Chapter 5

Ibiki explained it to us, and then,

CRASH!

A blur sped through the room, kunais struck the ceiling and floor, and spread out a banner. The blur landed, and a woman appeared.

"None of you are in any position to celebrate," she said, "I am the second examiner, Mitarashi Anko!"

Silence. This girl is a doofus.

But she really didn't unfazed.

78 of you are still here?" she turned to Ibiki, Ibiki! You passed twenty-six teams?! I'll cut down the number by half by the time we're done."

I raised an eyebrow. Uh-huh, I thought.

"I'll explain things in detail as soon as we get to our next location, so follow me!"

- - -

Wow, this is a huge forest, I thought.

I looked down at Katsu.

Yes, down.

Katsu was happily sitting on the ground, stroking the dirt into a small pile.

Right where I left him.

"With the other two members of your cell, bring the forms to the hut behind you and submit them."

Forms? What forms? I thought.

But my question was answered when Aika handed me a pile of forms. I took one, and sent the rest down to Katsu.

"Now, about the exam," Anko said, "To put it simply, it's a no-holds-barred survival test."

Survival test? I thought, oh, goody.

"It's kind of fight-to-the-death version of capture the flag. Or scroll, in this case."

"Scroll?" a boy said.

"Exactly!" replied Anko, "There's a heaven scroll, and earth scroll. Your objective is to get both. There are 78 of you here, that means 26 teams. Thirteen starts out with an earth scroll, and thirteen gets the heaven scroll. But you need both to pass. So you have to get the other scroll, while keeping your own safe, and bring them both back to the tower in the center."

"So, thirteen teams, the teams that lost their scroll, lose," said Sakura.

"Exactly!" said Anko.

She continued to speak about the rules, but I lost myself into my thoughts.

Well, that just tightens the noose. I mean, some of the people here are incredibly advanced! And we're only rookies. We have a chance, since Katsu's on our team, and he will be able to get us to the tower, and away from strong ninja, safely. But what about fighting? Aika would have to be in mortal peril for us to have a clear chance at winning. Our only way, would be to team up with another squad.

A man stepped out of the hut and said, "It's almost time to distribute the scrolls."

I looked around. It looked like almost everyone else had filled out their form. Except for me. I hurriedly wrote out the answers and walked toward the hut with the others.

When we got our scroll, a heaven one, and headed to a gate.

"Gate 3?" I asked looking at Aika, "Why'd you pick gate 3?"

"It's my lucky number," she answered.

I raised an eyebrow, but didn't comment. Katsu, on the other hand, snorted loudly.

Aika looked at him, peeved.

He smiled, "Dirt," he said, as if that cleared it up.

We didn't believe him. Katsu has never gotten dirt up his nose before.

"Part two of the chuunin exams begins…..NOW!"