Chapter 25 Forest Days

The next morning twenty two genin teams assembled outside of the forest of death for the second part of the Chuunin exams. The forest was filled with giant trees that loomed over the Genin, it was dark and foreboding. There was a small hut outside the fence that surrounded the forest with a few bored proctors sitting in it.

The forest seemed particularly lively that day, various ominous sounds were emanating from within it. Minato stared at the forest impassively, he practically knew the forest like the back of his hand as a result of often training in the forest.

"Heh. You're about to find out first hand why they call this the 'forest of death'!" Anko declared haughtily to the assembled Genin.

Kiba snorted skeptically, it was a forest, what was the big deal? They practiced in dangerous forests all the time with Kakashi sensei. They had been trained to be a hunter team and surviving in the wilderness was their specialty.

Anko smiled gently, "Seems we have a big shot here," She said hearing Kiba's snort. She whipped out a kunai and threw it, just grazing Kiba's cheek making him freeze. She appeared behind him, caressing and licking at the wound she caused, "Your kind are always the first to go. Spilling all that rich, red, lovely luscious blood…"

Anko suddenly whipped around with another kunai in her hand. A Genin from Kusa leaned over her with her thrown kunai held in a long tongue.

"Your kunai knife… I believe you dropped it." The Genin said in a raspy voice.

"Gee… Thanks." Anko glared at the Kusa nin. "Don't just stand behind me radiating bloodlust. Unless you're in a hurry to die."

"I'll try to keep it under control… but the sight of warm fresh blood really makes me crazy. And I was already wound up from losing a strand of my precious hair." The genin replied lowering their head and allowing their straw hat hide their face.

Naruto shifted uncomfortably. The Kusa team felt different from yesterday, as if they had been replaced by different people. They were also heavily suppressing their chakra and reeked of hostile intentions.

He signaled to Anko using ANBU code explaining his suspicions. She narrowed her eyes at him and blinked in response. Naruto sighed, he didn't know if that would accomplish anything.

"Hm… Seems we have a hot blooded team on our hands… Heh. Should be fun." She let go of a shivering Kiba and yelled out, "Before we begin the second exam there's something I have to hand out!" Anko pulled out a stack of consent forms. "These are consent forms," she said. "We want all the details taken care of before the first deaths occur. Sign before you go in so we can't be held liable. You wouldn't want me to get in trouble would you?" She started to hand the forms out, "ill explain what the second exam is about and then you kiddies can sign the forms and turn em in with your teammates at the hut behind you. Now about the exam. It's a survival test."

'Ah I guessed right.' Minato thought as Anko began explaining the topography of the forest and the objective of the exam.

There would be eleven teams with a heaven scroll and eleven teams with an earth scroll. Since a team needed both a heaven and an earth scroll to pass it meant that half the teams would fail. A team would be disqualified if they didn't reach the tower in the center of the forest in time or lost a member. Taking a peek at the scroll's contents was forbidden until they were in the tower. They also weren't allowed to leave the forest during the five days that was the exam's time limit.

"One final piece of advice… Stay alive!" Anko said before she dismissed them to sign their consent forms.

Naruto's team was assigned to gate 12 to enter the forest and they received a heaven scroll after turning in their consent forms.

"Part two of the Chuunin exam begins now!" Anko called at exactly 3:30.

The gates to the forest opened and all teams rushed inwards.

Naruto signaled to his team to wait for a bit after they had traveled into the forest for some distance.

"Okay everyone, discussion time. We have to plan out how we want to do this." he said.

Kiba tucked his hands into his pockets, "The tower is ultimately where everyone is going. So we might as well set traps as close to there as possible."

Akamaru twitched his nose and sniffed carefully, alerting Kiba. Kiba sniffed the air, signing to Naruto who nodded in confirmation at him. The team had a silent conversation in signs.

Suddenly Kiba scratched the side of his head and sheepishly said, "Guys i gotta go take a leak…"

Naruto sighed, "Seriously Kiba? Why didn't you go before hand? Hurry up man."

"Yeah, yeah just a second." Kiba disappeared into a set of bushes to do his business. After a couple of minutes he reappeared rubbing the back of his head.

"Oh man that's a relief! Let's get going now!"

