"Took you a while" Kiyomi muttered twisting her lips at Mana's direction. Maybe the blonde was worried that the trio that stopped her before had told her something disheartening or tried to play dirty, then again, she could've just been curious.
Meanwhile on the plain and wooden elevated stage Shibari turned at a large covered up spherical object and removed a dark yellow cover off of it revealing a bloated sphere of some sort of gooey and colorless liquid, on the bottom of the rather impressively sized unidentified object laid a bunch of consoles and four flat monitors.
"I was a little distracted by Gyllfa-san. She's a wrestler from Iwagakure and a fellow entertainer." Mana explained trying to reveal as much as possible without skipping too much of Shibari's show and briefing of the rules. Something told her that knowing all there is to be known about the assignment would be of great value. Still, she wanted to calm Kiyomi down in case she suspected foul play of some sort.
"Holy shit!" Kiyomi shrieked while at the same time snuffing her voice emitting a very undignified whine similar to that of an injured dog. "An actual wrestler!? I love wrestlers! I mean Kumogakure is where the real wrestling is at but still…" the Yamanaka future heiress playfully punched air as an expression of hype and happiness.
"This here is a tracking device, capable of keeping track of chakra signatures in a large area. Most of the time – an entire battlefield during times of battle." Shibari explained pointing at the watery sphere. The two teammates directed their attention at the briefing almost the same instant that the woman started talking again.
"Normally tracking you in the Forest of Death, where the survival drill will be taking place, would be difficult. There'd be too many large chakra signatures of giant sized predators that lurk inside, identifying the exact signature would also be a problem. That's where these come in…" the woman walked up to a large cardboard box and removed the top of it revealing a bunch of ordinary looking kunai with odd tags attached to them.
"These are designed by our sealing expert ninja to slowly drain you of your chakra, in rates so small and insignificant that it'd take entire days to even notice anything. They however emit a very barely felt signal with the signature traits of each individual user's chakra which will keep track of specific ninja inside." Shibari revealed pointing at the watery sphere that lit up with a crimson spark at its eastern side, as a demonstration, no doubt, the symbols above the red signal read "Like this".
"I wish those kunai kinda looked cooler… They're pretty bland." Meiko pouted rather indifferently before snickering about how silly her remark was.
A much more angry reaction came from the blacksmith's backside. A whole bunch of angry murmurs that were slowly evolving into a ruckus of raised voices. Lightly tantalized by the uneasiness of the genin, Shibari raised her hand and gestured for the loud side that they were allowed to speak.
"What does that mean? How would you tell whose chakra signature it is just by taking in a small amount of it? Does Konoha have our chakra signature samples? Isn't that a bit much? What if you decide to use that information for military purposes?" a familiar face from before yelled out, slipping out from under his hood. It was the same young man who previously scolded Mana for assuming that the vast number of participants had anything to do with long periods of peace or the allied nature of the countries involved.
This time the young man wore a symbol on his cloak, the forehead protector carrying the village insignia was not attached to a piece of cloth but instead sewn directly onto his hood, just like it was for his immensely sized one and frail and feminine figured looking teammates. Now that the young man had attracted attention to himself and his team, Mana had noticed how his shorter female teammate had her hands tied around one another and her fingers tensely pressed at her elbows and the young lady was quivering as if she was cold.
It made little sense for her overly sensitive reaction to be so clear. While the air certainly was cold, Mana didn't feel too uncomfortable under a simple autumnal coat whereas she wore a full body covering hood and had it cover her head and her face. It made little sense for her to be cold. The magician remembered her previous nasty feeling about the tall man of that same team and realized that maybe creepiness was a more common trait as the young lady seemed to be the reasonable one before.
Shibari stroke her tired eyes after lifting her glasses a little before explaining herself.
"Yes. Yes we do have your chakra samples, we do have the chakra samples of anyone taking the exams. You cannot be guaranteed we won't use them for military purposes as we cannot be guaranteed you won't kill someone inside of there or purposefully sabotage the exams. It's a common feeling of tension we'll have to live with, unless you want to turn back and head home to Getsugakure, Nacasa Doma, of Team Phobos?" Shibari inquired.
"We do not!" a firm and masculine voice from under the hood of the larger team member rudely cut down. Still visibly peeved over this whole situation the shorter male of the Getsugakure team kept on growling to himself and grinding his teeth.
"You know, it's kind of weird how you're a ninja and a magician and then there's that old lady and she turns out to also be a superstar wrestler too…" Meiko almost hummed out through a tune she was whistling just to entertain herself throughout the briefing.
"Quiet down." Kiyomi slammed her palm at the top of Meiko's head rudely shoving it downwards to shut the blacksmith down. The redhead just yelled out in pain louder as a result. Luckily enough everyone was still busy discussing the current revelations and verbal exchanges between themselves to be overly offended by Team Hokage's overly expressive nature.
