Drifting

by AlphaDelta1001

Naruto is many things; troublesome, wild, unpredictable, adventurous, untamable, unique. But there's a benefit to being wild and unpredictable; no one has the faintest idea what you're going to do next. NarutoHarem

18. Chunin Exam Arc I - Crossing the Margin

NARUTO

Drifting

Crossing the Margin

As soon as the massive doors at the end of the entrance chamber opened, a massive white cloud suddenly exploded forth from the darkness and flooded the entire area in fumes. The wall fell upon the Genin closest to the entrance, startling many and causing numerous shouts of surprise to ring out as everyone's view of the second gate was blocked out. Moments later, as people started to wave away the screen of smoke, their eyes then fell upon a squad of five adults, all dressed in beige proctor uniforms designed specifically for the exams.

When the white clouds cleared enough for everyone in the vicinity to see, every Genin in the area, including the now recovering Rookie twelve in the back could see that all five of the Jonin that had appeared out of the entrance were shinobi from each of the five great shinobi nations. The most notable of them was a man standing in the center, wearing a black trench coat over his proctor uniform, had a bandana wrapped around his head and scars across a stern face.

"Alright you little bastards, eyes front!" the tall man in the formation bellowed, causing all those closest to him to freeze up. Hands behind his back, the scarred official looked out across the sea of nervous humanity standing in his line of sight. "Introductions! I am Ibiki Morino, your proctor for the first stage of the Chunin Exams, and for all those who don't know me... your worst nightmare."

Silence reigned over all individuals present. The hundreds of eyes scattered around the room looked towards the man in awe and shock. Those who weren't prone to reacting extremely however maintained their composure and glared back at the tall, brutish shinobi with barely a waver in their expressions.

It was while he was sizing up to the crowds and taking count of all those present, Ibiki then noticed the results of the chaos in the room that had ensued prior to his arrival and scowled. He pointed across at the Iwagakure teams to his far left, the same ones that had been harassing the Kirigakure group. "Before we get started… you upstarts from the hidden stone village; knock it off! Who told you that you could fight with the other contestants? Do you want to fail before we've even begun?" He then looked over at the Kiri team, where he saw Naruto standing amongst them staring back curiously, before glancing across at the troublemakers from Iwa. "This is an event conducted under specific laws and guidelines, so I will have no quarreling between participants without authorization."

The Iwagakure squad members who had moved to help their friend that had been sent flying across the room glared back at the man hatefully.

"What gives you the right to tell us what to do, Konoha ninja?"

The one to respond to that question was the Iwa shinobi standing beside Ibiki, a very tall and brawny shinobi with a bulbous nose and a beard. He growled as he focused his attention on all the insubordinate Genin, "Keep quiet! All those from Iwa and every other village are to follow the instructions of their proctors no matter what village they are from! The rules that have been applied to past Chunin Exams apply to this one as well. Just because there are more contestants of different nationalities and the scale of the trial period is even larger than previous events, doesn't mean that the game has changed. You will all do as you are told and fight when you are allowed to fight, and even then the use of fatal force is strictly prohibited. Until the allotted time you are given the proper consent, shut your traps and listen up!"

This pretty much had all Genin, Iwagakure shinobi especially, straighten up and go completely quiet.

Ibiki smirked and nodded toward his fellow proctor, "Thanks for that Kitsuchi-san."

The Iwa Jonin smirked, "They're all still kids. You have to be firm with them if you want them to listen to you."

"No matter how old they get, Genin will always be regarded as children. It's a fact of life, I guess," the Jonin from Kumo standing on Ibiki's left chuckled while rubbing the back of his head. He was a young man with blonde hair and a kind face, so standing in contrast to the others he seemed a bit out of place. Nevertheless, appearances were deceiving. "Let's get this ball rolling." He then turned towards the crowd of international Genin and smirked, "Welcome to this year's Chunin Selection Exams. As of this moment the first stage of the assessment process has started, whether all teams nominated to participate are present or not. If you miss out or if any of your teammates are absent: tough luck. If you're all here and accounted for then pray you make it through to the next round."

That definitely sent a chill down the lesser Genins' spines. When they saw the blonde man step back, the scary Konoha shinobi Ibiki stepped forward again and glared across the heads of every ninja in the chamber.

"There are 498 Genin participating in this year's tests. That means a total of 166 teams; an impressive turnout," the head proctor exclaimed before smirking, "But don't get comfortable just because there are so many of you. All the numbers really mean to us is that the tests are going to be even tougher for you and that more than half of you are guaranteed to be eliminated in the first rounds." His grin widened, "As your proctors, it is our jobs to make your lives miserable and to ensure that only the best of you become Chunin… or none at all. That's entirely up to you."

As mouths opened in shock all around, Ibiki turned heel and marched through the wide open door, shortly followed by the Jonin from Iwa, Kiri and Suna. Seeing the others start to move, C stepped forward and raised his hand, "Alright you kids, gather up your teams and follow us. The first test starts in the next hall, so stick together until the next instructions are given out."

And so the long march began. Naruto and Kabuto quickly returned to their teams, gathering up and shortly thereafter following after the crowd that began to flood into the next room. Because of the sheer number of Genin present, it meant the move from the entrance hall into the next section of the massive building was slow going at first. However, when the numbers thinned the line sped up and soon enough, every single team had moved over into the next part of the temple. When they arrived, they stopped at a T-junction, where looking left and right from the junction itself every Genin could see on the other side of the hallway five archways that were the entrances to five separate corridors leading down a single strip with steel doors on either side of each channel.

The corridors were large enough and wide enough to fit whole masses of people, in case an evacuation was needed. The walls were still hard wood and the intricate design work from the previous chamber dotted this one perfectly, only the space was a little bit more constrained. The best way to describe the lengths of corridors leading down to the other side of the building was comparable to that of a prison's system of cells. However, the setup was cleaner in contrast to a prison, and what's more there were even more adults stationed in this part of the temple. Over a hundred Chunin dressed in grey uniforms with their headbands showing which villages they originated from were positioned all around the place, like guards keeping an eye open for any signs of trouble.

As soon as everyone was moved into the hall and had lined up against the back wall or was formed at the main junction, Ibiki took position in the center and turned to the crowd, with a single staff member taking up center station at the entrance to each of the five hallways. "Now that we're all here I want all of you, in your teams, to line up in front of one of the Chunin you see standing at the entrance to one of the corridors before you. It doesn't matter which one. Each of you will hand in your paperwork to them and your squad will then be assigned a number. This number will determine the room you will be placed in. When you receive your number you will stand by your door at attention and await further instruction. Now hop to it." All the kids did as they were told and gathered in front of each of the uniformed men.

After being handed their numbers they then quickly moved to their places, where they then stood at their assigned door and waited patiently for the test to begin.

Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura had taken to the hallway on the far right and were given a door somewhere in the middle between dozens of other teams. There, they watched as the last of the Genin in their section were given numbers. Due to the randomization of figure distribution, the group found themselves separated from the rest of their friends. At the doors around them, they saw a whole swath of Iwa teams, a Kusa team across the corridor from their door, a faceless Suna team to their right, and a random Konoha team further up to their left.

Leaning against the wall, Naruto tapped his finger against the wood and rested a hand on his hip. He watched closely as the Chunin giving out numbers finally dispersed to join their comrades in watching the hallways. Due to the sheer number of Chunin guarding their isle, it was guaranteed that nobody was going to be starting anymore trouble with anybody in this stage. "This place is so big and there are so many people taking part in it. I wonder what test this is going to be," Naruto thought. He glanced over at his kunoichi teammate standing directly beside him, watching Sasuke's back as he sized up the competition. "What do you think this challenge of this stage of the exams will be, Sakura-chan?"

The pink haired girl glanced back at the boy with a skeptical expression of her own. "Don't know. Your best guess is as good as mine."

Naruto sighed and looked away again, "Yeah. Just hope we'll be able to pull through it." His eyes then landed on the Kusa team standing across the corridor, where he saw the girl with red hair staring nervously at him through her glasses. He gave an upward nod in her direction, "Do you know what's going to happen next?"

The girl wearing the specs gave a startled 'eep' and looked away momentarily, but then stared back across at the blonde fearfully. When Karin saw him looking at her, she shrunk under his gaze and tried to keep her body from shaking.

Of all the squads her team had to be situated near, why did it have to be next to one of the four contestants she sensed had incredibly large chakra? It was throwing her off her game. "Uhh… I… I don't… really know."

Naruto tilted his head at her in concern, "Hey. Are you okay? You don't look too good."

Before she could answer, one of her squad members standing beside her stepped between them and held his arm out. "Quit badgering my teammate. She's nervous enough as it is without people trying to pick on her."

Flinching a little at getting shot down, Naruto grinned apologetically. "S-Sorry. I just… wanted to talk to her." When the boy gave him the cold shoulder, the desponded jinchuriki looked back at his teammates to see Sasuke and Sakura looking back at him oddly. Seeing their expressions, the blonde shrugged. "What?"

"You're a moron," Sasuke murmured.

Tick mark forming, Naruto held his fist up at the raven haired punk, "Say that again, teme! I'll rearrange your face!"

The Uchiha responded by turning away with a disinterested grunt, getting the jinchuriki to fume. While the two Genin had their little confrontation, Sakura could only shake her head at them. When she looked around, she could see whole collections of eyes on them from the other squads, who looked away when she attempted to make a count of them, which really showed how big of a target they were making of themselves.

Once all of the Genin teams had been assigned a door and were standing in whatever order they had been dealt, the sound of a man's throat clearing echoed throughout every single corridor, telling everyone present that the head proctor of this event was about to speak again. Utilizing the design of the passageways, he projected his voice throughout the whole structure to every ear in the vicinity. "Okay, you little shit stains! Welcome to your first test; the written exam! Because this is the first assessment leading up into the next stages of the process there are a few rules you'll have to follow, so listen carefully because I won't be answering any questions and I won't be repeating myself."

Duh. He was shouting throughout the entire network of corridors. His voice would be horse by the time he was finished.

Nevertheless, his announcement quickly had everybody's complete and undivided attention. Bodies stiffened and gazes hardened, with all ears training on the Jonin shadowing them from the main junction of the passageways.

"Rule number 1; this exam is a little bit different compared to the others you've probably taken in the past. It always is. But don't go loosening your sphincters thinking it's going to be a walk in the park. Just like ordinary exam documents you are given a total of sixty-four questions you need to answer before the time runs out, and you are awarded one point for every answer you get right. What you need to be aware of however is that each question from start to finish leads into the next, which means you cannot answer question two without first answering question one, and you cannot answer question three without first answer question two before that, and so on and so forth. It's as simple as that," Ibiki stated.

"No it's not, it's bloody annoying," Ino grumbled in her head, her expression matching the distain felt by both Shikamaru and Choji standing behind her.

"Man, really? I hate tests like this," Naruto moaned while rubbing his forehead exhaustedly. He personally preferred multiple-choice, since he had a one out of four chance of getting the question right if it involved four possibilities. Not to mention the questions were remarkably easier than the problem solving ones. "They went right for it, my one true failing in education. Well… at least I have Sakura-chan and teme to help me out." Looking at them however, he could see that they too were appearing a bit stressed out.

"Rule number 2; teams will pass or fail based on the total number of questions you are able to answer," Ibiki said, raising shocked looks and murmurs from every single Genin in the chamber. Some even felt like protesting, but all complaints and comments were quickly suppressed when the Konoha ninja growled warningly across the area. "Because you all came to this exam in teams you will either step down or move forward as a group, which is why the exam has been set up this way." His smirk then widened considerably. "In addition to this, the questions given to you will get progressively harder the further you go, and without the information you are able to obtain beforehand in the first questions it's useless trying to progress by skipping ahead. If you get less than eighty percent in your final score, you're out."

"Hey! That's not fair!"

"What kind of messed up exam is this?" voices shouted all around in outrage.

