Hey guys, onto the next chapter, some of these will be short like this one, not all of them will be this way. Now the second exam will be a little different, more will be explained in the chapter. As for teams, the eight that made it through are the rookies, guy's team, kurotsuchi's, an unidentified team, kabuto's, and gaara's. Just letting you all know.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Naruto stood next to his team, he didn't know why the woman asked them to line up behind her.
"Alright maggots, you have one objective, in this forest there are four snakes with special marking on them. Your goal is to locate one and bring it to the tower, trust me I will know if you do. Now you have two days to do this, if you are not in the tower or failed at the end of the two days you will be hunted down by the ANBU and retrieved. Now, each team will be marked by a certain color on their wrists, this will just let us identify you in the event your body is too mangled to identify by other means. Now, come forward with your team and receive your marks and you will be escorted to a gate by a Chunin." With that finished each team one by one came up to receive their marks. Naruto sighed in disappointment, their color is pink. From what he could tell the sand team got a yellow mark, the other rookies got green and blue, and Kurotsuchi got red. The team from the grass got the color black, Naruto wished they could trade colors with someone, but alas Sakura liked it too much.
"Team Seven, please come with me." Naruto's eyes widened, it was Hayate! Naruto jogged over to join the Jonin.
"Hayate, what are you doing here? I thought you were a Jonin?" Hayate coughed and sighed.
"I am Jonin, but I am late to an appointment in the tower here so I figured I'd at least escort your team to your gate." Sakura coughed into her hand and Hayate raised a questioning eyebrow.
"Do you know Naruto sir?" Hayate chuckled.
"I've met him once, he's special to a very important person to me, so I'm trying to look out for him. Anyway, let's get going, you lot are located on the back side of the fence." The team nodded and followed Hayate to their gate, excited but scared they began their journey to their gate.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
"So when he got to the farm, after all week of traveling in the mission, the guy stops and says, 'I left my keys at home!' So we had to go all the way back, grab the keys and come back. It was so stupid." Naruto busted out laughing while Sakura giggled. Hayate smiled lightly as they were approaching their destination.
"Well here we are guys, Gate 27-b. You three be careful, it's not the forest of death for nothing. I'll be waiting in the building for you three, later." The sickly Jonin jumped over the gate and took off through the tree's towards the tower. Naruto turned and smiled at his teammates.
"This will be easy, we have Sasuke with his Sharingan, I can corner the snake with my clones, and Sakura can hold it!" Sakura looked sick.
"Oh hell but no! I am NOT holding that, that thing! Oh no no no, you can hold it Naruto." Naruto laughed and nodded.
"Alright alright, so when do we know it's ok to go in?" A loud buzz went off and the gate flung open, a now visible green light on the right side of the door signaled its release.
"Well, that solves that. Let's go!" Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura run into the forest, not knowing of the ninja pursuing them.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
"Mizure, Kagumo, let's go, we need to get this snake by night fall." The two male's fell in line behind the black haired Kurotsuchi. She took off through the trees, her eyes scanning the floor as they go. She found three snakes but none bearing a mark. She was getting frustrated, she wanted to show her fiancé up and win these exams. All of the sudden a scream rang out through the forest, the team stopped in their tracks.
"What the hell was that Kurotsuchi!" She turned to the boy, he might be an Inuzuka, but he reeked of fear and was a natural beta. His partner was killed early in his career and due to his beta behavior the Inuzuka never assigned him a new partner. She growled out as she held a fist up, back of her hand to the two, she motioned two fingers twice to the left, and one finger thrice to the right. She took off towards the front, towards the scream. Kurotsuchi looked over the scene unfolding, a silver haired man infront of a large snake with a banner tied around its neck. She grimaced seeing the mangled corpses of the two Genin of this mans team, she had seen death, but this was terrible, bones sticking out from every angle, blood pooling under their bodies. She saw the silver haired man make a hand sign and his jutsu activated, chakra covered his hand, and moving with the speed vastly superior to that of a Genin he fought the snake. She was surprised when she saw the silver haired boy fighting the snake, but in a flash the snake swallowed the boy whole. She saw the banner on its neck fall to the ground and quick as lightning she made a dash to the banner on the ground. She never noticed the large tail hit her, nor did she know about the bones snapping in her back or the bone protruding from her leg as she slammed into the tree hard enough to leave an imprint.
