As my teammates went to sleep I was continuously spamming my chakra sense for increased range and accuracy. My vigilance paid off when I felt 3 chakra signatures arrive within my sensing range and then stop about 100 meters away and about 50 meters above us. I debated waking Hina and Shisui but after two hours or so the enemy team stopped moving around and their signatures became sluggish as though they were sleeping. 'Interesting tactic there geniuses. Let's just all go to sleep in enemy territory without a lookout, it'll be fine herp de derp.'
Deciding this was too good an opportunity to miss out on I created three shadow clones that raced off down the path we were going on before Hina needed to stop for the day. I tracked my clones as they moved through the tunnels and I briefly lost them for a time when they went outside my range yet picked them up easily when they came back.
Finally they arrived at the location of the enemy team and my eyes narrowed as I felt the enemy team's chakra signatures disappear one by one in quick succession. Even if they were sleeping that felt too easy and I had half a mind to think this was a trap before one of my clones dispelled. As the wave of new memories hit me I quickly sorted through them until my clone arrived at the enemy team's location.
As soon as I did so an intense urge to face palm hit me and I knew why the enemy team had gone down so easily. For one the team from Yu(Hot Water) hadn't had any form of facemasks to protect them from the spores within the cavern so they were probably tripping hard by the time I arrived. Another reason was the fact that the two guys and one girl were all buck ass naked and passed out on the ground wrapped around each other with signs of certain 'activities' that took place before I arrived.
A few minutes later I felt my two other clones pop as well after they had no doubt collected everything that could be useful. Quickly perusing the new memories confirmed that I now had team badge 10 safely stored within my inventory. Another useful thing was that my inventory could be used by my shadow clones making them useful thieves. My inventory was so versatile and I loved it dearly.
With this new badge we had badges 10, 19 and 37 along with our own badge giving us a total of 6 points. We had everything we needed to actually pass this portion of the Exam so that just left our secondary objective of eliminating as much as the competition as possible. Being mindful of that fact I sent out three more shadow clones as assassins. I didn't care if they only killed one person on an opposing team or all of them. Either way they would be unable to continue.
With that done I simply resumed spamming sense chakra as my clones sped off. I monitored them until I could no longer sense them and then there was nothing but the quiet background noise rumbling throughout the cave. Settling in to wait for the results of my actions I kept using sense chakra and glanced back to where my teammates were sleeping peacefully. I sometimes wish I could just have a normal sleep schedule and I know the only thing stopping me is myself. Even though it can be mentally tiring never sleeping I just couldn't bring myself to waste all those hours that I could be doing something useful like right now.
Letting my thoughts drift as I sat there I was drawn from them sometime later once I felt the telltale feeling of memories being received from one of my clones. I sorted through them as fast as I could but was mildly disappointed that it had failed to inflict any lasting damage on the team it had found. The team had all been awake and as soon as I attacked they ganged up on me with a lucky kunai throw dispelling the clone.
Creating another clone I sent it off and the cycle continued for the rest of the night. Clones would be destroyed and created anew as they threw themselves at the opposing teams. Even the team that I hadn't been able to kill off in my initial clone barrage still ended up harried for the remainder of the night which I considered a win for me. Now they would be tired and more prone to making mistakes that could get them killed.
As morning dawned on the outside world and my teammates stirred I had gathered an additional two badges from one team, disqualified another and harassed one until morning. All in all a good nights work.
The noise coming from my teammates increased as they became more and more awake. Eventually Hina rose and I glanced over at her. She seemed to be staring at me although it was a little hard to tell with the mask on. "Shiro, why didn't you wake me for my watch?" Her voice was still sleepy but I could also hear a bit of anger forming as she spoke.
"You told us in no uncertain terms that you didn't want to be disturbed so I didn't disturb you."
"You idiot,' her voice was a hiss, 'I didn't really mean it. I'm part of this team so why did you cut me out of something so vital?" Oh crap, I didn't mean for this to offend her at all.
"If it helps I didn't get Shisui up either." I tried to make my voice as placating as possible.
"No, that doesn't help. Why would you do something so stupid as to stay awake all night?" Looking towards Shisui I saw he would be no help here.
"I would also like to know why I wasn't woken up for my watch?" Time to hedge I guess.