"The world of shinobi isn't fair. Not every convention established by the organization is followed to the latter; therefore you can either deal with the situation or kiss your dreams for your future as shinobi goodbye. You pass or fail. Just like in the real world when you are out on missions, you either succeed by completing the mission or you fail it," Ibiki stated with a deep frown. "Rule number 3; the sentinels you see positioned at your doors will be patrolling the area on the lookout for any signs of intrusions, cheating and alike. If you are caught cheating you will instantly be disqualified and ultimately fail the exam before the written tests are even scored." A majority of the Genin shook where they stood at some of the looks thrown at them by those abovementioned senior shinobi and kunoichi present. "If you exit your room without first announcing your intention to do so, you will be disqualified. If you finish the exam, you are required to knock on the door and the sentinel outside will take your test for evaluation. Furthermore, and this is of grave importance, we'll need the test sheets back in the same condition that they are given to you. That means no rips, no tears, no smudges, and no damage. You may want to tread carefully. The sentinels are extremely sharp, so if they catch you taking any easy avenues or make any mistakes, consider you and your entire team blown."

The Genin sitting closest to the Chunin standing around leaned worryingly away from the men and women when they turned to smirk or glare at them. Those eagle eyes definitely didn't instill much confidence in them.

Ibiki smiled, "If you want to be considered shinobi, then show us what exceptional shinobi you can be." The silence that fell afterwards saw all number of youngsters tensing and squirming uncomfortably where they stood, with gazes and attitudes becoming stone cold serious all around and eyes locking firmly on the doors in front of them. However, when it seemed like the man was done with his little information dolling, Ibiki broke the silence with another announcement, "Oh yes; a couple more things. Get a zero, and you won't be allowed to participate in the Chunin Exams ever again. No pressure."

Well, wasn't that a real sucker-punch to the gonads...

With that said and done, the man then pressed the button on his watch to begin the count. "You have one hour total! Begin!"

And with that, every single Genin squad in each of the corridors stepped into their assigned rooms. The exact moment after which, the doors slammed shut behind them with an almighty bang and silence followed shortly thereafter.

On first glance, every single team saw that the walls were just as thick inside the cubicles as the ones outside with only a couple of vents and candlelight being the most distinctive features inside each of the rooms. It really was like a jail cell; depressing as fuck. They must have been designed to ensure that no Chinese whisper games could be pulled seeing how solid they had been built, not to mention made with the intention to utterly destroy whatever self-esteem you had left in you if the speech given by the head proctor beforehand didn't.

However, the room wasn't the biggest problem.

The main problem was the test that lay within it.

Standing in a tight workspace with a light consistency of a hunting shack in the middle of a dense forest at night, Team 7 stood in the middle of the room looking down at the desk shoved up against the back wall with a few sheets of stapled paper laid out on top of it beside a lit candle, with a pen sitting beside that. As if they were looking at a museum piece so delicate that they didn't dare approach it for fear of shattering the metaphorical glass that stood between them and it, the entire squad stared nervously down at the white document with hands clenched and breathing practically hitched.

For the first minute they said nothing. They just basked in the silence and the dark, bleeding sweat while also trying to settle their nerves. Eventually, the monotony of the moment was broken by the one who specialized in and had practically mastered the unconventional, which came in the form of a simple, easy enough to understand word that neither member of the group had a problem in agreeing with.

"Shit."

Gulping, Sakura looked between the steeled expressions of both Sasuke and Naruto before marching forward. "Standing around and staring at the damn thing isn't going to get us anywhere. Let's just do this." Brushing her short hair back over her shoulder, the kunoichi stopped before the table and glared down at it. "Sixty-four questions. That's a lot of questions to answer."

"We'll be lucky enough to do all of them within the hour," Sasuke stated, marching forward as well with Naruto to stand beside the kunoichi. "If they're as hard as that Ibiki guy said they were, then that means it's going to take longer than what we have to get it done."

Naruto frowned as he looked at the stack more closely, "We just need to get eighty percent right, yeah? We don't need to do all of them, just most of them."

"Yeah, but getting most of them done will still be difficult, if the written exam at the academy means anything to us today," Sasuke stated, looking across at his rival. He still remembered how tedious that experience was. The questions weren't difficult. They were easy enough, but it had still been an incredibly long exam. "You weren't really the most exemplary when it came to theory."

The jinchuriki grunted and folded his arms. "Sure, I'm not book smart, but I more than make up for that by being the most stubborn bastard I can possibly be."

"That won't serve you well here though," Sasuke stated a-matter-of-factly, smirking slightly. "Remember, we're not allowed to tarnish the paperwork… and I saw what you did to your second year exam sheet."

"You did?" Naruto asked, glaring back at the boy before grinning. "Well then, let me make this clear to you, if you screw us up teme, I'm going to do the same thing I did to my academy exam sheet to the back of your head. I'll bet you'll look pretty funny walking around with a penis shaved into your cranium."

"Guys, can we not do this now," Sakura groaned, glaring at the Genin standing behind her to see they were practically grinding their foreheads against each other. The sparks that flew from the metal of their head bands could be seen clearly, but that all stopped when they pulled apart at the threatening stare the kunoichi sent them. "Let's just focus on getting this done, because if we fail, I'm going to be periodically poisoning you two for an entire month."

Naruto and Sasuke wisely chose to heed this warning, and quickly reverted back to socially acceptable states of appearance. They came to stand on either side of the kunoichi, who trained her eyes back onto the documents on the desk and furrowed her brow at it. Though the candle on the table lit up the entire front of the first sheet, the illumination was still shoddy. It made the jinchuriki want to go out and complain about how crappy the conditions were, but all of them knew that they were not allowed to bother the sentinels outside unless they needed to go to the bathroom, to tell them that someone was dying or they'd finished the exam and were handing it in.

They had an hour to do this, and from the rules established by the proctor, not only did they need to get all of the questions they did right, they needed to do it so that they didn't damage the merchandise.

It was like they were on another delivery mission, in which the package they were transporting had to be kept in perfect condition.

Picking up the pen, Sakura held it in front of her and clicked it several times, considering it for a moment before looking across at Sasuke. "It's just like any ordinary test, except the stakes are a lot higher this time. We should just do this how we would normally do it."

Hearing this, Sasuke nodded in agreement.

"You're the smartest out of the three of us, Sakura-chan," Naruto spoke, getting the girl to turn to him. "How do you go about doing this? What do you do first?"

Sakura smiled, "Simple. I follow the instructions and work my way down. Step one." With that said the girl set the pen back onto the table and picked up the test, looking at the first question. However, while she initially intended to start from the first question and quickly work her way through the rest to follow, the kunoichi saw that there were instructions on the front page at the very top and decided to read through them first.

While it was customary to have the rules and guidelines of the exam on the documents themselves, and that it was normally always the same stuff regarding the penalties for you actions and what not, the kunoichi focused careful attention on the instructions. Since these were the Chunin Exams and stated to have some of the hardest tests imaginable, she proceeded forward with care and read through the added information thoroughly.

After skimming over it she then moved to the first question, then the second, third, and shortly thereafter began reading through the entire thing. Naruto and Sasuke proceeded to watch the girl breeze through all the pages of the test at light speed, her eyes darting across the text and taking in every word and every detail. Eventually, after approximately a minute of waiting, they watched Sakura close up the test, look up momentarily with a blank expression on her face, before she suddenly and unexpectedly turned around and started walking towards the door.

Thinking she'd snapped at the enormity of their task and the sheer difficulty of the exam, both Naruto and Sasuke freaked out and grabbed both of her arms. They held her back firmly and stopped her dead in her tracks.

"What are you doing?" the Uchiha asked.

"Sakura-chan. What's wrong?" Naruto followed up, also looking visibly worried.

The kunoichi turned back to them, stared silently for a moment, and held up the exam papers. "That's it. We're done."

The two boys were flabbergasted.

"Done? What do you mean, done?" Naruto exclaimed.

"Explain," Sasuke finished, his glare becoming deathly serious again.

Sakura sighed and walked quickly back over to the desk. Slamming the papers down onto it, she pointed at the first question. The very first question of the entire exam. When the boys walked over, she jabbed at it repeatedly. "Read it. What does it say?"

Puzzled, Sasuke and Naruto did as instructed with the former narrowing his eyes on the sheet and the number she was expecting them to read. "What's the number of hand seals that go into the basic clone jutsu and what are they?" Giving it a moment of pause, the Uchiha then recoiled in surprise. "Wait… that's…"

"Exactly."

"No way… they couldn't," Sasuke stammered before frowning.

Leaning over and taking a closer look, Naruto scrutinized the first question for himself. He stared at it for a lot longer than the other two, moments before blinking in surprise and straightening up. When he did, he gave the test a disbelieving stare. "The questions… they're way too easy…"

"The first ones anyway," Sakura stated, looking between the two boys before turning back to face the test. "The test becomes more complicated after that. It doesn't just require knowledge of differential equations and human biology, but complex mechanics and application of energy in field theory, all of it utilizing the values we come up with from the questions leading up to them. The material becomes far too advanced for Chunin level shinobi to solve, and I doubt even Kakashi-sensei would be able to answer all of the questions I've read."

"Can you?" Naruto asked curiously.

"With time, yes… but that's not the point," Sakura continued, slapping her hand on the table. "The point of this whole test isn't to answer the questions, it's to figure out the question of the exam itself and to complete the mission."

The jinchuriki furrowed his brow and pondered on what she was saying, before his eyes snapped open and he marched over to the test. Skimming over the instructions, he landed on the last paragraph and read one of the parts out loud. "Read everything before doing anything." This wasn't easy to spot. It was obscured within the paragraph of guidelines itself. This had Naruto then flip through the pages till he reached the end, where he then saw the last question clear as day. What followed after that was pretty much the same response Sakura had when she saw the last question, which had the boy turn to stare blankly at both of his teammates.

The other two felt a chill go up their spines, as they'd never seen the look the jinchuriki threw to them on his face before.

Holding up the exam papers, Naruto shook them. "Upon reading this you may quietly exit the room. Right?" Getting a nod from Sakura, the blonde haired boy acknowledged her answer calmly and collectedly, handed the papers over to the one who solved the riddle, and then made his way to the entrance. "Okay."

Sasuke and Sakura watched Naruto walk over to the door, where he stopped and seemed to stare at it for a good long minute. Figuring his silence and pause to be their cue, the pair also approached him and, lining up, knocked on the door. A second later, it opened, where they were quickly greeted by the sentinel standing outside, a Sunagakure shinobi wearing sunglasses.

Upon having the gate opened, Sakura held up their exam to him. "We're finished."

Not even showing the slightest bit of surprise or emotion whatsoever, the shinobi behind the door took the document from the girl and checked it. Hell, he only flipped through a couple of the pages and seemed to weigh the test in his hand, like it were a wad of cash. After inspecting the condition of the papers, he then slipped it under his arm and gestured down the corridor to his right, which inevitably led them further into the building.

"This way please." The sentinel then began escorting the group down the hallway to the other end.

Naruto, Sasuke or Sakura said nothing to each other or spoke any words of inquiry at all as they were guided away from the area. During which time their only actions consisted of looking around at all the walls passing them by and admiring the magnificent architecture around them. Eventually, after turning into the end hallway perpendicular to theirs, they were then taken into another chamber through a massive set of doors, which was presumably the main hall at the very end of the temple.

A large room with a ceiling that stretched two stories high, with impressive support pillars holding up the roof, and rows of tables with seats pulled up to them with enough room for eight each. The surrounding shogi doors and windows consisted of beautifully painted sheets of papers pasted against wooden framework, which added a touch of life to the area. The squad wordlessly awed at the designs as they were then stopped by the Chunin accompanying them, who glared down at the squad through his sunglasses momentarily before then nodding them into the hall.

"Take a seat wherever you wish." Once he'd said that, he left the group to their own devices.

Standing at the entrance to the chamber, the three members of Team 7 did as they were instructed and started towards the middle of the hall to find a seat. Picking out a table beside a pillar, the trio spread themselves out over it and sat themselves wherever they pleased. Naruto sat cross-legged on top of the table itself, whereas Sasuke leaned with his back against it and Sakura just sat normally, hands on her lap and just staring ahead of her in shock.

