Previously on NARUTO TCG…
"Quiet down you little brats!" Suddenly a giant voice boomed out of an exploding cloud of smoke. Out of the darkened mists calls forth a group of teachers. Amongst them is a large man who wears all black with a black trench coat and has a giant scar across his face. "It's time to begin. I am Ibiki Morino, your proctor, and from this moment on, your worst enemy!"
The tournament exams are about to begin.
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NARUTO TCG: CHUNIN BATTLE TOURNAMENT DUELS-
COILS OF THE SNAKE
Chapter 6:
The Examination
The entire classroom is in silence. They never have seen a person this scary before. Not even in horror flicks. Ibiki points one hand at the three sound genin. "You three, stop doing as you please. Do you want to be disqualified already?"
"Uh, sorry." Said the bandaged person, or Dosu. "This is our first time and… we did get a little carried away."
"Typical. Nows a good opportunity to say this: there will be no unauthorized fighting during the exams. Even if permission is granted, killing your opponent will not be tolerated." Ibiki's eyes turned dark and life-threatening. "Those who disobey the rules will be disqualified without question. Do I make myself clear?"
"Hmph, sounds too easy." Answered the earphone guy; of Zaku is who he's called.
"Good. We will now start the qualification exam. Instead of your current seating arrangements…" Ibiki took out a pack a small paper. "You will take one of these tabs and sit in the seat assigned to you. We'll start the written test once you've all seated."
"What? Did he say...written?" Naruto exclaimed. "No!!! Not a written test, no way!"
Meanwhile, after everyone is seated…
"Oh man. Everyone's separated now. What should I do?"
"Um, N-Naruto?"
Naruto quickly turns to see Hinata Hyuga sitting next to him. 'Whoa. I didn't even notice her there.'
"Let's do our best." She whispered.
"Do not turn your tests over." Ibiki says. "Listen to what I'm about to say to you." Morino standing next to the board starts to give out the rules listed below: "1. you guys will all start off with 10 points. 2. This test is made up of 10 questions, each one worth a point, and the test uses a subtraction system. 3. Basically, if you answer all 10 questions correctly, you keep your 10 points. [Exp: if you miss 3 questions, you lose 3 points and will have 7. 4. Whether you pass will be determined by the combined scores of you and your team mates."
At this point everybody gets freaked out, especially Sakura. "What? Wait a second! You're saying we all get scored as a team?"
"Shut up. You have no right to question me. There is a reason for this, so sit down and listen. 5. During the exam, anyone the testing officers [the other teachers] catch doing sneaky activities, namely, cheating will have two points subtracted for every offense. 6. There will be some who will lose all their points and be asked to leave. Realize that the pathetic ones who get caught will only be taken upon themselves. As shinobi trying to reach the level of a Chunin, act as proud shinobi should. Rule 7 and the last. Those that lose all their initial points during the test… will be failed along with their two team mates."
Now all three of squad 7 are surprised. The odds are against them. At this point Naruto feels scared of the fact that he might cause Sasuke and Sakura to get disqualified this soon in the Chunin Exam. "They're gonna kill me!"
"There will be a final question handed out at the 45 minute mark and the exam will last an hour. Now Begin!" said Morino.
Mostly all the students are nervous right now but Naruto is freaked. But then, "Heh, this is nothing. I've survived tougher situations than this. I can't fail here…"
'Don't worry, Naruto.' The Fox Sage tells him. 'It's times like this that you just have to calm down and relax. Calmly look over each question, find one you can answer and focus on it.'
"You're right. Thanks for the pep talk. Let's do it." Naruto looks at his test paper. "Okay, the first question looks like a cryptograph."
Later, Sakura realizes that this test encourages cheating because the questions are too hard to answer besides herself, later on Naruto and Sasuke and other teams realizes also but Naruto doesn't know how he's going to cheat. Sasuke then realizes that what Morino actually meant was that if you're going to cheat then don't get caught but cheat like a proud shinobi should. Gaara is the first one who starts to cheat by making a third eyeball appear in his hand, and then comes Kiba who is using Akamaru to give him the answers, and then the leader of the Sound nins was using his ears to hear the rhythm, stoke order, amount of strikes, then we got Shino using one of his bugs to fly to other people's paper and get the information, then we got that girl from Rock Lee's team, Tenten was her name, who is using her strings to coordinate the mirrors above her and taking answers from Shino to her team mates.
