Sasuke looked toward Kakashi with sheer surprise on his face and then growing comprehension as he realized that this would give him a chance to fight some very capable people. It was a chance to test his growing skills against some worthy foes. In fact, this might just explain what those Suna shinobi were doing in town.
Next to him, Naruto looked a bit perplexed as he tried to take in what that meant, but was also very obviously trying to hide the fact that he quite obviously didn't know exactly what the situation was.
Kakashi and Sasuke turned to look at him with expressions ranging from the disbelieving to the disgusted.
"Ano?" Ryoko said, inadvertently coming to Naruto's rescue. "What is the chunin exam?"
"It is an event that happens twice a year," Kakashi explained. "When the shinobi of various countries come together to test their outstanding genin and see who is worthy to promote to chunin status."
Ryoko nodded in understanding but still looked a bit confused. Behind her, Naruto was starting to figure things out and the stars were slowly growing in his eyes.
"Oh, so this is for Naruto and Sasuke then," Ryoko noted understandably.
"You also have the chance to participate," Kakashi said.
"Ano?"
Sasuke also looked a bit doubtful at that comment and looked toward Ryoko curiously.
"Why shouldn't she?" Naruto asked. "She's part of our team."
As the hyperactive genin spoke he stepped forward to slap the girl companionably on the back almost sending Ryoko spilling forward onto her face.
Kakashi and Sasuke watched as the martial artist was nearly floored with the simple friendly hit.
"Obviously her performance has been something of a fluke so far," Sasuke thought.
Kakashi thought back toward over his interactions with both Kodachi and Ryoko and how they fought. Every movement replayed briefly and he noted the pattern.
"Intent," he thought. "They read intent through their chi sense. Naruto lacked a hostile intent and surprised her."
"Ano," Ryoko said nervously as she straightened herself.
"Err, sorry, Ryoko," Naruto said in embarrassment.
"Well, anyway, this is just a nomination, taking it will be up to you," Kakashi said. "Those that wish to participate need to bring those applications to room 301 at the academy tomorrow, at 3:00pm. That's all."
And with that, he vanished into thin air, leaving merely a tracery of smoke in his wake.
"To…tomorrow?" Ryoko said. "That leaves little time to prepare."
"Ah, we're fine," Naruto said, waving off the concern before fading off completely into dreams of victory and Hokage-hood."
"Hai," Ryoko said. "There's still almost twenty-nine hours until we need to be there."
"It'd probably be best not to come too tired," Sasuke warned her.
"I shall be fine," Ryoko promised. "There's not time to prepare anything much."
Sasuke nodded at her statement, accepting that Ryoko would be careful before he left for his own home. That left Ryoko alone with Naruto, who was still mostly imbedded in his dreams of being a future hokage.
"Though I do know where there's a snake pit in one of the unused practice fields," Ryoko noted.
****
"I understand that your sensei has nominated your team for the chunin exam," Hiashi Hyuuga said neutrally to his daughter as she silently prepared tea for the morning workout he held regularly with his nephew.
"H…hai," Hinata said nervously, drawing a trace of irritation that Hiashi kept hidden below the surface.
He found it hard to believe that the girl had done much to deserve the nomination, her lack of willpower and confidence always prevented her from reaching her potential. More than likely she was merely included because teams were required to join as a unit.
"Do not fail your teammates in this," he warned her seriously. "You can fail yourself as much as you want as long as you don't bring others down with you."
"I…I will not let any of my teammates down, father," she ascertained quietly.
Nodding at that, though doubting she held the backbone to carry through the promise, he turned back to his preparations as Neji came into the courtyard, glowering.
"Be sure to pay close attention to this morning's exercise," Hiashi instructed her.
"Hai," Hinata noted.
****
"The Chunin Exam, eh?" Kiba's mother asked curiously. "At your age, that'll be something to show those high minded noble clans a thing or two won't it?"
"Yeah," Kiba said with a fangy smile only moderately subdued by his mother's overwhelming presence. "I'll come out on top for certain, and we'll see what they think when an Inuzuka hits Chunin months after graduating."
Tsume smiled broadly and clapped her son on the shoulder firmly.
"How's your pack?" she asked. "You've got an Aburame and they're great packmates, but is that Hyuuga girl still scared speechless half the time?"