"I just wanted you guys to be as rested as possible for today and since I don't really need a lot of sleep I just stayed up. It won't affect me at all and you guys are more prepared for the day so it's a win in my books." Hina's glare was possible to feel through her mask.
"That's not good enough! We're a team and we all need to pull our weight or it might as well not be a team." Shisui was nodding along as Hina spoke. I really can't get why this is such a big deal but they seem to think it is so I'll just keep apologizing.
"I'm sorry I'm just used to acting semi independently or being on new teams often and that affected my judgement here." I paused for a moment and then continued. "Since we are on this topic I also have something else to mention." I pulled out badges 10, 12 and 56. "I was able to secure these last night as well as disqualify another team."
Silence descended between us and then slowly Hina's hands rose to her head to clutch it. "How?" I opened my mouth to speak but she cut me off. "No, I don't want to know. Just give me a minute." She stood up and marched away leaving Shisui and I sitting next to each other. I turned to him as he spoke.
"Did you leave us last night?" I shook my head negatively and he continued. "Were you in any danger securing those badges?"
"None at all. I didn't even move from this spot." He slowly nodded and then turned to pack away his gear.
"Then I have no problem with that but I do hope you include us next time. It's frustrating to be left out of the loop and then have things thrown at you one after the other."
"Sorry." He didn't acknowledge me and kept packing. Hina took a good ten minutes to calm down and come back over and in that time I had thought out what I thought was a good apology for them.
"Guys, I want to apologize for my actions last night. It was not my intention to make you feel unneeded or marginalized I simply saw a situation and capitalized on the opportunity that presented itself in the moment. I will also try to include you more in the decision making process when possible." I stood and gave them a bow. "I do want this team to work and I am willing to work for it."
I held that position until I heard Hina gruffly say, "Straighten up, you're supposed to be our leader." I did so and she let out a large sigh. "I'm sorry as well. I just didn't like the fact that you seemed to be acting like I needed to be protected from everything in here. I'm a proud kunoichi of Konoha, damn it, I don't need to be coddled by anyone. I know you're better than us or you wouldn't be put in charge of this team and the proof of that was getting three badges all alone when we were asleep." She paused and took a deep breath.
"All I ask is that you not act like we need to be babied unless we ask for it like during the run to this place." I didn't even have to think about that.
"Of course." I looked towards Shisui to see if he had anything to say but he just shrugged.
"Hina said everything I wanted to say. That being said what will we do now? We have enough badges to pass." While I would like to pursue the team I was harassing all of last night the last clone I had sent their way had met a veritable maze of traps leading to them. With that in mind we should forget about them and set out for easier targets.
"We eliminate as many of the opposing teams as possible as safely as possible. We'll move out after Sora's group as soon as you guys are packed up and we've had breakfast." My head tilted to the side before I said the next part. They did say they don't want to be babied but giving them food wouldn't count would it? "Is there anything you two want for breakfast?"
"Will it be like yesterday?" Hina asked with a hint of caution.
"Yep, but I won't have to do the chant again."
"I want fatty tuna sushi." 'Wow, expensive much.' I wordlessly pulled a platter out of my inventory and handed it to her before turning to Shisui.
"Do you have grilled fish with an omelette?" I did have it and I handed him a plate full of food as well. Pulling out a bowl of ramen just to have something to chew on while they ate I sat down on the ground and began to eat as well.
It didn't take long to finish up breakfast and I collected their plates to put back into my inventory while Hina stowed away her gear. Another half hour was spent dismantling all of our traps and then we were good to go.
"Alright we don't need Sora's badge anymore but still I want you to lead us towards Sora's team and if you see any team in trouble steer us towards them. It'll be slow and steady for the rest of this portion of the Exam." Hina nodded and after taking a few seconds to acquire where Sora's team was she set out with us close on her heels.
Hina seemed to be more conscious about when she needed to take a break as about every hour or so we would simply stop and allow her to rest before we continued onwards. It was around the 4 hour mark when she tilted her head and slowed to a stop in front of us.
"Something odd is happening to one of the teams near us. For some reason they all seem to be attacking each other."
"Hmm, genjutsu?" She shook her head.