Neither of them had any idea what they were supposed to do or what was going to happen next. Did they get it right? Did they do what they were supposed to do or did they screw up? Did they fail? Why were they taken here? Was this part of the test? These were some of the many questions that started twisting around inside of their heads, and it was driving a couple of them crazy because they didn't know whether or not they'd gotten the damn thing right or not. The sentinel didn't exactly leave them with anything useful, just instructions to find a seat.

While Sakura was looking tense as hell and Sasuke was just being his usual self, albeit a little more quieter than normal, Naruto was just swinging back and forth where he was sitting, eyes cutting around the room and absorbing all there was to be seen. It was only a couple minutes in the team realized that they weren't alone, as they could see that there was another team sitting across the hall closer to the side wall.

It was the Suna team with the kunoichi carrying the fan, the tall boy in the black garb and the kid with the gourd on his back. They'd spotted them earlier on in the entrance hall because everyone seemed to be giving the shorter kid a wide berth.

This was something that had Naruto's immediate intrigue, which he decided to act upon as he jumped off of the table and began making his way over to them. Sasuke and Sakura were unable to say anything due to the speed he left at, and opted to instead stare after him. While they sat watching, they noticed a couple more teams enter the hall.

Leaping over the last table, Naruto stopped beside the three Sunagakure kids and waited until their eyes turned to him. When he saw all three of them look at him, the boy grinned and waved, "Hello!"

The Suna Siblings gazed at him silently for a moment, with Kankuro and Temari shrugging at each other questioningly before turning back to him. They stared at the blonde haired boy hard, sizing him up from head to toe as he stood before them normally and beamed at each of them.

After a few seconds of silence, Kankuro spoke, "What do you want, kid?"

"Nothing. I just saw you guys standing over him and came over to say hi," Naruto replied, stepping closer and slipping his hands into his pockets. "What did you think of that first test? Was it difficult?"

"Hardly," Temari spoke while smirking at the jinchuriki when he turned to face her. "It was all a big ruse. There was no written exam. It was all just a clever play to trick people into making the mistake of actually writing in the paper, when no writing needed to be done at all."

"How did you figure that out?" Naruto asked, tilting his head.

"Simple," the kunoichi exclaimed while raising a hand. "We read through the test. It's common practice for a shinobi to read through the mission guidelines thoroughly before beginning the assignment. If you don't, then you will start the mission not knowing what your objectives are or the directions of how to proceed with it, which means you will inevitably start making grievous errors. The rules were not to damage the document in any way; therefore from reading the exam itself we found out that the test wasn't answering the questions on the paper, it was the entire paper itself."

Naruto grinned, "In other words the exam was the package."

Elementary.

"Yep," Temari exclaimed, looking proud. "It's basic stuff. Only smart shinobi would be able to figure that out. I did."

"So you were the one who solved the riddle on your team?" When Naruto saw the teen look at him and nod in response, the jinchuriki smirked. "Man, you're not only good looking, you're smart too."

While Temari looked at the jinchuriki in surprise, they both heard a snort come from beside them and looked to see Kankuro had turned away and was, in a word, trying to hold in his laughter. After a moment, they saw the Suna teen with face paint turn back to them with a thoroughly amused look.

"You think my sister is good looking?" Kankuro asked in disbelief, getting a nod from the blonde. "Please. Why would you be into that?" He thumbed at the girl in question… which was the only thing he was able to do because he was then slammed over the head by his sister's fan.

The loud clang that rang out echoed throughout the entire room, which had a lot of eyes turn to them but then turn away when everyone present realized it was none of their business.

With Kankuro hunched over and a massive bruise forming, Temari retracted her weapon and propped it on the ground while glaring at her wounded brother dangerously. "Would you mind repeating that, Kankuro?" Shaking under her glare, the sibling with the indent in his skull gulped and wisely turned away, mouth shut. Satisfied she'd gotten her point across Temari smirked back at the jinchuriki chatting with her to meet his competitive gaze. Surveying the other carefully, the kunoichi sheathed her fan over her shoulder and placed her hands on her hips. "You're the kid that was causing all that fuss back in the entrance hall, aren't you?"

Naruto grinned, "Guilty." He then gave the girl his full and complete attention, giving him a cool visage for his presentation, "Naruto Uzumaki."

"Sabaku no Temari."

"Temari? Nice name."

"Thanks. I'm curious. Why would a Konoha kid like you approach ninja from other villages so freely?" Temari asked, raising an eyebrow. "You do realize that a lot of those shinobi are considered potential enemies by your nation, especially in an exam where it's practically free for all. That makes everyone here, including your own comrades, potential enemies."

"Yeah. But I'm kind of that free-spirited, go-wherever-the-hell-he-wants-to-go kind of guy," Naruto stated, rolling his shoulder casually. "I don't give a crap about all of that history between the villages or whatever problems the shinobi from them have with each other. All of that is just nonsense politics and stuff that happened years ago. Just because the villages don't like each other doesn't mean you can't try to make nice and get along with other people, because if you don't then none of that animosity will ever go away."

Temari smirked, "I'd still watch your back if I were you."

Naruto gave the girl one of his more charming grins, "Thanks for the concern, but I'm more interested in watching yours. It's a much more pleasant sight."

Feeling a little warmth in her cheeks, the older girl folded his arms and looked down at the slightly shorter boy with more interest. "I'm sure you may have heard this hundreds of times before, but you're a strange one."

"I'd like to think more unconventional," Naruto responded. "If you want to be a good shinobi, you have to be surprising. It's my best quality." He then grinned mischievously and looked her over a second time for posterity. "You however… I just can't see anything that isn't your best quality."

"Flattery can only get you so far," Temari chuckled.

"That's why I make it a point to mix things up as I go along," Naruto replied, holding his right hand out while resting his left hand over the top, covering it. Seeing the confused expression come across the older girl's face, the blonde smirked and removed his left in a great unveiling motion, revealing a rose that he then held out to the teen. "Friend?"

Surprised, Temari smiled warmly and took the flower, sniffing it briefly. When she did, she looked back at the kid with a little bit more red in her cheeks then before. His boldness and forwardness aside, it was the first time any boy's ever given her anything like this, and he was a shinobi from another village.

Satisfied he'd made leeway with one of them, and seeing that the other brother with the face paint was still wallowing in pain, he then turned to the other boy standing off to the side. When Naruto's attention landed on him, he saw that the red haired youngster with the dark rings around his eyes and the kanji for love on his forehead was glaring at him. Though the jinchuriki was used to being on the receiving end of such stares, this one was looking at him with both suspicion and murderous intent reflected behind him.

It wasn't the hatred Naruto was familiar with. This was something else.

Nevertheless, the jinchuriki faced the boy's hostile expression and smiled, "Hey."

"…" The teen carrying the gourd said nothing and just glared back at him.

Naruto gazed more sheepishly in kind and rubbed the back of his head. "Not much of a talker huh? I understand." Glancing at the other two, he saw that both Kankuro and Temari were looking at their teammate quite warily, but he paid it little mind and traded glances between them before pointing at the older siblings. "I'm guessing they're your brother and sister too, huh? I think they're pretty cool." He could tell from the smell. It was all familiar between them.

"…" Gaze tightening, Gaara looked away. "They're not my brother and sister. They're nobody to me…"

A little bit taken aback, Naruto tilted his head at the youngster with the cold disposition. "Why do you say that?"

The dangerous aura wafting off of Gaara increased several times, a sensation that did not go unnoticed by the people standing nearby. "I don't think that's any of your concern. It's nobody's concern but my own." He glared back at the blonde and hardened his gaze. "Leave… before I kill you."

Still stumped by the kid's negative reinforcement Naruto decided to fire back some positive waves of his own and smirked challengingly. "Many people have tried before. What makes you think you'll be able to?" He ignored the slack jawed expressions he got from the two older siblings behind him.

Gaara's expression darkened. "Because I will… because I can. That's the difference between me and the weaklings who've tried."

"We'll see," Naruto chuckled, stepping back and pointing towards the teen. "I'll look out for you in the next stage." Stepping away, he turned to Temari and smiled. "It was nice meeting you guys." Winking at the kunoichi and nodding courteously toward Kankuro, the grinning boy then left as speedily as he came, leaving two stunned older teenagers and a boy the same age as him glaring after his shadow.

Unbeknownst to Naruto, once he returned to his squad to be scolded by Sakura for acting so recklessly, Gaara's gaze would not lift from him as he watched the blonde haired boy interact with his teammates.

"Naruto Uzumaki…"

It was settled. This irritating brat was going to be one of his main focal points throughout this exam. The voice inside of his head was whispering its desires to him… and it desired to see that one bleeding out all over the floor.

If his mother said it wanted something, then Gaara was inclined to get it for her.

OOO

An hour later…

By this time the entire hall Team 7 had previously been occupying by themselves along with the team from Sunagakure had filled up with around a 159 Genin, a stark contrast to the 498 that started out, all of whom had been escorted over here from their assigned rooms. Looking around the crowds scattered throughout the chamber, Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura could see how much the numbers had thinned, as well as the amount of tension that was hanging in the air.

At the beginning, the number of teams that arrived to this chamber came in one after the other rather quickly, but then slowed to a crawl once the first twenty minutes had come and gone. By the time fifty minutes came and went, at least a quarter of the number of people to have started out had been pulled into this room and told to wait.

Looking around, Naruto could see that a lot of the people he knew from his village had made it through. In fact, all of the Rookie Twelve had made it through, with Team Gai also filling in the blank. Accompanying them were scores of other teams from the five great shinobi nations, including the one team from Kirigakure, all three of whom had arrived shortly after Naruto's squad was escorted here.

While the various faces and bodies were impressive, nobody knew what to make of it. Due to the lack of information given at the end of their testing period, everyone waiting in that hall was left biting their nails over what was going to happen next. Were they going to pass or were they the unfortunate ones that failed.

These questions continued to plague the minds of every person in the room until the sound of a throat clearing drew everyone over to the double doors where they'd come from. There, standing up on a makeshift podium surrounded by his sentinels, Ibiki Morino stood with his hands behind his back and scarred face fixed on the silent faces filling the room.

Steeling themselves, the teams watched and waited for the announcement to come.

Straightening up, Ibiki spoke, "As I understand it… you people are the ones who didn't write a single thing on your exam papers." His voice was sharp and echoed throughout the entire room. It was a sound that had everyone freeze up, "Not a name, not a word, not even a little scribble. Not one damn thing!" He gritted his teeth as he looked around from corner to corner. "Well… I just have one thing to say to that." Pausing for effect, the proctor allowed the fear of him to sink into the kids' heads for several seconds before grinning brightly and letting out a chuckle. "Congratulations! All of you have passed the first stage of the Chunin Exams!"

Mouths opening were the first forms of life to register from the crowd seated inside the chamber, upon which a tense silence then drifted across the room. Ibiki held himself firm for the fallout to come, which came in the form of a string of questions and exclamations of alarm sent flying his way.

"Wait… WHAT?!" Ino shouted, rising to her feet.

"You're passing us?! Just like that?" came Kiba's exclamation of bewilderment.

"That's all there is?" Karui asked.

Ibiki laughed as he turned side on to the onslaught of calls and shouts, "That's it. You being smart enough to figure out there was no written exam, was the exam. That's all there is to it."

"Then what the fuck was the point of giving us the sixty-four questions to answer?" Tayuya asked loudly. The whole setup had made her incredibly suspicious, which was the main reason why she didn't answer any of the questions. It had in fact been her teammate Shiho who solved the riddle.

Ibiki grinned, "As you all would have probably figured out, the sixty-four questions given to you were too farfetched at the beginning to really be part of the exam and later onwards too difficult to be answered by ordinary Genin of your level. Even experienced Chunin would have difficulty answering the questions that were on the test sheets. That, on top of the exceedingly impossible task of having to answer all of the questions before the allotted time inside of individual cubicles with additional objectives you had to meet, was to see how you guys would fair and think under pressure. The whole thing was set up not just to test your intelligence, your ability to comprehend and your guts, but to test your ability to think outside of the box and completely understand the task given to you."