"Hinata'll do what she needs to do, don't worry about that," Kiba said. "There's more bite than bark to her."
"There'd almost have to be," Tsume said with a snicker. "Still, you aren't the only one with a wallflower to deal with, Kakashi's team has that Saotome girl. Not even a proper ninja herself."
"She'll be trouble," Kiba said a bit more seriously.
"Why's that?" Tsume asked. "I hear you beat her pretty handily."
"Twice," Kiba said. "Out of luck, she's looking for a rematch I think."
"Huh, didn't think she had the backbone to get angry over something like that," the older woman said.
"Ryoko's not angry," Kiba said. "She's…It's like the first time Akamaru discovered bones."
"Can't get enough of my boy, can she?" Tsume asked with a teasing snicker as Kiba flushed moderately red.
****
Naruto's preparation for the next day was semi-feverish in terms of energy and effort, but undirected and unfocused.
He practiced every seal he knew, sparred his kage bunshin, challenged himself to sneak past any adult he saw and otherwise honed what he knew of each ninja talent whenever said opportunity came up. If he didn't find an opportunity, he tried to make anything he did into an opportunity to practice.
He was both excited and exciteable, and, without any clue as to what might be tested, he tried to practice everything rather than focusing on one coherent, concrete trait in which he might gain some advancement by the next day.
If he'd tried doing such with his Kage Bunshin, he might have had some chance at improving several skills at least slightly, but he wasn't yet aware of the way information was spread between his clones yet.
Ryoko hadn't told him, most likely assuming he already knew, and Kakashi had kept quite on the matter as well, for reasons of his own.
In the end, perhaps the firmest benefit he acquired was a very firm feeling of being prepared and psyched up for the coming challenges, his normal indomitable spirit fanned higher than ever by his scattered preparations.
"All right!" Naruto declared. "This is just the next step to being Hokage!"
It was easy to dismiss Naruto's predominately improvised training methods and rampant, naïve dreams as a sign of someone with only limited intelligence. It was very easy to overlook the creativity and the effort involved.
It was even more difficult to equate the cheerfulness with a supreme willpower. So often, people assumed that anybody who was happy and cheerful was also stupid.
Obviously, if someone was happy in the midst of a terrible situation, then they were merely incapable of understanding that situation.
Somewhere in the midst of his preparations, Naruto caught a glimpse of pink hair striding down the road ahead and eagerly shifted his path to land at the side of the girl he still considered the most beautiful in the village.
"Sakura-chan! How's it going?" he asked.
"Naruto," the girl growled. "Leave me alone."
Naruto slowed down a bit and then tried to press on.
"Did you hear? Kakashi-sensei nominated my team for the chunin exams," the blonde genin declared proudly.
Sakura froze and turned toward Naruto at that statement.
"Your team?" she asked. "Your whole team? Including…her?"
"You mean Ryoko?" he asked. "Yeah, of course her. So?"
"So?" Sakura repeated in disbelief. "So she's NOT a shinobi!"
"Hey, Ryoko's awesome," Naruto protested. "You should see her fight sometime. It's like watching everything in fast forward. She's better at taijutsu than Sasuke is!"
"Oh please," Sakura said. "She's a spineless scaredy cat that's been in the hospital twice with a concussion from trying to spar that dog-boy. There's no way that…that girl could be better than Sasuke at anything."
"Come on, Sakura, you don't mean that," Naruto said. "She really is very good. I mean, Sasuke's really good," he sounded a bit bitter as he admitted that, "and he can do stuff with ninjutsu that Ryoko can't, just like my clones, but if it comes to straight fighting skill, she's the best in the team."
"Quit being an idiot," Sakura said. "You're probably the one giving her the stupid ideas that she can spar any reliably trained shinobi."
She twisted her chin up and stomped down the street and this time Naruto didn't follow, standing back, perplexed.
*****
Sitting alone, Sasuke focused on his Sharingan, stretching the time that he could hold it usefully longer and longer.
It was this, his newest skill, that he focused almost all his scant time on, trying to bring it up to a level useful in battle and other circumstances. Trying to achieve the most basic level of mastery in the quickest time possible.
They would see he was a true heir of Uchiha bloodline and worthy of the title of genius that was given to him by the outsiders that did not understand the work he'd put in to his achievements.
Genius.