"I don't think so. I can't see any other team nearby and one of them is dead now." She paused for a moment. "The last two are still fighting though."
Considering the place we're in its likely that they were tripping right now and something set them off causing them to fight each other. Still, it would be bad to just assume that so I'll shelve that for now.
"Do you want to check it out? I know they're disqualified now but they still have a badge that we can take to deny other teams from passing." Shisui and Hina looked at each other before they shrugged simultaneously.
"Why not? If it'll keep a badge out of circulation then we should go and take it from them." Hina didn't say anything and merely set out again after Shisui finished talking. We sped along and as we got closer to the team I could begin to hear bouts of mad cackling along with screams of rage coming from ahead.
"They're down to one man." Hina stated as we drew ever closer. "The final one is acting more and more erratically as well." I was tempted to ask what he was doing but other things took priority.
"Make sure you're masks are secure first before we get there and cover up any exposed skin as well as you can. This is probably the results of the spores but let's not take any chances." We kept up the pace as both of them complied with my order. Soon enough we were close enough that I could see the shinobi with my own eyes as we crouched behind a stalagmite.
The brown haired shinobi from Suna was laughing periodically while stabbing one of his kunai into the chest of his dead teammate over and over again. The surrounding area bore the marks of battle and I sent out a shadow clone to check for any new toxins in the area. Not finding any I started tapping on Hina's arm to tell her what I wanted her to do.
She nodded as I finished and with a blur of speed rushed towards the cackling shinobi's back while Shisui and I flickered to a good distance in front of him in order to draw his attention towards us. We seemingly didn't need to have bothered doing so as our efforts didn't draw so much as a glance from him as Hina appeared behind him to seemingly reach out and gently tap the back on his neck. He dropped like a puppet whose strings were cut to sprawl all over his dead teammate's body.
Walking over to him I reached down and felt for his pulse. It was still going strong and I glanced up to give a nod towards Hina. "Good job with him. Go search the other body while I take care of him." She started walking away as I rolled his unconscious body away from his teammate so Shisui could start going over his stuff as well.
Giving him a once over with mystical palms revealed him to be in reasonable health if a little low on chakra and as high as a kite. My original assumption that they didn't have any facemasks proved to be correct in this case so we didn't have to worry about a new problem yet. Finished with my assessment I stripped him of anything valuable and tied him up.
I felt Shisui and Hina come up behind me as I finished my work and I turned to face them. They each handed me a badge as well as a scroll containing the remains of the Suna team. Excellent, with this we had badge numbers 2, 10, 11, 12, 19, 37 and 54. So that's 8 teams out of the Exam counting the one where I killed a member last night. I knew of two other teams at the moment so that left 8 teams unaccounted for right now. Slipping the two new badges into my inventory I spoke up.
"We're off to a great start. By my count there's only 11 other teams left but there are probably fewer if the amount of screaming was anything to go by yesterday. You also don't have to worry about a new toxin just yet they were just under the influence of the spores."
They relaxed slightly and moved to start uncovering any parts of their bodies that were covered in preparation for the fight while I made a shadow clone. I handed it the two scroll and it bent down to pick up the unconscious Suna shinobi. "Hina what's the quickest route out of the caves from here?"
"Um, give me a moment. You need to go back down the way we came from then take two rights, a left, three more rights and then two lefts before you get to one of the entrances, why?" As soon as she finished talking the clone sped off with the Suna shinobi on its back.
"I'm just going to drop him off at the entrance for the proctors to find. Suna is an ally so we'll help them out in this regard." Her head tilted to the side and then she shrugged.
"That's fine I guess." I glanced around to see if we missed anything and not seeing anything important I spoke up.
"Alright, is everyone good to go?" Both of them motioned that they were ready. "Great, Hina lead us out." We set out after Sora's team again yet as the hours rolled by they remained just out of our grasp. In fact it almost seemed like they were reacting to us at times. My eyes narrowed at the thought and I called for a halt.
"Hina does it seem like they're anticipating our actions at all?" Even though her body language screamed tired she seemed to want to soldier on for the moment.
"Now that you mention it they have seemingly changed directions sometimes when we started down a tunnel that would lead them directly to them." I hummed at that as Shisui spoke up.
