"All right, maggots!" Mitarashi bellowed like something out of a military flick. (Or like Colonnello, for that matter.) "Welcome to the stage for the second part of the Chūnin Selection Exam, Training Ground Forty-Four, otherwise known as the Forest of Death." She had a particularly sadistic smile on her face and, as viewed through Tsuna's window, it was getting to people.

"You'll soon find out why it's called the Forest of Death," she continued.

One of the Ame kids blustered and flaunted his bravado, which saw Mitarashi nail the kid with a kunai, slicing a delicate line across the kid's cheek. "It's kids like you who die quick," she said with a cackle, then licked the dripping blood.

'Are there not diseases in this world?' he wondered.

An overly tall nin with waist-length dark hair scuttled up behind Mitarashi. She whipped her head around and glared. "Don't sneak up behind me … unless you want to die.

"No…" The voice was as androgynous as the appearance. "I just get excited when I see blood. Plus you cut my precious hair. I couldn't help it…"

Tsuna wrinkled his nose when the nin let their absurdly long tongue dangle like a too-hot dog, then frowned sightly. Uh, guys? Can we get a window and tag on this one? he wrote as he tagged the nin himself with his Sky Flames and opened a window on them. Tracking charms went on each of his teammates.

Mitarashi chuckled. "Looks like we have a lot of bloodthirsty ones in this test. This should be fun. Now, before we start the second test, there's something I have to pass out," she said, holding up a sheaf of papers.

"You will each need to sign one of these forms, as there will be blood and death in this phase of the exam. If you refuse to sign, you and your team fail. I will explain the second test first, then you can sign. Afterward, each team will check in at that booth behind me. So, simply put, you will attempt the ultimate survival! The arena…"

Tagged and windowed. With a tongue like that we have to wonder if that's Orochimaru. He is a snake summoner, after all.

Yeah. Trying to decide if he should be taken out now, or right when the invasion starts.

We've been discussing that and we suggest we wait until the invasion starts. If nothing else, it will force Konoha to wake the fuck up and smell the laxity. A quick look into his mind—at great personal risk, mind you, since he seems bugnuts—shows that he intends to mark the Uchiha with a cursed seal.

Tsuna winced. Hm?

The seal, known as the Cursed Seal of Heaven, will do several things. There are enzymes in it that will provoke an addiction, like getting high off certain drugs or testosterone, to make them want to keep using its power. It's also designed to erode or corrupt the mind of the target. It contains some of Orochimaru's chakra, which forms a link—in some ways it's similar to a Horcrux, basically. It also allows the bearer to transform into a much stronger, more monstrous form. It has a survival rate of one in ten.

Riiiiight. Stealing the opposing scroll from that booth to go with whatever one we get is sounding better by the second.

Easily done, darling. But while getting to the tower quickly would potentially lessen the danger, there's no saying Orochimaru wouldn't decide to check there afterward and catch the Uchiha unaware when he thinks he's safe. It would also make your teammate think so much more highly of himself, succeeding so quickly. That is, if he doesn't decide he'd prefer to roam the forest looking for people to fight and defeat, or kill.

…My intuition says … fuck all. All right, I'm going to wing this, then. I did say I wasn't going to do more for the Uchiha Clan than save the children from kicking it in the massacre, so… I guess it'll be up to Sasuke if he uses that seal if he gets it. And if he does, he may well end up having a tragic accident.

Do you still want the paired scroll? You can always shift it to storage and 'find' it if you can't get one while in the forest.

Eh, sure. While you're at it, make up a dozen each as near perfect fakes and tag them so I'll be able to tell. Scatter them around when it seems appropriate. I imagine a number of teams might end up quite surprised when they enter the tower and open theirs to realize they've been duped into failing themselves.

He was distracted when the booth behind Mitarashi dropped curtains over the front and one of the nin inside poked his head around the door at the short side. "It's about time to exchange for the scrolls."

One by one each team went up to the booth to hand over their trio of forms and receive a scroll, then hike off to one of the forty-four gates that surrounded the training ground. Considering the thing had a diameter of twenty kilometers, it took a certain amount of time for people to get positioned.

He was amused to note that Gaara's gourd was still bear-shaped and he still had a fluffy teddy bear suspended from his belt.

When it was their turn to do the swap they received a Heaven Scroll, which Tsuna snatched before the other two had a chance. He stuffed it into his seal-extended pouch, but placed it in his storage. Sakura gave him a dirty look, but Sasuke just shrugged.

"You three will be at gate twelve," one of the nin back there said. "Turn left when you exit and follow the edge until you get there. A chūnin will be waiting to mark you off and unlock the gate when it's time."

They jogged off and shortly thereafter came to their gate to wait. By then it was after six o'clock and night would be closing in within a few hours, which sucked.

Scroll is acquired and waiting for you on the kitchen counter, darling.

He dropped his chin in a subtle nod, then looked at the sky when fireworks went off overhead. The gate nin used his key to remove the padlock and waved them in. Sasuke took off running; if he had a plan he wasn't sharing it. Sakura rushed after him and Tsuna tagged along.

The average genin-chūnin could get to the tower at the center in about ten minutes if they weren't completely useless (meaning, they could not, because—Sakura), but he had to assume Sasuke was just spoiling for a fight.

He got one a few minutes later when some random fellow from Ame tried something like Maito Gai's dynamic entry to ambush them and promptly missed as Sasuke was able to dodge. Ame-Nin bounced around for a bit between various trees and flung a handful of knives, but Sasuke successfully dodged behind a tree branch.

A glance to the side showed Sakura torn between worry and breaking out into a cheerleading session.

A short flurry after saw Ame-Nin fleeing with a kunai in his gut and blood dripping from his arm.

Sasuke scanned the area, then said, "We should have a code phrase, in case we get separated for some reason. If any of us gets the code wrong, assume we're an enemy, no matter what we look like. Listen carefully, because I'll only say it once."

Tsuna's brow went up as Sasuke recited the words from a nin song. While he was doing that Tsuna was busy writing a note which read: And what's wrong with just saying who got tied up during the bell test?

Sasuke scowled when he read it, but nodded. Sakura looked, nodded, and then they moved on. Tsuna took a moment to process how absurd it was for Sakura's long pink hair to be flapping around, and his own bright blond waving, as they ran through the trees. Shortly thereafter a prodigious wind swept through and tumbled all three of them in different directions.