The title was a mockery, a blind appellation given to him by people that had no concept of where he actually stood in comparison to other Uchihas.
Especially a particular Uchiha, whose sharingan was powerful beyond reckoning.
Sasuke did not feel he was a genius, but he would find a way to surpass his enemy somehow. He'd sworn to that. He would replenish his own clan and defeat the stain on their honor.
The man that had left him an orphan and sole survivor.
"I will kill him," Sasuke promised the empty lanes of the Uchiha compound.
A living ghost of the past.
****
Joseibi watched as Ryoko sat seiza in the middle of their room, practicing hand seals. She'd been in that position for a good three hours. The fox-cursed girl grimaced as she considered the discomfort that accompanied seiza for her even after only ten minutes.
By that time, her legs would start losing feeling, pins and needles growing along the surface of her skin, much longer and it would be difficult to even stand up.
But Ryoko could hold the position seemingly indefinitely.
Her elder sister had been practicing seiza since she was three years old at their mother's insistence. She'd said at one point that she started using it for body control practice soon after absorbing what Ryoko thought of as the prime concept of the family art: everything was training.
Recently, over the last four years or so, sometimes Ryoko just seemed to fade into the background while she was sitting seiza.
"When are we training today?" Joseibi asked.
She looked toward the kitchen counter and saw a familiar set of vials that sent a chill down her back. The last time she'd seen bottles like that was on their training trip with their father and Ryoko ended up with three serious snake-bites.
Ryoko looked up toward her in embarrassment.
"I do apologize, Imouto-chan," she said. "I…I am going to have to train properly tonight, I was thinking that if I could finish mastering the Ja Jin…"
"No!" Joseibi snapped loudly.
"Imouto-chan," the elder said patiently, "this chunin exam is supposed to be very challenging. I must be make sure my skills are properly honed. If not, I…I will not bring proper honor to our style."
"I don't care," Joseibi protested. "You promised you'd help me train!"
"I will, but I ha…" Ryoko started.
"If you don't help me train," Joseibi said, ignoring the look of shock her sister gave her at the somewhat unprecedented interruption. "I'm going to go talk to that blind lady and tell her you're practicing the Ja Jinku no Hebi. Didn't she say no training techniques you hadn't cleared with her or the one-eyed guy?"
Ryoko frowned and fidgeted nervously, vacillating between the personality that was her younger sister's caretaker, the training obsessive martial artist and the uncertain girl anxious to avoid bringing dishonor to herself.
"You promised," Joseibi repeated firmly.
Ryoko took a deep breath.
"Hai," she said finally.
****
Sakura stood stock still as she heard a rumor cross behind her. All three rookie teams were going to be put into the Chunin Exams. All three, including that…girl on Sasuke's team. The one that seemed so interested in HER Sasuke.
It wasn't fair.
The pink haired kunoichi had gotten the best marks of any of them on her exams in the whole graduating class of twenty-seven students. Then she had to be shuffled off to another group, one that failed the passing test, just because some the Village decided to put some outsider girl on a team for some experiment.
A girl with no real skill from what she'd seen and no backbone to boot.
That should be her on the team with Sasuke-kun. She would be a proper genin going on proper missions instead of sitting back, waiting for another graduating class and another chance at genin while studying the medical arts.
But then, what could she do about it?
She was stuck with the situation as it was.
After all, what could she do to fix the situation?
As she considered this against the coming darkness of the sunset, she turned a corner and saw one of the foreign genin teams come to test their skills. Sakura noted the headbands they wore but didn't recognize the device on them, some recently founded minor village probably.
Tomorrow they'd go into the chunin exams with everyone else.
Where she should be.
Still, what could she do about? It wasn't like she could sneak into the chunin exams or anything like that. Even given the training and researching she'd been doing since her failure.
It wasn't fair, last time she was the only one of her team to accomplish any of the objectives, and yet they failed her. Something about teamwork, she'd been a bit too distracted about the unfairness of being failed when she succeeded in the set conditions to catch everything.
Rather unlike her, but she had been having a rather bad day.
Getting told off by Sasuke immediately after it looked like he'd warmed to her.
Overhearing that outsider's plans of being Sasuke's mistress.
Almost being late to her team's meeting.
And then getting unfairly failed just because her teammates were morons.
It was the first of many such really bad days.
Days bad enough that they had her thinking of things she normally wouldn't have.
