Sequel to Rogue

No Broken Rules

The atmosphere was tense, and everyone had gathered in the middle of the ground with the unconscious Yamanaka family, now conscious. Ino and Sai felt stable, but their bodies still had a tremble, muscles aching from the memory of the pain they experienced not too long ago. Inojin was also conscious, standing before Kakashi, Naruto, Shikamaru, and Choji. Bolt and Sarada were by his left side, with Sarada healing the punctures by the senbons and Bolt examining the seals for his jutsu, all as per Kakashi's order. Shikadai, Chocho and the other younger generation stood on his right, offering a quiet, unspoken support. 

"Well, you sure created quite a scene, didn't you?" Kakashi spoke, his words light, but his tone was anything but light. "Explain yourself."

"Lord Sixth-" Shikadai tried to interject, but Kakashi shut him down quickly. " I asked Inojin, so I want the answer from Inojin only. He is capable of speaking for himself, isn't he? Don't try to bail him out of this." Shikadai had to back out. 

"I'm waiting, Inojin" his tone was stern, insistent, impatient and demanding. It was clear he would not let this go without an answer. Inojin was internally in a frenzy, his mind running a million thoughts per second, and he couldn't choose which thought to voice, and a prolonged silence wouldn't work in his favour. 

"Would they declare me deranged? I mean, I am quite close to it, but that's not the point. Am I going to lose despite winning, and all via a biased jury decision? Kami-samaaaa, save me! What do I do? What do I say?" Inojin was spiralling in his mind, forcefully trying to get a grip and failing. He felt like he couldn't breathe. He was about to throw the towel and say a sorry when-

"Damn!!! This sure is one heck of a seal!!!!!!!" A loud voice from his left side declared, cutting through the tension in the air and drawing the attention away from him. Inojin's internal panic came to a halt as he turned to his left in confusion, only to find Bolt, with his face almost shoved against his left forearm. 

"Huh???!!!!!!??!?!?!" The sound escaped his mouth before he realised it. Bolt, either not noticing everyone else's stare on him or ignoring them, replied to him.

"Yeah!!!! I mean, you're doing so much here with just one seal! preserving the blood's warmth, the residue of chakra that's in it, establishing a non-detectable link, amplifying damage, minimising strain--" he continued to geek over the seal but Inojin drowned him out, for he finally got a breath and some clarity returned to his mind, thanks to the distraction created by Bolt, he got a moment to collect himself.

"I hope the seal nerd talk gives him enough time to formulate a response to give to old man Kakashi in his head. Inojin, you better not waste my efforts dattebasa!!!! But other things aside, this truly is a well-made seal, I mean, there are some technical errors here and there, but still, for an amateur's work, this is some S-tier craftsmanship." Bolt thought as he kept rambling.

Bolt was jerked out of la-la land by a hand shaking his shoulder, turning behind, he saw Sarada pointing to her left, looking over, he saw all the adults glaring at him with a can-you-not-see-that-we-are-trying-to-intimidate-someone-here face. But we're talking about the son of the most knuckle-headed ninja over here, so the first response that came out of his mouth was-

"What? Is there something on my face?" 

*Cue dramatic anime fall by everyone*

"Talk about the most clueless ninja in history", muttered Naruto.  "You mean yourself", deadpanned Sasuke.  "Hey"

"Give it a rest, you two, now's not the time", Sakura said exasperated.

"Thank you, Sakura", Kakashi sighed, ageing from stress. "Now, Bolt, I'll love to hear your findings about that seal later, but right now, if you couldn't tell me and Inojin were in the middle of something!!!!"

"Oh yeah sure, go ahead, all yours ", whispers to Inojin, but is still loud enough to be heard by everyone "You're gonna tell me all about how you came up with that seal later, kay?" Inojin, feeling the second-hand embarrassment for Bolt, replies awkwardly, "Yeah sure"

Kakashi clears his throat, "Coming back to where we were...." Sharply turning to Inojin, "Explain your actions"

Perhaps because of the lighthearted, awkward exchange earlier, but now Inojin didn't feel as intimidated as before and could think much clearly without going into a panicked frenzy. Taking a deep breath and looking Kakashi straight in the eye, "I don't see what I have to explain, I didn't break any of the rules you had set in place", a statement said with complete confidence and nonchalance as though he was just commenting on the weather. "What do you mean you haven't broken any rule?!!!!?-" Tsunade started, but Inojin cut her off. "Which rule did I break? I'd like to ask you that, Lord 6th, had made the rules clear to us since yesterday, and he had clearly stated that in order to win, we either knock you out, immobilise you or make you forfeit. I just chose to go with the first option. Is there anything wrong with that? I don't think so, besides neither today nor yesterday did he state that anything or any technique was off the table. In fact we were asked to give it everything we have." everyone fell silent but, Inojin didn't stop there, he was not going to give them a chance to come up with a counter argument, "also, didn't you say so yourself Lord 6th that these fights were supposed to be aa simulation for us to get an idea about how dangerous REAL missions are and how life always places us in positions where the odds are always lined up against us? Tell me, do you really expect us to survive and complete actual missions by playing nice? I don't see why we are even having this exchange in the first place. I only followed the instructions. I was told to fight like I was in an actual fight, so I did. I saw my opponents and dealt with them in the most efficient way possible." he covered all his bases, but he wasn't done. No, not yet. A final remark, or taunt, to make sure that any idea of rebutting or retaliating will be shut down even before it sprouts, man, Shikadai has really rubbed off on me. "Don't tell me!!......." He makes an over-dramatic expression just enough to be noticed, bringing a hand over his mouth as though he was in shock due to the revelation, "Don't tell me that you guys didn't take this seriously at all. Underestimating your opponent, thinking that you would definitely win...... isn't that like a rookie mistake?" He ended with a mocking smile, moving his hand a little, intentionally showing them his sneer.  Beside him, he heard Bolt snort and then try to disguise it as a cough, but everyone heard it. No worries, though, because it only enhanced the effect of Inojin's words. The Best Shinobi across the hidden continents, The Greatest Heroes of the 4th Great War, no matter how humble or down to earth they are, after all their achievements being compared to a rookie, that too by someone younger than them with perfectly backed logic. This will be a hard pill to swallow. 

With their pride taking a hit and their minds in a mess with thoughts like 'how could I have overlooked this?', they would want the source of their distress, aka this conversation, to be over. No rules that were set prior to the fight were broken, meaning I have done nothing wrong. Adding rules to ban torturous and lethal attacks now would be equivalent to saying that they want a safeguard against us, the Great heroes, wanting a safeguard against younger and, in their opinion, inexperienced Shinobi? Yeah, no way would they go through with that. Their pride won't let them. Simply put, their only course of action left is to dismiss this conversation and proceed with the rest of the fight as though nothing happened.   Yeah, I so got this in the bag.

Kakashi heaved a heavy sigh, as though to say, 'Yeah, you got us. "Well, it seems this exchange was truly pointless. As you said, no rules have been broken. Fighters for the next fight, Shikamaru, Temari and Shikadai, stay here. Rest, move to the sidelines" 

[Aaaaaaannnd CUT. That's it for today, folks. Next time, the Nara's will have a go at it.

WARNING - I have no clue about how to write a clash between geniuses, so don't be surprised if you find the next chapter to be underwhelming. 

Mitsuki's fight will also be short and uneventful, as he doesn't have much relevance in this story.

Sarada's will also be lacking in the sob-story-parent-issue-drama-department, though it won't be lacklustre in the action department, rest assured.

Boruto's, well, you know it, drama, boatload of drama, and action to keep the pace too. 

So, see you next week. BYE]