Team seven nodded to each other and set off into the forest in the direction of the tower. The team didn't encounter any other teams along the way to the tower. They fought off a few wild animals along the way. Kiba stuck to throwing kunai while Sasuke made liberal use of his fire jutsus. Naruto on the other hand stuck to taijutsu.

They stopped halfway to the tower when it started to get dark to set up camp for the night. After a quick Rock Paper Scissors game, Sasuke disappeared into the forest to go hunting for food leaving behind Kiba and Naruto.

Kiba waited until Sasuke was out of sight before pouncing on an unsuspecting Naruto. He quickly overpowered Naruto and tied him up.

"Which one of you has the scroll!? Tell me!" Kiba harshly yelled in Naruto's face as he sat on top of him.

"Kiba! What are you doing?" Naruto asked. "What do you mean which one of us has the scroll?"

Kiba snarled in his face, "Never mind! I'll just search you!"

Kiba quickly rifled through Naruto's pouches, ignoring shouts of confusion from Naruto. He found nothing and angrily growled. Suddenly the Naruto he was sitting on laughed.

Kiba punched him angrily, "What are you laughing at?" He demanded.

Naruto stuck his tongue out at him and poofed into a cloud of smoke, leaving a confused Kiba sitting on top of a pile of rope.

Kiba leapt away from the pile of rope and into the claws of the real Kiba.

"Thought you got me real good huh? Newsflash asshole, that was an earth clone!" Kiba crowed.

The fake Kiba released his henge and threw a flurry of short knives at Kiba. Kiba easily dodged the salvo and returned fire. The now revealed Ame nin in a pale yellow jumpsuit and respirator leapt backwards. He prepared a kunai with an explosive tag attached to it and was about to throw it at Kiba.

He was suddenly hit in the back of the head by a harsh blow, knocking him out cold.

"Hmph, took you long enough!" Growled Kiba.

"Ah sorry I wanted to see if he had anything else up his sleeve and then I didn't want to risk it." Naruto replied jumping down and inspecting the downed Ame nin.

Sasuke dropped down into the clearing with a line of fish. "Oh so he finally acted, took him long enough."

"I know right? I was dying of boredom." Said Kiba.

"Where do you think his teammates are? He probably doesn't have the scroll after all." Sasuke asked.

"Well we are trackers for a reason Sasuke."

"Well. Get tracking then!"

"Maa… There's no need for that, they were following us from a distance. They'll be here shortly. Said Naruto.

Kiba clapped his hands together, "Oh. Okay cool. Ambush?"

He got two nods in return. Team seven hid themselves and disappeared from the clearing.

Soon two Ame nin landed in the clearing. They tsked at seeing their tied up comrade and made to release him. Foolishly not checking for traps. All three screamed as they were hauled into the air by a large net.

Kiba appeared in the clearing with a disappointed pout. "Aw man that was too easy… who doesn't even check for traps in this day and age?"

"You're right. That was too easy." One of the Genin in the net said. Suddenly Kiba was surrounded by enemy clones. "Surrender your scroll to us and we may not kill you." The Genin said disappearing from the net.

Kiba gasped and backed up against a tree, hesitantly pulling out a kunai. The clones advanced on Kiba slowly, Kiba slashed through a clone but it simply reformed after he passed through it.

"What!?" Kiba shouted. He tried again with another clone only to have the same result.

A clone threw a kunai which nicked Kiba in the arm revealing that not all of the attacks were illusory.

Akamaru barked from atop Kiba's head.

"I know already!" Kiba responded in frustration.

Just as things were looking dicey for Kiba. Naruto jumped down into the clearing landing on top of one of the many duplicate Ame nin, knocking him out. The clones slowly faded back into nothingness.

"Damn it Kiba, what have we told you about jumping the gun?" Sasuke asked dropping down to the forest floor as well.

"Heh. Sorry. But it's alright Naruto got him!"

"Yes but what if I'm not here next time? Think. Kiba." Naruto scolded.

Naruto searched the Genin he had just jumped on top of and found an earth scroll.

"Perfect. Now we just have to get to the tower." Sasuke said as he looked over Naruto's shoulder.

"Hmm… I think I'll make a few decoy scrolls just in case…" Naruto said as he packed away the scrolls they now had. "Give me a moment."

