I do not own Naruto or Naruto Shippuden

Kankuro assessed his opponent, Sakura, if he remembered correctly. He felt the tense atmosphere in the air as he looks toward the leaf ninja who were huddled together in one corner.

Obviously, they were discussing something important as they were very meticulous about not being heard. He wondered if perhaps the plans were in jeopardy as for the whole day the leaf had been very uptight, more than ever for such an event. He doubted even his sensei would not notice the significant increase of leaf ninja present in the leaf village at the moment.

With his mind made he walked towards the veranda "Proctor, I forfeit."

Naruto's eyes Narrowed a tad bit and took note of the genin's uneasy pose. "Winner by forfeit: Sakura of the leaf".

The people in the stands began booing the forfeit, Naruto raised his left hand and the stadium went silent again "Shino Aburame, Akatsuchi of the Hidden Rock, make your way down to the arena."

The two imposing genin made their way down the stairs and took their position facing each other, the serious face the two made didn't betray any other emotion they felt.

Naruto looked at the two and initiated the match "Akatsuchi, Vs Shino Aburame; You may begin when ready"

Shino ran towards The burly rock genin engaging him in taijutsu. Left, right, dodge, roundhouse kick to the ribs, jump back, block, counter-attack.

This dance continued for a bit until Akatsuchi made a series of jumps backward putting some distance between them and slammed his hands into the ground

"Earth Style: Earth spike."

A long trench of spikes begab to sprout rapidly from the ground making their way towards shino, who dodged towards the left.

While shino dodge Akatsuchi performed the Earth Style: Rock fist and covered his hands in earth like a glove and shot off with surprising speed towards shino to engage within another round of Taijutsu.

Meanwhile in the stands

Hinata Hyuuga and Kiba Inuzuka were sitting with their Sensei, one jounin named Kurenai Yuuhi. When Kiba spoke:

"Man, shino seems to be in trouble. Do you think he will win sensei."

His timid teammate spoke on behalf of her teacher "A-ano Kiba-kun. S- shino will do just fine."

Kurenai gave them a firm nod when her genin turned to look at her and Kiba apologized

"I guess I should have more faith in Shino."

However just as he said this shino was caught with a brutal punch to the gut causing him to double up.

On another side of the stands, another group of genin were having a similar talk.

"Man shino seems to be having a hard time. These rock genin are good." Said Ino.

Chouji nodded as he ate his chips. Suddenly he stopped for a second and asked his sensei, one Asuma Sarutobi "Neh, sensei. How come Iwa was allowed to compete in our exams, aren't we like enemies or something?"

Asuma exhaled the smoke from his cigarette and answered "There are rules set in place that allow even hostile nations to participate with their chunin exams even if they are warring states. This set of rules are known as the neutrality charter and was signed by all shinobi nations in the treaty that ended the first ninja war, it was proposed by Hokage-sama to honor his sensei the Second Hokage. Who created the idea of the chunin exams. It's even considered a war crime to deny an invited nation entry, however, I think that pops hopes that through this exam he can begin to reconcile our two nations"

Both Ino and chouji were surprised.

"Reconcile? But sensei aren't the hidden leaf and hidden rock historical enemies?" Asked chouji

Asuma furrowed his brows "Historical implies that we have been enemies since our inception. But that is not true, In fact, in the Founding Era, Konoha and Iwakagure were friendly. Hashirama Senju even gave Ishikawa Kamizuru a very steep discount and allowed him to pick what Bijuu they would take when shodai-sama dispersed the tailed beast"

"What happened then?" Asked Ino.

"I don't know, it is rumored that Madara Uchiha tried to force Iwakagure into subservience. But the first instance of Konoha and Iwagakure going to war was during the second shinobi war, and that was mostly due to economic disparities and the formation of political and military factions" answered Asuma.

Back in the fight, Akatsuchi was steadily losing ground, despite being the stronger of the two the bugs of his Aburame opponent had managed to land on him and begin to sap at his chakra reserves so he did the smart thing. He Gave up.

"Proctor, I surrender."

Naruto nodded and called the fight in Konoha's favor

In the stands, Onoki was grumbling about damned Aburame along with a good portion of Iwa visitors.

"Kamizuru Kurotsuchi, Shikamaru Nara. Make your way down to the Arena."

The two genin did as told, and soon Naruto raised his hand "Shikamaru Nara, vs Kurotsuchi Kamizuru. You may begin when ready."

To be continued