He heaved a sigh on hearing through his window, "You guys just play around over there. I'll take care of them myself."

A huge ass snake popped up and hissed at him. He was really kind of annoyed that he hadn't gained snake-speak from Riddle's Horcrux, but it was probably for the best if this thing was one of Orochimaru's summons. If it wasn't, it being there was one hell of a coincidence.

When the thing's head dove at him he jumped straight up, using Earth Flames to boost him, then used his flames again to rip the thing to shreds by fucking with gravity all around it.

He hit the ground just in time to see Orochimaru deep throat an Earth Scroll. After a long bemused pause he grabbed the Earth Scroll from the kitchen counter and stored it, then headed in the direction his tracking charms were telling him to go.

When he got there—admittedly, he wasn't hurrying or anything—Sasuke was panicking.

"If I had the scroll I'd give it to you!"

Tsuna blinked. 'Okay, kid's terrified. Even Sakura looks surprised by this.' He got closer and shifted a couple of dozen explosive tags on top of Orochimaru and set them off. 'Yeah, didn't think that'd work.'

Orochimaru rose up like something out of a George Romero flick and he looked a wee bit annoyed. Tsuna, naturally, was Edging, so Snake-Man was further pissed off at not being able to find the source of the attack.

Tsuna kept up his explosion attack from Between until Sasuke finally stopped quaking in his ninja sandals and figured out where he'd left his backbone. He did some fancy shit with ninja wire, a windmill shuriken, and some kunai to trap Orochimaru, then breathed fire all over the guy.

Then, of course, because it was never that easy, Sasuke was frozen in place by killing intent about two seconds after Sakura jumped over to join him. Orochimaru's face was peeling off—or possibly melting—and the Kusa symbol on his hitai-ate sloughed off to reveal one from Oto.

Is this going to be an issue? he wrote.

"I had fun testing your powers."

Possibly, because he might body hop again. But since we've seen his mind and tagged him…

"You really are brothers."

All right, so you can check his hideouts with windows, and he'll be there at the finals.

"I sense power in your eyes that surpasses Itachi."

Yep. Not to worry, darling.

"Who the hell are you!?" Sasuke demanded.

"My name is Orochimaru. If you want to see me again, then survive and pass this exam. Of course, you'll have to defeat my men, the trio from Oto, on the way." He made a seal with his hands.

"What the hell are you talking about!?" Sakura said. "We'd never want to see your face again!"

Orochimaru chuckled. "Oh, it won't go that way…" A moment later his neck elongated like a snake and his head rushed forward to bite into the side of Sasuke's neck, then his head retracted and everything went back to normal. "Sasuke-kun will seek me … to seek power…"

Sasuke groaned in agony and dropped to his knees.

"What did you do to Sasuke-kun!" Sakura screeched.

"I gave him a going away present," Orochimaru said as he sank into the tree limb he was on.

'Huh, you don't see that shit everyday,' he thought, then Edged closer to his teammates. He waited until his tag on Orochimaru let him know the defect had genuinely left the area before he reemerged behind a tree. He waited again until Sakura looked around helplessly and started crying before he called out in a rough voice, "Sakura!?"

He hastily made sure he looked like hell.

"N-Naruto?" she called out tentatively.

"Sakura!" he called back and made like he was following her voice.

He heard Sasuke groan in agony again and Sakura gasp, then lifted his gaze up to spot them. A moment later he was up on the same branch. "Who was it? That day, during the test?"

"Huh? What? …Oh, me."

He nodded. "What the hell happened here? I got attacked by a massive snake. Took me a while to get free of it."

"Oh, Naruto, it was awful! That weird Orochi person bit Sasuke-kun on the neck and he just collapsed."

"All right, we need to find a place we can hole up." He looked around for any kind of cover and spotted a hole farther up the tree. "Hold on a second, let me go check that out real quick." He scampered up the trunk and had a look. It was a good thing the trees in Konoha were so fucking huge, because the opening revealed a decent-sized spot.

He scampered back down and said, "That hole up there is big enough. Help me carry him up there. Once you two are inside I can use some nin-cloth to disguise the entrance."

She nodded again and got up, then took hold of Sasuke's feet. Tsuna grabbed the kid by the shoulders and started up, diverting to the side a bit once they got closer. "Take him in feet first. I'll keep his upper body supported and slide him in, okay?"

Sakura carefully stepped into the hole and pulled Sasuke in after her, so he completed the job and propped the kid up against the wood inside. "Hang tight. I'm going to go get some of that moss down there to soften this place, then I'll put up the cloth. Try not to make too much noise."

He scampered off again and down to the forest floor to gather up some of the abundance of moss, trying to not make it obvious, then headed back up. The moss was tossed inside before he tacked up some nin-cloth and slipped inside, reaching back out to tack down the bottom so wind wouldn't make it so obvious.

"Okay, so we've had shit luck so far," he muttered, distributing the moss around. "We can't risk fire in here, but we are high enough up that it's unlikely we'll be easily found. How is he?"

"Um… He's got a fever and his breathing is erratic."

He groaned quietly. "I really don't like having to stay so close to where you were attacked. Uh, let's give it an hour or two, see how he is then. He's got a fever, so…" He pulled a scroll out and extracted a filled water bottle, then pulled a cloth from his pocket. "Use these to try to bring the heat down some."

She accepted them gratefully and got to work.

"Did that Orochi guy say anything? Give any hints?"

"Um…" She paused in wetting the cloth. "He said, um, there's three of his men? From Oto. They'll be coming and we have to survive them?"

That was more or less what he remembered. "Okay, so we can't afford to stay here long. Let me think…" While she went back to tending to Sasuke, he was sending out another window to find a better place.

He was helped by a huge purple arrow in the air, which he followed with his window. About half a kilometer to the northwest (relatively speaking) was a whole lot of vines hiding a cave. He marked it in his mind and left the window there just in case, then eyed the amount of light coming past the edge of the cloth.

Two hours later Sasuke still had a fever and groaned in pain every so often, but he bullied Sakura into helping to shift their teammate up against Tsuna's back so he could carry the kid, then carefully shuffled out of the hideout, taking the cloth with him. "Let's go. Anywhere is better than here."