"Good idea." Said Sasuke.

The team waited a bit as Naruto drew up two heaven scrolls and two earth scrolls. He handed both Sasuke and Kiba a pair and kept the real scrolls himself.

"Hey you guys wanna pick off a few more teams before we leave this forest?" Kiba asked excitedly. "If we get some extra scrolls from a few teams we can lower the competition of the next stage yeah?"

"It's a good idea Kiba, but we don't need to risk ourselves unnecessarily like that. It's better to just pass right now. We can make it to the tower by nightfall at this pace." Said Naruto.

Sasuke hummed, "I think Kiba's right. For once. We should try to eliminate as much competition in this stage as we can."

Seeing that he was outvoted Naruto shrugged. "Okay then guys. How do we want to do this?"

"I don't think we should split up because look what happened to this team" Sasuke gestured to the Ame team in the net. "How many teams can you sense nearby Naruto?"

Naruto crouched and put two fingers to the earth and focused his senses. He closed his eyes and stilled his breathing and stretched his awareness out to the rest of the forest.

His eyes snapped wide open. "Sasuke! Kiba! Run!" He yelled.

A blast of wind shot from the depths of the forest at them, blowing the team away in separate directions.

Naruto gasped. That had been a high level wind jutsu. Far above anything that the average Genin could perform. He had sensed two jounin and one Kage level shinobi rapidly approaching their location and tried to warn his teammates but it was too late. They were too fast and now he was separated from both Kiba and Sasuke. He felt the two jounin level signatures headed in his direction as he picked himself off the ground. Minato readied himself for the enemy. Soon he saw the two Kusa nin who were accompanying the strange long tongued girl from earlier appear.

"Well look what we have here… A little piggy ripe for the slaughter." The one on the right said. Both Kusa Nin were dressed darkly with straw hats. The one on the right had a mask on and was extremely tall while the left one was very short with the character for 'crime' written on his clothes.

"Sorry gentlemen, but I have business elsewhere." Minato said dropping down into a fighting stance with a kunai held in each hand.

"Not while we're around! Now show us your blood!" The tall one screamed charging wildly forwards as his partner hung back for support.

Naruto engaged him in a rapid taijutsu fight. The tall man's style was extremely unorthodox, he weaved and bobbed as if he were drunk. Pushing Naruto back with his unpredictable sweeping movements. The short one was extremely accurate with kunai and shuriken that he peppered Naruto with from a distance. Naruto was hard pressed to avoid all the attacks the duo was throwing at him.

'Tch. I'll have to release my resistance seals for this! I have to get to Kiba and Sasuke fast! Who ever is going after them is out of their league!'

Naruto leapt towards at the short man, escaping the taller man. He threw an extremely telegraphed punch that the short man avoided by ducking. But he ducked into a sharp snap kick to the chin from Naruto.

"Gah! You bastard!"

The short man responded to the kick with a punch that whizzed over Naruto's head. Naruto spun and swept the man's feet out from under him, he swiftly buried a kunai into the man's neck, ending his life.

His companion roared in anger and started to perform hand seals. Naruto dodged out of the way of a burst of earth spikes that exploded from the ground beneath him. He turned to the tall man who was still performing hand seals. He hid behind a tree as he registered the jutsu the man was about to unleash. A great dragon made of earth rose from the forest floor and began to shoot a devastating barrage of earth bullets into the trees where Naruto was hiding.

Naruto dashed between the trees, hopping up to the higher branches out of reach of the man. He flipped through hand signs and sent a wave of wind blades back down at the man. The man yelped and formed an earth dome around himself blocking the wind blades. The collision between wind and earth sent up a cloud of dust, blocking vision for a few precious seconds. When the dust cleared the dome was cracked open but the man was missing.

Minato smirked. He had fought countless Iwa nin who'd used this tactic. He dropped down into the clearing and acted like a confused Genin. He stumbled about, poking at the dome curiously. A hand burst from the ground and latched onto his ankle. He gave a shout as he was pulled into the ground up to his neck. The man slowly emerged from the ground and began to gloat.

"Foolish little Genin, you may have gotten lucky with killing my partner, but I'll be taking my time with you… Heheh I can't wait." The man bent over him caressing his cheek gently and then grabbed his hair roughly, "Now where should I start cutting first? Eyes? Ears? Nose?"