Bitterly she continued walking and started slowly walking up toward the steps of Konoha's library. She reached the foot of the steps and found her way blocked by an unfriendly looking chunin.
"Excuse me," she said. "I'd like to go through into the library."
"I'm afraid not Haruna-san," the chunin said firmly. "Your library privileges have been suspended."
"What?" she said.
"You can't expect to keep sneaking technique scrolls in and out without getting caught, girl," the chunin said.
"B…but," Sakura protested. "I didn't…"
"Consider yourself fortunate that you limited yourself to the genin stacks," the man repeated. "Otherwise you'd be looking at more permanent repercussions. Then again, if you tried anything more secure, you'd probably have gotten caught much earlier."
"This isn't fair!" Sakura protested.
"Kid, take my advice," he said. "Go home, take a breath and wait to be called on the matter. Your parents already turned over the scrolls you had in your room, so you don't need to come back. You've obviously got talent. Give it some time, you'll be a full shinobi and then you can get in here all you want."
Fuming, Sakura turned away and stomped down the street.
She should be a shinobi now!
Somehow, she'd prove it.
The girl froze half-way home and started considering carefully a rather ill-considered idea.
The genjutsu she'd used to get into the library's genin technique stacks wasn't strong enough alone to get her into anything with real security, but still.
"It could just work," she muttered. "I might just be able to slip in. Then I can prove to Sasuke-kun that I'm not a pathetic would be genin."
The pink-haired kunoichi student turned directions and picked up her pace as she started formulating a plan.
Above her, a slim figure wearing a Kusagakure headband watched her go. A moment ago it had been ignoring her, and then she'd let slip Sasuke's name.
Now, the slim figure smiled as slender fingers tapped out a sinister rhythm.
"I can make some small use of this."
****
Well before three o'clock came, the various jonin responsible for the genin applying to the chunin exam had started to filter into the lounge set aside for them to wait out the results of this first round of testing.
The first to arrive was the youngest jonin, Kurenai Yuuhi. Or at least she had thought she was the first to arrive. Instead she found a woman with long black hair covering her face like some sort of ghost and sitting next to a young teenaged girl.
She immediately recognized the chi-user from the earlier meeting and her assistant, and voice, Mokya.
"Oh, hello," she said. "I suppose it makes sense that you would be here as well. I am Kurenai Yuuhi and you're…what is the proper rank?"
"Mistress is an Iyoku Disciple within the Redeemed school," Mokya answered after a nod from Kodachi.
"How would that compare to the shinobi ranks," Kurenai asked. "If that's not considered prying into your school secrets."
Kodachi shook her head and reached forward with a bundle of paper and a pen, writing a quick note for Mokya.
"There is little the school considers outright secret," Mokya explained, she looked toward Kodachi and waited for cues. "There are five basic ranks. Student…Initiate…Disciple…Master…Grandmaster. Disciple is roughly equivalent to a jonin."
Kodachi nodded in confirmation of her assistant's explanation.
"I see," Kurenai noted. "A disciple of Iyoku. Will, ambition. Is that the most important virtue of the school?"
"The school credo consists of five virtues, with some disagreement over which is most important," Mokya explained. "Airen, Iyoku, Gimu, Fuki and Chikara. The leaders of the school have differences in training and philosophy leaning more toward one virtue or another. But all are required to advance"
"Compassion, will, responsibility, freedom and strength," Kurenai noted. "I assume each path is led by a grandmaster?"
Kodachi shook her head and raised a single finger.
"Only one master has so thoroughly mastered his own strengths and flaws," Mokya said reverently. "Accepted them all as a part of himself and balanced them completely."
"And which path is that?" Kurenai asked, curiously.
Kodachi let her hair fall back so that the ninja could see her amused smile underneath, but neither she nor Mokya gave any other indication.
After a good wait, Kurenai decided to press on.
"Do you carry a rank in the school?" she asked the young girl.
Before the girl could respond, the door opened into the room and another jonin entered into the room.
"Ah! Yuuhi-san!" a loud voice accompanied by blindingly white teeth declared. "I am impressed that you are here before all the rest of us. Surely you are finding closeness to the Power of Youth, and who is this with you?"
Under her covering of hair, Kodachi arched an eyebrow at the idea that this fellow seemed to not remember someone as distinctive as she had to be.