He "discovered" the cave a short time later and ducked inside, knowing that his family would have vetted the place before showing it to him. Sasuke got laid out on the floor just around the bend, where it was cool and surprisingly dry.

Sakura scampered in behind him and immediately set to making sure her beloved darling was comfortable.

"I'll keep watch through the vines for now. Do you need more water? Ration bars?"

She checked the bottle he'd given her earlier and nodded. "Another would be good. I have plenty of rations."

He pulled more water from the scroll and handed it over. "This cave bends enough that you can probably get away with a small light if you have one, or a very small fire. Just enough to see by. Anything more and it could be visible to the outside and give us away."

She nodded, so he went to the vine curtain and took position. What she didn't see was him setting up an anchored bounding box to keep everyone away, and then pulling a bento from storage along with some water for himself. As he ate he wrote: Thoughts?

That team is headed for the original site. In other news, several teams have already fallen for our ruse of fake scrolls. We planted them in scenes of body parts with the fake scrolls just visible under bushes and the like. Assuming they don't cotton on to anything being off, that's those guys out of the running.

And Sasuke when he wakes up?

Be prepared for us to knock him out if he wakes up too wonky. We don't have details, because Orochimaru wasn't interested and we didn't dare dig too deep, but the kid could die, wake up relatively normal, or wake up enraged. Orochimaru has a vague notion that it has to do with whatever the target is thinking about when they wake, or were dreaming while knocked out. That he's still alive after several hours is a good sign that he'll live.

He snapped off a quick spell to check the time and saw it was getting quite late. He finished his meal and stepped back from the curtain and around the slight corner. "I can't make you sleep, but it'd be a good idea, at least for a few hours while I stay on watch. Then I could sleep while you stay awake."

She got a stubborn look on her face, then wilted. "I am really tired. I'm so worried, though. What if he wakes up and…"

"I'll wake you, if him waking up doesn't already do it."

After several minutes of silence she nodded and settled herself down. Once she closed her eyes he checked back at the curtain in case she was peeking, then set up what was basically a chamber pot so he could relieve himself, then threw in fragrant wood chips to help with the smell and covered it.

An hour later he checked the kid's temperature and breathing. He was still feverish, so he redid the soaked cloth Sakura had left on Sasuke's forehead, but there was precious little he could do about the breathing issues aside from keeping the kid propped up a bit.

It was incredibly dark out there so everyone was probably hunkered down in some kind of cover and not likely to stumble over them. There could be some special ones who had excellent night vision, but even that generally depended on starlight or moonlight. There was a reason many animals had the type of pupils they did, like cats.

While he was waiting he hung a black-out cloth a few feet back from the vines as a light barrier and then pulled some small squares of wood from his storage that had seals on them for a dim light, and pushed a tiny amount of chakra into them. One was placed near the chamber pot and the other was placed near Sasuke. The final one was placed inside the black-out cloth.

When 3.30 rolled around he laid a hand on Sakura's shoulder and shook her gently. "Sakura," he whispered. It took several tries, but she eventually woke up with a start and looked around wildly. "Sakura," he repeated, "it's been several hours. It's your turn to watch. I've continued to re-wet the cloth, okay? His breathing seems a bit better, but he's still feverish."

"Okay," she whispered.

"I hung a black-out cloth a couple feet back from the vines, but there's a small light next to it. There's also one by the chamber pot I set up, and of course, the one by Sasuke. It's not much, but it's enough to get around by. I'm going to get a little sleep. It should be daylight in a few hours."

Once she nodded he moved a short distance away and laid down, using some spare clothing as a pillow. Sakura, of course, immediately honed in on Sasuke, which helped only in that she wasn't looking his way and couldn't see clearly to begin with. He formed a clone around his body, then stepped away to the stronghold under the tower.

"Sleep yourself out," Sin said. "I'll keep track of how many hours you'll need to turn back so you can 'wake up' there at the appropriate time. Oh, and they have cameras in the forest. They didn't catch you dealing with that snake, but you'll want to be careful from now on for anything else they might get now that your team is back together."

He nodded, did an air kiss because he was grimy and couldn't afford to clean up, then dropped onto a cot.

xXx

He yawned and sat up, feeling much better.

Sin shot a smile his way and said, "You'll want to turn back five hours. I left the side room there closed for you."

He got up, stretched to work out the kinks from sleeping on a stretched piece of cloth, then did another air kiss before entering the side room. His time turner came out of storage and was put to use, then left in the side room for later retrieval. A quick step and he was laying down again so he could disperse his clone and pretend to wake up.

Sasuke was still out of it, which was both good and bad, but he seemed to be breathing far more normally. Sakura was absently munching on a ration bar as she gazed at the kid, so she had probably done fuck all in terms of checking the entrance.

He sat up slowly in an attempt not to startle her and rooted around for water to rinse off his hands, then a ration bar to eat. "Changes?" he whispered.

She told him what he already knew, but at least she made the effort.

He ate, had some water, and went off to check the vine curtain. It was about then that he realized he had been a complete tool and had forgotten to erase their tracks, which would explain the trio of idiots he could see. He crept back to Sakura and grimaced. "Bad news," he whispered. "There's a trio of Oto genin out there sniffing around. I think they found our traces. I'd be a lot more upset with myself than I am if it hadn't been so damn dark that I couldn't see well enough to erase them."

Sakura got the, "Aaaah! I'm going to die and my dreamy Sasuke-kun isn't awake to save me!" look on her face.

"Let me see what I can do to trick them off in another direction," he said, then scampered to the vine curtain. He hauled a fuckton of explosive tags out of storage and started seeding them where the trio were about to walk, and watched as they exploded. He was exceptionally lucky (it had nothing to do with his Earth Flames, no, sir) that all three of the Oto nin had their legs blown off and one of them lost an arm.

There was a startled cry behind him that he thought nothing of—at least, until Sasuke, covered in a weird pattern of ink all over one side of his body, stalked past him and through the vines, then beelined for the three gravely injured foes.

"Sure, okay," he said, "that happened."

Sasuke made short work of the three who were already on the verge of death, then looked sulky because there were no more enemies to savage.

