Naruto: The Outsider's Resolve-Chapter 9INTERLUDE_.2 (365)

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Momoe felt her spine stiffen. She exhaled and tried to ease up as she pulled out her sword from the scabbard. Izumi stood half a second away, an image of agility and feather-like weightlessness as she skipped on her feet.

She flicked a pebble into the air. Both of them followed its trajectory until it began to descend when they shifted their attention to each other, having already calculated when the tiny stone would hit the ground.

Blades of grass flew into the air as both kunoichi vanished when the pebble touched the green. A screech announced their clash. The leather wrapped on the hilt stretched as Momoe pushed her sword's weight advantage against Izumi's kunai, but in the exact moment, Izumi pushed a metal vambrace around her other forearm against the sword, switching the power balance.

Momoe got read as she was shoved back. Izumi was faster and more agile than her and used that to its full advantage as she launched into a flurry with twin kunai. She danced around her, attacking from all angles, making defense harder by not allowing a moment of relief.

However, even though Izumi was physically faster, the sword matched her pace. Momoe efficiently used footwork to put her in the best position possible against Izumi's movements while her sword handled the heavy volume of attacks.

She caught a gap among the attack and fought back with a wide horizontal swing which Izumi evaded by pulling away with a back handspring. Momoe didn't waste any time activating her kenjutsu. Her sword released pale smoke as she charged back in with confidence.

Izumi's eyes widened in recognition and changed her mid-way into wanting to keep pressure and backed away. She was faster, but the sword had length to reach her. She still comfortably blocked with her kunai but her eyes narrowed knowingly as the smoking blade cut through the metal like paper. She dropped the broken kunai as it became too hot to hold.

Momoe exploited the advantage and rushed in for the offense. Anyone else would've made the correct choice and fallen back to put some distance between them—but Izumi charged in, confident that she knew her well enough from all their spars over the years.

The response wasn't surprising, but it was still annoying. The smoke emanating from her sword grew deeper as she, too, charged at her friend.

———

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Among the kids in her age group in the clan, Izumi was among the weakest. She was physically weaker than everyone else and barely had the chakra to perform the basic three. Clan training was miserable for her because she never won in spars and was always last in exercises.

Her family didn't live in any of the Uchiha neighbourhoods, so every time her mother would take her to the training, she would refuse to go and cry in her mother's arms as they walked to the training. If there were a silver-lining, then it would be that her father would teach her taijutsu, saying that she would become stronger as long as she worked hard.

It was the basics of Hidden Leaf Kata because her father wasn't an Uchiha and had married into the clan, but it was still precious to her because those times had created the strongest memories of her father. He had died protecting her during the Nine-Tails Demon Fox's Attack.

After the attack, her mother moved them to the newly created Uchiha Compound. From then on, she decided to get stronger to protect others instead of having others defend her.

Izumi weaved hand seals as she ran toward Momoe.

Fire Release: Rabid Rabbits.

Splotches of fire sparked and materialised around her in the air before growing into nearly two dozen rabbits made from fire that immediately targeted Momoe, who dug her heels into the ground to stop and evade the bunnies who wanted nothing to hop into her embrace and exploded.

Unfortunately for Izumi, Momoe knew that if she struck the rabbits, they would explode in her face.

Fortunately, Izumi planned around her knowledge.

Evading was the only immediate option. The rabbits moved without her input and solely moved towards the target. If the target dodged, they would pursue them. She took out kunai and observed the rabbit's movements and how Momoe dodged them. She predicted her movements and threw the kunai.

Momoe dodged another pair of rabbits when something glinted in her peripheral vision. She stepped to the side to get out of the way of two kunai, parried two more, and the last only managed to nick her clothes. She breathed out and returned her attention to rabbits still out to get her when a single kunai pierced a rabbit jumping at her.

The rabbit exploded and made her cover her face with her arm. The exploding rabbit exploded four more, sending her flying away.

Rabid Rabbits as a C-rank jutsu. Due to the many rabbits, each rabbit was weak and insufficient to do critical damage. It wasn't supposed to be a jutsu to take down an enemy, but an option to throw off the enemy of their momentum and create an opening to attack. Izumi equipped two kunai and began to walk toward Momoe, waiting for all the rabbits to explode.

The temperature suddenly rose and an expanding dome of roaring fire hit the remaining rabbits, which exploded before they could reach Momoe, who suddenly leapt out of the flames and flew down from the air with her sword gleaming in silver, that she swung down to release a silver-blue sword beam of chakra. Izumi jumped to the side to avoid it. The intense beam hit the ground and scarred the earth where she stood moments before.