"Ah, Gai," Kurenai said hesitantly. "This is…"
Kodachi raised a hand politely in request for Kurenai to stop before gesturing to Mokya and pulling her fingers together as if holding a thin string and pulling along for some length. The teenager nodded and stood up clearing her throat.
"My Mistress is an Iyoku Disciple of the Redeemed School of Anything Goes Martial Arts, student to Master Akane Saotome, chi sorceress," the girl declared loudly in a shrill voice.
Kodachi briefly flinched as her own master's surname was given, having forgotten that was included in the long introduction.
Mokya continued as her mistress stood up and posed aristocratically, keeping her arms crossed in front of her chest.
"And wife to the rightful King Herb of the Ancient Dynasty of the Musk and mother to the rightful heir. She is Kodachi, the Black Rose. Ohh-HOHOHOHOHOHOHOHO!"
The teenager cleared her throat again and turned toward Kodachi for the normal thumbs up given by her mistress, who also added a firm nod to the end of the spiel.
"And I am Mokya," the teenager continued humbly in her normal voice. "My mistress's voice, eyes and nurse."
"Indeed, the Power of Youth burns most impressively in you," Gai said to the girl.
"It is my Mistress's spirit," the girl said humbly. "I am merely the voice."
Kurenai, meanwhile sweated in embarrassment at having merely witnessed the exchange. In the doorway behind Gai, a newly arrived Asuma Sarutobi did likewise and seemed to be considering whether or not to enter the room with the apparent lunatics.
****
Naruto found Ryoko and Sasuke waiting for him to arrive before entering, Ryoko characteristically sitting in seiza. He waved genially and smiled at them.
"Hey! You guys all made it," he declared, waving at them. "Why didn't you go in with everyone else?"
"W..we were waiting for you, Uzumaki-san," Ryoko explained.
"You're cutting it close to the time," Sasuke added, noting the visible clock tower and the hands growing closer to the three.
"Yeah, yeah," Naruto said. "So let's go and get this thing done."
"Hai!" Ryoko declared, moving smoothly from seiza to a standing position.
The three walked into the building amongst the other one hundred fifty genin and assorted odd chunin and special jonin involved in the exam. As they moved along, they found a small gathering of genin standing around outside of room that was marked as room 301.
Two shinobi that looked about sixteen or eighteen years old stood outside the doors blocking entry, kicking down a young genin in green spandex as he tried to pass them. Soon after, a girl in a pink tunic also tried to pass and was also knocked back to the floor.
"This is our kindness," one of the two declared. "All you lot see is the chance to get promoted, but you don't know what this test is like. Even we've failed it three times straight."
"People die in this test," the other continued. "Even worse, some give up being a shinobi altogether."
Kakashi's Team 7 reached the scene soon after the speech started and the three watched the two genin in the way carefully and politely.
"You think you kids are ready to handle the responsibility of a chunin?" the first asked. "Chunin are responsible for entire teams."
"Ano," Ryoko said meekly as she stepped forward and bowed. "Excuse me, might you let us pass please?"
Sasuke sighed as the Saotome girl moved ahead, apparently not noticing Sasuke was about to say something.
"Didn't you just hear us?" the second asked. "You're just going to fail."
"I…I do not mean to be a bother," Ryoko noted as she stepped forward, moving in a stutter step.
As Ryoko came closer, the bandaged one of the pair of struck out with a simple kick.
"Wah!" she gasped as she seemed to cringe past the kick.
The hand holding her bokken struck out in seeming reflex, which the bandaged genin easily dodged past.
"Oh! Su…sumimasen," she gasped. "I…I did n…wah!"
The bandaged bully tried to attack again, punching out as Ryoko ducked down to her knees, letting the punch swing high over her small frame. Almost immediately, the girl straightened into the torso of her attacker, pushing into his own momentum.
The chi of her attacker was confusing though, it felt too spread out, like it belonged to a larger body. She'd puzzle that out later however, for now she didn't need to worry about it. The attacker's chi was moving in one direction, she'd moved out of that direction and then moved in behind to shift her own chi into his momentum.
In the blink of an eye, the surprised shinboi was flying backwards through the air into his equally surprised partner.
"Su…sumima…masen," Ryoko said, bowing apologetically to the two young men tangled into each other. "But we r…really must pass."