Tsuna flung out a wire with a blob of sticky chakra on the end and snagged the Earth Scroll the Oto group had been carrying and yanked it back to him. He checked it to make sure it wasn't marked as a fake, and as he tucked it away Sakura came up beside him and gasped.

Sasuke looked back at them, a murderous gleam in his eye, and started stalking their way. Sakura darted out of cover and beamed at the object of her obsession, which had the startling effect of making the kid stutter through a few steps and stop. The markings slowly receded from his skin and he went back to normal.

'Huh, guess she's good for something after all,' he thought as he emerged. "We have both scrolls now. We can head for the tower."

Sakura beamed at Sasuke again. "Yes!" she said. "And get cleaned up, and a decent meal, and…"

Sasuke shot a look at him and jerked his head, a clear enough agreement to get moving.

Tsuna paused long enough to surreptitiously grab his anchor, then checked the position of the sun so he could orient. The huge purple arrow only he could see was a big help, too.

xXx

The tower had quite a number of sets of doors at the bottom, which was odd, but they were numbered the same as the gates. After forcing the other two to pause so they could check that no one had trapped the area first, then scampered over to the tiled area at the base of the tower and headed through the doors.

Inside was a roughly square room with a large placard on the wall facing the door. Overhead and to each side were walkways leading deeper into the building.

"Hey, look at that," Sakura said, pointing at the placard. "This is probably about the scrolls. I think they're telling us to open them here."

When Sasuke failed to object, Tsuna got both out of storage and handed one to Sakura. "At the same time?"

She nodded and prepared, then opened hers when he did his.

"Let go of them!" Sasuke said. "It's a summoning of some kind!"

Both scrolls hit the ground and from them came a haze of smoke. Iruka stepped out and said, "At the end of the second test it's set up so we chūnin meet up with the candidates. I was the one allowed to greet you. Since you arrived with both scrolls well within the time limit, you three pass the second stage. Congratulations!"

Sakura chose that time to question the missing word on the wall, so Tsuna zoned out during the ensuing lecture, but paid attention when they were released to find open rooms within the tower to rest up and recover until the stage was over.

Tsuna promptly jumped to one of the walkways and headed in, trying to look like he had no idea where he was going. Sasuke pushed by him and took the lead, eventually locating rooms they could sleep in. Sasuke ducked into one and firmly shut the door, which left Sakura to dither for a moment before choosing the one right next to it.

Tsuna, already knowing that they were on their own from that point on and could take a room elsewhere, grabbed the other side, just in case the officials were paying attention to stuff of that nature. Inside he swept the room with his flames to seek out any form of spying, then started inking seals on the door to keep people out.

"Thank kami there's an en suite," he muttered, then headed in to clean up.

Shortly thereafter he laid down for a nap, formed a clone, and stepped Between to the stronghold under the tower.

"It's going to be a boring wait," Daemon said, switching his gaze from the window they had open on his room to Tsuna himself.

"Yeah, but at least I'm not forced to hang around those two. I can only hope that feeling Sakura had of utter hopelessness will spur her on to actively bettering herself, but… When Sasuke stalked out to kill already dying and unconscious nin, that might have caused her to backslide." He shrugged. "I don't think I much care for this world, you know? Some of the skills we've picked up are incredibly useful, but there's so much damn spying going on and so much suspicion. If I busted out half of what I know I'd probably get dragged to T&I. I can't even use shadow clones openly."

"You could have saved Sasuke from that cursed seal," Ken said.

"Yep. Could have."

"It's pretty pathetic the way the village never bothered to give him any real help," Ken continued. "It's also pathetic the way the kid didn't bother to think more about the other children, and less about what's become a consuming hatred and need for vengeance."

"It's fucking tempting to get medically discharged from the force," he said. "No one remembers I'm a container, so they can't use that against me."

Mukuro chuckled darkly. "And you could always gain their trust by winning them over with your cooking."

"I couldn't use Kaiten as a name, though," he said jokingly. "The Hyūga would be all over our asses if we tried it."

"Look on the bright side," Xeul said. "You're only contracted to serve five years before they're forced to accept your retirement. If we can meddle well enough we could get you moved to replace Chuya, and then we can tinker with our sensei, send clones in to do the D-ranks, and have fun elsewhere."

"And keep things to the point where C-ranks are more of a goal than a reality?" he said.

Daemon and Sin nodded. "We've yet to do one, and it's been, what, six months since we graduated? Our sensei seems to have a different take on things, and I can't say he's wrong about it. The fact that Team 7 went on a C-rank so early is probably more a function of the Uchiha being on the team. Teams 8 and 10 because they have clan heirs on them."

"Whereas I mostly demoted myself to a nobody, as very few people are even aware of this body's parents, and Sakura really is a nobody."

"Do you even want to fight in the finals?" Hayato asked.

He shook his head. "But getting here means those two can. Once this stage is over and they call for those who want to quit, I plan to. I did my part for the sake of the team, but that's all I'll do. I mean, I suppose I could have tried failing out of the academy, but I get the idea the old man would have found a way to keep me there. If you guys can successfully wrangle a team assignment change, I'm all for it. Then the three of us can be on the team we wanted to begin with and ride out the contract."

"What I don't get is why Orochimaru even bothered to show up, or have his minions in the exams, like Kabuto and his team," Chikusa said. "It's not like the Uchiha woke his sharingan."

"Maybe he thinks that cursed seal will make it happen?" Ken said. "It's creepy enough he wants the kid's body for his own so he can learn every jutsu in the world."

"He's no Nicolas Flamel or Talbot, that's for sure," Hayato said.

"Besides, if I opt out, Hatake will be busy with Sasuke, so I can spend as much time as I want with my family, and on planning. I mean, think about it. We have no idea why we're in this world other than that Uzumaki Naruto had some pivotal point in the 'plot'. I've always suspected we'd be killed early if we went too far off in the 'wrong' direction. But we're still here. I haven't tripped over my own shadow and fallen into a convenient pit of poison-coated, sharpened stakes."

His family started snickering and laughing.

"Whatever it is Naruto is 'destined' for isn't necessarily dependent on him being a super ninja," Sin said. "It'll take time to uncover the other things we might want to interfere in."

