This is my first story. Don't hate for no reason. Will take fair criticism though.
I do not own Naruto or anything related. That goes to Masashi Kishimoto
CHAPTER 18
One month after Team 8's break from missions the genin were waiting in Training Ground 8 confused and worried because for the first time, their sensei was late.
"Do you think Kurenai-sensei is okay?" Hinata asked
"Oh she's fine. She probably woke up late or something."
"Actually it is more probable that she is being held back by some sort of interaction." Shino pushed up his glasses.
"Yeah that might be it too."
They continued talking over it until in a swirl of leaves Kurenai appeared.
"I'm sorry I'm late. I had a meeting and it ran long," she sighed.
"It's okay." Hinata replied.
"Actually the meeting concerned you all. I have nominated you all to participate in the upcoming chunin exams." Kurenai handed out some papers.
Naruto grinned, "Awesome! It's the next step to becoming hokage."
"It is also a necessary step in becoming a clan head." Shino admits.
"And I will get to show my clan how strong I am," Hinata says excitedly.
Kurenai smiles, "Sign these forms by next week. You have to turn them in on exam day. It's next week in the academy, room 301."
Slightly concerned Hinata asks, "Are you sure we are ready?"
"I believe you all have the skills required to become chunin. And though you may not have the experience, the only way to build that is to actually experience things, so I signed you up. You may not pass or become chunin but it will still help you grow."
Hinata nodded, "Makes sense."
"Sure, now start training, We're still training all week up until the last day so you can rest and prepare."
"Hai!"
-next week-
Naruto and Hinata were on their way to the academy, ready for their exams. But on the way they heard a cry for help. But running over they saw two girls, one with a fan on her back and the other wearing a catsuit and holding a boy by the collar.
"Hey girl! Put the kid down!" Naruto shouted.
The girl in the catsuit shouted, "I'm not a girl!"
Taking a closer look Hinata asks, "Then why are you wearing makeup?"
"It's not make up, it's war paint!"
"Sure lady," Naruto dismisses, "But I'm pretty sure the third Hokage won't appreciate some suna-nin beating up his grandson."
"I am a boy!", the boy seethed angrily. However he did put down the boy.
"You okay Konohamaru?" Naruto asked
The boy gave a nervous smile, "Sure boss. I'm just gonna get out of here." The boy sprinted as far as he could.
"Now do you three want to explain why you're here bullying a kid instead of on your way to the chunin exams?"
The two suna-nin paled, "Three?"
Hinata nodded, "There's another of you up in the trees."
Jumping down from the tree a boy with red hair and a gourd on his back faces his teammates, "You two are an embarrassment. Let's go."
The other two suna-nin nod and walk behind the boy, "Okay Gaara."
Following their example Naruto and Hinata walk away, having to meet up with Shino before they get to the Chunin exams. However after talking a few steps they hear a shout, "You! What's your name?"
Turning around they see Gaara staring, "Uzumaki Naruto. And yours?"
"Sabaku no Gaara," He seethes and clutches his head, "During the exams, mother will have your blood." And without another word the three suna-nin walk away, the first two following after the red haired boy.
Naruto rolls his eyes in slight concern but just turns to Hinata and says, "We have to go too or we're going to be late meeting Shino."
"Right!"
Walking down the street Naruto heard a voice in his head, 'I sensed my brother in that boy.'
'Your brother?,' Naruto asked.
'Shukaku, the one tailed tanuki.' Kurama responded.
'His jinchuriki seemed unstable.'
'They tend to be. You should watch out for him.'
'Thanks Kurama!'
With only an hour before the test starts the two walk a few blocks before they run into Shino. They confirm with each other that they have anything they might need, remove all their restrictive seals, then walk the remaining few blocks to get to the academy.
Walking up the stairs they spot a large crowd surrounding two larger ninja. However, completely ignoring the complaining genin they sneak past to get to the stairs. They all knew they had only gone up one flight of stairs so the room 301 that everyone else was gathered around had to be fake. However, they did not want to draw the attention of the other genin and give them some help.
But as they sneaked past the cluster Hinata saw someone she recognized, "Neji?"
Turning, Hinata weaved through the crowd towards the person she had saw, another Hyuga, tapping his shoulder she whispered, "This is not the actual exam room, we are only on the second floor."
The boy rolled his eyes and walked out from the crowd, "I know Hinata-san, this is an act so that my team seems weaker than we are."
Following their teammate out of the crowd the girl seemed angry, "What the heck Neji! You blew our cover."
"I apologize, my failure cousin decided to intervene." Neji scoffed.
Naruto stepped in to defend his girlfriend, "Hey! She's not a failure. And because you're family, maybe you shouldn't call her that."
A boy beside them in green spandex shouted, "That was very unyouthful Neji-san!"