"None of the above." Naruto quipped. He stuck his tongue out at the man childishly and disappeared in a cloud of smoke. The man's eyes widened before he fell with a kunai in the back of his head.

Naruto sighed as he stood above the two dead bodies. He turned towards the direction he sensed Kiba and Sasuke struggling, and vanished in a shunpo.

Picking himself up from the wind blast, Sasuke coughed as he choked on some of the debris in the air.

"Sasuke! Are you alright!?" He heard Kiba shout.

Sasuke cautiously peeked around a tree at where he heard Kiba's voice from. He relaxed a bit as he saw that Kiba was fine.

"Kiba, over here." Sasuke said. Kiba turned to him and let out a sigh of relief.

"Oh good, you bastard. I thought we were goners. What the hell was that?"

Sasuke twitched his fingers in Kiba's directions carefully. He narrowed his eyes when Kiba didn't react. "Kiba, have you seen Naruto?"

"Nope. Hopefully he's alright too…" Kiba said scratching the back of his head.

Sasuke threw a kunai at Kiba. Kiba yelped and dodged ridiculously.

"Hey! What was that for Sasuke you bastard!?"

"Who are you? Where's Akamaru?"

Kiba looked around for a few seconds, "Akamaru? He'll be back in a second!"

Sasuke titled his head up. "Hmph. You're not Kiba you didn't respond to the code and Akamaru would never be far from Kiba. Don't even try it."

Kiba stilled, he lowered his head and laughed raspily , "I see. How clever of you three to have learned hunter nin hand signs."

A poof of smoke engulfed Kiba. When the smoke dissipated the strange Kusa kunoichi stood there smiling wickedly.

Kiba groaned and picked himself up from the ground shaking his head slightly. "Akamaru? You okay buddy?" He asked.

Akamaru whined at him from his side in response.

"Aw, I see buddy, here hop in." Kiba unzipped his jacket slightly for Akamaru to climb in.

"Well, Akamaru looks like we'll have to find those two fools." Akamaru yipped at him. "We'll be fine buddy." A whimper. "Wait what? A snake?"

Kiba turned slowly to find a gigantic snake looming over him. It was the size of a small building and its eyes were locked hungrily onto Kiba.

Kiba gulped, "H-huge…"

The snake lunged forwards. Kiba yelped and dodged to the side. He jumped over a tail that whipped at him from behind.

"No way am I being snake food here! Akamaru with me!" He yelled tossing a food pill at Akamaru. Akamaru chomped down on the pill and leapt out of Kiba's jacket. His fur turned bright red and he crouched down growling.

"Jujin Bunshin! Let's go!"

Akamaru barked and transformed into a copy of Kiba. Both Kiba's bent down on all fours and charged the snake. They assaulted the snake with quick blows from sharp claws in all directions. The snake writhed and thrashed around, trying to hit both Kibas with its massive bulk. Unfortunately for the snake the Kibas were too fast. They nimbly ducked around the snake's wild moves.

"Akamaru!"

"Woof!"

Both Kibas stopped on a dime and charged straight for the snakes throat in a pair of gatsugas. They drilled through the snake's thick skin and punched a hole through the snake.

"Whew! This forest is kinda crazy, eh, Akamaru?"

"Arf."

"Yeah buddy. Let's go find Naruto and Sasuke."

The kunoichi stared Sasuke down with beady eyes. She pulled out an earth scroll causing Sasuke's eyes to widen.

"I suppose you'll be wanting our scroll hm? Since you want to eliminate the opposition?" She smiled nastily. Then she held the scroll to her mouth and swallowed it in a gruesome display. Her tongue wrapped around the scroll as she pushed it down her throat. "Now then… why don't we fight to the death over these scrolls? One on one."

Sasuke froze in horror as images of his death assaulted his mind. He watched himself die over and over. Kunai to the head. Decapitation. Torn in half. Crushed. Slashed to pieces. A cold chill went down his spine. Instinctively he knew this woman was no ordinary genin. He was going to die right this instant.

Sasuke dropped to his knees and vomited. He trembled uncontrollably and panted for breath. His Sharingan activated automatically.