"All right, then we'll get started on figuring out how to get you reassigned," Daemon said, "and Chuya elsewhere."

xXx

Tsuna zoned out through the Hokage's explanation of what the Chūnin Selection Exam's underlying meaning was—if he missed anything of value the others would catch it—and then through Gekko speaking, but zoned back in when he heard, "Um… So, anyway… Those who are not feeling well, those who feel like quitting after these explanations, please come forward now, since we'll be starting the preliminaries immediately."

"What!? Right now!?" Kiba said.

Tsuna stepped forward. "I'm out."

Gekko coughed and consulted his clipboard. "You're Uzumaki Naruto-kun of Konoha, right?"

Tsuna nodded.

"You may leave now."

As he turned to exit the room he noticed that Kabuto looked frustrated and a red-haired girl looked surprised. Sakura touched his arm and asked, "Why?"

He gave her a long look. "I have no interest in being a chūnin. I only made it this far to give you two the opportunity." He started walking again, seeing one of the proctors waiting by the door.

"Soon as we know who's leaving…"

He nodded and opened a window on the room.

After a long pause in which Sakura tried to get Sasuke to bail because of that cursed seal and failed, Gekko said, "No one else? All right."

The proctor at the door motioned to Tsuna and headed through the door, then pointed at another one. "There's a waiting room over there. Once the prelims are done all of you will be escorted back to the village. No idea how long it'll take, but there's food and water there if you want any."

He nodded again and entered the room, then took a seat so he would watch the prelims unbeknownst to any of them.

"Since we have exactly twenty entrants we will conduct ten matches. The winners of those matches will advance to the third stage. There are basically no rules. The fight continues until one of you admits defeat, is knocked out, or dies. So, um, if you don't want to die, quickly admit your defeat. But, when I decide that a winner has been clearly established, the fight is over. I will jump in if necessary to avoid pointless deaths.

"Now, the object that will decide is this electronic scoreboard. It will randomly determine the people for each match." Gekko paused so he could cough again. "This is sudden, but, let's announce the names of the first two to fight."

Uchiha Sasuke v Uzumaki Karin

"All right. The two named please come to the front. The rest of you please move to the upper level."

While everyone was making their way upward, Hatake had appeared and moved to speak with Sasuke, so Tsuna moved his window close enough to overhear.

"Sasuke… We need to take care of that thing."

"…So you know."

"If that curse on your neck becomes active, you might lose your life. And if it becomes active, I'll step in and stop the match."

Shortly thereafter everyone was in place. Hatake took a spot near Sakura, and while she looked pleased to see him as a familiar, adult face, she looked far more worried about the Uchiha.

"The two participants in the first fight are Uchiha Sasuke of Konoha and Uzumaki Karin of Kusa. Are you ready?"

Both nodded, though Karin looked a bit weird, almost like she was falling for the kid right there in front of her. It was decidedly strange, the look on her face. What followed after Gekko said, "Hajime!" was a somewhat one-sided battle. Karin seemed too distracted to properly fight, and Sasuke, though troubled by the cursed seal, was able to take her down with taijutsu.

"Winner by knockout, Uchiha Sasuke," Gekko announced.

Two proctors scampered onto the field to take Karin away. She was seen to by a medic nin, then placed with the rest of her team in the stands.

The jonin sensei for Kusa appears to be Orochimaru wearing a new face.

A quick looked showed that jōnin to practically be salivating over Sasuke as he was escorted out of the arena by Hatake—or more like followed by him, as Hatake was trundling along behind the kid while reading his porn.

Hatake plans to get that cursed seal seen to. They plan to use the 'evil sealing method' to restrict it from acting on its own. Something like that.

The scoreboard (though why they were calling it that when it scored nothing) reset and showed new names.

Akado Yoroi v Aburame Shino

Why the hell didn't Hatake seal the thing during the wait, then? he wrote. He had several days. It took them that long to realize? Or it took Hatake "Always Late" Kakashi that long to get here?

"Will the two participants please come down so we can begin the second match."

Tsuna only half paid attention, choosing instead to haul a book out and start reading. It was a damn shame he couldn't have left immediately, because most of the fights held little interest for him. Reading up on the history of Kumo would have to do.

Shino won some time later. The Aburame Clan was downright creepy, using their bodies to host colonies of bugs. Tsuna felt the urge to start carrying bug spray with him wherever he went.

Hatake and Sasuke showed back up in time to watch the next match, between Kankurō of Sand and Misumi Tsurugi of Leaf.

Kankurō won, mostly because he had a puppet acting as his body to fake out his opponent with. Tsuna sincerely hoped the guy was more than a one-trick pony, though, as anyone coming out of the prelims would already be prepared for puppetry.

Haruno Sakura against Yamanaka Ino was interesting only in that Ino had more up her sleeve than just giving herself a dramatic haircut, and that Sakura could shake off Ino's mind transfer Hiden. In the end, they knocked each other out and both failed to pass to the finals.

The whole thing was frankly embarrassing, because the two girls were fighting not for advancement, but over the Uchiha, which was a shit reason. Tsuna was almost sorry he had bothered to ensure his team made it to the tower with both scrolls.

Tenten was up against Four-Haystacks, Temari of Suna. It was a terrible match for Tenten, as while she was seriously good with weaponry, most of her tactics were useless against someone with a wind affinity and the knowledge to use it. Hopefully she would bounce back and work on that weakness, or be prodded into it by her jōnin sensei.

Nara Shikamaru fought Shigeri of Kusa and won, mostly by dint of his intelligence and tactics. A very boring match, all told. Sadly, Shikamaru, in terms of actual techniques, was something of a one-trick pony himself.

Yakushi Kabuto went up against Inuzuka Kiba and won handily, but considering Kabuto was one of Orochimaru's lackeys that wasn't a surprise. The next fight was just nasty, Hyūga Hinata against her emo cousin Neji. He tore her apart verbally and got her to forfeit without ever once attacking physically.

The match between Gaara of Sand and Lee Rock (and why was it that literally no one ever referred to the kid in the normal manner, and instead used Rock Lee?) was fast-paced (though somewhat absurd as Gaara's gourd was still bear-shaped and he still had the teddy bear hanging from his belt).

Gaara could control sand, and physical attacks were more or less useless against it.

Glass his defense? he wrote.

