The audience saw cracking and more cracking until eventually…

*BOOOOOM*

Shira was crashed into the arena’s floor with the webs cracking upon impact and revealing his partially destroyed state. He was bleeding from his head and it looked as if he was a broken doll sprawled upon the ground. Fu gently flew towards him with her Eight Gates bug wings and smiled.

“It was a fun match Shira-kun! Your muscles look very cool!” Fu said while doing muscular poses.

The referee hopped in the ring and checked on Shira before calling the results.

“Is he still trying to get up?”

“Whoa he is twitching down there! He isn’t done yet!”

“That courage is remarkable.”

Shira’s fingers twitched as he tried to lift himself up. He shouted out in pain as he forced his body to give in to his demands. He smashed his fist to the ground in determination. Fu watched as her new friend wanted to play some more but decided that it would be better for him if he took a rest.

“Are you going to call it or what Ref!?” Sho yelled reluctantly.

The referee ignored him as Shira continued his struggle. The audience cheered Shira on. Fu happily sighed at she looked at her new friend trying so hard. She disappeared and smashed her rounded shield into his gut. Forcing him to spit out blood and finally lose consciousness.

Not many people liked this outcome and started to boo her. The referee could even be seen looking at her with slight disgust. But regardless of how he feels, he called Fu the winner and stayed on the heavily destroyed arena from the past matches. With the giant hole in the arena with some parts burned and others cracked.

“Despite how heartless she was, it was the correct choice for an enemy shinobi. However, this is just the chunin exams. She didn’t need to be so cruel.”

“Those three are from the Village Hidden in Demons? No wonder their power is so destructive and behavior so heartless.”

“Those were the only team sent from that village as well. I wonder where their jonin captain is..?”

It was at this time a break was called. The electronic board turned off as the audience and judges/VIP’s huddled off. The remaining 5 contestants were confused.

“I didn’t know there were breaks in the chunin exams.” Fu said confusedly.

“There aren’t.” Khael said.

“Oh no… This sounds like trouble.. and not the peaceful kind of trouble.” Sho whined.

“Something is happening. Follow me.” Khael said.

“Wait Why!? Why does it matter if something is happening? We should just stay right here and continue doing nothing. What if they disqualify us!?” Sho rapidly spat out.

Khael stopped as she thought about why was she about to leave. ‘Teacher told me to gain attention for the village… Nothing else was told.. And I don’t feel much for this place..’

“You’re right Sho. But I’m still going. There could be something useful for the village going on.” Khael declared.

With a heavy sigh, Sho got off his back and looked at Khael.

“If you really wanted to find out what’s happening, I’ll do it. Your power doesn’t show that well in information gathering and I don’t want you getting caught up in something you shouldn’t.” Sho said.

Sho started to rapidly draw upon his scroll as he created multiple tiny cartoonish creatures that soon spread out and started to follow the hokage and the other VIP’s. Fu was happily talking with the other contestants as Sho and Khael activated their Byakugan to look at the important people. For a while nothing was happening as they started to discuss until things look as if they were getting heated up between Temari and some of the other important guests. Gaara started talking and seemingly appeared to settle the rising tension between them. Then they looked out towards the Demon Desert, the second exam stage, and saw two figures in the Akatsuki robes. Gaara stood in the front. Temari and Shikamaru to his sides. Sand shinobi started to prepare for battle as they took positions on top of the coliseum and all around it. Other sand shinobi started to evacuate the guests and contestants in preparation.

One of the Akatsuki members had the appearance of a child. The only thing that was visible about him was his bandaged mouth, white hair, and red eyes. However for Khael and Sho who had the Byakugan, the managed to see far more than the average shinobi. They saw through his cloak and saw that most of his body was covered in bandages. He had a stitched scar on the left side of his chest and a sort of weak or drained body. As if he really was a mummy. The second one however wasn’t wearing the classic Akatsuki robes that most people know them of by now. He was wearing a beekeeper outfit in the Akatsuki colors with the clouds on it. Khael and Sho saw far more though underneath his suit. The insides of his body was filled with bees and wasps!

“Doesn’t he seem like that quiet guy Jabie-sensei’s clone trained for three years?” Sho asked.

“Yes. He’s similar.” Khael responded.

“Maybe he’s from the same clan as him. They both got bugs inside their bodies.” Sho suggested.