"I thought I was the only one trying to be a ninja as well as an entertainer behind the scenes…" Mana admitted. "I guess the idea of hiding one's identity in plain sight is a bit older than me." She whispered much quieter than Meiko before her.
"Anyways, before this whole thing needed to be cleared out, I was about to explain the rules better. This here's a hunting/survival test. Before entering through that door you'll have to pick a file from the pile right on that table. Inside that file you'll find one name – the name of the person you need to eliminate. The file is an excerpt from that ninja's own ninja record file, obviously, sensitive information is sealed with utmost care to ensure protection of their country's secrets. It was also made during that person's graduation from the Academy day meaning that you'll only get the info on their skillset not too long after they graduated – predicting their current abilities is a part of the test. That person is your ticket to the semi-finals, eliminate them and move to the northern gate of the Forest of Death." Shibari explained before staring awkwardly at the bunch of genin staring back at her in a level of awkwardness not quite unlike that of her own.
"Questions?" she wondered as the woman had expected the crew to be a bit more proactive in their hunting/survival drill.
An athletically built young man with golden dyed hair and red facial tattoos marking their eyes and lines that went over his cheeks and down to his chin as well as the typical Kaguya clan facial tattoo on his forehead lifted his hand revealing an Iwagakure headband tied around his strong arm.
"Jekleifer Kaguya, Team Corundum from Iwagakure. So it's every person for themselves? I fail to see the teamwork aspect here. What if we see the name of our teammate in that file? Could you, please, clarify the team matters regarding this test?" the young man requested with a very polite tone and equally as restrained and well taught mannerisms. His skin and arms were too well defined, too clean and smooth to be a worker of the Iwagakure mines, they were very clearly artificially buffed up from scratch instead of being a result of hard work.
An energetic young lady wearing a maroon colored jacket smacked her teammate in the back with a smile similar in its intensity and goofiness to the monkey-like smiles which Meiko liked to adorn, the edged up strings of her short darker shade of teal colored hair fell on her face making her comically struggle to move all of her hair out of her face. She must've commended her teammate on a good question in that way.
Shibari sighed before scratching the side of her very tensely stretched back into a hair bun hairdo, she did so in such speed and carelessness that a string of her hair let loose and began maliciously ruining her rather firmly established first impression of a cold, strong and strict woman.
"Well… We haven't really considered the part where you may find your teammate's name in the file. Truth be told, there're thirty two teams here so the odds of it happening aren't that great. Anyways, the whole team is only eliminated if at least two of its members are eliminated and surrender their ticket to the semi-finals to other ninja. That means that one person in your team can, in theory, be eliminated and you'll be just fine. The only thing you may not do is trade or try and switch out your own files so you'll have to confirm your candidate in secrecy with a staff member before entering." Shibari concluded.
"So at least two people in a team will be required for the semi-finals' exam…" Mana uttered to herself already beginning to count the chickens before they hatched. She realized that to trouble her head about the semi-finals was not overly wise however she was concerned with the entirety of the exams and not just a single round.
"If we find one of our names in the files we'll strike a deal of some sort, right?" Kiyomi suggested. "Let's not just go on backstabbing people, right?"
An uneasy sensation began burrowing in Mana's gut. She just felt like she was going to get Meiko's or Kiyomi's name and that this whole thing will blow out of proportions. It was just her natural luck… She couldn't fail, she couldn't allow herself to be eliminated for the sake of the team because in that case she'd fly right out of the team after being eliminated. Kiyomi and Meiko probably didn't know that and they wanted and deserved a shot at the semi-finals and finals just as much as anyone else did.
With certain anxiety Mana approached the pile of files spread in front of her and with a lightly shaking hand she reached out and pulled one out. It was like her heart had gone cold, she had the name in her hands, just inside the file but she didn't want to peek in. She didn't want that confirmation that she'd need to backstab her own friend in order to pass. Luckily enough Kiyomi and Meiko didn't pester Mana to show the name written inside the file, no one checked the files out in the open where someone could've taken a peek from behind. The names inside those files were astoundingly sensitive information.
The teams were then lined up by the entry and let inside, one by one. Mana stood behind a rather unimpressive looking young man with flappy and frail looking arms, stature even shorter than Mana's and very underdressed for the season, choosing to wear just a light blue sleeveless shirt. The young man proudly tied his headband protector right on top of his forehead like it was meant to be worn. Mana could recall seeing this boy in the Konoha Ninja Academy but he was younger than her, in the later generation that graduated one year after Mana did.