Perhaps. It's probably not the right kind of sand, but anything can melt if you get it hot enough.

Once Lee was allowed (by his sensei, Maito Gai) to remove his training weights he went from incredibly fast to blindingly fast.

The kid can't use chakra techniques. His coils never developed.

Huh. I suppose that's why he's a clone of Maito. The dude's a taijutsu master.

Lee was pushed to his limits trying to counteract Gaara's sand and was carried off by the medics after opening some of his celestial gates (Tsuna couldn't be bothered to even try to understand) and getting mangled by Gaara despite his inhuman strength. Maito stepped in when Gaara tried to kill the kid.

Well, at least the kid didn't lose control and let loose the Ichibi.

Yeah, but it looked like he might. Lee went pretty damn far in showing Gaara that his sand is not an absolute defense.

And if he does during the invasion? It's not like anyone can go into that kid's head. He's probably completely psychotic if he never sleeps. If Lee had managed to knock him unconscious…

Our first line of defense is Mist.

Yeah. My eye, or Xeul's, perhaps in concert. Mukuro's six paths. I'd say Adamantine Sealing Chains, but that would raise far too many questions.

Tsuna snorted. Yeah, like he wanted to explain how he had learned a clan Hiden when he would have had no reasonable chance of even learning it existed, never mind finding a scroll explaining the technique. Kushina probably learned while she still lived in Uzushio, or from Mito.

We'll discuss it after I'm finally able to get back to the village. I can't imagine Sakura and I would be made to do missions when Sasuke will be off getting trained.

The final match, between Saito of Kusa and Akimichi Chōji, went quickly. Chōji busted out the clan Hiden and nothing else, and Saito was clever enough to trick the kid into ramming into the walls repeatedly, rattling the kid's brains. It was like watching a bull fight.

"Well, with this," Gekko said, "the preliminary trials for advancement to stage three have been completed. To all of you who succeeded in your matches, congratulations."

The Hokage ambled in and took up the instructions. "Now, as mentioned before, in the final stage your matches will be seen by everyone who attends. Each of you will fight to represent the strengths of your countries. I'd like you to show off all your powers with no reserves, which is why the finals will be held one month from now. This break, you can say, will be for preparations."

"What does that mean?" Neji asked, only proving he was something of an idiot.

"In other words, in addition to informing all the various leaders of countries and villages, this is the time needed to arrange for the gathering of the event. This is also preparation time for those of you who'll be fighting."

"I don't understand what you're trying to say," Kankurō complained. "What does that mean?"

"Basically, it's preparation to get to know your enemy and yourself. It's the time period where you calculate your chances of winning by analyzing the data you accumulated in the forest and during these preliminaries. The battles up until now had you fight as if you were in an actual combat situation, the assumption of fighting an unknown opponent.

"However, the final stage will not be so. There are those who've showed all that they can do already to their rivals. There are those who competed and were badly injured. To make everything fair, this month should be used by all of you to rest and recover, and to advance and improve yourselves.

"Now, much as I'd like to dismiss you all, there is one final thing to be done first. There are pieces of paper inside the box Anko is holding. You will each take one."

"I'll come to you, so wait your turn!" she said, then moved to the first of them. "Only one!"

"All right," the Hokage said once Anko was done. "Starting from the left, you will each tell us the number on your paper."

Morino was standing by with a clipboard and pen and wrote down the numbers to go with the names as they were called out.

"All right. Now I will reveal to you the final tournament. Ibiki?"

"Yes, Hokage-sama. Yakushi Kabuto will fight Hyūga Neji. Gaara will fight Sasuke Uchiha. Kankurō will fight Aburame Shino. Saito will fight Nara Shikamaru, and the winner of that fight will face Temari."

"Well then, you're free to start strategizing or resting as you like. Before I dismiss you all, are there any questions?"

Shino's hand went up.

"Yes?"

"Since it's a tournament, it would mean there's only one winner. Does that mean only one person can become chūnin?"

"No, that's not quite it. There will be judges, including myself, the leaders of both Kusagakure and Sunagakure, as they both have genin who have reached the final stage, along with Daimyos of various countries, and other ninja leaders. Throughout the tournament, these judges will be evaluating your abilities. Those judged to have the necessary qualities of a chūnin will be able to become chūnin, even if they lose their first match.

"As far as advancement goes, it is possible for none, some, or all of you to become chūnin. Those who advance higher in the tournament will have more chances to appeal to the judges. Well, then, thanks for all the effort you've exerted for these trials. You're all dismissed until a month from now."

'Finally,' he thought. Thirty seconds later one of the proctors came into the waiting room and beckoned to him, and he joined the procession of people back to the village.

On the way Hatake decided to say, before disappearing, "You two will have the month off. Try not to get into too much trouble."

Tsuna snorted softly.

xXx

"How about we run some tests while Between to even see if our techniques will work on Gaara?" Daemon asked after Tsuna retrieved his time turner and stowed it.

He nodded. "Better to know now. You guys can be ridiculously subtle. Aside from what we already talked about, I'm curious to know how easily the kid can be caught by genjutsu and, more importantly, Mist illusions. If he goes bugnuts it'd be nice to know we could lead him away from the village without him even being aware of it. All else failing, we shift the fucker elsewhere, like back to Suna."

"On a side note, Saito turned up 'mysteriously' dead," Mukuro said, "I imagine so that Orochimaru can continue with his original plan to kill the Kazekage and take his place, and not have to worry about an additional Kage being present."

"What do we do if the invasion wipes out the village?" Ken asked.

Tsuna shrugged. "Then we three genin are found amongst the dead and the Kuro clan says, 'Fuck this,' and ups stakes. We bail and do our spying from elsewhere to figure out what the big deal is about us being here. Or hell, since the compound is basically secured with 'Keep the Fuck Away' protection, it'll probably be fine and we can spy from there."

"Assuming it doesn't get blown away by incidental damage caused by flashy nin tossing around high level jutsu," Hayato said.

Ken stared. "We control gravity," he said slowly.

"Well, uh, yeah, there is that," Hayato mumbled.

"I'm really hoping that Kabuto fucks Neji up," he said, mostly the change the subject.

"I'd hope we'd get lucky and they both off each other, but that's just not going to happen," Sin said. "Kabuto will take a dive so he can be in place to set off the invasion."