Neji rolls his eyes, "She is a Hyuga who is terrible at the Jyuken. She is so terrible at the jyuken they moved her to the branch house. But alas it was fate."
Barely containing his rage Naruto seethed, "Look I would love to go into all the reasons why Hinata-chan is amazing and strong and why you are such an ignorant prick with a ten-foot pole up your ass, however we all have a test to get to." Turning away he walks away and up the stairs, Shino and Hinata following closely behind.
They were walking towards the doors of the exam room but Naruto turned to his teammates for one last check up, but he turned to see Hinata sad and slightly disappoingted with her conversation with Neji. She had hoped that when she moved to the branch house she would have the opportunity to reconnect with her cousin.
Holding Hinata by the shoulders, Naruto says, "You are not a failure, no matter what that prick says. You are so strong, and it may not be in the traditional Hyuga way, but you are still strong. So cheer up because we are about to destroy those exams. Because me, you, and Shino, are the strongest genin here."
Hinata gives a light smile, "You are really good at motivational speeches."
Naruto gives a light peck on Hinata's forehead, "I try. Now let's get in there and kick some butt!"
Turning to Shino, they nod to each other and confidently walk through the double doors. Inside they saw over a hundred genin from a multitude of different villages, and yet Team 8 kept their confident looks. However, they still didn't want to gather too much attention so they walked to the side. They had been waiting for roughly 30 minutes for the test to start when they heard the screech of, "Sasuke-kun you're here!"
Looking over Team 8 saw Yamanaka Ino and Haruno Sakura doing everything they could to draw the attention of their beloved Uchiha Sasuke. However, they were simultaneously drawing the attention of everyone else in the room. Hinata was about to walk over and say hello when Naruto held her back by the shoulder. She looked at him confused but he just shook his head and Shino spoke up, "It is beneficial for us to draw the least amount of attention."
Understanding her teammates point she stood back next to Naruto just leaning on his shoulder but, unfortunately for them, Kiba spotted them. He waved and shouted, "Hey Hinata! You're here too?"
Naruto instantly palmed his face and while Shino's expression made no major change he was just as upset, Hinata began to get a little nervous, now that she was the center of attention, "Hello Kiba-san."
As Team 8 walks towards their former classmates one of them drones, "So all the rookies are here. How troublesome."
Again Naruto palms his forehead again and Shino's eyebrows begin to twitch, "You know Shikamaru for a Nara you make some dumb decisions. Maybe this is how I manage to keep putting you in a stalemate when we play Shogi."
Shikamaru rolls his eyes, "No, your troublesome strategies are just too hard to predict and counter. Besides, I didn't say anything dumb." To this Ino and Choji looked shocked. Not even their sensei managed to get Shikamaru to stalemate.
"Actually you did." The rookie nine quickly turned to the new voice. It was a young man roughly in his late teens, a Konoha nin. He had gray hair, circle glasses, and black eyes. He wore a purple outfit with bandages tied around his waist.
"You informed every other competitor here that you all are rookie genin, making you a target for all of them." The man said.
"Troublesome, I knew I shouldn't have come. Why are you telling us this?" Shikamaru asks.
Kabuto gives a kind smile, "Seeing as we are fellow Konoha-nin and that you have all been given such a disadvantage," The rookie nine glared at Shikamaru at this, "I feel it is my responsibility to at least give you some advice."
Kabuto takes out a stack of cards from his kunai pouch and says, "These are my Ninja Info cards. They have information stored on every shinobi here for the exams. If there is anyone you would want information on, I will provide it."
"Rock Lee of Konoha," Sasuke spoke up.
Naruto follows with, "Sabaku no Gaara."
"Aww that's no fun, you already know their names." Kabuto fake pouts as he swipes two cards from his deck.
"Well first is Rock Lee. He is a genin who is about a year older than all of you. He is a part of Team Gai with teammates Hyuga Neji and Higurashi Tenten led by Maito Gai. His taijutsu has improved explosively over the past year since becoming a genin, however all of his other attributes are atrocious, his ninjutsu being especially bad. He has 20 D-ranks and 11 C-rank missions on his record."
The image on the card displayed an image of Rock Lee. It had been the boy in the green spandex they had met earlier. Off to the side Sasuke seemed to be deep in thought.
Inserting chakra into the second card Kabuto continues talking, "Sabaku no Gaara is from Sunagakure, a fresh genin just like you. His abilities are all completely unknown but what's surprising is that he comes back from all of his missions, 8 C-ranks and even a B-rank, without a scratch."
While most of the rookie nine adopted looks of complete disbelief, Naruto squinted in suspicion. But after Kabuto put the cards away Kabuto asked, "Is there any other information you might need?"
Naruto was about to ask a question when a voice boomed, "Welcome genin to the first test of the genin exams! Please turn in your exam forms at the front to receive your seat number!"