"KUROTSUCHI!" Mizure screamed out bringing the attention of the snake to his self, he shook in place terrified at the gleam in the snakes eyes. A large boy jumped from the other tree bringing his large stone war hammer down on top of the snakes head. This boy never got to go back to his mother and apologize for yelling at her, he would never get to hold his baby sister who was to be born in three months time. He would however know how it feels to be constricted. The snake wrapped its tail around the boy, he screamed and in an instant a splash of gore erupted from the snakes tail. Mizure felt alone, scared and alone. The snake turned itself towards Mizure and he fell to his knees, dropping the kunai to his feet he saw his broken teammate, the pile of skin and bones he called friend, and for the first time in his life, he wept.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Naruto and his team smiled, they finally found a snake, it was huge! This snake easily fifty feet long but it seemed like it was young, naïve, they had the chance, and they took it. Naruto jumped down at it through the trees, Sasuke threw several shuriken with string attached towards the snake, and Sakura made hand seals for her genjutsu. The shuriken collided and bounced off of each other wrapping around various trees and limbs of said trees. Naruto holding out his hand grabbed one wire and used it to bounce up, his feet catching the one above him he rocketed towards the snake. Sakura smiled her genjutsu in place, she made the snake fall asleep just as Naruto was closing in. Naruto pulled a hand back and threw the hardest left hook he ever made right into the snakes head. A large crack and pop resounded across the clearing, the snake vanished! Naruto stood popping his index finger back into place, he was very confused, the snake vanished but it left behind the banner. Naruto bent down raising the banner to see a simple mark, it had a snake circling around and biting its tail, in the circle was a set of numbers, 5, 6, 3, and 4. Naruto sighed as he rolled the banner up into a cylindrical shape, he stuffed it into his kunai pouch and turned to his teammates, they looked winded.
"What's wrong with you two?" Sasuke gave him a look that promised pain.
"You, you should know, mister leave us in the dirt!" Naruto and Sasuke chuckled at Sakura, they took a rest stop when Naruto heard something he wish he wouldn't have.
"KUROTSUCHI!" Naruto felt dread and nearly vanished towards the noise. Sasuke cursed as he heard the yell as well. He looked to Sakura and handed her his scrolls.
"Sakura, take these and cloak yourself in a Genjutsu, keep safe. I'll return with Naruto, if what I think happen did happen, then god help us all." Sasuke took off after Naruto, his trail wasn't hard to miss, the snapped trees, claw marks, and even in some places burned bark. He saw a red light in front of him and he pushed chakra into his leg muscles, pushing him faster even though it was extremely painful. Within seconds he was behind Naruto who was expelling a black mist and red chakra from his body. Sasuke reached out to touch him but he reeled his hand back from the heat the red chakra put out. HE noticed Naruto slowing and he reciprocated, Naruto dropped to the forest floor and jumped into the clearing, Sasuke hot on his trail jumped down to join him. They were greeted with a large snake, a broken and battered Kurotsuchi, and a dead boy. Sasuke grimaced when Naruto vanished and appeared next to Kurotsuchi, he acted as if his very touch could hurt her more than she already was and he snapped. Sasuke felt dread and malicious intent wash over him and the clearing, the snake curled itself close ready to strike, that's when Sasuke saw it, Naruto wasn't radiating the red chakra, he was radiating the black mist, and it covered his form. Naruto stood and his red slitted eyes burrowed into the slitted blue-green on the snake, he pulled his fist back and launched it forward with a yell. The mist launched forward every particle becoming denser and denser by the second. The mist slammed into the snake the pieces of mist coagulating with the snakes own blood to form dark crystals which with a clench of his hand wrenched out of the snake shredding it to pieces before it vanished in a puff of smoke leaving a slime covered brown haired boy Naruto identified as Kurotsuchi's teammate and a silver haired boy. Naruto felt a hand on his shoulder and he sneered ready to strike at whoever it was, Naruto stopped as he saw it was Sasuke. Sasuke looked Naruto dead in the eyes with defiance, he saw the pain, hate, darkness, the pit that one never comes back from, it filled Naruto's soul.
"You're not going to be of any help like that, get the two that is still breathing from the snake, and I'll get Kurotsuchi." Naruto was about to growl back a defiant response but he saw himself in a reflection from blood, it even terrified himself. The black mist absorbed itself back into Naruto's body and he made clones to pick up the two boys and they went to join Sakura.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
"Oh my god! What happened!?" Sakura ran to meet up with her two teammates her concern flashing brazenly across her face.
"They were attacked by a snake larger and stronger than the one we had. If it wasn't for Naruto using some jutsu I've never seen before we would have been next." Sakura fell in line as the three and the two clones led the charge towards the tower. Suddenly a large presence washed over the three and made them stop in their tracks.
"Why hello there, Sasuke."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Cliff hanger!