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Momoe moved fast as soon as she was on the ground and pursued with a ferocious intensity. Her sword was replaced into its scabbard as she wove her hands seals. The earth below and around Izumi turned into mud and tentacle-like mud appendages shot towards her. Izumi cut one of them before it could grab her and kicked another off her leg, but three more grabbed onto her and pulled her down into the ground.

Izumi immediately shrugged them off as they weren't sturdy enough to hold her down, but the jutsu had already fulfilled its purpose as even though she saw Momoe's foot coming for her face, her body was delayed long enough for her to be unable to react.

She was sent flying by the decisive kick and rag-dolled on the ground a couple of times before she forcefully regained balance only to see the glinting sword blade coming down at her. She raised her arms and blocked the blade with her forearm vambraces.

Izumi groaned in pain as even though the vambrace saved her from being cut, the sword's impact force travelled down to her bone.

There was once a time when Izumi compared her progress against Itachi. He never came to the clan training when they were kids, but was still stronger than everyone in their group combined—he didn't come because he was that strong. She didn't let that deter her and continued to chase him as a goal, thinking that as long as she worked hard, she would catch up—she never came close, but that didn't bother her until he graduated after one year at the academy, which made her realise her foolishness.

Momoe replaced him as the new goal among her peers. She was good at everything she did. It took Izumi a couple of years at the academy to catch up by building up her strengths to shore up her weaknesses. But even though they were considered equal, Izumi knew she was always half a step behind. For the longest time, she was happy with that. She was satisfied with her progress and glad to have a rival against which to compare herself.

That was no longer the case.

"—There's a simple solution to resolve everything... You become a jonin—"

"—To be more precise, you rise so high that when clan bigwigs respect her because of you, she'll have no choice but to realise that her daughter is not one to be tied down... but it's a tough road—"

She wanted her mother to be proud of her and not worry about her. For that, she had to be a jonin, which wouldn't be possible if she was satisfied being behind someone. If someone who was once the last of their academy class could leave behind people behind to become one of the first chunin among their peers, then she should be able to put her rival one step behind her.

As Momoe's sword came swinging down at her, Izumi's black iris turned red.

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Momoe clicked her tongue when she saw Izumi activate her sharingan and effortlessly dodge her sword. Rather than pile on pressure, she jumped several meters away because she knew she was no longer fighting the same opponent.

A year and a half ago, she wouldn't have feared Izumi's sharingan because she didn't like to use it, and it was straining on her naturally low reserves. She still trained them because a Uchiha who was not trying to advance their eyes was plain stupid. But in the last year, she had gone through two growth spurts that also boosted her reserves, which had made her completely comfortable having her sharingan up and active through long fights if she wanted.

Momoe had made "acquaintances" with several clan shinobi and sparred against them regularly to find their weaknesses. As much as she hated to lose, she despised losing to clan shinobi, especially those kekkei genkai. She also sparred against Izumi regularly, but she was one of her best friends; there wasn't a kinder girl out there. But that didn't change that she had considerable experience against the Uchiha dojutsu—more than any other kekkei genkai—enough to think that no one would complain if she claimed to be somewhat of an anti-sharingan expert.

She held up her sword as Izumi zapped towards her with three commas spinning in her eyes before suddenly changing her direction to attack her from the side even faster. Momoe could barely move her sword fast enough to block the kunai as the impact sent sparks flying. She swung her sword down but Izumi effortlessly sidestepped at the very last second. The sharingan worked effortlessly to show Izumi things Momoe could only imagine.

Izumi launched a combination at the highest gear that was all expertly blocked by Momoe, who kept pace. She was expecting another quick combo, but Izumi suddenly slowed and threw off her rhythm, which was immediately punished with a kick to the kneecap and an elbow to the face.

Roughly half a year ago, Izumi had met with Lady Uchiha, who took a liking to her and started giving her advice. At first, Momoe thought their meetings would be about genjutsu as Uchiha Mikoto was Takuma's genjutsu teacher—but surprisingly, Izumi was learning taijutsu. She was a taijutsu-heavy fighter due to her struggles with low chakra reserves. She was outstanding—but after meeting Mikoto, she had become terrifying.

Momoe stopped her from attacking by launching a diagonal strike, shockingly parried by her vambrace at the perfect angle and time.