'Illusion! It's an illusion! Not death! Just an incredible simulation!' He told himself furiously. 'If I don't get out of here I'll die!'

The woman laughed. "I imagine you're paralyzed by now…"

Sasuke forced himself back to his feet and stared warily at the woman. He slowly moved his hand to his kunai holster and pulled one out. It was a small reassurance, though it felt useless against the sheer weight of the killing intent being pressed down upon him.

The woman casually took out a kunai and lobbed it in his direction with a lazy flick. Sasuke watched the kunai speed towards him in slow motion. His muscles locked up against his will under the force of his fear.

Splash! A burst of blood spilled across the forest floor.

The woman walked up to the puddle in amusement. Sasuke had dodged at the very last moment and disappeared into the trees.

Sasuke had slammed his kunai into his own thigh. Overpowering the overwhelming fear with pain and forcing himself to escape.

Sitting on the branch of a thick tree Sasuke panted in fear and pain. He trembled as he ripped the kunai out of his thigh. Sasuke peeked around the tree for a glimpse of the woman.

Just based on killing intent alone he already knew he couldn't win against her. It was a thousand times worse compared to the killing intent he'd felt when he faced Zabuza. The mental exercises he performed with Kakashi were useless underneath the mind numbing fear.

Sasuke was so caught up in his fear that he didn't notice a large snake crawling up to him. The snake opened its mouth and lunged at him.

Sasuke gave a shout as he leapt away, he saw a shadow of the woman behind the snake as it lunged for him. He threw a brace of shuriken at the snake, shouting, "Get away!"

The snake collapsed on the tree branches, dead.

Sasuke watched in horror as the Kusa nin emerged from the snake's neck like it was a cocoon.

"For shame." She said licking her lips, "Stay on your toes like a good prey. It makes the chase so much more rewarding… For the predator!" The woman slithered up the tree branches like a snake. Her body stretching and contorting unnaturally as she advanced on a fear stricken Sasuke.

Thud! Thud! Thunk!

The woman halted in her advance as a brace of shuriken and kunai embedded themselves in her path.

"Sorry Sasuke! I'm late!" Kiba yelled from a tree across from them, waving his hand in a distinct motion. Akamaru barked from atop his head.

"Kiba stay back! Run! This guy is out of our league!" Sasuke yelled back.

The woman chuckled, "Congratulations for defeating that snake child."

Kiba crouched as if to pounce at the woman. Sasuke started at seeing his friend take up a combat stance. He deactivated his Sharingan and hurriedly pulled out the decoy scrolls saying, "If it's our scrolls you want. Just take them and go!"

"Well done." The woman purred. "You're obviously natural born prey, knowing your only hope… Lies in the chance of the predator being distracted by tastier bait!"

Sasuke threw the scrolls at the woman who caught it easily.

Kiba jumped over to stand at Sasuke's side and whispered angrily, "If what you said is true and she's stronger. What if she doesn't care about the scroll?"

Akamaru whimpered piteously and trembled. Kiba looked up at him in worry.

"Wait really, Akamaru? Shit." Kiba warily eyed the woman in a new light.

The woman laughed, "Oh my, Sasuke. Your little friend is absolutely correct. I don't care about the scrolls." She rolled up her right sleeve revealing a strange snake tattoo and bit her left thumb. She swiped her thumb down the tattoo in a trail of blood.

Sasuke and Kiba watched her apprehensively.

Boom!

A huge snake appeared beneath her in a cloud of smoke. The snake lunged for Sasuke. Sasuke froze in terror again. He numbly watched the approaching snake in horror.

He was abruptly tackled out of the way by Kiba.

"Snap out of it Sasuke! You big chicken!" Kiba shouted at him.

The snake lashed out with its tail and whipped Kiba to the side. Sending him crashing into a tree and falling to the forest floor.

"Kiba!" Sasuke yelled seeing his friend plummet to the floor unconscious.

A flash of yellow appeared and caught Kiba.

Akamaru barked in relief at not falling anymore.

"Sasuke! Are you okay!?" Naruto shouted up at him.

"Heh. Nice save." The woman said sarcastically.

"Take Kiba and run!" Sasuke shouted at him.

