All of the genin who had passed Ibiki's test the day before now stood outside a large forest with gates surrounding it. Sakura and Sasuke both stood tense in the middle of the crowd waiting for Naruto to show up. He never did and it scared them.

"Hello everyone," said Ankou with a smirk, "welcome to the Forest of Death. This is gonna be fun," she gave a small giggle before pulling out a couple sheets of paper, "Now before we begin this test I have to get you to sign these papers. They're consent forms that you must sign before taking the test."

"What about our other teammate?" asked Sasuke and everyone else agreed.

"They already signed the consent form when they signed the application forms," said Ankou with a shrug, "Though they didn't know that they were doing that."

"Well then where are they?" hissed Sakura.

"Hold on a moment," answered Ankou, "I'm getting to that part. You guys are so impatient," Sasuke and Sakura just glared at her though Sasuke's was much worse than Sakura's. "Usually during this part of the test we send the teams out together to gather scrolls, but it has come to our notice that almost none of the chunins know what to do when their teammates are caught and taken hostage. So one of your teammates has been taken hostage somewhere in the Forest of Death with 3 chunin guards both protecting them and keeping them hostage. One of the chunin gaurds also has one of these scrolls," she pulled out two scrolls with the word heaven written on one and the word earth written on the other, "Once you have saved your teammate and have captured your scroll from the chunin guards you will need to find the other scroll and then take them into the middle of the forest where there is a locked tower. You also have to finish it within the week."

"What are we supposed to do for food?" yelled Chouji.

"Look around," answered Ankou, "There's plenty of food in this forest."

"That's not all that's in this forest," muttered Sakura just loud enough for the people closest to her to hear so they all began to ask her what she was talking about. She shrugged and said, "There are man-eating beasts and poisonous plants in there."

The mutters continued until Ankou finally silenced them by saying, "You can be disqualified though. If all three members do not make it to the tower within the time limit your team is disqualified. If a member of the team is lost or becomes incapacitated then you are disqualified. And if you look at the contents of the scroll before you reach the tower you are definitely disqualified. Alright now that that's settled each team turn in your consent forms and pick a gate where you will be let in."

Just as Sakura and Sasuke reached their gate they heard Naruto call out to them. "Sasuke…Sakura?"

"Naruto are you okay?" asked Sakura not even trying to conceal her worry.

"Yea," answered Naruto, "I'm just a little sleepy because they filled our room with sleeping gas."

"Are you sure you're okay?" asked Sasuke while trying to conceal most of his worry, but both Sakura and Naruto could hear it through their mental connection, "You aren't hurt at all?"

"I'm fine Sasuke," answered Naruto, "But I have an idea that I need your help with."

"What is it Naruto?" asked Sakura.

"I can sense Ino and Kiba close by so I think that the rookie nine should team up and meet at our tree. I'll get these two. You guys just need to get the other guys to cooperate," said Naruto.

Sakura and Sasuke looked around to find that the other two teams of rookie nine were on either side of them. "Alright Naruto," said Sasuke within his mind before talking out loud to Sakura, "You get Ino's team. I'll talk to Kiba's."

Sakura nodded and they both walked to the two other teams to get them to work together.


Naruto opened his eyes after his conversation with his teammates and slowly looked around. He noted briefly that the jounin guards that he had sensed earlier were not even bothering to stay hidden from him before continuing to look at his surroundings. He also noted that the vines that held him tied to the tree was almost filled to the brim with chakra. He looked back at the jounin and said, "You guys are idiots."

All three of the jounin turned to glare at him. "What are you talking about?" growled one of them.

"You could have killed Akamaru with that sleeping gas. If I hadn't put him in my jacket when I had you would have killed the poor dog," said Naruto.

"Who cares about your stupid dog?" asked the second ninja.

"Death is probably better than living with the demon boy anyway," said the last one.

"He's not my dog," Naruto said slowly as though they were children making them glare harder at him, "Akamaru is Kiba's dog."

"Doesn't surprise me that you stole someone else's dog. Do you plan to torture it?" asked the first one.

"Why do I have jounin for my guards while everyone else has chunin?" asked Naruto completely ignoring what the jounin had said, "Is my skills really that great that you need to use jounin?"

"Yeah right kid," laughed the jounin, "your were the bottom of your class, but we were told to come and be your guards so that you can't pass. No one wants you to be a ninja let alone a chunin. Besides since we're your guards if some deadly animal comes to attack you we might, I don't know, accidently let it slip passed our guard."

The three jounin opened their eyes, which they had closed when they had laughed at Naruto's remark to find him standing before them without any trace of a struggle to get out of the vines that they had tied him up with. "How-" was all one of them got out before Naruto punched him in the gut sending him flying back into a tree.

