"Ah, it's you, Mr Hiruzen."
Hearing Hiruzen Sarutobi's greeting, Goku turned his head and replied with a smile.
When he had first arrived, he had followed Kakashi's lead and called him "Lord Hokage."
But about a month ago, Hiruzen had suddenly said that since Goku was an outsider, he didn't need to use that title like everyone else and could call him "Mr Hiruzen."
Although he had found the request a bit strange at first, Goku had never been one to fret over such things, so...
Whatever. He'd call him what he wanted to be called.
"Hehe, Mr Goku, you're here to watch Naruto and the others compete, aren't you?" Hiruzen walked up to Goku, beaming.
"Who's that guy? Lord Hokage seems really polite to him," Choji asked curiously, watching the scene from a distance.
"I don't know. Probably some VIP guest," Shikamaru replied lazily, giving a cursory glance.
Beside them, Asuma subtly watched his old man chatting and laughing with Goku, thinking to himself, Old man, is this the super-strong, mysterious person you told me about?
"Haha, alright then. Let's watch together."
After confirming that Goku was there for the match, Hiruzen promptly ended the small talk, as the match in the arena had officially begun!
"Ahem, let the first preliminary match begin!"
On the field, after explaining the rules, Hayate Gekko announced the start of the match.
"I'll show you what happens when you underestimate me!" Kankuro said viciously, placing the long, bandaged object he had been carrying onto the ground.
"Hm?"
But across from him, Naruto ignored the threat. Instead, he looked confusedly from Kankuro to the bandaged object on the floor.
"Why does this guy have no ki, but that weird thing does?"
In his perception, there wasn't a trace of ki fluctuation coming from Kankuro, but there was a distinct fluctuation coming from the object on the ground. This puzzled him greatly.
Goku had told him that as long as something was alive, it would have ki.
Could it be that the Kankuro in front of him wasn't alive? And a living thing was hiding inside that long object?
His guess was spot on. The "Kankuro" standing before him was indeed not a living person, but a puppet named Crow, disguised to look like him.
The real Kankuro was currently hiding inside the bandaged bundle, controlling the puppet to confuse Naruto. When the time was right, he would use it to deliver a fatal blow!
"Hey, are you scared?"
Seeing that Naruto wasn't attacking immediately but instead kept eyeing his real body's location, Kankuro felt a twinge of nervousness and tried to provoke him.
For him, taking the initiative wasn't the best strategy. Letting the opponent attack and get close to his puppet before launching a surprise attack was the most effortless and effective method.
But now, that method wasn't working so well, because the opponent noticed something strange about him.
'Damn it, there's no way he could have detected my real body hiding in here,' Kankuro cursed inwardly.
His disguise was flawless. Only someone extremely familiar with him, or a puppeteer more skilled than he, could notice the subtle stiffness in the puppet's movements and deduce his location.
The guy opposite him wasn't either of those things, so he shouldn't have been able to tell!
What he didn't know was that Naruto had a cheat-like ability: ki sensing. No matter how well he hid, his ki was like a beacon in the dark, completely exposing his location!
"Hmph, I was just thinking about how to beat you!"
After suspecting for a while, Naruto had an idea.
It didn't matter what the trick was. If he just blew up the ki-emitting object on the ground, he'd find out what was hiding inside.
With that thought, he quickly formed a ki blast in his hand, raised his arm, and...
Swoosh!
The ki blast shot towards the object on the ground like a bullet.
!!
'What is that?!'
Seeing the incoming ki blast, Kankuro's pupils constricted.
Because the distance was short and the blast was sudden, there was no time for the puppet to carry his real body to safety.
He was forced to burst out of the bandages, revealing his true form as he quickly dodged to the side.
BOOM!
With a loud explosion, the ki blast blew a half-meter-wide crater in the ground where he had just been.
'Phew, good thing I didn't rashly use Crow to block that.'
Seeing the power of the ki blast, Kankuro breathed a sigh of relief.
He had considered using the Crow puppet to block the attack. But if he had done that, Crow might have been damaged.
As a puppeteer, his combat ability relied entirely on this puppet. If it were damaged and he couldn't control it properly, he would have no hope of winning the match.
On the spectator gallery, many people were equally shocked by Naruto's ki blast.
"What kind of ninjutsu is that? When did Naruto learn that?" Kiba asked his teammate instinctively.
"I don't know. But he didn't use any hand seals, so it shouldn't be a ninjutsu," Shino replied.
"Not necessarily. Some ninjutsu don't require hand seals. They're called seal-less ninjutsu. That's likely what Naruto used," their sensei, Kurenai Yuhi, corrected him.
At the same time, she wondered, Is that the Fourth Hokage's Rasengan? It doesn't quite feel like it...
Not far away...
'So this is ki? Its fluctuations are remarkably similar to chakra.'
Hiruzen Sarutobi thought to himself as he felt the energy from the explosion. Although he had heard about ki from Kakashi long ago, he had never thought it up close.
This was his first time truly experiencing this energy.
On the other side, seeing Kankuro forced to reveal himself so quickly, Temari frowned, worried for her brother.
But her brow soon smoothed, and she smiled faintly as she looked at the arena. "Now Kankuro's got this in the bag."
On the field, after Kankuro revealed his true form, Naruto pointed at him and his Crow puppet in surprise.
"Whoa! So you were hiding in there! Then what's the deal with this other you?"
Both regular clones and shadow clones possessed a certain amount of ki, but Kankuro's Crow puppet had none at all, making it impossible for Naruto to tell what it was.
"Hmph. I didn't expect you to find me. In that case, let him give you a proper greeting!"
With a cold snort, Kankuro commanded the Crow puppet to reveal its true form. It opened the joints in its arms and fired three pitch-black spheres at Naruto—one straight at him, and one to his left and right.
"Eh? What are these?"
Naruto was still curious about the puppet's transformation when he saw the three unassuming objects flying towards him. Sensing absolutely no threat from them, he was a bit baffled. What were these things for?
Poof! Poof! Poof!
Before he could think further, the three spheres reached him and exploded into clouds of purple-black smoke.
"Is that poison smoke?!"
On the spectator gallery, Sakura gripped the railing tightly, her eyes wide as she stared at the three clouds on the field. She had also been wondering what the black spheres were, but she hadn't expected them to be this.
"That dirty cheat! He can't win in a fair fight, so he uses underhanded tricks!" she hissed through gritted teeth once she realised what had happened.
"Sakura, real ninja battles are unpredictable like this. Releasing poison smoke, coating weapons in poison—these are common tactics," Kakashi said gravely from the side.
"As long as it secures victory, any trick, no matter how dirty or devious, is a good one."