The Preliminaries
When Anko and Mugen arrived at the building, the teams that passed the exam were Team Sasuke, Shikamaru, Gaara, Neji, Kiba and Hidden Sound. Anko congratulated them and asked them to follow her into another room. Mugen walked from the back with his mind was focused on the intruder. He watched the candidates in front of him but made sure they didn't notice him doing so. His eyes stopped at Kabuto's team and noticed he was injured. "Hmm, what happened to him to get those injuries?" He thought and the doors to another room was opened, light penetrated through the gap and reveal a bigger room, an arena. The Third Hokage, the Kazekage and other Jounins were there as well. Anko told them Genins to line up and listen to what the third Hokage has to say.
Anko and Mugen joined their fellow Jounins and stood with them as the Hokage gave his speech. Mugen noticed something was going on in Naruto's team. He noticed Sakura had a worried and terrified look on her face while Sasuke seemed to be in pain. He gave a look to Kakashi and gestured him to come closer to him. The Copy Ninja wondered what was it about but it must be important, so he walked up next to him and leaned a bit towards him. "When the Old Man finishes his speech, have a talk with your team. They seem to be worried about something or hiding something." Mugen whispered and Kakashi looked at his team, gave him a nod. "I'm sure it's nothing but I'll ask. Thanks, Mugen." Said Kakashi and patted his back, going back to where he stood.
As it seem to be an eternity to Mugen and the candidates, the Third's speech was finally over and the Preliminaries will begin soon. All teams, including their Jounins, Hokage and Kazekage got onto the platform on the wall to spectate the fights between the Genins to determine who will go to the finals. Anko excused herself to the Third and hit Mugen's back, gave him a chuckle and left the arena. The man rubbed his painful back while glaring at the kunoichi. "What the hell was that about?" He asked, while Kurenai and Asuma chuckled at him.
Mugen noticed one of his friends become the proctor for the current exam and waved at him. "Hey, Genma! Don't screw up or get a cold feet!" He said and laughed at him. The other Leaf Jounin sighed and had beads of sweat on their cheeks, "Only you would do something like that…" They thought and sighed. The Hokage covered his face with his hat, embarrassed by his ninja's behavior. "Mugen! What the hell are you doing there for?! Get over here!" The Third yell, making everyone jumped by surprised except the Kazakage, Baki and Harawa. Genma chuckled, "Haha, got scolded like a freaking child. How embarrassing." He said and smirked at the embarrassed Tora.
Naruto laughed at Mugen and ended up getting a big smack on the head by his teammates, Sakura. While the other Genin simply didn't care of the situation or just chuckled at the man. "He got you there, Sensei." Said Shikamaru, smirking. "Shut up…" Mugen simply said and got some pats on the back. Also a thumbs up from the one and only, Might Guy. After having a walk of shame to the Third Hokage, the first fight has finally begun. The first ones to fight was Sasuke and a guy from Kabuto's team. It seemed to be one sided at first with the other guy had the advantage until the tables was finally turned and Sasuke got the win. "Hell yeah! Way to go, Sasuke!" Naruto cheered loudly, along with Sakura and Ino. Mugen whistled, "Not bad. I guess that was to be expected from an Uchiha." He said and the Third nodded.
After the fight, Sasuke lost his balance and almost fell but Kakashi caught him. "You've done enough, go and get treated." He said. Sasuke doesn't want to admit it but he gave in and nodded. As he was walking out of the arena with two men in white, Naruto shout out at him. "Don't worry about us! We got this in the bag!" He said, earned a lot of looks from other teams and ended up getting smacked by Sakura, again. Kakashi only chuckled at his student. Sasuke smirked and continued to walk away.
Next up was Shino versus Zaku, a genin from the Hidden Sound. Mugen was a little bit confused and he asked the Hokage. "Ummm, excuse me, Old Man?" He asked and the Hokage turned before gave a nod, a permission for him to ask a question. "Was he in the Exams all this time? I didn't notice him at all…Now, I'm starting to wonder if I'm getting rusty…" Said Mugen and looked at the laughing Hokage. The man yelled at him for laughing and got smacked for yelling. "He has always been like that. He likes to be by himself and not getting involve with other people too much except his friends, like his teammates." Sarutobi explained and Mugen nodded. "I see…did you noticed him?" Mugen asked and he got a nod from him until he started to look away. "But when I sometimes visited the academy…I didn't notice him at all…" He said and sighed, got a pat on the shoulder from the man.
The young Aburame struggled a little but just like the other members of his clan, they managed to pull through by using their insects. Shino's bugs drained managed to got onto Zaku despite being blasted with sound waves and sucked his chakra to the point that he no longer can continue. "The winner is, Shino Aburame!" Genma announced and his teammates cheered for him. The others cheered as well while some were just kept quiet, watching the match went on. "Not bad but he needs to work on his Taijutsu." Mugen thought and clapped for him.