"Why you!" yelled another as he lunged to attack Naruto, but he simply grabbed the man's outstretched arm and flipped him over so he landed hard on the ground and then kicked him in the middle of the back so he was knocked out.

The last one stared wide-eyed at his two teammates who had been knocked out and then looked fearfully up at Naruto. "Demon!" he cried as he lunged forward only to have Naruto step aside and use his elbow to hit the back of the jounin's neck. He then searched their pockets finding the scroll that he needed before heading to where he sensed Kiba was as Akamaru began to stir within his jacket.


"Where is Akamaru?" screamed Kiba as he thrashed wildly to try and get out of the vines that held him.

"We don't know who you're talking about," said one of the chunin who was trying to calm him.

"Where is my dog?" yelled Kiba, "You better not have killed Akamaru!"

"There was no dog there," said the same chunin as she turned to her teammates to look for help. They just shrugged which made Kiba even angrier.

"I'm gonna kill you when I break free!" he screamed in his rage.

He continued to scream random threats at the chunin while they tried to calm him until he heard a familiar voice say, "There's no need to get so worked up Kiba. Akamaru's not dead. Just really sleepy."

All four of them turned to see Naruto come out of the trees with his orange jumpsuit on and a lump inside of his jacket that made him look pregnant.

"Well then where is he?" demanded Kiba.

Naruto unzipped his jacket to reveal an awake Akamaru though he still looked really tired. "He just woke up a couple of minutes ago and that sleeping gas is still affecting him so he's rather tired." Kiba sighed in relief when Akamaru barked to confirm what Naruto had said.

"How did you escape already?" asked the chunin as they backed away from him, "The teams have only just been let in. There is no way that they could have made it here by now, and you had jounin guards."

"I escaped myself," answered Naruto with a small smile as he walked over to where Kiba was tied up, "Though I do believe that it's unfair that you guys are trying to stop me from becoming a chunin. They even said that they'd let someone or something kill me if they had the chance."

"You-you did?" they gasped, "but those were jounin guards."

Naruto merely shrugged as he cut the vines with what looked like no effort. He handed Akamaru to Kiba and turned to the chunin. "Now we need the scroll and we'll be on our way." The chunin took up fighting stances. "Come on," said Naruto, "You know if I can take out jounin I can definitely take out you guys." The chunin looked at him with fear in their eyes before one of them pulled out the scroll and tossed it to him and they all fled.

"I bet you just got a lucky break," said Kiba with a cocky grin, "There's no way that you could beat chunin let alone jounin."

"Sure Kiba," was Naruto's answer. They walked toward where he knew Ino was.


When they reached Ino they saw that she was trying to seduce the chunin, as they were all male, with her beauty to let her go. Naruto snickered before walking out to the clearing with Kiba in tow.

"Who would ever think that you're beautiful?" called Kiba making everyone focus on him.

"Alright Kiba why don't you go save the damsel in distress since you're so strong," said Naruto gesturing to the chunin who were glaring at them.

"They'll be out in a flash," said Kiba with a cocky grin, "Ready Akamaru?" he asked receiving a bark from the fully awake dog in reply. The both of them began to fight as Naruto made his way over to her.

"I am not a damsel in distress," said Ino, "I could have made it out of here by myself."

"Because your beauty is such a great weapon to use against men," said Naruto as he cut the vines holding her, "Just sit back and watch the show." He and Ino turned to watch Kiba and the chunin fight. After a while it was evident that Kiba was losing so Naruto stepped in. "This is taking too long Kiba. We have to get a move on if we are to meet the rest of the teams." He promptly knocked out the three ninjas with one blow.

"What are you talking about?" asked Ino.

"We're meeting the rest of the teams at a meeting place," answered Naruto handing Ino the scroll that he had fished out of one of the chunin's pocket.

"Yea right," laughed Kiba, "and how did this plan come to be. I mean we haven't had any contact with any of our teams."

"I talked to Sakura and Sasuke a bit back and we had a plan already set up if one of us ever got captured. Can't be too careful."

"Of course," Ino sighed, "I should have known that Sasuke would think ahead and always be prepared. He is perfect."

Naruto laughed and rolled his eyes before turning to walk to their meeting place. "Hey Naruto," said Kiba, "What happened to those cool clothes you were wearing before? They were so much cooler than some orange jumpsuit."

Naruto looked down at his clothes and grimaced at what he was wearing, "Oh yea, I wanted everyone to underestimate me so I wore this outfit," then he did a couple of hand signs and his orange jumpsuit poofed away to reveal his normal outfit, "There much better."

"It's kinda hard to underestimate you Naruto," said Kiba with another cocky look, "You're already the lowest of the low."

Naruto just kept walking into the woods with the two genin following him.