Nods of understanding could be seen coming from every individual Genin as those who had previously been standing sat back down. Now that it was being explained to them properly, everything that they had been put through in the past hour and performed on their own accord started to come together.

"Your environment was designed to make you panic, to push you into making a mistake, to make a rash decision, and to see which of you had the smarts to think things through before acting. It would have been impossible for most of you to have been able to answer the questions in the time given to you, which was why we designed the test to basically be the 'read everything before doing anything' test. Those of you who managed to see underneath the underneath and act intelligently survived. The others who were unable to keep a cool head, acted rashly, followed the rules blindly and defiled the mission objective were weeded out and eliminated."

Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura smiled. Like many of the others, they were relieved that they were able to figure it out and get the task right, and that one of them was smart enough to have looked into it before either of them made a move. The boys had their resident kunoichi to thank for that.

"So that's it?" Omoi spoke up with a frown. "The whole point of the exam was not to answer questions, but to evaluate our situation, read the information given to us and complete the mission?"

"Correct," Ibiki replied with a firm nod, hands slipping into his pockets. "Shinobi teams, team leaders especially, are expected to act intelligently, consider the situation carefully before proceeding, and to follow instructions to a certain degree, even when they're based around obscurity. Not only that, but the test was also arranged to push your team and to see if you could still work together even when put into an impossible situation and faced with great adversity. This was why the results of failure were so harsh. If you were caught once, if you screwed up once and damaged the package, a.k.a the exam document, if you acted boldly without first considering your situation, you not only risked your own life, but the lives of your teammates. Sometimes the mission objective would be the safe transportation and preservation of the information. To alter the information in any way could amount to serious consequences in the end, including the destruction of your home. This exam highlighted the fact that as a Chunin, you have a much greater responsibility to take hold as the leader of a squad and a shinobi for your village. As a Chunin, you complete missions as a group, work alongside your comrades to accomplish your goals, gather, read and acquire information, and make decisions for your squad. Discipline, teamwork, courage, nerve, leadership… these are the qualities of a Chunin squad leader. It is your responsibility to put the safety and wellbeing of your comrades and village above your own." The man finished his speech with a smile and saluted to the crowds seated in front of him. "For those of you who have made it this far with your squad, you have earned the right to move on to the second stage of the exam."

OOO

Everything that had transpired following the first test came as a sort of blur to those who were still conscious of the day. Thanks to their little session with Ibiki, the Genin to have gotten through the whole ordeal were, to no surprise, still in a slight daze. I mean… could you blame them? After learning that the entire written portion of the exam was orchestrated in a manner to push their mentality, nerves and thought processes to the limits, it made plenty of sense that a lot of those who weren't used to acting under pressure were stumbling about in a stupor.

There were still fifty-three teams left, and you can bet there were still some headaches amongst them.

While they were waiting in the main hall of the building for their next proctor to show up, Sakura had an ice-pack over her head provided by none other than herself, as she attempted to quell the raging storm inside her brain. Sasuke sat comfortably beside her in silence, whereas Naruto was hanging off to the side smiling at every team he came into eye contact with while trying to enjoy the feel of their new environment.

"Ooh… I hate this," Sakura groaned, looking up with a pained expression. "The suspense, the waiting, the stress… this is way too much…"

"But we did well," Sasuke stated, looking over at her with his usual grimace, "We were one of the first teams to figure it out. Without you, all three of us would be heading home right now, and I'm sure the idiot over there would be crying all the way back to the village." He thumbed in Naruto's direction, the two seeing him smirk and wave back at them before turning to stare across the room again. "You know how determined he can be."

Sakura frowned a little, "Yeah… I know." She groaned again when her head gave another throb. "Speed reading on top of all the scares. I think I may have overworked my brain a little."

"Same here," another voice cut in, drawing the trio's attention to Team 9 who had decided to come over to them. Apparently, it was Shiho who had answered the kunoichi's exclamations, and was also showing signs of mental fatigue. "You figured out the riddle behind the exam too, didn't you?"

The pink haired girl nodded in response, which then earned her a quick response from Team 9's resident tea connoisseur. Young Kaede knelt down in front of the kunoichi holding a cup of steaming herbs, which he then held up to the surprised pinkette with a smile on his face, "Here you are, Sakura-san. This herbal tea should soothe your head pains and help recover your vitality." It was an honest smile, and from the fumes wafting off of the steaming glass, it certainly smelled heavenly too.

The kindness expressed by the young man had Sakura smile and take the tea off his hands. She sniffed it once before beaming back at the still kneeling boy, "Thanks, Kaede-kun." Before anyone on either team could speak, most notably Sasuke and Tayuya, the girl was already drinking…

Well, she drank the first few sips anyway, until the taste of the liquid attacking her tongue with bloody daggers had the kunoichi spit out whatever was in her mouth across the floor like a geyser. She wound up dousing an unfortunate Konoha team that was sitting directly in front of them, getting the trio to glare at the girl and move away. Panting with tears in her eyes, the kunoichi looked down at the cup she was holding before choking down a shocked gulp.

"W-What the hell is this?" It tasted like undercooked chicken from a barbeque. "Grease? How in the world did you make this?"

"I-It's tea I made from my own herbs," Kaede exclaimed before a confused look came over him. "Y-You do not like it?"

"It's horrible! How the hell can you even drink this stuff?" the kunoichi asked, looking across at the boy in bewilderment, only to find him gone.

Tayuya, Sasuke, Shiho and a now quiet Sakura looked across the room towards the far wall to see Kaede leaning against it with his hand and looking down with a raincloud hanging overhead. As the downpour went on, the two teams could hear through sharpened ears the boy muttering degrading statements to himself, "I am not worthy of being called human."

Shiho sighed and walked over to where he was currently sulking, "I'll help him."

Upon seeing the kunoichi of the group wander over to pull the stricken Kaede out of his slump, Tayuya then decided to head over to where Naruto was sitting, and plopped down beside the boy as he leaned back with his hands behind his head. "That was pretty intense. Huh?"

"Yeah, no kidding," the jinchuriki chuckled with a wide grin, "But boy was it fun. I hadn't felt so much tension in the air since that fight in Wave, and unlike the test I was actually trading blows with my opponent."

"How did your team figure it out? The exam I mean." Tayuya asked, raising an eyebrow. "I assume you didn't think about diving right into it. Even you aren't that dense." It was never simple with Naruto. He either stubbornly refused to bend or went along with the flow at the drop of a hat. It was this two-faced character trait that made him as good as he was.

"Sakura-chan figured it out," Naruto said, gesturing towards his teammates. "Since I'm not that good at the writing and theory, and Sasuke isn't as smart as her, we let her take the wheel."

"So in the end she led you guys to the answer?" the redhead inquired with a knowing grin. "Everyone has their strengths I guess. If it's not muscle then it's definitely brain power."

"Yep," the jinchuriki nodded, "It was a kick to the teeth though. They pulled that whole 'read everything on the test first thing' where if you go ahead and answer all of the questions before reading it… you're an idiot." He then gave her a curious look as he leaned forwards. "How'd you figure out it was all a trick?"

"Instinct," Tayuya chirped, tapping the side of her head, "The way that Ibiki said how badly we'd fail if we screwed up, I didn't even want to go near the exam papers. My guess was that he was either trying to psyche us out from even touching the damn thing or trying to rush people into completing it. Turns out it was both, but good thing we didn't fall for it. It was Shiho who figured it out for us." She then shrugged. "Plus Anko-sensei told me to be on the lookout for Ibiki, since the guy is a bit of a screwball."

Naruto laughed, "Nothing can get past your ear."

"You have to be sharp to stay alive, shithead," Tayuya said, tapping him in the shoulder, "You're the one who taught me that."

"I also taught you how to be awesome, but I can see you're more than able to do that all on your own." He saw the girl's cheeks turn red as she shyly pushed several locks of her hair behind her ear. The boy then saddled up a little bit closer to her with a warm gaze. "You've gotten so strong, Tayuya-chan. I know you're going to get promoted to Chunin after this exam… for sure."

"Y-You think so?" the musician asked, unable to hide the red on her face as she looked back up at the boy smiling at her. She slid a little closer to him while staring at him fondly, "What makes you so confident that I can do it, shithead? What about you?"

"Me, ah," Naruto waved a hand at her. "If I get promoted it'll just be an added bonus. The only thing I'm interested in here is to meet other shinobi from different villages and to see how much stronger I am compared to them. There are so many powerful people here… I bet it's going to be a blast."

Tayuya shook her head at him, "How did I know you would say that?" She then thumped him in the arm again. "Even so, I know you desperately want to become a Chunin; more than anyone else here. I've known you for years now, so you can't hide what you're really thinking from me, shithead."

The jinchuriki laughed and scratched his cheek sheepishly. "You can read me too, huh?" Exchanging glances, Naruto then gave the girl a more knowing stare. "And what makes you think I can't get what you're thinking, Tayuya-chan?" He gave her suffix a little more flare to highlight his affectionate addressing of her.

The girl looked smugly at him before poking him in his whiskered-cheek, "That may have worked on me before Mr. Wizard, but not anymore. I'm not as easy to read like when we first met." The tough guise she attempted to put up faded as the warmth in her cheeks grew as Naruto leaned further forward, their foreheads almost tapping.

"You sure about that?"

Before they could continue their teasing and jabbing banter, the two were then interrupted by a clearing of a throat, which then had them look up to see one Tenten of Team Gai standing before them. When she finally managed to grab their attention, the two flat mates also noticed that she was accompanied by Neji and Lee, both of whom were also waiting patiently. The girl with buns in her hair looked on in amusement before also taking a seat beside them, more precisely next to Naruto.

"No, no, don't let me interrupt," Tenten exclaimed, propping her chin on her hand and getting an odd blink from Naruto and a surprised stare from Tayuya. The kunoichi smiled cheekily when she looked between them, "Having fun?"

Expression brightening at seeing his other good friends from Team Gai, Naruto turned to face Tenten fully, "You bet. How'd you do?"

"Great," the shuriken user replied before thumbing over to Neji and Lee, "Those two did just fine as well. Though Lee wouldn't shut up throughout the whole ten minutes we were in there, I'm just relieved we can always count on dark and stoic over here to pull through for us."

Neji frowned at her description of him, "Excuse me? Stoic?"

"Oh, just roll with it, Neji," Tenten smirked at him, "You don't exactly have the most flexible personality." Her cocky face managed to coax a sigh from the genius and got him to fold his arms.

Grinning from ear to ear as usual, the boy with the massive eyebrows and wearing the green spandex gave his trademark salute and stepped forward to face Naruto completely. It was obvious he was taking a more challenging stance in his presence, since this exam environment did give off that competitive vibe, hence his automatic setting. "Yosh! You certainly know how to make a marvelous impression on people, Naruto-kun. Your exuberance and passion is intoxicating, and you are constantly burning with positive energy. Your flames of youth burn the brightest of all!"

Naruto turned to give the boy a cheerful grin, "Thanks Lee. I'm sure yours was burning brilliantly too. I bet you attacked your test with every fiber of your body."

"Yes. It was truly a worthy adversary, indeed. But not enough to beat me!"

Tenten rolled her eyes, "Of course. There's no bending your will, is there, Lee?" This got a firm nod from the boy, which pretty much solidified his answer.

After that exchange, Tenten looked back at Naruto and directed towards him her full and undivided attention. While doing so and getting comfortable, the shuriken user combed her bangs back and smiled warmheartedly at the teen. "So… what do you think this next test is going to be like, Naruto-kun?"

Naruto shrugged, "Don't know. A test of strength, maybe?" He looked around at Tayuya, Sasuke, Sakura and the others for an answer. Receiving only shrugs and confused glances from them, he panned back to the shuriken wielder. "Since we're in another village in a whole other country, it could be anything."