"Kankuro! Misumi! Come on down, you guys are next!" Genma announced and the two Genins jumped down before facing each other. Kankuro had a smirk on his face since before he jumped down from the platform while Misumi watched his movements. Kankuro grabbed the bandage covered object on his back and put it in front of him. "How's it going? I hope you'll my puppet show that I will be showing you." He said and chuckled. Temari scoffed, "Stop being cocky and get serious, you idiot." She said and turned to her little brother, who silently watching the match. "He's awfully calm this time. Thank God…"
At first Misumi seemed to get the upper hand as he caught Kankuro by surprised and grabbed him from behind. "Forfeit or I'll break your neck." Misumi whispered and Kankuro chuckled. "Hell no." He simply said and not going back on his word, he broke the boy's neck and watched his lifeless body fell on the floor. Everyone was surprised except for the Jounins and the Kages. Before Genma called Misumi the winner, Kankuro's corpse, turned into a puff of smoke and wooden puppet appeared. Misumi, along with everyone else was surprised yet again. The puppet quickly grabbed onto the Leaf Genin. "Oh, I see you've met Karasu! I think you will really get along with him. He enjoys killing assholes like you." Said Kankuro and started to pull the chakra strings that were connected to the puppet. "No..! Please!" Misumi begged and Karasu constricted him.
Genma stepped in and announced Kankuro as the winner. Misumi survived however, was no longer qualified to fight any longer. Misumi was carried out of the arena and Kankura got back on the platform. "Using chakra strings and puppets as weapons. Interesting…but something tells me he didn't show us his puppets full potential." Mugen thought and shook the thought away. "Probably the reason he doesn't show us so that he can use it in the finals. Hopefully then the puppet master will show us his tricks."
"Next up are…Haruno Sakura and Yamanaka Ino!" Genma announced and the two girls looked at each other with intense electricity between them as they let out some fighting words, along with insults. Mostly insults. "Enough, you two. Go down there and show what you have learned." Said Kakashi, splitting them up and Asuma walked up. He patted on their shoulders, "Save it so that you two have the energy to fight each other in the arena, alright?" He said. Sakura and Ino looked at each other before quickly turned away from each other and head down to the arena. Asuma looked at his student while scratching the back of his head while Kakashi sighed, making Mugen chuckled.
As the fight had begun, the two still throwing insults at each other and mostly about who wins will have the right to be Sasuke's girlfriend. "Sheesh, those girls on fire…" Said Mugen, surprised at how intense their love towards the young Uchiha and their rivalry. With only Naruto's cheer in the background, the two clashed. "Heh, look at that teammate of yours. Looking such an idiot, it makes me feel bad that you have an annoying person like that in your team." Ino spouted as she got into the kunoichi's head. Then, something inside her awakened and to Ino's surprised it was Sakura's inner self, looking down at her.
"Going after Sasuke is one thing but insult to insult my teammate like that?! CHA!" Sakura's inner self pounded her huge fist down onto the blonde and literally knocked her out from her mind. Ino was wide awake and in shock, "How is that possible?!" She asked and watched Sakura slowly stood up, clenching his fist tightly. They both gave flurries of punches. Some hit, missed and connected to each others' fists. "It ends now, Ino!" She said and charged towards her with her fist ready to hit its target. "Sakura!" Ino yelled and charged towards her, with her fist ready to hit her as well. Just before the punches connected, a flash of the two when they were kids flashed in their heads. Then, the two girls' bodies pushed back by each others' strength and fell on the floor, unconscious. Genma checked both of them and called it a draw.
"That was pretty intense." Mugen noted and smiled. "Well, you two did gave it your all. And that's more than enough." He thought and watched the two carried away on stretchers. His attention returned to the arena when Genma announced the next candidates.
Another Genin from the Sand stepped into the ring and her opponent was the ninja tool enthusiast, TenTen. "Ready? Fight!" Genma signaled the match has started and TenTen jumped back to create distance between herself and Temari. The Third praised her for doing so but despite of her skills of using ninja tools, she was outmatched by Temari's wind style techniques. TenTen seemed to be down after she lost the fight and didn't look at anyone nor talk to them. She walked back to her team and sat down, resting her back against the wall while burying her face to her knees. Lee was about to cheer her up but Neji stopped him, simply shaking his head. "It was unfortunate but learn form this battle and sharpen your skills, TenTen. You can take advantage when the enemy make big swings like that or use the wind to counterattack the user." Mugen thought and stretched his arms out. He looked at the Jounins from the Sand and Sound, to see if they were acting suspicious of some sort. He had been watching them from time to time in between watching the fights in the arena.
Now, for the second half of the preliminaries.