Khael just continued to look at the two members as the reached the entrance of the coliseum. The Akatsuki members stared at Gaara and his forces who seemed as if they prepared for them ahead of time. A giant image of the mummy Akatsuki member appeared in the sky. Contrary to his appearance, his voice was actually more like a young handsome gentleman rather than a childish voice.

“We’ve come for the Jinchūriki. Come peacefully or face destruction.” He threatened.

Gaara walked forward.

“Come then and face the strength of the Hidden Sand Village! Together we stand and together we will fall.” Gaara said back.

The image of the Akatsuki member shattered and his partner finally took action. A massive swarm of bees and wasps of different colors and sizes started to rapidly fly out from Beekeeper’s suit towards the coliseum. Gaara used the nearby sand in the desert to combat against the creatures. He rose and manipulated the sand to crush and try and stop the insects from coming closer, but they were too many and also too tiny. Temari and the rest of the sand ninjas joined in. The sand ninjas jumped down to attack the Akatsuki members while Temari brandished her fan and swung. Slicing and cutting many of the insects apart.

The child-like Akatsuki member combated against the incoming sand shinobis with ease. He used his bandages wrapped around his body and manipulated it with chakra to stretch to incredible ranges. He sliced the sand shinobi in half with just his bandages and jumped towards the wind ninjutsu that Temari just produced. He held out his palm and strangely the wind jutsu was sucked into his hand.

“What!?” Temari shouted.

Shikamaru was giving orders to the sand shinobi as Gaara was continuing to deal with the sea of insects. The sand shinobi went after the Beekeeper along with Shikamaru. The child-like Akatsuki member held out his palm that just absorbed Temari’s wind jutsu and suddenly shot out light blue flames towards the motionless Gaara and Temari.

“Tch! Fire ninjutsu against me? How reckless!” Temari yelled.

She swung her fan once again producing slicing and lacerating winds towards the blue flames. However the blue flames did not get fed to her wind ninjutsu and instead the blue flames only grew in size as they flew towards Temari and Gaara. Temari’s shocked expression forced Gaara to move. He tried to use his personal sand to block the attack, but it seems someone beat him to it. A familiar puppet appeared in front of Temari and used the shield on top of its body to block the attack.

“Kankuro!” Temari said.

“Haha. Don’t get too riled up Sis.” Kankuro said with three puppets at the ready.

“Let’s go.” Gaara stated as he created four sand clouds for them to stand on including Shikamaru.

The three Suna siblings started to fly around destroying more and more of the insects while Shikamaru gave orders from above towards the sand ninjas. Gaara surrounded the child-like Akatsuki member with 4 giant sand hands that reached for him.

“You should have just come along peacefully. This war against the world will really be necessary for true peace..” He muttered to himself.

He suddenly disappeared from his previous position and appeared elsewhere. He went through some hand signs before raising his hand in the air and blowing a large thick mass of black clouds that seemed to get larger and larger.

“I don’t think we can fight against a thundercloud.” Kankuro said as a torrent of flame shot out from his mechanical foot, incinerating a large amount of wasps.

“Focus on the maker of the clouds.” Gaara said.

The three charged towards the producer of the thunderclouds but before they could get the chance, the black cloud shot out a bolt of lightning.

“Impossible…. I just got here….” Kankuro muttered as blood leaked from his mouth.

“KANKURO!!!!!!! YOU BASTARD!!!!” Temari screamed as she flew towards Kankuro.

“You will pay for this!” Gaara said vengeful.

Temari caught Kankuro who had a gaping hole in his stomach as Gaara created even larger sand constructs to crush and battle with the Mummy. Unfortunately for Gaara, his tactic was simply not working against an enemy he could not catch. His inability to punish the enemy that fatally wounded his brother, angered him so much that he felt his control over Shukaku was faltering. A sand-like tail made of chakra grew out of him. His sand became faster and much more precise even almost managing to catch the Mummy. But he managed to use his hand and absorb the chakra within the sand, rendering it as useless. The Mummy shot out multiple bolts of lightning at Gaara but failed to pierce through his multi-layered defense. He then slammed his palm on the ground.

The desert’s sand started to split apart slowly before suddenly widening and swallowing up a majority of Suna shinobi. It then rose up to try and swallow Gaara. Gaara’s anger was peaked as he saw more and more of his people fall at the hands of this shinobi. Two sand tanuki-shaped ears appeared on top of Gaara’s red head while his tail increased in size. Sand started to cover parts of his body and face as one of his eyes turned yellow with a black star pupil. The sand’s speed and prowess increased even more. Mummy realized that by fighting Gaara head on wasn’t working.