"How many times has that happened?" She paused for a moment in thought and then answered.
"I think it's happened two or three times." They definitely have some way to track us then.
"Once is an accident. Twice is a coincidence. Three times is an enemy action. They know we're after them somehow. Do either of you have any idea of how they're doing it though?" I looked between them and it seemed like they didn't have much of an idea of how they're doing it either.
"Maybe one of them is a sensor?" Shisui's voice was hesitant but it sparked the metaphorical lightbulb above my head.
"Hina, how far away is Sora's team on average?"
"Um, ah, I think about maybe 2 and a half kilometers away." I let out a low curse. If one of them actually does have a sensor ability that strong then we need to reevaluate our position. They could be the ones trying to hunt us as we hunt them.
"I know it's been a long day but I need you to go for another hour or so. I want to try to put as much distance between us as possible and see how they react." Her stance was weary but she still nodded. This time I went in the lead and sent out multiple shadow clones to the front as a scouting force.
We didn't encounter anything and after reaching what I thought was a reasonable distance we stopped once more. "Alright, this should do. Hina I need you to use your dojutsu one last time for today to find Sora's team." She went rigid for a moment and then let out a sigh.
"They're about 3 kilometers away."
"They're definitely following us then. They would have had to backtrack over ten kilometers to do that." So it's become a game of cat and mouse then. Hopefully we're the cat in this case.
"So now we know that they know where we are at all times just as they should know that we know where they are at all times." I blinked at that. The statement got a little bit confusing there.
"What do we do then?" I mentally shook my head and focused as Shisui spoke.
"There's not much we can do at the moment. Neither of you have learned the chakra dampening technique and even if you could learn it overnight I was told in no uncertain terms not to teach it to anyone without approval." My fingers beat a steady drum against my side as I thought about our options. "I suppose we could try to trap the areas as we move through them and try to catch them in a trap but I don't hold out much hope for that to work. Do either of you have any ideas?" They both shook their heads and I let out a sigh. "Alright then let's fortify the area and get some rest. It'll give us a chance to recuperate and hash out some more ideas."
They seemed amendable to that and the next hour and a half was spent making the area as secure as possible before we had a light dinner and both of them set up their sleeping supplies. I of course did not and they didn't make a fuss about it. We drew lots for watch and Shisui got first, I got mid and Hina got last watch of the night.
Settling in for another long night of shadow clone spam I noticed Shisui glance towards me as I was clearly not going to bed at all. "Don't worry about it." I straightened slightly as a new rush of memories hit me as my shadow clone dispelled. It would seem that the nameless Suna shinobi would live as I had left him to the tender mercies of the proctors.
With my newly recovered chakra I sent out three clones. While it would perhaps be prudent to simply send wave after wave of clones at Sora's team I wouldn't do it for two simple reasons. If they did indeed have a sensor on their team they would have no doubt sensed what I was doing last night and prepare for it accordingly. So I would be wasting time trying to rush a prepared enemy for little to no gain. I could try to dampen my chakra but I hadn't done so for the duration of the Exam and if it was discovered that I could do so by their team without me killing anyone of them I would be giving away a tactical advantage.
A light cough from Shisui drew me from my thoughts and I turned to him wondering what he wanted to talk about. "Would that be how you acquired those badges last night?" I took in his stance and could only conclude that he wanted to learn how to make the clones but was too polite to simply steal them with his dojutsu.
"Yes, it's a type of clone that sends its memories back to you when it pops but it splits your chakra equally between how many clones you make. It's another thing that I'm not allowed to teach you but if you really want to learn it just ask Jiraiya for it."
"Oh, are you sure you can't just let me learn it? They seem really useful." I sent him a mildly reproaching look which he couldn't see at all, damn masks.
"Yes I'm sure. It's technically classified as a B rank Kinjutsu just for the potential damage that could be self-inflicted." He visibly deflated as soon as I said kinjutsu so I tried to lessen the blow. "Like I said ask Jiraiya about it and he'll most likely say yes. If we pass the third portion of the Exam I'm sure that you could ask for it as a suitable reward."
He perked right back up again. "Thanks, I'll do that then." He settled back down to continue his watch and I simply spammed chakra sense once more. It was mostly silent between us as the time passed and occasionally I would remake a clone as it popped. Shisui's watch ended and he let out a huge yawn as he gave me a wave.