That said she turned toward the door and started to push it open, disregarding the looks she was getting from the crowd.
"Ryoko," Sasuke said grimly. "This is the second floor."
"Ano?" the Saotome responded, pointing up toward the sign before looking up toward it herself to make sure she'd read it correctly.
"It's a genjutsu," Sasuke noted as the two bullies got to their feet and watched Ryoko standing their confused.
"So you noticed," one of them said as the 301 sign faded away into 201 for most of the people around the door.
"Ano?" Ryoko repeated, still looking at the sign above her head and blinking.
She was pointing and staring for several more seconds, still seeing 301, before her chi finally flushed itself completely of the illusion. At which point, her face flushed brightly and she hung her head, hunching her shoulders in embarrassment while orange fire slowly flickered into life in her eyes.
"Heh, I knew it all along," Naruto said proudly.
"Sumimasen," she said quietly, laying a shaking hand on the door next to her.
Then the girl quietly turned about and started to walk toward the stairwell. Naruto watched her, and took a couple of steps to catch up to her as Sasuke stayed behind smirking at the two false bullies.
"Hey," Naruto whispered comfortingly. "I really didn't notice you know, and you totally kicked their asses."
"Arigatou, Uzumaki-san," Ryoko said quietly nodding.
Behind them, three others were reacting to the situation, talking amongst themselves.
"Your suggestion to avoid attention was a good one," Neji said simply to Lee as the boy in the spandex watched Sasuke finally start to move off with his teammates. "We've gained some interesting information this way. Though I would like to know who that boy was."
"That's Sasuke Uchiha," Tenten said, blushing. "Ask any girl about him."
"Who was that girl?" Lee asked, frowning.
"I don't know," Tenten noted. "She wasn't wearing a headband though."
"My cousin has mentioned her," Neji noted. "She's the daughter of that thief that tried to steal techniques some time ago."
"Really?" Tenten said. "I hadn't thought she'd graduated yet."
"I'll meet you on the third floor," Lee said quickly, "I need to test something."
As Lee surged forward, few people noticed the pink-haired kunoichi keeping quietly out of the way of sight, praying her own genjutsu wouldn't be pierced and draw attention to her being there. Sakura followed the bulk of the crowd, the presence of which made the illusion that she belonged that much more effective, breathing a sigh of relief that she had escaped being noticed by any of the people that actually knew her.
Further along, the false bullies watched things from behind the doors to room 201.
"So that's the older Saotome girl," Kotetsu said rubbing at his shoulder where he'd slammed into his partner. "Dangerous clutz."
"I don't think those moves were an accident," Izumo corrected. "I'm more interested in Gai's kids though, they're being very sneaky."
"Hey, what's this?" the bandaged chunin asked looking up toward the front of the door.
Izumo, standing on the other side of the door in question, swung it open to look and saw the charred outline of what could have been a small handprint.
****
"Ano," Ryoko said as they came to the bottom of the flight of the stairs and looked around. "Wh..why did we come do..downstairs. Is the t…test n..not upstairs?"
Sasuke and Naruto paused to look at each other in consideration of that fact when a voice called out from above them.
"Hey!" Lee called out. "Black-haired girl and guy with the dark eyes…"
They looked up to see him standing on the flight above them and recognized the slightly older kid that had been kicked aside as they arrived. His injuries were gone now, however and he had a determined look in his eyes.
The young man jumped down to the ground and pointed forward.
"You, you're Sasuke Uchiha, right?" he asked. "And you're Ryoko Saotome?"
"Hai," Ryoko nodded with a respectful bow as Sasuke merely gave a curt nod.
"Gah! Ryoko too?! What do I have to do to get people to notice me?" Naruto privately wondered. "And what is with the eyebrows on this guy?"
"I am Rock Lee," the boy said. "I would like to fight you."
"Hey, what about me?" Naruto demanded stepping forward to meet Lee.
"I don't wish to fight you," Lee noted as Naruto rushed in.
The strikes came in with high speed, a speed that Naruto had seen before. He blinked in shock as he barely managed to raise a block and roll with the power of the hit, softening the blow enough for him to control his impromptu flight.
The hyperactive ninja rebounded off the wall and shot forward slipping a strike in which forced the green-clad fighter to shift his position before responding with another strike that sent Naruto stumbling far out of position.
