks and kicks more; Gaara flew higher and higher. Guy began praying for his student's success.

After a series of kicks, one kick, in particular, made Lee flinch in pain, but he persevered. Lee grabbed Gaara in a suplex and began spinning on the way down. "Primary Lotus!" Lee screams as they descend, and they crash into the ground hard. Gaara is lying motionless in the crater. "Right on!" Guy-sensei scream.

But the body began disintegrating, leaving a broken shell in place of Gaara's body. Everybody was shocked except Kakashi, who had a close eye on the two since the beginning. Unfortunately, Sasuke didn't have enough chakra left to have them activated. Gaara rose from the rubble unscathed as Kakashi explained to Guy and his students what had happened. The most sinister smile Naruto had ever seen was plastered over Gaara's face. He shot three tendrils of sand towards Lee. Who still hadn't regained the ability to move after that last attack. Lee flew a fair bit after he got hit. Gaara's smile widened as he sent a tsunami of sand towards Lee. Lee still couldn't move, so the wave crashed into him.

Gaara licks his lips. He was toying with Lee now. Lee was just beginning to be able to move as he dodged more tendrils of sand. Unfortunately, Lee still got hit with almost half of the tendrils. But he was getting his speed back slowly but surely. The sinister smile on Gaara's face had not gone away. Lee got hit with a tendril and fell, and then another came crashing into his back. Lee braced himself for another attack. But he dodges without trouble; his speed was back. He continues to weave in between the tendrils.

Lee's chakra began going off the charts. He was opening his gates. "The time to carry through and protect one's own Way of the Ninja!" He screams. 'The Third Gate of Life... open!' He thinks as the third gate opens. 'The Fourth Gate of Pain... open!' he thinks as his whole body has turned into a fiery red. Lee's new power was so great that his movement and strength blew the arena apart when he threw a punch at Gaara. Kakashi even acknowledged his speed. Gaara flew into the air with his armour cracking. Lee appeared above Gaara when he was still falling in the air. He punches him down hard then begin to punch Gaara around the entire arena, all within the air. Gaara's sand was nowhere to be seen.

Lee even tore some of his muscles moving. 'The Fifth Gate of Closing... open!' He thinks as he opens another gate. More speed and power slam into Gaara's stomach. Lee pulls Gaara back up to himself using the sash that he wore. "Reverse Lotus!" He screams as he slams both his leg and arm into Gaara's body. Even Gaara's gourd broke under pressure. However, Lee did take some severe damage himself. Both the leg and arm he used became paralysed.

Gaara lay in a crater. He was severely hurt. Even if the sand from the crushed gourd broke his fall, he still reaches out his hand to crush Lee with his sand. Sand begins moving slowly towards Lee. It gets ahold of his left arm and leg. "Sand coffin!" Gaara says as he closes his hand. Crushing both Lee's arm and leg completely. Lee falls to the ground unconscious. Gaara reaches out with more sand to finish the job. But Guy swoops in and dispels it before he can. Guy's severe expression puts Gaara in a sombre mood. He puts his hand to his head as if to prevent a headache. "Why? Why... save him?" Gaara asks the teacher. "Because he is my precious subordinate," Guy says seriously. Gaara didn't seem to understand. He stands up and reforms his gourd, and tries to walk away. "I quit," was all he says. "Winner Gaara by interference," Hayate calls the match.

Everyone gasps suddenly. And Gaara turned around to see what the fuss was about. Lee was standing on a shaky leg and had a cloudy look over his eyes. Guy shed a few tears. "You truly are a splendid Ninja..." He sombrely says as he hugs the younger man close to his chest.

The medics were soon at the scene. They were giving Guy some bad news because his already sad face became downright depressed. Naruto felt terrible he hadn't studied more medicine since he knew this was way above his paygrade.