Max had the urge go and slash Naruto a few times. He didn't mind that the kids had made such a nickname, but Naruto was not like the other kids.
Only the kids in the villager called him that Trash Devil, meaning that no adult knew of the nickname. But Naruto looked like someone that would spread that nickname to anyone that would listen.
'I'm going to start hearing that everywere on Konoha now. Thanks Naruto.' Max thought.
Still, Max let it go since things like that weren't important for him. Well, mostly.
"I hope that you are prepared. I wont have you complaining after I beat you that you weren't ready for the fight." Sasuke say after noticing that Max was distracted.
"A true blade needs to face everything with it's edge to cut it. Since I have my hand in my weapon, it means that I'm ready to face you. It's just that I'm curious to see what a ninja is capable of, so I'm waiting for you to do the first move." Max said with a smile.
"Then you are already late. The first move was casted since the moment that I faced you." Sasuke said as he focused his eyes at Max.
Max's expression finally changed. He saw that Sasuke's eyes changed. He had a weird pattern with a tomoe on them. He didn't know why, but that look made him feel strange.
'Sharingan? It seems that Sasuke awakened it in his fight with Haku.' Kakashi on the side thought after recovering from hearing what Naruto knew about Max.
He felt a little embarassed for expecting some new information from Naruto. Since he spent a lot of time asking around the village but never asking the kids for it, he thought that what Naruto was going to say should be important. But clearly Naruto was Naruto.
Seen that Sasuke was using his Sharingan in the fight, Kakashi decided to reveal his own. He lifted his headband and revealed his.
'Is this common on ninjas? Changing eyes in battle?' Max was confused by this.
Sakura was paying atention to the fight after hitting Naruto on the head. Seen the Sharingan in Sasuke's eyes, she felt great at Sasuke's chances to win.
Naruto on the other hand had seen the Sharingan on Sasuke before so he wasn't supissed by it. But, compared to Sasuke and Sakura, he also saw what Max did against Gato's goons so he didn't know how the fight was going to end.
"Kakashi-sensei, do you know who is going to win this?" Naruto couldn't help but to ask.
"Well, its better for you to find out by watching the fight. This is a good way for you guys to understand what you are missing at the moment." Kakashi said after thinking about it.
"What we are missing?" Sakura asked, but Kakashi didn't explain.
On the other side, Max was felling unconfortable as Sasuke contined to look at him so he diceded to do something about it.
'First, lets see what you can do.' Max thought as he took out his katana and started to walk.
Sasuke didn't know what Max was trying to do, but he had already activated his Sharingan so he was sure to be able to react to whatever Max could do.
Max on the other hand suddenly started to shift his body around as he walked. As he walked closer to Sasuke, he felt that his body was getting locked in place by something. So he decided to get that feeling off his body by shifting around.
But as he tried getting that feeling of, he noticed that as Sasuke's eyes stayed locked on him the feeling didn't go.
'This isn't working. Lets turn up the pace.' Max thought as he suddenly moved 2 times faster. His movement were smooth and instinctual. There was no pattern followed so he didn't think that Sasuke's eyes would keep up.
"Max really haven't heard anything about ninjas it seems. This is something that should give an edge to Sasuke normally." Kakashi commented as he saw what Max was doing.
"Normally?" Sakura noticed Kakashi saying that and got confused. Kakashi noticed her so he decided to explain.
"In battle, ninja's advantages comes by initiate, surprise and power. The initiate by getting the first move to get the flow of battle in your favor: Surprising your opponent with techniques and jutsu to secure the win quickly, and power enough to neutrilize any counter attack made by the opponent.
Mantaining these 3 things would secure avery fight that ninjas participate in." Kakashi said as to Sakura and Naruto.
Sakura quickly understood this since this is one of the theories of battle taught at the academy, but Naruto was clearly confused. Kakashi noticed this but decided to ignore it since the fight was getting mommentun by the second.
"Sadly for Sasuke, this isn't a battle between ninjas." Kaashi said as he saw Max making another move.
"What!?" Sasuke screamed as he found himself with a katana at his throat.
Sasuke's scream surprised Naruto and Sakura as they found out that Sasuke had lost in a blink of the eye. They espected the fight to have their ups and down, but never for it to be so one sided.
"Your eye trick seems to not be that important. I felt that you saw every motion that I made, but your body didn't react to it. You still need training." Max said as he retracted his katana.
"What was that? I clearly saw your chakra flow for a moment, but you didn't do any sign or move it towards your feet. What did you do?" Sasuke couldn't help but to ask. His Sharingan should be able to predict what he had done, but he couldn't. At the end, his body also couldn't react in time to defend himself when Max approches.
"Sasuke enough. Your Sharingan clearly saw what he had done, but you didn't understand it since that wasn't a ninja jutsu." Kakashi decided to step in after seen the outcome that he had predicted.
Sasuke still wanted more answers from Max but decided to calm down and ask Kakashi instead. "Can you explain us what he did, Kakashi?"
Kakashi looked at Sasuke weirdly for a moment but decided to let it go. "Is simple. You're faced Max as a ninja. Normaly, this would work on ninjas and goons everywere, but Max his not a goon. And he isn't a ninja either."
"Not a ninja!" Naruto and Sakura recovered from seen Sasuke lost and came by Kakashi side as they heard what he was saying.
"Yes. Not a ninja." Kakashi said as he looked at Max who was looking at him with a weird face. "Max is what we call a 'Samurai'. They are a group of people origined from the Land of Iron which use chakra differently from ninjas.
Instead on the normal ways of battle that the ninjas follow, they folow a more spiritual and focused way of combat. The believe in quickness and focus as the principal way of battle and are fast enough to attack ninjas before they have time to make a hand sign.
It's said that in a fight with equal level ninja and samurai, the samurai would always win." Kakashi took his time to explain.
The trio had now understood why Sasuke had lost. Sasuke was expecting been fought with a form of genjutsu, but Max just straigh up used his body to fight him.
"You are wrong."
Kakashi didn't get surprised as he heard this, but the trio was startled by what they heard that from Max.
"Wait, are you not a samurai?" Naruto asked. Naruto trusted Kakashi's word so he didn't believe that he had lied about if.
"Well, he had some part right about my strength. My training method is to increase my concentration and reaction, so my spiritual energy and quickness gets a boost from that. But that is just a part of my strength.
Since I started training, doing a Blade Wave was a milestone that blocked me for performing some more advance techniques. Now that I passed it, my fighting style is now more adaptable." Max said as he remebered what was in the book.
"Say Kakashi, there were parts of the book that I took as been too abstract in its way of explaining it. But now that I now that ninjas exist, the weird techniques that you and Haku displayed at the brige and Sasuke's eyes, I believe that some of that is starting to make sense now.
Are you willing to spar with me to help me out."
Max didn't hide his willingness to fight Kakashi as he asked. He really needed someone to fight him to clear his doubts and Kakashi was perfect for his knowledge and skills.