"It's going to be tough though, that's for sure," Shiho spoke up.

"A test of our hearts and souls; one that will surely try to break us," Kaede nodded affirmatively while folding his arms in meditation. He was back to his normal self, thankfully, and was now able to become more a part of the exchange of dialogue. "We must remain vigilant and face this next obstacle with everything we have."

"Agreed!" Lee chirped loudly.

The pair's talk of passion got strange glances from Neji, Sasuke and Sakura, with the latter choosing to speak up after recovering enough from her headache to stay in tune with their conversations. "Why are you guys so enthusiastic? What if it's something extremely dangerous?"

"Extremely dangerous? Pah!" Naruto laughed, "We've fought extremely dangerous before, Sakura-chan. If we could face guys as strong as those rogue thugs from Kirigakure, then there's no way anything out there can beat us. We just need to stay focused. Right, Tayuya-chan?"

The musician grinned back confidently, "Yeah. Definitely."

"We're gonna get through this and come out unscathed, no problem," Naruto said, next giving Tenten a cocky grin and watching her expression turn into surprise, "I'll be waiting for you guys at the finish line."

The older kunoichi threw him a taxing gesture, "Oh yeah? You think you can beat us?"

"I know we can," Naruto said, hopping to his feet and backing up to stand beside Sasuke and Sakura. When he glanced at the Uchiha and they both exchanged nods of acknowledgement, both turned to smirk at Team Gai, while Sakura went along with them and faced the opposition, "Because we're Team 7."

Tenten stood up as well, folding her arms, "It's a challenge then, I take it? First one to reach the finish line of the second stage of the exam gets the members of the losing team to do whatever they want for a day at their request."

"Huh? Hang on!" Sakura spoke up, panning across at Naruto in bewilderment while Sasuke remained passive, "Are you guys making a bet?"

"Damn straight," Naruto nodded firmly, sharing the same look as his fellow combat oriented genius teammate. He then pointed between both teams. "The winning squad gets to ask the people on the other team for one thing from each of them. No complaints and no arguments. It has to be something cool though."

Lee, sensing opportunity, turned on the shinobi of Team 7 with an excited gleam in his eyes, "If we win, then I will immediately challenge Naruto-kun and Sasuke-kun to a battle!" Oh yeah. He knew exactly what he wanted out of this, right off the bat. If it was a no-questions-asked deal, then he was going to live up to it. "It will be a passionate, fiery engagement that will shake the very foundations of our village! Our flames of youth will clash in an epic contest, and test our strength and power in a spar between comrades! A battle where our hearts are put on the line will surely strengthen our bonds as shinobi of the hidden leaf!"

Also picking up on a chance to even things out a little, Neji glanced across at Naruto's group with a smirk. "I think I'll put my name in for this challenge too. What harm can come of a little friendly competition?" He looked between the blonde and the raven haired boy standing beside him; finding the promise of a duel with the two of them should he win the right to a request from the losing team quite tempting.

Even though he didn't look it, Neji definitely picked up some of that battle enthusiasm from hanging out with Lee and his sensei on a day-to-day basis. He was just a lot cooler about it.

Sensing a hidden agenda behind the challenge being made by Tenten, Tayuya stood up from her seat and placed herself between the two teams. "I'm in on this one as well." She was quickly joined by Kaede and Shiho, both looking across at the other groups firmly. "Don't go thinking that this is just a two horse race. If you can beat both of our teams to the finish, then you get to ask a favor from the two, and vice versa." She then stood down the Team Gai's kunoichi, who returned her stance firmly.

Kaede gazed up thoughtfully, "A friendly bout where the souls of individuals are being put on the line." He placed his hand across his chest and bowed grandly, "I'm in."

Seeing the two out of three vote in favor of the contest being made had Shiho look on worryingly momentarily, before a small flicker of fervor crossed her face. "If that is what everyone wants, then I'm not going to argue. I'm in it too."

Sakura sighed, running a hand through her hair before glaring back into the center with a smile, "Alright. Fine. Since everyone's so psyched about it."

"We have a deal," Sasuke nodded. If it was a fight they were looking for, then it was a fight they were going to get. Nobody challenges an Uchiha to a race and expects an easy win. They'll have to work for it.

Sealing the agreement, all squad members shook hands with one another. With that said and done, and just as everyone was separating from the group accord, a loud bang suddenly rang out throughout the room and drew everyone's attention to the exit at the other side of the hall. There, they saw that the doors had been blown open and a massive tarp had been tossed in. Quickly unbundling itself, a series of ropes with kunai attached to them shot outwards and impaled the surrounding walls, revealing a massive banner with 'Chunin Exams: Second Stage' written on it in exclamatory letters.

When the tarp unwrapped itself, it revealed hidden inside of it a kunoichi with wild purple hair pinned back into a high ponytail, a gorgeous figure and a roguish face, wearing a large, khaki overcoat, a tight, fishnet body suit underneath, an orange battle skirt, and shin guards over standard issue sandals. The woman came to stand proudly before the shocked crowd all turning towards her, before she raised a fist in a grand manner.

In that moment, Tayuya, who had just been saddling up beside Naruto again to continue speaking with him, couldn't stop her jaw from dropping when she saw who it was. A woman who was scary beyond all reason…

"Oh hell…"

"Heads up boys and girls! This is no time to get comfortable; because your sexy proctor for the second stage of the exams has just arrived!" the loud, boisterous voice of the woman that had appeared immediately bellowed out. If her entrance didn't startle people, then her energetic exclamations certainly did as she pointed straight at them, "Anko Mitarashi; here strictly for your viewing and entertainment pleasures!"

A dead silence fell over the hall as those who claimed to be completely sane and problem free gawked at her, while others who didn't give a blink to anything around them just stared. After a full minute ticked by and nothing happened, with Anko maintaining her pose with a growing look of embarrassment coming across her, Naruto then turned back to his team to continue speaking with them despite their bewildered states of person.

"So did you know that Mockingjays respond to any fucking noise you just happen to make?"

"No? Do they?" Lee asked, genuinely surprised.

"Not sure, I haven't really tried that theory out mys-OH SHIT!" Naruto swayed back at the last second when a kunai went flying right for his head, forcing him to perform a flip and look back up. "What the fuck, Anko-sensei! If that had hit me, I would have been pissed!"

"No, you would have been dead with a kunai lodged halfway through your brain. Try to keep up with the program, gaki," the kunoichi standing in front of the banner replied while lowering her hand. She then smirked when she saw Tayuya standing beside the jinchuriki, giving the girl her familiar leer that had the red head quickly shrink away and hide behind her roommate. Now that she knew her former student and her friends had made it through, Anko then glared back out across the chamber with more vigor. "I see that a lot of you had made it through the first stage. Good. It means I've got a lot more toys to play with."

"Why the heck did you run ahead of us so fast?" a voice suddenly cut in from behind, forcing Anko to look over her shoulder as two more people stepped around from behind the banner, all of them looking a little ragged. They gave the woman dirty looks as they spread themselves out a little. The person that had spoken was a dark skinned man with shaggy white hair, bulbous nose, lazy expression, tattoos that read lightning and water on his left and right shoulders in kanji respectively, and was wearing a black uniform with the Kumogakure vest, complete with sword strapped to his back. "Don't tell me you sprinted all the way up that last hill just to crash through the door and make a spectacle of yourself, Anko-san?"

"Hey, if you didn't want to do it then someone else had to," the woman replied while smirking up at the taller man, hands on her hips. "It's not my fault you wanted to lag your ass up that last stretch on the lowest possible gear, Darui. Come on. Loosen up a little and have some fun."

The man sighed and rubbed the back of his head, while his companion went around to take a stand on Anko's other side. "Are all of you Konoha women like this?"

"Nope. I'm one of a kind, baby," Anko exclaimed, "Spunky, mean, and downright nasty when I want to be."

The man next to her, a Kirigakure shinobi wearing the dark uniform originating from his village, with long black hair that reached passed his shoulders, a beard, his headband worn around his head, and a scar crossing his left eye, shook his head at the woman with an amused smirk on his face. "Don't play around with this one, Darui-san. She's got fangs.

"No kidding," the Kumo ninja chuckled, looking around at the crowds as well. "I'm not fool enough to mess around with someone who can potentially kill me, Tsurugi-san. Now, enough with the useless bantering and on to business. I'll let the young lady here take this one, since she was the one that went out of her way to make the 'grand' entrance."

Grinning from ear to ear, Anko gratefully stepped forward so that she could be flanked properly by the two other proctors. "Alright you little munchkins, this next test is a relatively simple one. All you have to do is escort a priority target safely to the next stage of the exams." A wide smile remained on her face as she allowed the silence to grip the crowd. She didn't say anything for the next few minutes.

When chattering started up, a lot of people began inquiring for further details into their next assessment.

"Uh, okay," Naruto nodded while rubbing his chin. "I'm listening. Is there… anything else we need to know?" Was Anko screwing with them? From the look on her face, she probably was.

Shikamaru frowned from where his team was currently standing, "Aren't you going to tell us who we're escorting and where we're escorting them to?"

"We're glad you asked, kid," Darui exclaimed, suddenly reaching behind him and pulling out two scrolls. Anko and Tsurugi both mimicked his actions, before unfurling the items along the floor in front of them. As soon as the lengths of paper were laid out and stretched to their fullest, all three of them then flipped through hand seals before slamming their hands down on the foot of their sheets. Six explosions of smoke filled the air and sent a white cloud filtering across the area. Once it cleared, the Genin were met with an extraordinary sight.

Fifty three little animals lined up in military formation along the lengths of scrolls they were summoned from. All of them were relatively the same size, they all had a scroll strapped to their backs, and all of them were of different colors and patterns to determine individuals from the same species apart. Among the little animals seated patiently in their places there included dogs, cats, otters, flightless birds, and marsupials.

Everyone looked down at the creatures for a moment before finally glancing back up at the proctors when they stood to full height and beckoned the youngsters to return their attention to them.

"These are your 'clients'," Darui exclaimed loud enough for everyone in the room to hear. "One of the many assignments Chunin squad leaders and teams are sent on are escort missions. In some cases, the client that is being escorted may be in the possession of valuable information; information that may contain important aspects about your village or your home. It is essential that every escort job is completed from start to finish, not just for the benefit of the client, but for the weight they carry upon their shoulders and, by extension, yours."

"Whether they be ordinary villagers or high-ranking noblemen the protection of the client and their safe passage to their destination are made top priority above everything else. You must work together as a team to ensure the person or persons of interest are transported safely and unharmed," Tsurugi informed, before smirking deviously. "Which is why we believe this is the perfect test to assess you guys on."

"In order to see how well you function as a group and how much you can be depended on, you will each be tasked with guarding the life of one of the summons you see before you," Anko stated, gesturing down to the assorted critters still sitting at attention. "Your job is simply to escort your assigned summon across the Boiling Lands, or what the grounds have affectionately been named by us proctors as The Fire, to the lookout post on the other side where the coastal border resides. You'll have three days to reach your destination." When she saw faces become serious and mutterings start up again, she then grinned sinisterly. "Oh yes, and before I forget; only eight teams are allowed to pass."

This immediately had expressions change and faces pale. "WHAT?!"

Darui let out a laugh at the unified shout of outrage. "Yep. You got it. Eight. Only a handful of you will be able to move on to the next stage. Sorry."

"So that's it?" Karui asked out loud, looking back at her teammates to see them shrug, "All we get for our trouble is an impossible mission and an apology should we fail the damn thing?"

"When you fail the damn thing," Tsurugi corrected with a grin. "The cut off rate this time is well above sixty percent. Good luck with that."

Anko giggled before waving at the crowd in front of her, "I believe this is the perfect time for you to say 'fuck you'?"

"Fuck you, Anko-sensei!" Tayuya shouted while waving a fist at the woman.

Naruto sweat dropped and looked back at the girl still using him as cover. "You know she can't hear you when you're hiding behind me."