"Try to get some sleep even if you don't feel the need for it." Another large yawn. "I'm going to bed." I gave him a lazy wave as he passed me by. I wouldn't be sleeping anytime soon if I had anything to say about it.
My shift went quickly yet I felt a little frustrated at the lack of contact that my shadow clones were having. It would seem that the two day period had given everyone enough time to actually spread out from the initial starting point and the cave system just went on for kilometer after kilometer. 'Well it was either the fact that everyone is scattered or more teams have been eliminated than I thought.'
Still there was no use just guessing and I spent the rest of my shift just feeling the surrounding area for chakra signatures while waiting for an update from my clones. I heard the rustle of clothe behind me as Hina started rising from her sleeping bag. 'That was some fine-tuned internal clock if she forced herself to wake up for her shift.'
"Hey,' she spoke softly as she settled in next to me, 'was there anything unusual?"
"No, I sent out clones to scout for opposing teams but I couldn't find anybody near us except for Sora's group." I felt her chakra flow to her eyes and then she nodded.
"I don't see anyone near us either." 'Byakugan OP please nerf.' The thought almost made me snort. If anything needed to be nerfed it was me not that I would ever want to lose my hard earned power.
"You're eyes' are way too good." I could almost feel the smug aura that settled around her.
"Are they even better than a certain other clan's eyes?" Letting out a hum I pondered the question. Were they actually better?
"Based on what I've seen so far and do bear in mind I have no idea of all the capabilities of each. It seems to me that the Byakugan lends itself to a more supportive role in the team dynamic while the sharingan lends itself more to the offensive side. I don't even really know why your two clans are rivals. From my point of view it would seem like you have two very separate fields that your eyes lend support towards."
"Hey, the Byakugan can be offensive just look at our taijutsu. Anyways the Uchiha are our rivals because we obviously have the superior eyes but they keep yapping at our heels like dogs." The thought of Itachi running around barking at people made me smile under my mask. It would just be so unlike him I might have to learn genjutsu just to have the Uchiha run around yapping at the Hyuga. My thoughts were broken by a stream of new memories that came flooding in.
"Besides the-" Whatever Hina was about to say was lost as the ground gave a sudden heave as though a giant had decided to smash the ground with a hammer. Both of us gained a foot of air as we were launched off the ground but we both landed on our feet as we came back down.
"What happened?" Shisui seemed to have teleported to our side as the ground gave ominous rumbles. I caught up the most recent memories of my clone and I couldn't help but curse.
"Fuck! One of my clones spotted two teams battling and stayed out of sight to observe. One of enemy teams hit a pillar with some kind of jutsu and it exploded. Now the cavern is collapsing and we need to get moving now."
"Which way?"
"Towards Sora's team and away from the collapsing portions, now move, full speed ahead." We sprinted out of our resting area leaving behind most of Hina's and Shisui's sleeping gear along with our traps. There was simply no time to spare and even as we ran another clone of mine popped. "The cave is still collapsing and it seems to be spreading along the tunnels."
The ground shook again and I nearly lost my balance as we sprinted along. "Hina set a course for the outside. As long as we don't leave the cavern it doesn't matter where we are but I would prefer to fail and live than die pointlessly."
I dodged a falling stone as Hina shouted over the rumbling. "We need to take a left at the next split. I can also see Sora's team on an intercept path with us."
"What? Are they crazy? The whole damn cave is coming down around us." The rumbling noise increased and my last clone popped. Fucking hell this was bad. I created three more clones and had them dampen their chakra output while running along the ceiling. If they wanted to start something we'll finish it.
"Be ready for them then and go all out from the beginning. We literally don't have time to deal with this." They acknowledged me and as we ran along I could feel their team's chakra signature close in and then stop ahead of us. They weren't even subtle about it as I could see them standing together in full view as we came around the corner.
A small grin formed on Sora's partially covered face as we came into view. "Why hello there, if you could be so kind as to give us your badge-" That was a far as he got before he had to dodge my near invisible blades of wind along with the rest of his team. Each blade made a sizable slash in the ground where they were standing and my team sprang into action as I made a beeline for Sora, tanto raised.