Mummy started to target the Suna shinobi more. Gaara however wasn’t having it anymore. He created a gigantic wall of sand that blocked him and Mummy away from the others.

“Enough tricks. You wanted my tailed beast! You will get him!” Gaara snapped.

He shot even more sand towards Mummy.

“I guess your right. I will get him.” Mummy cryptically said.

A sudden shift in the sand. Nearly instantaneous movement. And a hit.

Drip.

Drip.

Drip.

Blood slowly trickled down Gaara’s sand cloud.

“I’ve got you now….” Gaara said with a bandage piercing through his gut, that bypassed his automatic sand defense.

Gaara grabbed the bandage and had his sand start coating it. Mummy saw as the sand was coming closer to reaching him and he quickly cut off his bandage before it could return back to him. But this did not stop Gaara’s retaliation, Gaara’s sand chased after him until he got a grab around Mummy’s leg.

“Hm. These Jinchūriki’s are tougher than I’d imagine.” Mummy said as Gaara soon crushed his leg.

With a slight wince, Mummy removed Gaara’s sand from his leg and went through hand signs before creating another thunder cloud beneath him and rising in the air along with it. Gaara noticed that his sand didn’t crush Mummy’s leg like it should have. There was some resistance preventing him from breaking bone. But under that Akatsuki robes, he couldn’t see exactly what Mummy did. Gaara shot forward sand bullets and more monster-shaped sand hands at his opponent. Mummy easily dodged with his new aerial maneuverability before getting in close using his bandages to whip towards Gaara. Gaara’s sand blocked it without trouble but didn’t manage to dodge the lightning bolt that fired from Mummy’s cloud that pierced through his shoulder. Sand slowly started to fill up the hole.

With a pained groan, he whipped his tail and grabbed one of the bandages. Gaara pulled Mummy towards him and caught him by the throat.

“Die!...” Gaara said with his face half-transformed into Shukaku.

As Mummy was being choked by Gaara, he slowly grabbed Gaara’s head. Gaara noticed that his chakra was being siphoned! He shaped his tail into a sharper shape before piercing through Mummy with his tail. This did not stop the draining of his chakra though. Gaara’s sand transformation started to fall apart as his eyes slowly turned a glowing red. He dropped Mummy and created a cloud under him. A deep blue slime-type of fluid covered Mummy’s destroyed chest. Mummy was breathing raggedly as he flew back towards the coliseum along with a red-eyed Gaara behind him.

As they arrived they noticed Beekeeper was immobilized by the Konoha ninja and about to get swarmed by the remaining Suna ninja.

“Shadow Stitching Jutsu!” Shikamaru yelled as the shadows that kept the Beekeeper bound stretched into black sharp tentacles and pierced throughout his body.

The sand shinobi slice, slashed, punched, and kicked the immobilized Akatsuki member as Mummy and Gaara appeared overhead. Temari was seen desperately worried next to a medical ninja healing Kankuro.

“I’ve got the Jinchūriki Beekeeper. Let’s return.” Mummy said.

Beekeeper burst into a mass of bees that flew towards Mummy and stood on a sand cloud created by Gaara. The previous sea of bees and wasps returned to Beekeeper and they were about to leave with the Jinchūriki in hand.

“GAARA!!! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!” Yelled a hysterical Temari.

A tear fell down Gaara’s glowing eye as he left along with the two Akatsuki members.

“No medical ninjutsu in the world could save this kind of wound…” The medical ninja said as he stopped healing Kankuro.

It was at this point Temari broke down. She wept over her brother while shouting and beating the sand next to him to come back to her. Shikamaru came over and put his hand over her shoulder. The rest of the sand ninja looked distraught and angry as they also wept. They’ve lost their Kazekage…. They’ve lost a battle that was prepared for…. They even lost the brother of their leader…

“Hang on a moment.” A sudden polite voice said.

Everyone looked around for the source of the voice until they saw…

“Jabie-sensei?!” Sho shouted with slight foreboding about the next sequence of events.

“Jabie-sensei?” Khael said confused.

“Jabie-sensei!” Fu shouted excitedly to repeat Sho and Khael.

“I might be able to save him… For a price… Along with your precious Kazekage.” Jabie said with a greedy grin.