The girl huffed as she kept a majority of her head concealed behind his shoulder. All of the boys standing around her, Sasuke and Neji included, had to admit that seeing the girl poking her head around in such a timid manner was actually quite cute. In fact, it got way more than its fair share of eight chuckles from the teams gathered in that spot.

Utakata looked up from his side along with his teammates, "So what you're basically telling us is that this is just a race to the finish?"

"Pretty much," Darui nodded in response.

"However, there are a few more conditions to this test," Anko stated while folding her arms. "Remember, only eight of you are allowed to go through into the next stage… that means everyone will be trying to rush across the landscape at the same time to get to the desired location."

"Be warned," Tsurugi picked up with a frown, "The Boiling Lands are given its name by the Yugakure shinobi for a reason. It is a treacherous landscape, filled with dense jungles, geysers that spew sulfur and poisonous gases, sheer cliffs, sink holes, and, most importantly, rivers and lakes, many of which are boiling hot. What's more, there are only a handful of avenues you can use to safely cross to the other side. Should you try to get across the lowlands in a hurry, you might end up not only losing your client, but your lives."

"Additionally, as well as concentrating on your primary objective, one of your other aims is to prevent the other teams from reaching the same destination as you, and that means either slowing them down or stopping them completely," Anko nodded, seeing everyone's expressions shift and change in response to the overwhelming information. The kunoichi then smirked and pointed towards the far wall of the chamber to her left, where a desk was set up with several Chunin sitting behind them with stacks of paper laid out beside them. "To those of you who wish to continue, there is a waver you are required to sign saying that we are not responsible for anything that happens to you guys out there."

Darui chuckled, "Heh, we wouldn't want to be blamed in case any of you runts accidently end up getting sucked down a gas chute to the center of the earth, now would we?"

"Once you've signed your wavers and handed them in, your team will then be given a number. That number will correspond with the one on your assigned summon, which can be found on the scrolls on their backs," Tsurugi stated while raising a hand. "Remember; from the time the exam starts you have only three days to get across the Boiling Lands to the other side. In order to get through, you must get there ahead of everybody else with all three of your team members intact and your assigned animal at all costs. Failing to make it by the allotted time or if all positions are filled by the time of your arrival, you will not be allowed to advance. Good luck."

The three proctors stood back and watched as the Genin all lined up in their squads to sign the wavers provided for them. As they observed the first groups move over to collect their summons, which they were required to protect and look after for the duration of their three day venture, the Jonin began whispering to each other regarding the teams they believed would be making it into the next round.

"Who do you think will survive going through hell's gate?" Anko asked, nudging Darui in the side.

The man chuckled, nodding towards Samui's team as they passed them and proceeded to collect their client. "Those three. They were trained by Raikage-sama's brother, so I know they will get through into the next stage just fine."

The snake mistress smirked, before gesturing towards Tayuya and Naruto's groups still lined up. "I've got my eye set on those two. If there's anyone out of my entire village who is bound to make it across, it's those little bastards."

The pair then looked over at Tsurugi, who was standing back with his arms folded and looking at the teams sagely. When silence passed and the man felt a couple of eyes drilling into the side of his head, he looked over to see Darui and Anko waiting on him expectantly. Blinking in surprise, he frowned, "What?"

"Well? Who are you counting on getting through to the next stage of the exam?" Darui asked.

Anko grinned as she rested her hands on her hips, "Are you gonna place your bets on your village's own team? Out of the fifty-two other contenders, those three are kind of on the losing end, don't you think."

Tsurugi smirked before looking back towards Utakata, Tsubaki and Kiyoko he could see preparing to sign in their wavers. "Oh no, don't misunderstand. I'm not making any bets that they will come in either first or second in this race." His expression then became deathly serious as his eyes followed them to the signing desk. "I'm not making any bets because I have no doubt that they will win this whole thing; both the second and third stages."

Appearing surprised, Darui and Anko looked at one another before shrugging and glancing back to oversee the proceedings.

From what they could tell, the guy seemed a little more nervous about his supposedly confident response than anything else. I mean… what in the world did one of Kirigakure's finest have to fear of a team of Genin?

OOO

"This has got to be some kind of joke, right?" Ino groaned, watching as the animal they had had chosen for them by the official clamber up to hang off of Shikamaru's arm. The blonde Yamanaka could only shake her head in dismay at the sloth, "Is someone filming this, because I swear someone's toying with us right now."

And before anyone gets confused at her illustrating of the situation, yes, it was an actual sloth she was referring to, not her teammate. The Nara simply stared lazily at the animal with incredibly long arms hanging off of him, watching it yawn and look back as it then made to fall asleep. As for Choji well, the rotund Genin standing beside them just went with what the proctors gave to them and, with a mouthful of chips, made no complaints about their situation whatsoever.

"Oh, the universe hates us," Ino cried, looking away while shaking her head.

Shikamaru shrugged when he glanced down at the scroll on their summon's back before turning to look at his teammates, "Hey, it could have been worse. Just be grateful it wasn't a tortoise."

Meanwhile, on the other end of the spectrum, Tenten was glaring down at the floor with a twitching eyebrow as her team looked upon their client; the bored, sluggish form of a tortoise smiling up at them. Now, while it was common knowledge amongst them that their sensei's main summon was indeed a tortoise, the fact that they were given one seemingly out of mere association seemed kind of strange. It didn't help them that it was unbelievably slow and that Lee had taken an immediate liking to the critter.

"Oh, what a wonderful animal! So full of life, passion and energy! He is truly a force to be reckoned with!" Lee exclaimed loudly, kneeling down to grin at the animal. "With you as our partner there's no way we're gonna lose."

Neji, arms folded, arced an eyebrow at his teammate, "What makes you say that?"

"Because, I can feel it in my heart!" Lee stated, looking up with a raised fist and fire in his eyes, "The flames of your burns brightly within this tortoise as it does for me! This bond that we have made… it's unbreakable."

Tenten's shoulders slumped, "Well, it's not like we can really give back this guy and ask for another one. The rules are set in concrete after all, so we've got no choice."

Like the proctors and the Chunin handing out the paperwork said; there were no take-backs, refunds or exchanges allowed. The bond that Lee was talking about, yeah, she was pretty sure it was just a binding contract.

All around teams were up and collecting their clients left and right. One after the other the little animals joined up with their assigned protectors. Many squads were happy with the contracts they were given, others were a little bit despondent, whereas a great majority of them were focusing most of their concerns towards the test ahead of them. Because they were in a whole other country with terrain that only the Yugakure shinobi were probably familiar with, though it was highly unlikely since the course they were going to was restricted to all Genin, they didn't know what to expect. That, and they were wondering whether they, as human beings, would be able to take the strain of not only watching over their assigned animal but also whether their summon would be able to handle the environment too.

It worked out like this. Team 10 got a sloth, making it two sloths in total on their squad. Team 9 got a squirrel, much to Shiho's joy as she thought the little thing was cute. Team Gai got a tortoise. The Sand Siblings acquired a cat, which got scared the wits out of and into obedience when it got a good feel for the boy carrying the large gourd on his back. Team Samui acquired a hare, the lone Kiri team got themselves a ferret, and Team 8 wound up partnered with an adorable little otter.

As for Team 7, well… it seemed like their summon had decided to take a walk.

When they arrived at the spot where their number was supposed to be sitting and waiting for them, Naruto and his companions found to their confusion an empty space. While everybody else was becoming familiar with their clients, the team under Kakashi Hatake was left scratching their heads and wondering where the hell the little tike went off to.

"Okay, what the hell?" Sakura said, rounding on her squad mates to voice her frustration. "Is it always going to be like this with us? Are every client we're going to be signed up with, human or animal, going to cause problems for us?"

Sasuke frowned as he too was looking around with his hands in his pockets, "Knowing our luck… yeah. Probably."

Naruto sighed and scratched his head, "Damn… what kind of animal would be troublesome enough to just go wandering off on its own? It doesn't make any sense." With the large number of mammals and what not already present, with over a hundred Genin also walking around, it made their task of locating their summon even more challenging.

Deciding to search for it, Naruto got down on all fours and sniffed the ground, earning strange looks from his team. However, they figured he was using his heightened senses to track it, seeing as how he was part animal himself… in a way.

However, while Naruto and Sasuke were looking out over the heads of all those present, searching the grounds for any sign of a stray cat or something, Sakura suddenly felt a tug on the back of her dress and looked around. Seeing nothing at first, her eyes dropped to the floor, where she then spotted the white, furry form of a snow fox. The little animal had tugged on her dress and was now sitting in front of her with a cute smile on her face. Tail wagging behind her, the animal yipped happily.

Surprised, Sakura then noticed the number on is back and smiled, "Oh there you are!" Her exclamation had Sasuke and Naruto focus on her, in which they gathered around their summon to take stock of her. The kunoichi squatted down in front of the vixen when she came up and nuzzled her extended hand. "Aww, you're so adorable."

Naruto chuckled and scratched his head, "That's… strangely appropriate."

The raven haired genius next to him turned to the blonde with a puzzled look, "What do you mean?"

"Oh uhh… nothing," Naruto replied quickly while looking away. Shrugging off his weird behavior as something ordinary, the Uchiha returned his attention to their client while the blonde was left to sweat the little details. "Geez, I don't want them finding out about you yet, furball. It's too soon." Thank God Sasuke didn't pester him about his response; otherwise he would have quite literally been dipped through hot water for an answer.

The blonde then heard the nine-tails inside of him snort in amusement. "Whether or not they find out that you're my container I don't really care. Besides… you seem to be holding up pretty well on your own. You may as well not even have me inside of you."

"Wow. Thanks for the vote of confidence."

"No problem…"

Sakura giggled when the fox licked her hand before allowing it to climb up onto her shoulder. When she stood up she turned back to her team as the snow creature waved its tail happily. "What do you think we should call her, Sasuke-kun?"

The boy raised an eyebrow, "You want to name it?"

"Might as well," the kunoichi exclaimed, scratching the animal behind the ear. "We'll be out there for three whole days if we don't arrive at our destination by the first. If she runs off anywhere along the way, we can always call out for her."

"How about Eris?" Naruto offered, walking up to the cheerful pair and smiling at the fox on the girl's shoulder. When he leaned in to get a closer look at her, the fox leaned forward and licked his nose, getting the boy to laugh a bit from the show of affection. "I think it's a great name. She seems to like it."

Sakura blinked before looking at the albino mammal thoughtfully. Rolling the name around her tongue for a bit, she then saw the fox look her way and beamed. "Is it okay if we call you that? Eris?" At that inquiry, the fox yipped in response, getting Naruto to smile due to his being able to understand animal speech and the kunoichi to grin at how delighted she seemed. "Alright. Eris it is then."

Sasuke smirked and shook his head at their antics. "You guys are having more fun with these trivial games then this entire exam." He turned on his heel and looked away. If anything, he attempted to hide the amusement, but failed due to them spotting his expression beforehand. "Try not to become too attached to her. We're going to be split up at the end of this anyway."

"Aww, come on teme. Don't be such a buzz-kill," Naruto mock-whined, reaching over and petting the fox on the back, getting it to purr approvingly. "How often do we get to name an awesome animal like this during one of the toughest exams in history? Certainly not every year." The exams came once every few months, and this was the first mass international one that they had the privilege of being a part of.

"She's cute too," Sakura chirped, feeling the fox nuzzle her cheek when Naruto was done scratching its ear. "I bet she'll make a great companion to have at home."

Ignoring the displays of affection and the pair pretty much warming up to the animal, Sasuke turned his head again and glanced at his teammates firmly. "We're not supposed to be bonding with the animals; we're supposed to be protecting them. Consider them as 'clients' who have paid a considerable amount of money to have us safeguard them to the next checkpoint. They expect us to do our jobs well and to act professionally, even in the face of adversity. If anything you should be showing more concern for the journey ahead of us then the banter between you and the fair…"

Naruto smirked at him, "Sometimes it's good to talk with the client and get to know them a little better. That way they'll be able to trust us if something bad was to happen along the way, like with that shop owner that one time, remember?"