"Okay, so, how are we playing this? Who wants who? We've got Kabuto and Orochimaru to remove from the gene pool, and potentially Orochimaru's other minions, like the ones who'll be trapping the Hokage so Snake-Man can off him."

"Did I forget to mention that Orochimaru plans to resurrect the Shodai and Nidaime Hokages?"

"Well, that's lovely," Chikusa said. "I plan to tranquilize the fuck out of enemy nin so Konoha forces can more easily defeat or kill them."

"Using that technique on the Scroll of Seals?" Sin said.

Xeul nodded.

"So there's a few seconds in there of breathing room, before Orochimaru would have to use a control device on them."

"I say we shift the controls away and the bodies away, and Hayato could disintegrate them."

"Or one of us could atomize them with gravity. I can't tell if Orochimaru wants them there just to make Sarutobi upset, or because he honestly thinks he'd need their help."

"You would think that with a kinjutsu like that on the Scroll of Seals, people like the first two Hokages would have insisted their bodies be cremated. I mean, fuck, people in the magical world should be all for that shit, too," Hayato said. "Does anyone really want their body to be used as an inferius?"

xXx

"Thank you, everyone, for coming to the Konohagakure no Sato Chūnin Selection Exam. We will now start the main tournament matches between the eight participants who made it through the preliminaries. Please stay and watch until the end," the Hokage said, then took his seat.

The stadium was massive and the walls were at least several storeys high, and inside were several mature trees. Atop that, on the "wall" opposite the main entrance, were viewing stands, with an additional level on the center one, for the Hokage and any other village leaders.

Tsuna and his family were well supplied with drinks and snacks as they rested comfortably on sofas and watched one large window up against the wall, with six smaller ones, three on each side.

Shiranui Genma, a replacement for the deceased Gekko Hayate, informed the participants of the slight change in fights due to the mysterious death of Saito of Kusa. Nothing was said about the fact that Sasuke was not amongst their number until Shikamaru brought it up.

One of the windows on the left side showed that Hatake was still coaching the kid, which seemed rather foolish. Why expend so much energy and chakra when his match was second in the line-up?

"If he doesn't appear by the time of his match, he will receive a default loss," Shiranui said. "All right, guys, this is the final test. The arena is different, but the rules are the same as the prelims. There are none. You fight until one of you dies or admits defeat. As in the prelims, if I determine the fight is over, I'll step in and stop things, got it? Now, first fight is Yakushi Kabuto and Hyūga Neji. Those two stay here, while the rest of you go to the waiting area."

Kabuto took a dive, though he at least made it look like he wasn't taking a dive, but rather that he was simply outmatched by Neji. All that dodging and running around just exhausted him. Sadly, all that did was make the Hyūga even more assured of his own superiority.

Kabuto was hauled off by medics to be seen to, though one of the side windows showed that the second he was left alone he created a clone to take his place and took off. He hunted down a member of ANBU, killed him, and stole his mask. He returned to the stadium so he would be ready for his part.

"By the way," Orochimaru-disguised-as-the-Kazekage said, "where is he?"

A Konoha nin who had just flickered in bent down to whisper to the Hokage. "We still can't find the Uchiha, and we still have that other matter to deal with, so before everyone starts to make a big fuss, perhaps we should disqualify him."

There was a pause of several minutes as Sarutobi considered, then he said, "We have no choice. Uchiha Sasuke is disqualified."

"Hokage-dono," Orochimaru said smoothly. "Please wait a little longer before making a decision."

"I beg your pardon," said Konoha-Nin, "but anyone who takes punctuality lightly doesn't have what it takes to be a good chūnin, no matter how skilled they are. Unless there's a good enough reason to convince the lords and shinobi leaders to wait, then we should go on without him."

"I see," Orochimaru said. "If that's the case, then there is a more than satisfactory reason. The majority of the shinobi leaders and lords, myself included, are here mainly because we wanted to see the next match. He is, after all, a member of the Uchiha Clan, and we, Suna, would also request that our Gaara be given the opportunity to fight him."

"…Uchiha Sasuke is disqualified," the Hokage said firmly, "but I will allow the fight to take place, as the final match of the round, assuming he shows up in time. Gaara will advance either way. That is final. Inform the examiner, and caution him to avoid mentioning the disqualification."

"Yes, Hokage-sama," Konoha-Nin said, then flickered away.

"It seems odd that you would push so much for this, Kazekage-dono."

"Not at all. There's no better opponent than the Uchiha to show off the quality of our village's shinobi to these clients. It's a great opportunity for us."

"A contestant for the next match has yet to arrive," Shiranui belted out to the crowd. "Therefore, we will push this match back and begin the next one! Next up, Kankurō and Aburame Shino!"

"…I forfeit!" Kankurō yelled.

Shiranui paused, seemingly having trouble processing that, then belted out, "Temari and Nara Shikamaru!"

Temari rode her huge war fan down to the arena ground, while Shikamaru was pushed over the railing and fell to the ground. He just laid there unhappily.

"What, are you going to give up, too?" Temari asked. "If you won't come, then I will!"

The girl took off running at him as Shiranui yelled, "Hey! I didn't start the match!"

She used her closed fan as a blunt instrument only to hit ground. Shikamaru could apparently be quite speedy when he chose.

"You know, I don't really want to fight, and I don't care whether I become chūnin or not, but I'm not going to lose to a girl!"

Tsuna rolled his eyes. "Seriously? Sexism again? I mean, okay, way too many girls are freakin' fangirls, but really. Is he a misogynist or just trying to wind her up?"

There was a whole lot of running around on Shikamaru's part, darting from place to place to gain a new position or to avoid Temari's wind attacks, but also to make time pass so that the angle of the sun would improve his reach with his clan Hiden. Of course, being who he was, he forfeited after he had Temari trapped with his shadow technique, claiming he only had enough chakra to hold her for another ten seconds.

"So, this demonstrates that he's brilliant, lazy as fuck, and didn't bother to make sure he could force her to threaten her own life once he had her."

"Yeah, sure," Ken said, "and in a real damn fight he'd be dead."

"Winner, Temari!" Shiranui announced.

The crowd began to get restless again because the Uchiha had yet to arrive, but then came a whirlwind of leaves, and from it emerged Hatake and Sasuke.