Naruto's face hardened. He formed a shadow clone and had it carry Kiba off.

"I'm not leaving you alone to fight!" Naruto yelled.

The snake lunged for Sasuke again. Sasuke jumped up to a higher branch and clung to the underneath of the branch with chakra. He looked at where the unconscious Kiba had been and clenched his fists. He couldn't afford to be a coward now! His friends were in danger! He opened his eyes revealing the Sharingan in its full glory. Sasuke had now developed two tomoe in each eye.

The woman smiled and directed the snake to charge at Sasuke. Suddenly the snaked lurched and Naruto came bursting out of the snake's neck, the remnants of extremely dense chakra dissipating from his right hand.

The woman growled and leapt towards Sasuke. Sasuke whipped out a series of shuriken and kunai and sent them flying towards the woman. The woman weaved around the projectiles on the tree branch and headed straight for Sasuke. Sasuke smirked and tugged the wire he had hidden in his mouth. The shuriken swung around and bound the woman to the tree trunk behind her with wire. Sasuke flipped through hand signs and sent a stream of fire roaring down the wire at the woman.

She screamed as the fire melted her flesh. Sasuke smirked triumphantly.

The fire died down as she when limp, her head drooped forwards and she slumped in the wire bindings.

Then the woman snapped out of the fire weakened ninja wire. She raised her head at Sasuke, revealing peeling skin and another face beneath her original face.

Sasuke's smile disappeared in an instant.

"That one so young could have such mastery over the Sharingan!" She crowed. "I believe I want you as well!" She swept a hand over her Kusa headband and revealed that it was a Sound hitai-ate instead. "You really are his brother after all."

Sasuke started. "Who the hell are you!?" He yelled in anger.

She held out the decoy scrolls that Sasuke had thrown at her and they were consumed in a green fire. "I am Orochimaru. If you'd ever like a rematch then pass this exam as fast as you can! I'll see you again if you can defeat the three Sound ninja under me." She formed a strange hand sign. Her neck suddenly extended and shot forward at Sasuke. She twisted abruptly as three kunai flew by her neck, narrowly impaling her to the tree.

Naruto landed next to Sasuke on the branches, "Combo?" He asked.

Sasuke grinned at him, "Combo."

Both boys turned towards Orochimaru and weaved hand signs simultaneously. Sasuke launched a great ball of flame towards Orochimaru and Naruto followed it up with a blast of wind. The already large fireball doubled in size. Orochimaru's eyes widened with glee. A combination jutsu at so young!

Orochimaru took the jutsu head on. When the fire cleared all that remained behind was a pile of burnt sludge.

"Sasuke!"

"Yeah!"

Both boys leapt away from the branch as Orochimaru exploded out of it beneath them. The man lashed a long tounge out at Sasuke.

Sasuke threw a kunai and pinned the muscle to the branch behind it. Naruto took advantage of the pin and rushed at

Orochimaru. He engaged the man in a high level taijutsu fight. Orochimaru's eyes widened. A genin that could keep up with his speed? Unthinkable! The man wrung an elbow at Naruto's face, causing the boy to duck into Orochimaru's guard. Naruto punched at Orochimaru's torso with a bright blue ball of chakra forming on his palm. He shoved the ball into Orochimaru's stomach and the man popped into a cloud of smoke before his eyes.

Naruto turned worriedly towards Sasuke only to find the boy held in Orochimaru's arms.

Orochimaru grinned at Naruto and then bit onto Sasuke's neck as Sasuke yelled out.

"I look forward to seeing you again Sasuke… In the quest for power!" He cackled.

Sasuke fell to his knees on the tree branch, clutching his neck in pain as a three tomoe symbol began forming on his neck. Orochimaru melted into the tree and promptly disappeared from sight.

Sasuke shouted in pain and collapsed into Naruto's arms.

Naruto looked at the slowly forming mark on Sasuke's neck in worry. He jumped off the tree carrying Sasuke and formed a few shadow clones to collect Kiba and Akamaru. He cursed under his breath. Every moment was crucial in such a high level fight and he had mistaken Orochimaru's true objective in the fight. How could he have made such an elementary mistake?

A/N: sorry Minato but otherwise where would the plot be? Also maybe one day I'll stop writing mianto when I mean to write Minato