"How rude. All you needed to do is hand over your badge and we would have let you go." He grunted out as my tanto and his kunai clanged together over and over again in a deadly dance as smaller rocks started to fall from the ceiling. "I guess you'll just have to die then." He said cheerfully as I felt lightning chakra gather in him. I tried to pull back but a jolt of light flashed between our blades and I felt my muscles spasm as the lightning ran through them.
Cursing internally chakra strings formed and pulled me away as fast as they could from Sora while I tried to regain control of my body. It wasn't fast enough and I let out a grunt of pain as his kunai lodged into my left arm along with several small senbon in my stomach. I ignored the ding from a pop up and focused on regaining control of my body as one of my shadow clones jumped forward to engage Sora.
"What's this? You can hide your chakra from me? What a little prodigy we have here." His smile turned into a grimace as I felt one of his teammate's charka flare and die. "How unfortunate."
"Hina help Shisui." I shouted over the now constant roar that surrounded us as I rushed back towards Sora my muscles mostly under control once more and the kunai didn't impede my left arm's movement too much for what I planned to do. He turned and shot out a stream of senbon needles from his mouth striking my clone and popping it to leave me alone with him.
I raised my tanto and as I got close enough a swirling blue ball of chakra formed in my left hand. I saw his eyes go wide as the rasengan formed in my hand and he swiftly tried to dodge before I could hit him. The suddenness of the attack and the close range were too much for him to fully dodge so he thrust his arm forwards in a desperate attempt to try to block the attack. The only apt description of what happened to his arm was it going into a meat blender. Bits and pieces of it flew every which way as my fully formed rasengan traveled every further up his arm.
Screaming in agony at the sudden loss he still managed to raise his leg and kick against my chest saving himself momentarily. Instead of trying to resist the blow I let it push me away and lashed out with my tanto scoring a line along his leg as I rolled backwards.
"Ah, fuck that hurts." I could feel his other teammate's chakra disappear while Hina's and Shisui's chakra remained. In addition my other two shadow clones popped giving me back most of my charka and the memories of the other two fights as well. Sora started as my chakra returned and then gave me a rueful grin. "I really underestimated you and your team didn't I?" He let out a chuckle. "If I'm to die at least I took out you as well."
I let myself focus on the popup for half a second as he said that.
Ding! Gained Status Effect Poisoned: Lose 50hp/min for 10 minutes.
'Almost half my health gone and that's with my poison resistance.' Giving him my full focus once more I took in his sorry state. He was clutching the remains of his right arm with his left hand and his eyes were clouding over in either pain or shock as a trickle of blood ran down his left leg.
"You talk way too much during a fight." He didn't get the chance to reply as Hina appeared behind him to lightly tap him on the back of his head killing him instantly. 'Mental note to self, never try to fight a Hyuga to the death in close combat.' The ground made one last rumble and then everything became silent as a large amount of dust started to float into the air.
"Shiro are you okay? I heard what Sora said." I waved her off as she tried to examine the hole in my left arm that was left after I pulled the kunai out.
"I'll only be half dead by the time the poison wears out. What about you and Shisui? Are you guys okay? Can you see if the cavern is still collapsing elsewhere?" She didn't seem reassured by my words at all but I had other things to concentrate on at the moment. My hands glowed green as I placed them over my arm and stomach.
"I could be better." I glanced over and saw that Shisui had a large gash going from his shoulder down to his hip. Stopping my own treatment briefly I made a shadow clone to attend to him before resuming my own treatment. He hissed in pain as I made him lay down on the ground and then a sigh of relief as I numbed the wound.
I could hear Hina mutter something to herself before she spoke up. "I have good and bad news for you guys." Great.
"Give us the bad news first."
"The tunnels around us have collapsed so we're temporarily trapped here." I grimaced at that. I knew some earth techniques to move the ground around but it would take a long time to carefully dig out of here. "The good news is that I can't see any other parts of the cave system collapsing for now."
"Wonderful,' I muttered, 'at least we have that going for us." Letting out a sigh because it could have been a lot worse I continued. "I know some earth moving jutsu but what about you two?" Shisui shook his head while Hina nodded. "Great so where do we have to dig to?"