Growling, Naruto recovered his balance and brought his hands together, starting a hand seal.
"This guy is just as fast as Ryoko and quite a bit stronger," he thought to himself. "This'll be tough."
"Get out of the way, Naruto," Sasuke snapped. "He was talking to me."
"And Ryoko," Naruto added hastily to the end of that statement.
"Ano," Ryoko said, blinking into stars. "Does he want to challenge us?"
"Yes," Lee said. "I have come to test my techniques against the Uchiha heir. But I also saw your fighting skill Saotome-san and would also like to test myself against you."
"Wai!" Ryoko said, jumping up off the ground excitedly. "I accept."
"She is certainly much filled with the Power of Youth, even the loud one named Naruto is stronger than I thought" Lee considered silently. "Truly a worthy adversary, but first I must test myself against the number one rookie."
He focused his gaze on Sasuke before politely turning toward Ryoko again.
"I've challenged Sasuke first," he noted.
"Oh…" Ryoko noted, deflating again somewhat. "I see."
Naruto, shifting somewhat out of stance wandered over to Ryoko's side and muttered to her quietly.
"Don't worry, you get used to it."
"Ano?" Ryoko responded, not really understanding what Naruto meant.
"Okay, so I was lying, it keeps being annoying," Naruto further explained.
"Ano?"
"There's no way you can beat me," Lee noted. "I am currently the strongest genin of the Leaf."
"We'll see about that," Sasuke said, smirking as he leaped into the attack, only to find himself easily countered within a few moves.
The first exchange was only mildly better than what Naruto accomplished, much to Sasuke's bitterness. Grimacing momentarily, Sasuke then smiled in a self-satisfied manner as his eyes shifted into a brilliant red with a pinwheel of black marks within.
"Sugoi!" Ryoko called out as she saw the eyes change colors, wondering what it meant for Sasuke's skills.
Sasuke ignored her and charged in again at Lee, determined to use the sharingan to puzzle out the secret behind Lee's technique. As the next series of exchanges carried on, it became obvious to Sasuke just what was behind Lee's power, and it was a discovery that shocked him completely.
The next exchange did not get much better, even through the sharingan eyes. Every high-speed kick and punch came flying past his face, just barely dodged. Each one without an accompanying burst of ninjutsu or genjutsu designed to fool his senses or give only the appearance of extreme speed.
The realization that she was fighting a man that used pure taijutsu slowly sank in and, as the monster slipped past his defenses and he was sent rocketing into the air: something he saw coming but couldn't move fast enough to prevent.
"That's right," Lee said as he leaped up behind Sasuke's floating form. "My techniques are pure taijutsu, and it doesn't matter how well your eyes can read my movements you can't keep ---."
Lee found his lecture interrupted when his audience was pulled out from in front of him.
Flipping out of his trajectory, he pulled himself to the ground and watched as Naruto landed with the still shocked Sasuke.
"You, why do you interrupt our match?" Lee demanded.
"Uzumaki-san," Ryoko said, in similar shock. "Th…that was very rude."
"Hey," Naruto protested. "We've got to go to the chunin exam in like ten minutes, Sasuke won't make it if he's unconscious."
At that statement, the mentioned genius snapped to his feet, angrily shrugging off Naruto and stalking away from the scene, fuming in shame at the poor performance he'd just given.
To be saved by Naruto, of all people.
"Whatever," he muttered bitterly. "Let's get to the test."
"I…I shall have to answer your challenge…another time," Ryoko said with much hesitation. "But, Uzumaki-san is right. W…we are out of time."
Lee looked up toward the clock and nodded with a grimace and took a deep breath.
"You are correct," he said. "I should also join my team. We'll test our techniques against each other some other time."
With that the small group separated and drifted up to the third floor.
"You're lucky, Lee," a voice said as the shinobi was about to vanish upstairs with Team 7. "I was about to send Gai-sensei a message that you were using that technique."
The busy-browed fighter flinched as he looked to the giant turtle that was the source of the voice and then nodded in acceptance.
"I am sorry, but I did not intend to use the other one," Lee noted.
****
"Ahh, you all three made it," Kakashi said as Naruto and Ryoko joined Sasuke at the entrance to the testing room. "Good, let's get started."
He shifted aside and gestured for the three to go past him.