A bit earlier. Original Uzumaki Naruto
We walked up to a training ground I knew. Heh… way back when, I trashed two booths here. Wonder if the wildlife's still just as cocky.
A tall chain-link fence blocked our way to a forest of massive trees. Shi no Mori—the Forest of Death, that's what they called this place. Gigantic trees, nearly a hundred meters tall, and the local fauna matched. Basically, everything was the same as ever.
When everyone finally made it, Anko started her speech, and I got to checking out the crowd.
All my old classmates passed the first stage, same as Guy's team. There were also a few more Konoha teams—one of them had Kabuto with two shinobi I didn't recognize. Suna's team—the one with the Kazekage's kids—made it through too, along with a couple other Suna teams. Then there were teams from Rain, one from Hidden Waterfall, and one from Grass. And in that last one sat a very well-known shinobi who, for now, was disguised and not drawing attention.
But he got mine. I turned my head his way.
Hiruzen's student. One of the Sannin. An S-rank international criminal. Orochimaru. The guy was squatting with his "bros" about ten meters from me. Feminine face, and a Chinese-style straw hat on his head. Right now, with that nasty grin on his face, the three of them looked like some local street hoodlums.
This chunin exam was clearly not your standard one. Not only was Gaara a straight-up monster, according to the intel, but some deserter of this caliber also squeezed his way in here.
My meta knowledge was still with me. And I knew this specific snake was chasing two goals at once.
First: he was looking for a vessel for himself. Orochimaru has a technique where—like I understand it—he swaps bodies with his chakra, grabbing the vessel's chakra and genes along with it. He has to find a new body every three years, because all the bodies he's taken start breaking down over time, eventually rejecting Orochimaru and straight-up rotting. And an exam like this is a perfect place to find a good candidate—maybe someone with strong enough genes not only to be a "spare," but also something interesting to dissect, figuratively and literally.
Second, the main one: he was planning an attack on the Leaf, and Hiruzen's murder. Between him and his teacher—the Third Hokage, Hiruzen—there's old beef. Orochimaru's still pissed his sensei didn't name him successor and didn't make him the Fourth Hokage. Plus, as I know, the old man also didn't let the poor little snake go around gutting Konoha citizens… and the snake didn't listen, which ended with him getting exiled. So from Orochimaru's point of view, this was Big and Righteous Revenge.
For all that, Orochimaru cut a deal with the Kazekage, who also wouldn't mind hitting the Leaf. Right now the Sannin came for the first goal, and also—apparently—to do some recon and keep his finger on the pulse for the second.
That's enough for me to wait until this clown goes deeper into the woods and then, from the bottom of my kind heart, smack him so hard they'd be collecting bits of him all over the Forest of Death. Like, who the hell does he think he is?
But why rush?
I could do the opposite—let him pull off his plans. Because I could squeeze some profit out of him, and it came down to three points.
First, and the biggest one: according to my meta knowledge, Orochimaru—crooked as hell but still—will later, during the third stage of the exam, resurrect the First and Second Hokage to fight Hiruzen. I once looked into Edo Tensei—Impure World Reincarnation—but the technique isn't really polished, and Orochimaru might add some interesting details to the jutsu. I could just steal them by watching and copying from the sidelines. That alone is a nice little bonus. But even more important: his resurrection will 100% work, and it won't bring any backlash onto me.
In this world, dragging the dead back is considered disgustingly vile. If I resurrected the First and Second Hokage of the Leaf myself, they wouldn't exactly be eager to help me. But if Orochimaru does it, and then I help beat him—now that's a whole different story. I'll definitely get at least a shot at finding out something from Hashirama and Tobirama. At minimum, I'll get to see real Mokuton. And maybe, if the stars line up, the First will tell me how he learned Sage Mode—how he managed to absorb natural chakra spread across the entire planet.
Second point: Orochimaru will bring an army with him. The Gato cartel is almost done for. And that army can be taken and burned as expendable resources.
I can always delete Orochimaru—before the exam, after the exam, doesn't matter. I know he's hard to kill. But against my power, he's got nothing… He'll be a puppet in my hands: do what I need, and die when I need.
Thinking all that, I stared right at the disguised snake like he was already my slave, and like some scene out of a gachimuchi vid, I bit my lip and slowly shook my head.
He noticed, and no… he didn't start staring back. Instead, he let out that long tongue and slowly licked his lips.
Heh-heh. This guy's in the know too.
Too bad it wasn't very authentic, since Orochimaru was in a female body right now.
Luckily for my girls—and especially for the integrity of their mental health—they didn't notice. Though some dude standing nearby kept side-eyeing me and the snake like he was thinking:
'Bro, are you even okay? Why are you flirting with that scarecrow? Look at the examiner's tits—she's a goddess compared to that Grass kunoichi!'