"Sorry we're late," Hatake said.

"Your name?" Shiranui asked, which made Samsara chortle over the dig.

Sasuke scowled. "Uchiha Sasuke."

"Well, we showed up all flashy and the like, but could Sasuke have been … disqualified?" Hatake said.

"The fight between the Uchiha and Gaara was pushed to last for this round," Shiranui replied, neglecting to mention the actual disqualification as ordered.

Hatake laughed. "Good, that's good."

"Gaara, you're up! Get down here!"

Hatake flickered off and found a spot near the other jōnin sensei.

The match began and Sasuke started attacking with a taijutsu style that wasn't quite the usual. He was a lot faster than before, which meant Hatake had to have weighted him down and pushed him until he dropped, repeatedly. Sasuke did manage to make Gaara retreat into a sand cocoon, then he planted himself on the far wall and prepared a new attack.

"Aw, shit, the kid managed to awaken his sharingan," Ken said. "That might explain why his taijutsu was not quite right."

Sasuke built up a fair amount of chakra around his left hand. His right hand braced the other one. Then he took off running, down the wall, a hop to the ground, then forward at blinding speed. He hit that cocoon and pierced it.

"… … Blood! My blood!"

Sasuke jumped back and stared as an arm formed from sand emerged from the cocoon, but it soon enough disappeared and the cocoon started to crack. It lost cohesion and turned back to fluid sand, revealing Gaara, who had been pierced through at his shoulder.

"Okay, alert time," he said. "He's gonna blow." He called over the window he had prepared earlier, the one showing the Suna desert, and waited.

Daemon had a window on Kabuto, Hayato had a window on Orochimaru, Chikusa had several open to various points, and Sin slipped into Between to get to his position.

Kabuto made several handsigns and bowed his head. Moments later feathers started falling all over the stadium. Daemon immediately zoomed in on Kabuto's face, shifted the mask away, and used his eye. Kabuto went blank, and a moment later was shifted away.

Ken stepped out briefly—to obliviate the living fuck out of the guy—then forced Draught of Living Death down the young man's throat and got him to swallow. Kabuto was then tossed into an extended trunk and stored until they had a free moment.

Orochimaru managed to grab Sarutobi and jump them both up to the roof of the viewing box, and a second later four Oto nin jumped up as well, spread apart in a rectangle on the roof ridges, and between them caused a purple barrier to spring up.

A pursuing Konoha nin bashed into the barrier and disintegrated.

Before Temari, Kankurō, and their jōnin sensei managed to get to Gaara, Tsuna had shifted the boy to the desert, which made them screech to a stop in confusion.

"Abort plan!" the sensei said. "You two, flee! I'll join the fight!"

"Fuck me, he's started with Edo Tensei," Hayato said.

One, two, three coffins rose up, but something seemed to be wrong with the third one. The first two opened to reveal the previous Hokages.

"The fuck? They're already talking about how they have to fight against Sarutobi?" Hayato scowled and set to work, using his Storm Flames to disintegrate the two of them before anything nasty could happen.

"No!" Orochimaru screamed.

For good measure, Hayato disintegrated all three coffins.

Chikusa was busy tranquilizing three enormous snakes—or was it a three-headed snake?—over at the village wall so that it struggled to fight back against the Konoha nin attacking it.

Sin chose that moment to strike, taking out all four of the Oto nin holding the barrier so that ANBU could get to the Hokage and assist in the fight—which had been slightly delayed due to Orochimaru chucking a wobbly and screaming incoherently.

Tsuna moved on to taking out Yoroi and Tsurugi, then switched his attention to the overall fighting.

Sin decided to be a troll and shot Orochimaru in the arms and legs from his place Between, then stepped back to Samsara. "I wonder if basilisk venom would kill that fucker," he mused.

Tsuna shrugged. "You up for one more, Hayato?"

"You got it, Heul!" Hayato said enthusiastically, then disintegrated Orochimaru.

The Hokage and his ANBU came down with a strong case of confused, but quickly recovered and went off to deal with the rest of the invaders.

"Think those curse marks can resurrect the defect?" Chikusa said, not taking his eyes off the battle at the wall breach.

"If they're anything like a Horcrux? Yeah."

"What the fuck are all those jōnin doing just standing there in the viewing boxes? They're not asleep, they're just—nothing. There's not even any fighting near them."

"What happened to Sasuke, by the way?"

"Amusingly, he pouted before running off to join the fighting. He went after Temari and Kankurō."

"So we should have seen a flying Uchiha? Or will shortly?"

Tsuna glanced at his desert window and saw that Gaara had gotten himself under control. He was making a cadre of sand bears to hold an oddly-ornate palanquin so he could ride in style back to Suna, whatever direction that was in.

Sin stepped out again so he could let loose with his amazingly excellent and accurate sniping skills. Tsuna could see Oto nin dropping like flies as his lover punched through their brains with explosive rounds or flash fried them with Chaos Shot.

Mukuro sent a legion of wolves into the mix, focused on Suna nin. "I'd have used my preferred snakes," he said, "but we know that wouldn't go over well. People might think Mitarashi was involved, but I'd rather not risk Konoha nin going after the wrong targets."

It took quite some time, but the fighting died down, the enemy nin either captured, dead, or fled, and Konoha began to clean up the mess.

"Hang on!" Chikusa called. "There, up on the wall!"

"What the fuck, man?" Hayato said. "Those cloaks are freakin' weird."

The two figures had on sugegasa and long black cloaks with stylized red clouds on them.

"Tagged them," Xeul said and Daemon said as one, as the window zoomed in close.

"We don't need to destroy what's already suffered a lot of damage," the taller one said. "What do you think?"

"The village is at the end of its prosperity," the shorter said. "We shouldn't feel sorry for it."

Chikusa angled the window so they could get a better look at the faces.

"Is that Uchiha Itachi?" Tsuna said.

Sure enough, the sharingan-wielder had a slashed Konoha hitai-ate. The other had a slashed Kiri hitai-ate.

"Gaara's no longer here," Shark-Face said. "Actually, you still miss your village, don't you…"

"No, not at all," Itachi replied.

"Got it!" Daemon practically sang. "They're part of a group called Akatsuki."