Hina went silent for about five minutes as she no doubt looked around with her Byakugan. "We have to dig 150 meters up and a kilometer South before we come to uncollapsed tunnels. There are a few sections of tunnels that didn't completely collapse but that's the nearest one that leads up to the surface."
"Okay, let Shisui and I get back to reasonable health before we get out of here. In the meantime could you scavenge anything useful from Sora's team?" She made to carry out my request before I had another thought. "Don't touch Sora at all. He might have trapped his stuff with poison." Nodding she moved away leaving Shisui and I to recuperate.
I finished first because I have a cheat like body and then I started working on Shisui alongside my clone to heal him up faster. It was a pretty simple cut but it was annoying having to constantly sweep the air around us free of dust particles so they wouldn't fall into his open wound and contaminate it. By the time I was done though the cut had been reduced to an angry red line that looked like it had been healing for weeks instead of 30 minutes. Removing the numbness from him I ran my glowing hands over him once more to check to see if I missed anything.
Not finding anything I gave him a pat on the shoulder and stood up. "You're good to go." He accepted my helping hand up and then looked down to see my work. He poked at the now red line before giving me a big thumbs up.
"Thanks for that."
"No problem. I'm supposed to be the battlefield medic and if I couldn't even handle that… well I wouldn't make a good medic now would I?" Giving a light laugh he pulled out a scroll as I made my way over to Sora's body. I was going to just search it but what I had said to Hina came back to me and I sent a clone instead. He had quite the variety of small bottles with various liquids inside them and his team badge which had a faint sheen to it that I didn't trust at all so I wrapped it in some spare clothe that I cut from his clothing.
With that done I stood up just in time to see Hina walking back over. That went pretty well all things considered. Sure we were stuck for the time being but we would make it out eventually and no one got too badly hurt. Now if I could just know what possessed them to think that this was a good idea in the first place. They all had facemasks on so it wasn't the spores and a quick once over with my mystic palms didn't find any traces of other drugs in Sora's system. Maybe Hina or Shisui would have an idea.
"Do either of you have an idea why they thought this was a good idea for them?" I asked and Shisui spoke up as he was putting on a fresh set of chain mesh with a new shirt as well.
"The one I fought used a variety of earth jutsus so maybe they thought he could create a shelter for them? Or maybe he planned to just take them along underground with the hiding like a mole technique?" He shrugged. "Either way it was a bad idea and even worse implantation of stealing our badge. I think they seriously underestimated us even though neither Hina nor I have tried to hide our clan origins and you've been showing off as well."
Humming in thought I placed Sora's badge in my inventory and then spoke up. "Well if everyone is good we should start digging our way out of here. I for one want to go right to the cave entrance and camp out there until this damn portion of the Exam ends. These caves seem a little bit too unstable for me at the moment." They both voiced agreement with my sentiment and Hina showed us where we had to dig.
Hina and I took turns slowly moving the surrounding earth into an arched tunnel out of our current predicament. It took the majority of the rest of the day as we wanted to be as sure as possible that it wouldn't collapse on us and the ground let out a few minor rumbles from time to time. As soon as we were free we had a unanimous agreement to just continue on and reach an outside exit which took the rest of the day. Shisui collapsed asleep almost as soon as we reached the cave entrance leaving Hina and I on watch. Pulling out a bed roll I put it over him and he curled up into it.
After that was done I sat down then leaned on the wall and looked outside the cave to the starry sky visible above. If I'm being honest with myself a large portion of me wanted to just leave this cave and sit outside under the sky but I couldn't do that if I wanted to pass so I refrained.
I looked over as Hina sat down next to me. We were silent for a while before she spoke up. "Would it be possible to take off my mask now?" My hands glowed green and not finding any spores in the air I nodded. She let out a sigh of relief and removed her mask for the first time in 3 days to take a deep breath of air. "That feels so much better."
I could see that she had bags under her eyes while her lavender eyes were bloodshot. I took off my mask as well and it was nice to feel the cool breeze from the outside flowing into the cave. "Do you want me to take a look at your eyes?"
"My eyes?"
"They look pretty bloodshot right now." Her hand reached for them before she thought better of it and then just huddled up, placing her chin on her knees.
"No, I just used them a bit too much in the last few days. They'll be fine."