Right before the magician stepped in between the area outside the forest and the quiet darkness of absolute death that laid inside the forest she closed her eyes. Sounds of rustling leaves with no end to the height of where the rustling came from or how far away it came from in each direction. The darkness swallowed her whole and just as the magician opened her eyes on the other side did she witness a swarm of giant centipedes engaging the kids right there and up close to the southern entrance to the forest.
Meiko shrieked in joy, the prospect of battle must've excited her as she rushed at the gigantic thing with unheard of glee but Kiyomi's firm hand grabbed Meiko by her collar as well as Mana by hers and with great force dragged the two away.
"Don't waste your energy. Let's see if we can sit this out…" Kiyomi whispered before hearing ear deafening buzzing and looking up only to see a swarm of wasps at least three times her size diving in down to join into the feast of the young flesh let in to feed the forest.
"Storage Seal Rank-C: Unseal!" Meiko yelled out opening a large scroll and unleashing a flock of burning shuriken at the diving in swarm. It slowed the offensive on that front down somewhat but the swarm redirected their efforts elsewhere. The blacksmith merely tossed the scroll up in the air before touching a sticking out piece of her chest plate, unsealing a short one handed sword and jumping at the giant insect swarm, leaping from one wasp to another, slashing at them blindly like a madman and covering herself in sizzling white goo that shot out from the wounds. The poison that the wasps had within their system must've also been corrosive, as well as served the delivery function that blood served in most other species of animals.
"That idiot! She's wasting chakra augmenting her body to protect against that acidic goo. She's wasting stamina by fighting those things too! We need to get out of here fast!" Kiyomi grunted out seriously raging at Meiko and showing obscene gestures the likes of which should never be elaborated on.
"Aim at the lower part of the wings!" Mana screamed out from the depths of her lungs, she figured that Meiko wanted to fight it through the unexpected offense of the insectoid assailants so at the very least she should do so meaningfully.
Right as instructed the blacksmith began lobbing off the wasp wings one by one, disabling the insects completely by making them smash down raising storm of wood chips and bark flying all over the place as they smashed and busted down trees in their trajectory of freefall. Covered in sizzling acidic substance inside of the wasp's bodies and past their highly armored shells the blacksmith leaped off with a confident grin. The places where the acid stuck on her were lightly swollen but the blacksmith's system managed to fend off more gruesome effects of corrosion than just a light swelling.
Kiyomi angrily grabbed Meiko by the ear as the three began fleeing the total madness of the area right by the entry point. More and more genin entered the fray beginning to fight the insects off. The girls tried to focus on simply evading the battle to the best of their abilities so they could find a pocket of empty space to dash at high speeds through, the primary objective was to get away and find a safe spot. Then read out the names inside the files and come up with a strategy of some sort.
An even larger dark red colored centipede blocked off the girls' path, a loud popping sound alerted them to a ninja tool blowing up nearby. The trio tried to evade the explosive force but there was none to evade – only purple gas came out, poisonous gas which obviously the insect was immune to. Most of the more advanced poisons targeted very specific and complicated areas of the human body, areas and organs which insects such as those in the Forest of Death may not have had. Only the most primitive poisons could've worked on these beings.
A swooping sound of a blade cutting through air and sizzling sound of an explosive tag blowing the entire area up followed by a powerful explosion which knocked Mana off her feet and nearly deafened her completely.
"The gas bombs were flammable too…" she realized. That was one sneaky long range genin taking on that centipede, or maybe he was already rushing at her? Could he have identified one of the girls as his target? If the files really did have the Academy information on Mana it would've been easy to identify the young woman she'd grown up to be from the chubby cheeked brat in the picture. A steel string with a powerful scythe attached to it lobbed the centipede's head off before spinning in an erratic and impressively fast manner shredding the armored tissue and the goo inside to mush alike.
"Let's go!" Kiyomi shouted out pulling Mana by her elbow away from the madness.
Further away a large snake was assaulting a bunch of kids. Mana pointed at the trio and looked at Meiko with shock.
"Look there, it's Menna, Tala and Tiwul, Izem-san's team from Sunagakure!" she shouted out, her surprise was interrupted by Tala's sand bullets tearing holes through the snake's flesh and leaving it holey as a chunk of fermented cheese. Tiwul used her weapon puppetry to control a massive hammer in a manner that smashed the incapacitated snake dead.
"Can we just can it with the friend reunion and get out of here!?" Kiyomi angrily yelled out, all the yelling and ordering around was beginning to make her lose her voice a bit.
"You're just jealous you don't know Menna, Tala and Tiwul from Sunagakure…" Meiko grinned with that signature monkey-like dumb smile before Kiyomi remembered that the redhead had a yet untouched ear that she had to be pulled for great and highly painful effect.
And thus began the second part of the Chuunin Exams!