The Uchiha, hearing his rival's reasoning, grunted and looked away with his arms folded. "Do what you want with her then. Just make sure to keep your eyes open and on all sides, so we're not blind-sided by anyone looking to muscle us out early."

Staring at his shoulders for a moment, the jinchuriki then looked back at the fox and pointed towards the genius in question. "Don't worry about that guy; he's always like that." The fox yipped in response, acknowledging the blonde's statements with her own exclamations. "Yeah, you're right. His hair does look like the ass-end of a duck." That little observation got Sakura to look more carefully at her crush and the most handsome boy of her age group, after which she too noticed the illustration.

The sight got her to giggle and snort.

Tick mark forming on his head, Sasuke turned to glare at the three of them, only to see Sakura start laughing even harder, and both Naruto and the fox perched on the kunoichi's shoulder look mischievously in his direction. A little bit thrown by their stares and unable to ignore the pink haired kunoichi's fits of mirth, the raven haired teen glared away with a huff, and kept his eyes locked ahead of him.

This assessment was going to be a troublesome one. He just knew it.

OOO

An hour later…

Starting line…

The starting points for every team were spaced out over a wide arc following a semi-circle perimeter representing the entrance point of the Boiling Lands. A massive fence was set up at its crest to stop trespassers from wandering to their potential deaths; a metal mesh structure that stretched a full story high with razor wire at the top. At every interval of the massive barrier there sat a gate with numbers on top of each of them, allowing the numerous teams to take their pick of whatever entrance they wished to use. The plus-hundred teams made sure to spread themselves out across the width of the entrance to the valley.

Due to the large growth of forest standing before them just beyond the fence, it was impossible to see any further than the darkness of the woods, leaving everyone to question of what really lay within, far outside of the protection of their gate numbers.

With their summons in tow and a Chunin stationed at every entrance, the squads waited patiently for the next stage to begin. An intercom setup on every post would announce the start of the test, leaving everyone waiting with baited breath until the gun was fired. Everyone was in a different state and condition of readiness, starting from worried leading all the way up to excited. This could be said for Teams 8 and Gai, with Team Samui and the Sand Siblings following close behind. All of them were looking confident and ready for action.

Team 7 brought up the rear with Naruto grinning, Sasuke smirking as he knelt on the ground looking through the fence with his Sharingan, and Sakura carrying Eris comfortably on her shoulder. All of them, including the fox, were glaring down the woods like it was there enemy, mostly for a fact that it was going to be swarming with them the moment the gates flew open.

Kotetsu, who was assigned to their post, smirked at their grins and stares. "Eager?"

"Oh yeah," Naruto said with a firm voice.

"What place do you think you'll come at the end of this, if you don't mind me asking?" the man asked curiously.

"That's easy. First," Sakura said confidently, resting a hand on the white fox as she squatted down. She saw Naruto and Sasuke look at her, to which she responded with a smirk, "What? Did you think you guys were the only ones allowed to get excited? I've got stake in this one too. Me and Eris both."

Naruto grinned brightly. "That's the Sakura-chan that I know." His statement got a chuckle out of the Uchiha kneeling close by.

Kotetsu nodded toward each of them, "Well then, since you're all up to it; good luck out there."

Shortly thereafter, the intercoms blazed into life, "Alright teams, the hand just ticked over to noon. Remember, you have exactly three days to make it across and secure one of the eight spots to make it through to the next round. Make sure your client arrives safe and sound, as they will be helping you reach the third stage!" Anko's voice echoed out. The squads could literally see her grin forming on the microphone end of the system despite her not actually being there. "Now get the hell out of here!"

The horn blared and the gates flew open. Almost instantly the teams darted in all at once. However, before Team 7 could jump through Sasuke held up his hand to stop Naruto and Sakura from rushing in, the three of them hanging at the entrance while Kotetsu watched and waited for them to enter. After a full minute of them just standing there doing nothing, Sakura raised an eyebrow.

"What are you doing, Sasuke-kun? Why'd you stop us?"

"If we run in there all gung-ho and gunning for the finish line across a terrain we don't know, we're more than likely to run into some of the other teams ready to fight over the same route. As much as I'd like to butt heads with them, it's not the right thing to do when we have a passenger with us, nor is it the safest."

The kunoichi realized what he was getting at and smiled, looking across at Eris waving her tail happily. "I see. If we rushed in there without thinking, we'd be putting our client at serious risk." She then lowered the animal to the floor and allowed her to walk passed on all four legs through the fence at her own leisure. Sakura followed the animal close behind with her hands behind her. "We'll let her lead the way then."

Naruto chuckled and relaxed into a regular standing position as well, aiming to follow his teammate and the animal with his hands at the back of his head. Sasuke allowed the first pair through and followed close behind, the jinchuriki hanging back a second longer to wave at Kotetsu. "See you at the end."

The man from Konoha saluted back, "Sure thing."

With that, Team 7 then strolled into the woods where they disappeared shortly thereafter, with their fox client and summon in the lead.

Since they had no idea what was in this place, it was best to let the one they were escorting lead the way. It was most likely that the animal knew the best possible route through, as well as the safest course if they were going to complete this thing in one piece.

XXX

Several hours later…

By around this point, Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke had traversed much of the terrain across the Boiling Lands from their starting gate all the way through the woods and further down into the lowlands. Their exit from the dense forest saw most of their cover thin out as the topography became even more treacherous and steep. At first it started off smooth with a gradual, downhill slope, until things started to become jagged and they ended up twisting and turning through rocky mounds, drops and pathways of stone, while weaving through thick and equally distorted vegetation.

It was almost like Kokoda out here. The climb down was extremely hazardous, which Sasuke found out for himself when one of the ledges he was using as a step gave way and tumbled several stories down onto the next road, where the rocks shattered. That was just one of the many potholes they experienced earlier on in the second stage before they continued to descend into unknown territory.

While of course the terrain only worsened from that point onwards, the temperatures became even more unbearable. About an hour in the group suddenly noticed their surroundings go from tropical to unbearably warm. Soon it became so hot they may as well have been wandering through a desert at peak hour, only there was moisture in the air and enough fertility in the ground to have a forest still in full growth. It reached this stage of irritability when they climbed down their third cliff, in which they then entered another winding path through hills dotted with limestone and trees. They even managed to catch a decent view of the landscape before them, a jungle covered map with steaming, rocky mountains, tors and cliffs all around. It was almost like they'd landed on another planet.

The path they followed was forged by the keen nose of their client. The white fox expertly led them down without any dangers befalling them. As soon as they reached a stable track, she then hopped back up onto Sakura and the team proceeded forward of their own accord.

In spite of their successful descent into hell thus far, the three teenagers quickly found themselves unable to ignore the sheer heat enveloping them and seemingly coming off of every bedrock stalagmite and brimstone pillar on their chosen path. For the next few hours of marching after that, the squad proceeded forward with their clothes completely soaked in sweat and humidity.

It looked like they had just gone swimming, but they hadn't.

Sakura groaned unpleasantly as she fanned her face, whereas the fox on her shoulder remained unfazed. "Why is it so damn humid?"

"Don't know," Naruto also groaned, sharing the same expression and slumped posture as the girl. They both looked up at Sasuke, who was also trudging along with his stance keeled over. "Hey Sasuke, why is it so fucking hot?"

In spite of his best efforts to maintain his composure even the Uchiha was beginning to feel the strain. With an exhausted expression in play, the genius glanced back over at his teammates. If he was wearing makeup right about now, he'd look like a crying tramp, "We're standing on an active volcanic area. I think this is one of the points where the lava comes closest to the surface."

"That explains the heat," Sakura groaned, looking across at a mound of rock they were passing by. Curious, she held out a hand and touched it, only to recoil with a loud yelp and a hiss that came off of her hand, trailing steam. Both her teammates looked at her in concern. "Shit! And it's coming off of the rocks."

"They must be venting the heat from underground, otherwise our sandals would have melted off by now," Naruto stated, watching with disinterest as Sasuke decided to take off his damn shirt. It was already so unpleasantly hot the guy didn't need it right now.

Though it didn't seem physically possible, Sakura got even hotter under the collar watching the raven haired boy stride forward with his bare back turned towards her. God, even his naked shoulders were cool. However, due to the overabundance of heat in the area, the girl quickly had to reframe from blushing outright or risk passing out from the blood rushing to her face. She groaned and stumbled, leaning up against a tree when the group came over the top of another hill.

"It's going to get worse, isn't it?"

"Not unless we can find some higher ground," Sasuke stated while stopping and looking back at the kunoichi to see her resting. "We need to get out of this pot before the sun goes down completely, otherwise we'll get lost or risk falling into a pit or something. That or the heat will end up slowly killing us."

Sakura, not thrilled with the prospects of death by being melted or boiled alive, bucked up whatever energy she had in the tank and trudged forward. When she arrived at the shirtless Sasuke's side, they both looked back to see Naruto inspecting the same tree Sakura had been leaning against. It was bottle shaped and strangely swollen, which immediately had the youngster's interest in it. The other two then proceeded to watch the boy pull out a kunai and stab the surface of the trunk.

When he yanked it out, a loud hissing sound could be heard as thick, gooey liquid spilled out onto the floor and, upon looking at his blade, the jinchuriki could see it had melted away. He cringed and stepped over the sizzling pool while losing his now blunt weapon. "Unless you can stomach it, don't eat anything from the trees or plants, and stay the hell away from the bottle shaped ones. The vegetation here is toxic."

The other two nodded in understanding before moving on. They followed the path onwards, winding through trees and giant stalagmites that looked like massive termite mounds, before they arrived at a rocky wasteland area. A cloud of steam washed over them that had all of them coughing and sputtering, before they each covered their mouths with cloth.

Unable to bear the heat himself, Naruto removed his jacket and wrapped it around his waist, at the same time pulling his goggles over his eyes and wrapping his headband around his mouth. Sakura and Sasuke merely used cloths, but were unable to cover their eyes, with the kunoichi doing the same for the fox when she heard it sneeze unpleasantly.

"There are different gasses in the air. Let's get across this quick," Naruto said, picking up the distinct scents of several different fumes that were in no way good for one's health. Unfortunately, there was no other way through, none that were safe anyway, so there only real option was forward.

The trio moved carefully, following the same vector across the badland until they stopped at some bubbling pools formed in the ground. The steam rising from them was what they assumed to be the cause of the foul stench in the air. Even with their face masks on they could smell it, which had them recoil somewhat and move further away from the ponds of corrosive liquid.

"Brimstone and sulfuric acid," Sakura stated, recognizing the stench. "This place really is hell."

To add to her observation, jets of steam suddenly shot out as once again the ground vented through use of what they presumed were underground streams. Staying the hell away from the blasts, they moved across slowly until a jet of steam from a gap up ahead sprayed water on them. They thought it was water at least, till a stinging sensation on their skins told them to take cover behind a boulder. Not pressing up against it since it was scorching, the group glared around as jets continued to rocket into the air beside the pools of boiling liquid.

The ground was grey and cracking. Clearly not the place to be walking through, but they had no choice. Any bridges across were up another level, and they didn't really feel like exposing themselves to anyone who might be nearby unless absolutely necessary.

The fox whimpered when she too felt the stinging cloud of moisture, which had Sakura quickly attempt to calm her.

"This is suicide. The further we go, the more dangerous the ground becomes and the more likely we're going to fall through or worse," Sakura stated, looking at her teammates to see them silently agreeing with her as well as at the fox who was resting on her shoulder. "Let's backtrack and go around."

Nodding, Naruto looked to his right and pointed towards the cliffs they could see over a few rises. "We'll take the woods over there. Streams might be filtering down into this area and cooling the ground. We might even be able to find a river with suitable drinking water."

"If we're lucky," Sasuke said. It all depended on their location, which seemed to be a valuable commodity in this fucked up place. He looked around again before shaking his head at the sheer incredibility of their environment. "I wonder if anyone else tried to cross through this bowl."