"Alright." We sat in silence for a bit before she spoke again.
"Am I a bad ninja?" That was a bit out of left field there.
"What? Of course not. Where is this coming from?" She tightened her hold on her legs huddling into a smaller ball.
"I was terrified when the cave started collapsing." That's why she thinks she's a bad ninja. That's nothing to be ashamed of.
"So." I said plainly and she sharply looked up at me. "So what if you were terrified? You didn't start panicking and from what I saw you came out of the fight without a scratch whereas Shisui and I were injured in the fight." My brow scrunch up. "I guess that makes girls superior to boys then." She let out a light giggle that sounded just a tad hysterical to me so I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and pulled her closer. "Now that I've had some time to think about it I also think the Byakugan is better than the Sharingan."
"Hmph, I'm glad you've come to your senses." Her voice became haughty before she dissolved into giggles again and leaned into me more. "Thank you."
"No problem at all." We let silence fall between us and I felt her breathing get slower and slower until I could tell she was asleep. Creating a clone and having it pull a blanket over us before dismissing itself I looked back out into the starry sky.
Hours passed by slowly and when it was time I prodded Shisui awake for his watch with my chakra strings. He jerked awake as soon as I touched him and then looked over my way. I'm sure the sight of his face would have been comical to me but alas he was still wearing his mask. As it was he took a few seconds to process it and then he was up and about for his watch.
We didn't say anything to each other and simply sat there until the sun had risen over the horizon. As it did so I felt Hina stir and then suddenly tense before relaxing again.
"Good morning Hina." I heard her mutter something that might have been morning before she rose taking the blanket with her as she did so. I also caught what might have been a massive blush on her face before she turned away.
Not really willing to make a big deal out of it I simply handed out breakfast which we all ate quickly. As soon as we were done I felt the need to address the issue of what to do next with them. "Let me start off by saying that I have absolutely no desire to go back down into the cave. I could still hear it rumbling last night so it just isn't safe enough to go back down there. Honestly we got extremely lucky that the portion we were in merely trapped us and didn't crush us, so what are some of your ideas on what we should do next?"
Shisui had taken his mask off sometime during the night and his face scrunched up in thought. "I agree with not going back down into the cave. We have... how many badges again?"
"8 badges not including our own. I also disqualified a team on the first night as well so we took out 9 teams." He nodded at that.
"So we took out half the competition and the two teams that started the collapse are probably dead so 11 teams are out. That leaves 7 teams still in the cave and we probably have their target badge so they need three other badges. I think we could just sit here and let them kill themselves off." Hina seemed to agree as well so we spent the fourth day simply fortifying our position and sitting tight for now.
Nothing happened during the fourth day and night but on the fifth day we could hear a loud gonging sound resound throughout the cave signaling the end of the second phase. We had already packed away all our supplies and as soon as the gong finished ringing we walked out of the cave. Off in the distance I could see Aiko sitting under an umbrella next to a huge gong.
We made our way over and as we approached her she lazily waved at us. "Yo, it's the ankle biters from Konoha. First to finish again I see." She cracked her neck and pulled out a clipboard. "Well let's see here. You had team 35 as your target so show me what you got."
I was curious to know how she knew which team we were hunting when I never showed her the slip of paper I took out of the box but in the end I dismissed it as some sort of trick that I missed. Pulling out the 9 badges I laid them side by side in front of her and I could see her eyes widen briefly at the amount. "Careful with number 35. It has some sort of poison on it."
Her eyes met mine before she started to examine all of the badges. After a little while she set the last one down and wrote something down before nodding. "Team 44 passed with 13 points. Take a seat and wait for the other teams to show up."
We sat down in the shade of the umbrella and waited for the other teams to arrive. I would be happy if I never had to venture into a cave again but we had passed and the second phase of the Exams were done.
Age: 6 years - 0 months
Title: Rookie Root Shinobi
LVL: 19 - 21% to next LVL
HP: 1,230/1,230
Chakra: 34,648/34,648
Elemental Affinity: Water
STR: 130(156)
VIT: 123
END: 111
DEX: 141(155)
INT: 115(121.9)
WIS: 100(106)
LCK: 20
Points: 29
Money: 221,546