Back to Naruto, he is still freaked out because he is running out of time, 'Tick, Tick, Tick! Couldn't they've had a digital clock?' but then he gets a lucky break since he is sitting next to Hinata.
"N-Naruto?" she squeaked.
"Huh?"
"If you want, I could, um, I could show you my test."
Could it be that Hinata wants him to look at her paper?
Naruto was surprised at what she just said. ') Say what? She'd let me look at her test? Why would she want to do that? Unless of course, it's some kind of trick. Yeah, I'll bet that's..- No. What am I thinking, no way? Hinata's not like that. But she could have been forced into tricking me by Kiba or the others. I wouldn't put it past them.' "Hey, Hinata? Can I ask you something?"
": Hmm?"
"Why would you want to show me your answers?"
": Why? Well, just because...Well, you see..." Hinata just stands there twiddling her fingers. She doesn't know what to say. But then she came up with an answer. "It's just, it's because I don't want you to have to leave."
"Hmm?"
"Uhh? Well, um, it would be nice if we could all stick together. I mean the nine of us. Being rookies and all."
"That makes sense, I suppose. I thought you were trying to pull a fast on there. Sorry." 'This is my lucky day. I mean, what are the chances of sitting next to someone who wants you to cheat off of her?'
Hinata covers only half of her sheet, so that Naruto can see the answers. But then he saw an exam proctor standing right at the edge of the table. Due fact that if he gets caught cheating, this will also affect Sasuke and Sakura. "I can't."
Hinata becomes surprised and looks right at him.
"A true shinobi never needs to cheat. "
"But, Naruto?"
"If I get caught, I don't want you to get in trouble."
Hinata blushes. 'He does care!' she thought. "Thank you."
All of a sudden other team mates start getting disqualified because they got caught cheating. Suddenly all the other top nins started to use their special abilities again like Sakura started to right faster, Neji uses his Byakugan to see through people and see their answers, Sasuke also uses his sharingan to copy other peoples movements, then Ino waited for Sakura to finish her test and then do a body switch so that she can copy her answers for a quick moment and at the same time more people are being disqualified. 13 teams have been disqualified so far.
Naruto is still having trouble and has to bet everything on the last question.
Some time later…
"Time's up." Said ibiki. It's time for the 10th question." Finally, the class is about to receive the 10th question. "Now before we get to it, I would like to go over the added rules to this question. These are rules of desperation."
The class became quieter.
"For the 10th question, you can decide whether or not you will take it."
"What happens if we don't want to take it?"
"Your points will automatically be reduced to zero. You and your entire squad will fail. Although, if you do choose to take it and get it wrong… you will lose the privilege to enter the chunin battle tournament again."
Naruto is surprised on the spot.
"What kind of stupid rule is that?!" Kiba barked, "There are people who have taken the selection exam before!"
"Hmph. Well you luck's run out this year…" Ibiki answered, "because I am the law here… but I'm giving you a way out. Those who don't have the guts to answer the 10th question can try again next year."
The entire classroom is shocked and scared. They are in for the ride of their lives.
"Now let us begin the 10th question! Those who don't wish to take it, raise their hand. Once your number is called, go."
'I guess you don't have much of a chice, hm, Naruto?' the fox sage said.
'What are you talking about, Kyuubi?! I don't even know what question is going to be! If I choose to answer the 10th question, and I get it wrong, I'll be a genin forever! But if I don't, Sakura and Sasuke will fail with me! I don't want that either! I guess I have only one choice.'
Several participants decide not to take it. Sakura is now worried about Naruto as she watches him shivering in fear. 'I can't raise my hand. I know I can do this…' she thought. 'Even if Naruto causes us to fail, it's not like I got the question wrong, we can try again next year. But Naruto… you're different. You should forget about us and think about our next chance.' She then thinks of all the times Naruto claims that he could be Hokage someday. That's all he ever talks about. 'Hokage, hokage. He's got a one track mind. That dream's all he's got. It would kill him if it was taken away from him forever, but he's too stubborn to raise his hand. I won't let you do this to yourself Naruto.' She is sure that Naruto wouldn't be able to answer the question because she doesn't want to see Naruto's future of being Hokage crumble, so she starts to raise her hand. Then she sees Naruto slowly raising his. Is this all over? Is Naruto no longer able to…
"Don't underestimate me! I don't quit and I don't run!" Naruto slams his hand down to his desk. "You can act tough all you want! You guys are not gonna scare me off...no way! I don't care if I do get stuck as a Genin for the rest of my life...I'll still be Hokage someday!"