"Uhh… yeah…" Naruto murmured before pointing across one of the flats of the scorched ground towards a massive pool of boiling water. "There's your answer." When his teammates looked around the cover to where the jinchuriki had his attention, their eyes widened when they saw the remains of six bodies of former Genin floating in a smoking pond. When one of the lifeless cadavers upturned, it revealed a face melted through to the bone, which was also being eaten away by acid. The sight had all three of them vomit in their mouths and pull back behind the boulder. "Alright, let's get the fuck out of here."

Without another word, the three carefully made their way back and up onto more vegetated ground. They followed the tree line out of the area, gradually ascending several levels so that they were able to scope out the entire area. From what they could see hiding up on the ridge, the desolate, cracked and scorching wasteland they had just wandered into and left was one of many craters plotting the entire region. Following the columns of smoke from sulfur rising into the air, they were able to make out several areas, with an entire cluster further up, which was blocked by both trees and mountainous stones jutting into the sky. This did not instill much confidence in the team, and neither did the coming night as they could also see the sun setting from their position.

They wandered even further along and higher up, until arriving in a clearing well above the hot zone.

They found a massive tree amongst many growing over a cliff, with enough space inside for them to sleep in. While Sasuke gathered leaves and made a bed, and Sakura went about setting traps, Naruto had a look at some of the vegetation and plant life. He even went up into the canopy to find water pooling, and tested its viscosity and acidity using powders he normally used to check if any water sources were poisoned. Seeing that it wasn't, he bottled as much as he could before jumping down to look for food.

When night fell and the three gathered around a pit fire with massive leaves pulled over the entrances to hide the light from any curious onlookers, the team was absolutely spent. Their client had also fallen asleep, the white fox affectionately named Eris curling up beside her kunoichi caretaker and enjoying the comfort of the group's company.

All three of the kids had disrobed down to their underwear and had tossed it up to dry. At least at this time the night was cool and the temperatures had receded to a suitable norm, much to their relief. However, while Sasuke and Naruto had no problems being in their boxers or briefs respectively, Sakura did, in which she couldn't stop herself from blushing to the roots of her hair, trading glances with the boys while trying to hide her own self. She shouldn't have been worrying about this as much.

She was a kunoichi for goodness sakes.

Thanks to Naruto's scrounging, they were able to get a decent, vegetarian meal, so things were going pretty good for them so far, despite the horrible trek they'd had up to this point.

Cracking fruit and mixing them into his leaf soup, Sasuke looked up from his dinner. "I'm sure we're more than a third of the way across, but this place is huge. Those hot spots with the acid pools are only going to get worse until they become impassible except for a select few crossings. My guess is that the other teams will either be waiting in ambush for us or will be trying to block the routes to prevent others from passing… if they're smart."

Naruto looked up as well with a frown, "That's… really annoying." Granted he would do the same thing, he would honestly prefer going out and kicking the crap out of the other teams with his own two fists. But this was neither the time nor the place.

"Will they really do that?" Sakura asked.

"It's a pass or fail assessment," Sasuke reasoned with a deep frown, "With only eight spots available. This test was designed to kill off as many of us as possible. Those bodies we saw dissolving back there in the acid." He looked around at his squad with a serious face. "They probably got into a fight in that area and ended up falling in. There was debris floating in the pool from what was previously a thin earth plate, and the area just couldn't take their weight."

Sakura paled at that realization and looked down at her own soup, "This is bad. They said the terrain was unstable and filled with spots like that. They could be anywhere."

"Not just that," Sasuke stated, breaking a stick off of the roots they were hiding in and shuffling closer to the center, "Geysers, some of them spewing acid, sink holes, boiling rock, rivers of magma, steam vents, toxic water and corrosive plants. I'm pretty sure in an area like this the soil is also tainted. We have to navigate through all of that, while also protecting our client and battling the other teams." He then drew a rough image of what he believed to be the terrain to follow from what he was able to make out from their spot on the cliff. He drew an oval that represented the Boiling Lands, their position, and plotted out the various hot spots, significant terrain details and craters. "This is where we are."

Naruto and Sakura took a closer look. In the oval, they could see they were somewhere past the first third, but there was also a hell of a lot of shit ahead of them, including an area labeled with a question mark that Sasuke just wasn't able to gauge. From the rough sketch, it didn't look good.

"What's this?" Sakura asked, pointing at the huge gap dividing the valley.

Naruto's expression conveyed his incredulity. "That… is a massive gorge across a boiling lake. I saw that while I was up in the tree taking point." His eyes were sharp, so he knew exactly what he was looking at the moment he spotted it.

The smell was also a dead giveaway, and in this environment it was a miracle he could still smell as accurately as he could.

"I believe that's where the lava moves closest to the surface while not actually vaporizing the entire water source," Sasuke said with a grim look on his face. "It's hot… VERY hot. That wasn't a stratocumulus we could see, that was superheated steam rising into the air. All I could see was a mountain and a jungle on the other side. I'm willing to bet that's the last elevated area until the final descent down into the coast."

Understanding thus far, Sakura nodded before looking over at her blonde teammate, who was also rubbing his chin thoughtfully. "So all we have to do is pass the minefields, pass that gorge, climb over that mountain and slide down to the other side."

Naruto nodded while brushing down his arm. "It's going to be a long haul. Night is too dangerous to traverse this landscape so everyone is bogged down just like us. Where exactly, I have no idea, but they're probably a little further ahead."

"Our only safe option is to wait for them to arrive at the same crossing and let them fight over who gets to pass. That'll give us a big enough opening to get over," Sasuke stated.

"Yeah, but what if someone else has the same idea as us?" Naruto asked, looking up at his rival. "There's only a small amount of time and its exclusive entry into the third stage. The other squads are going to be both desperate and dangerous… maybe even just one of those."

"Yes. I've considered that," Sasuke murmured while running a hand over his face. Breathing a sigh, he then looked up. "We'll try to avoid a fight if possible to circumvent endangering out client, but if a situation arises and there are no other options available… then you know what will happen then, right?" Getting a nod from Naruto, he also looked across at Sakura to see her determined face staring right back. She petted their sleeping companion on the head before she too nodded in agreement. Acknowledging, the Uchiha leaned back to continue eating. "Good. Then we'll make for the gorge as fast as we can… but keep our distance so that we're not caught off guard like back on that mission."

"Everything is riding on this bet," Naruto said with a smile, looking down at the fox beside Sakura. "In the end, we all need to get through this in one piece."

Experience told them they needed to be extra careful, especially with so many more potential enemies wandering around. They kept this in mind as they decided to keep watch in shifts, with one staying awake beside them while the others slept.

As the night dragged on one thing remained clear in all their heads; all three of them were in uncharted territory. For all they knew there were probably even worse things waiting for them out there then a few acid pools and the ground caving in at their feet…

OOO

Meanwhile…

Elsewhere, standing in the middle of a wide open clearing not too far from where Team 7 was currently nesting, carnage had been brought to the grounds of the second stage of the exams.

Surrounded by boiling grounds on both sides as well as the treacherous forest routes all around, dozens of teams from different villages laid dispersed across the expanses of clearing and woodland; some twitching, some lifeless, but all of them sporting the same exact wounds that were pretty much the result of the attack that had struck them down. But what should have been signs of cuts, bruises and conventional injuries from a beat down given to them by a superbly trained shinobi, all those lying in the area instead had been burned to a crispy black.

The smell of burning flesh flooded the air and blocked out all other scents, including the sulfur and brimstone from the acid spots just a stone's throw away. It almost looked like a hellfire had been brought down upon the mix of teams lying scattered in this first third of the region. The animals they were meant to be escorting were no longer in sight either, indicating that they had all been dispelled at the exact same time all the squads in the area were taken down.

Even further outside of the clearing, more groups had fallen to the exact same fate at presumably the exact same time at a spread of twenty to thirty meters apart from each other. While most of the shinobi in the clearing were all Iwagakure shinobi, presumably several groups who had decided to band together in an effort to try and force their way across the field and pass as a collective, ultimately ended up sharing the same fate as the other Genin not from their village within jumping distance of them, and whom had also no intention of engaging them. It was safe to say that whatever had hit them, had hit them so hard and so fast that those nowhere in sight of the kill zone didn't even notice the short battle, and the people that had been hit by the attack were struck down without warning or provocation.

And of course, the ones entirely responsible for the depositing of bodies here and there stood high up on a nearby ridge overlooking the clearing. Their forms outlined by the moon hanging high in the sky where the steam from the Boiling Lands could be seen blocking out the stars, the distinct forms of the entire Kiri Team towered over and were glaring down at their handiwork.

Well, it wasn't so much as the entire team's handiwork as it was one of them. The one to have dealt all the nameless squads the exact same fate stood between the two other members; with Utakata sitting off to the side blowing bubbles from his pipe and Kiyoko sitting on the edge swinging her legs over the side childishly while petting their ferret client on the head, which was resting in her lap. The animal in question was looking quite surprised at the chaos it had just witnessed, wrought by the lone, orange haired girl member of the troop.

After finishing blowing bubbles, Utakata removed the pipe from his mouth and sighed, "Maybe you overdid it, Tsubaki."

"Overdid it?" the kunoichi replied with a scoff, hands in her pockets, "They were in our way and presented a great threat to the other teams going it alone. It's not like any of them were going to give us full quarter if they'd caught us unawares while crossing the plains. This is a competition, Utakata-kun… a race to the finish to determine those who are worthy of carrying the title of Chunin."

The boy snorted before lowering his bubble blower to his lap. "At this point in time, the title of Chunin would mean nothing to you. If I was to accurately place you in terms of skill, power, experience and intelligence, you're a lot closer to the level of Jonin than Chunin."

Tsubaki smiled as she gazed down at her partner, "My, aren't you the knowledgeable one."

"You're my teammate," Utakata said with a small smile. "It's my job to know you two, especially if you're going to be sticking around me for the next couple of years."

Kiyoko giggled as the ferret wagged its tail under her affectionate scratching of its head. "So… who are we going to play around with next?" the blonde asked while looking up onto the ridge towards a distant tree line, in the approximate direction of Team 7. "Weren't there some more teams hiding out in the area? We could track them down now and beat them like we did the others. That way we can have a clear and safe shot to the finals."

Tsubaki shook her head, "No." She looked down at the field of charred, smoldering bodies still kicking, all of which were unconscious. "I've had enough playing around with these nuisances for one night. Besides." A confident smile crossed her face as she ran a hand through her hair, a cool breeze drifting past them and carrying the scent of decay over to the next field. "By my count, I've already eliminated over one third of the competition…"

Utakata and Kiyoko smirked, both of them pleased at that number.

In a single evening in just one area, using whatever technique she used, only a single member of the Kiri Team had done away with nineteen squads in one shot.

The Genin to have fallen to her terrifying wrath could only thank their lucky stars that she was merciful enough to leave them all alive…

TO BE CONTINUED…

---

Author's Note: I really, really enjoyed writing this chapter, because it allowed me to add my own twist to the Chunin Exams.

As you would expect, the first test is a sort of written exam, and probably one I'm sure many of you know. The 'Read Everything Before Doing Anything Test,' the bane of all of my time in school. I chose this one to be the first test because I knew it would easily thin out the numbers, because people are careless, and it did the exact same thing to my year level when I was in high school.

Our entire class and many more were given an 'exam' and told to do it before lunch time. As we sat down and the clock started, we went on with the test, with explicit instructions to read through the exam before doing anything. At the very end of the exam document, there was a line that read 'there is no exam. Upon reading this you may quietly exit the room.' To everyone's surprise, only one person in our class got up and left. We realized why at the end of the exam period. I found out only a handful of people actually left the classrooms and had an extra long lunch.

I also really enjoyed writing the second stage of the exams. The plot of the exam sort of follows what I had planned for Art of Appropriation, but I changed it and gave it a bit of flare of my own for this one. Now the challenges are even harder in here, and Gaara isn't the only person you have to watch out for.

Well, I hope you guys enjoyed the exams so far, because it's going to get even better. Alpha out.