Uchiha's Interceptor Fist

Momoe was exposed as her sword arm flew back, opening her up. Izumi smoothly stepped in and smashed a body shot into her side that moved her organs around.

She didn't know what the Uchiha kunoichi had taught her friends, but it had overhauled her combat style. Izumi used to have the fighting style she had been developing for years, but half a year ago, that changed. Every time she fought Izumi, she faced a fighter that seemed lab-grown to be the antithesis of herself.

Each time they fought—each sparring round—Izumi found and exploited weaknesses like she was full of them. It shook her confidence for some while and she was forced to re-evaluate her entire combat style and philosophy.

To confirm a doubt, she introduced her to one of her many acquaintances over a sparring session. And her doubts were proven right as even though Izumi started by using her own style as the fight progressed, she adapted to become a better counter to her opponent and exploited weakness with Uchiha's Interceptor Fist.

For the first time in nearly nine years, they knew each other, Momoe felt that her friend and rival would leave her behind.

She couldn't let that happen.

Momoe let go of her sword and endured the devastating blows. Her vision was doubled as she blocked another attack and grabbed Izumi's arm before pulling her close with a jerk to smash foreheads. Surprise flashed through Izumi's red eyes as she squinted from the sudden pain.

If she was finding and exploiting weaknesses, the only way to go was to either close them, improve them, or replace them with something better. Each time Izumi showed her a weakness, she would try to solve it, test it out with someone else, and then fight her again, and the cycle would repeat.

Fighting her had become a miserable experience and she preferred actual combat to their spars. Momoe failed more than she had ever, but she continued because one thing was clear—

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Izumi made her better.

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Between Itachi and Momoe, Izumi felt that the latter was more remarkable. She was aware that Itachi was a jonin and thus magnitudes stronger. But Itachi's strength had always been a mystery, she had no idea how he got so strong—in fact, she had no idea how strong he was.

But she knew a lot more about Momoe. She had witnessed her friend's growth over the years. If that had taught her something, it would have been to be grateful that she was born as a Uchiha because she didn't believe she could have kept up with her without the sharingan.

Lady Mikoto had taught her to use the sharingan beyond "monkey copy." She had taught her to observe the enemy's style, break it down to understand it, find strengths to watch out for and weaknesses to exploit, and learn from the experience. At first, Izumi didn't get it, but once she understood, it felt like scales fell from her eyes. Their training involved sparring against Lady Mikoto and other Uchiha members who mimicked the people they had fought, exposed her to many different opponents, and allowed her to experience so much that it often overwhelmed her.

Since learning what Lady Mikoto claimed should be "common sense for every Uchiha, " Izumi's sparring win rate had increased. She rarely lost anymore unless she fought people much stronger than her, even though she hadn't grown physically or learned powerful new jutsu.

Half of those rare losses came from Momoe.

Izumi held a kunai in each hand, aggressively attacked Momoe, who had abandoned the sword, moved faster with freed-up dexterity, defended with the continuity of water, chaining moves with close to no gaps and even flowing into attacks when the opportunity arose.

Izumi looked for openings she had observed in previous fights and spotted one as Momoe left her side open without a block. She immediately moved to punish when Momoe's hand moved faster to grab her wrist before slamming her elbow into her chest.

It was a bait.

Surprised, she took a few steps back and saw the look of absolute concentration in Momoe's eyes as she was already weaving hand seals. Izumi jumped out of the way as a wave of fire almost burned her before dodging a volley of shuriken thrown at a perfect timing.

Izumi got up and saw Momoe charging at her. She focused and time seemed to slow down slightly as she observed Momoe, who seemed to change every time they fought. As she entered melee range, Izumi remembered her usual patterns of favouring the right side and moved to defend from the right when she not only shifted to the left and swung a kunai in the left hand.

Momoe had already fixed that.

Izumi still blocked the kunai because her sharingan allowed her to react quickly. Anyone else would've been stabbed in the face. There was a second of lull before they exchanged a dozen strikes where Izumi came out on top, but Momoe grabbed her and threw her away.

The two kunoichi began weaving hand seals and a large amount of chakra was mobilised in a training field reserved for chunin.

Fire Release: Fire Dragon Flame Bullet

Fire Release: Great Dragon Fire Jutsu

A long dragon curled in the air on Momoe's side while a dragon head-shaped fireball formed before Izumi. The two dragons roared and flew towards each other as two B-rank ninjutsu clashed.