Ibiki deeply glares at Naruto. He was certain that he would give up. "I'll ask you once again," he scowled. "are you sure you don't want to quit?"
" I never go back on my word. That's my Nindo, my ninja way!"
Naruto wipes out everyone else's uncertainty and the 78 remaining all decide to take the last question.
'Remarkable! That little outburst has given the others some backbone. He's inspired them into staying. But that won't change anything.' "Then I got only one thing to say to you all… Congratulations! You've passed the Chunin Battle Tournament Qualification Exam!"
Surprise and shock reached the entire classroom. They didn't know what hit them.
"What do you mean we pass the test? What about the 10th question?"
"There was never a 10th question. Or perhaps those 2 choices were the 10th question."
"Then what were those other 9 questions for?" Temari asks "Those were pointless!"
"They weren't pointless. They already served their purpose. They were meant to test how well you gather information."
"Oh, well that explains everything." She says sarcastically.
"Let me explain..." Morino continued. "Success of this exam is based on the success of the entire squad. This puts pressure on each member not to screw up for their partners."
"Mm-hm, yeah, I figured it was something like that," Naruto says "that's why I kept my cool."
'Oh really?' the fox sage say sarcastically.
Hinata just giggled.
"Yes, but those 9 questions aren't for a mere genin to answer. Because of that, I'm sure that most of you decided to cheat in order to score. The entire purpose of this test was to see how well you could gather information as a team without getting caught. This is essential for a shinobi."
"Ha ha! I knew that all along! It was so obvious, right Hinata?" Naruto exclaims.
'So he really didn't know the whole time.' Sasuke thought.
"But those who cheat poorly fail, of course." Ibiki removes his cap… "Because in times, information is more important that life." …which uncovers his scalp, revealing deep scars, burns and screw holes. Everyone cower at this gruesome sight. "If the enemy of a 3rd party notices you, there is no guaranteed the info will be accurate. So remember this: important information can be either an asset or a liability, mostly an asset. So we have to gather information through cheating. This clearly separates those who don't have the right abilities."
"But I still don't understand the purpose of the 10th question."
Morino put his cap back on. "It's simple: the 10th question itself is the true purpose of the test. Obviously, these were painful choices. Those who chose the latter fail along with his teammates. Those who choose to take it could risk the chance to ever take the exam again. It's a true leap of faith. The game of Shinobi is based on the true batte at hand. No matter what the danger, if you could believe in the power of your deck, you can overcome almost anything."
'Hey, that's my line… well, sort of.' The sage thought.
"Those who answer the 10th question, answers correctly. You will be able to survive any obstacle you face in the near future. You have made it through the entrance. You are now official participants of the Chunin Battle Tournament!"
everyone cheered for joy. They can't wait to get onto the field. Suddenly, someone breaks in through the window like a strong gust of wind. Kunais fly to the for corners of the front wall. That stranger is a woman, whose spiky hair is tied to a ponytail, wearing a long tan trench coat. "Heads up boys and girls, this is no time to be celebrating! I'll be your next proctor. Anko Mitarashi. You ready for the second test? Good! Then let's go, follow me!"
Everyone in the room is dead silent.
"You're early...again." Ibiki says. Anko is embarrassed.
'Great, screaming nutcase.' Sakura thought. 'She reminds me of Naruto.'
After observing that 78 participants of the original 153 are still remaining, she is convinced that Ibiki was too easy on them and vows to fail more than half of the remaining participants. As the 78 participants leave to take the second part of the chunin exam, Ibiki accumulates the tests sheets from the empty desks. Ibiki then notices a particular sheet with no writing at all on it, except for the name Naruto Uzumaki. ": I just passed a candidate who didn't answer a single question. Ha ha. Naruto Uzumaki. He's a funny one alright."
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Tune in for the next chapter of NARUTO TCG.
Next time: Survival
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