Looking around they saw Konoha chunins and jonins along the walls of the room. It too some time but after about 10 minutes every genin had received their seat number. Soon after the Konoha nin along the wall began to distribute a paper as a man at the front began to explain, "My name is Morino Ibiki and the first test of the Chunin exams is a written evaluation. There are nine questions however you will receive a tenth at the 45 minute mark. Each question is worth one point and each team needs twenty to pass. However, if even one teammate gets 0 points the entire team fails. If at any point you are caught cheating 2 points will be deducted from your score, therefore if you are caught five times you and your team immediately fails. You have 45 minutes until the final question. You may begin."
Everyone flipped over the question. And slowly Naruto's confidence in his own intelligence slowly dimmed. The first question was calculus, the second was advanced physics, and the third was a cryptogram. Each question was more and more complicated than the last.
'This can't be it. I don't know how to answer any of these.' Naruto thought. He was going to look around when he thought, 'Wait! I can't cheat or I'll…" In that instant Naruto came to a realization, 'I have to cheat! That's why we only lose two points every time they catch us cheating. First step: finding who to cheat off of.'
Discreetly looking around he tried finding someone who would give him the correct answers. It took Naruto a minute but eventually he found someone who was filling out the exam way too quickly for a supposedly struggling genin but what clued him in was what seemed to be an imprint of a flak jacket on the "genin's" shirt. Next Naruto flipped over his paper, infused his pen with chakra then began to draw all over the back of it. He was drawing when suddenly a kunai whizzed past his ear.
"Examinee 79, you have been caught cheating therefore you and your teammates have failed. Leave or we will remove you."
Turning to face the failed genin, he watched as the failed genin was carried out of the room despite all of his desperate cries. Returning to his paper he continued to draw all over the back of the paper, designing a seal. And when there was only 5 minutes before the tenth question Naruto activated it.
Suddenly smoke exploded from his seal too fast for anyone else to discover it's source. And there was so much it was hard for anyone to see, so using the cover he activated a second seal to make both seals fade away and quickly swapped papers with the undercover chunin, erasing the other shinobi's name and replacing it with his own.
The smoke cleared quickly but it was enough time for Naruto to get his answers, confident that he would pass this test.
"Time for the last question genin," Ibiki Morino shouted, "However there are some additional rules for this question. If you take the next question and get it wrong you will be banned from ever taking another chunin exam ever again. So you will be allowed to leave now, however if one person leaves, the entire team fails."
"That's not fair!" Kiba cried.
"You can leave if you don't like it." Ibiki responded. This immediately shut Kiba up but many others were discouraged by the price of failure. Many hands went up and many teams began to exit. Slowly the numbers dwindled but what troubled Naruto was that he could see Hinata getting nervous, ready to give up. Before inspiring her to stay he let the crowd thin out as much as possible but just before she raised her hand Naruto shouted, "Are you done with your mind games? You don't even have the power to ban us from becoming chunin. Besides, it's been ten minutes, are you ever going to give us the question?"
Ibiki immediately snapped to Naruto, "So you are okay with failing?
"Yeah," Naruto shrugged, "I can still accomplish my dreams as a genin. So are you going to give us the question or not?"
Though Naruto was staring down the proctor out of the corner of his eyes he was happy to see Hinata's hand slowly go back down. And a smile slowly spread across Ibiki's lips, "No one else?"
Seeing the genin's resolve Ibiki continued, "Well…for everyone who stayed…You passed!"
There was a long silence after that statement so Naruto asked, "We passed?"
Ibiki nodded, "You all pass. When you become chunin you will receive some risky missions, and you are not allowed to turn them down just because of some risk."
"Then what was the point of the first nine questions," A random genin asked
The proctor removed the bandanna covering his head and continued, "Information gathering. Sometimes information is so important for your village that you will need to get it at all costs. So you all need to know how to gather said information."
Ibiki takes a second to retie this bandanna then continues, "However, wrong information is just as dangerous as no information, so be warned make sure that your source is veritable."
Ibiki was going to continue but at that moment something crashed through the window and pinned him behind a banner that read: I am your sexy and single second proctor, Mitarashi Anko!
Standing in front of said banner was a purple haired woman wearing a trench coat, a fish-net shirt and a short brown skirt. "Hello little genin, I am your next proctor!"
She paused to scan the room then asked, "Seventy-eight genin? You let this many pass Ibiki? You're really losing your touch."
Emerging from behind the banner Ibiki growled, "You're early Anko! Besides, there's some good genin this year."
She rolls her eyes, "Yeah sure Ibiki. At least half of them will fail my exam"
Then facing the genin she barked, "Meet me at the 44th training ground by noon. If you're late you fail." And with that she shunshined out of the room.
To be Continued…
I will post every one to two weeks. Thank you for reading.