After that little performance, my thoughts slid to the third point of my "profit." From my meta knowledge, I'm guessing Orochimaru's currently tied to Danzo—the already-fired elder who's supposedly got no power anymore, since he "doesn't have" Root ANBU operatives. Except I know he does have some. And if he has some, then what? Then he needs to share. Ahem.
I mean, it doesn't massively bother me, but it still annoys me that there's a radical old bastard sitting around with a mini—maybe even a mini-mini—army that he can use to cause trouble. On top of that, that radical old bastard has Shisui's eye, which is supposedly insanely strong, and I wouldn't mind having it myself. And since he's connected to Orochimaru, I'll use the snake to shove both those dangerous elements into the grave—and shove their resources into my pocket.
Honestly, I won't even have to manipulate Orochimaru much. He'll do almost everything himself. The snake's probably already calculating how much force he needs against the Leaf—or rather, since you can't build that overnight, the forces are basically ready already, and this visit is just the final touches and scouting. And to make him mobilize forces he doesn't have, but Danzo does… I was already sketching out a plan.
Putting on a normal face, I gave Sakura a promising look. She immediately flinched and turned to me.
"Um… Naruto, sorry, but I feel like you just thought of something I'm not gonna like."
Holy shit. She's perceptive…
Hinata, reacting to her words, turned to us with interest.
"Don't worry about it," I said, putting a hand on Sakura's shoulder. "I'll tell you later…"
"Hm…" My teammate got super suspicious.
"It'll… help you on your Path," I said, keeping it short.
Sakura thought for a second, then nodded firmly and turned back to the examiner. Hinata, watching this, threw us a weird look, shrugged, and copied Sakura's motion.
Meanwhile, Anko said, "…But before we start, you need to sign this paper." She waved it. "Here you confirm that during the second stage of the chunin exam, the examiners are not responsible for your life! This is serious. Some of you won't leave this forest!"
She finished with a big smile and looked over the crowd. Someone immediately had something to say.
"So the exam is that dangerous…" Shikamaru muttered, unhappy as hell.
Anko took it like a question and answered with obvious glee. "You have no idea how bad it is. This place is full of mutated animals. Not only are they way bigger than normal, a lot of them are extremely poisonous."
"What do we have to do in the exam?" Ino asked, raising her hand next to Shikamaru.
"Yeah, I'm getting to that. Hand these out."
Mitarashi passed sheets to a genin nearby and continued.
"In order. After you sign, your whole team goes to those shinobi over there." She pointed at ninjas in the distance hanging curtains on some beams. "They'll issue you either a Heaven Scroll or an Earth Scroll."
She pulled them from behind her back and showed them off: a light one and a dark one, with kanji in the middle.
"Then you'll be assigned to one of forty-four gates, and at the appointed time, they'll be opened. The exam itself is to obtain two different scrolls," she said, holding them forward so even the dumbest could follow, "and unseal them in the tower in the center of the forest."
Then Anko hid the scrolls behind her back and pulled out a very simple map of the area. Pointing at the target, she continued:
"From the gates to the tower is about ten kilometers. You have five days…"
"Five days?!" Choji blurted, cutting her off. "We're getting fed, right?"
His voice was pure hope.
"No, of course not! You eat what you find. And don't interrupt me!" Mitarashi snapped. Then she swept her gaze over everyone again. "A few more rules. Opening the scrolls outside the tower is forbidden. If you reach it without your full team—fail. If one or more of your teammates can't keep fighting—also fail. Questions?"
"What if I want to quit the exam?" Shikamaru spoke up again.
"Nothing. Lie down and wait till you get killed," she said with obvious sarcasm. "You either sign and go take the exam with your team, or you don't sign and you and your team can fuck right off out of here. Any other questions?"
No more questions. The genin started reading the "we're not responsible for your ass" paper, while Leaf chunin kept setting up the scroll handout point.
Soon the teams lined up and exchanged their signed papers for scrolls. Right after that, a Konoha chunin escorted each team to one of the forty-four sealed gates.
My team got gate number nine.
Standing at the fence, my teammates stared into the forest beyond it while the chunin next to us sometimes checked his digital watch. Finally, when it showed 14:30, the shinobi immediately took off the chains holding the gate shut. After a few locks clicked, the chains dropped to the ground, and we moved in.
Jumping from tree to tree, we crossed huge distances in seconds.
After about a kilometer, we stopped in a small clearing. In a rough triangle, almost face to face, my teammates instinctively scanned the area. I didn't bother and went straight into repeating our mini-plan—the one we'd talked through before the exam even started.
"So," I said, "like I told you, I was told to keep an eye on our 'ally's' jinchuriki." I stressed that last word again, making it clear what I thought of that "alliance." I adjusted my hair, paused, and was about to continue when the Uchiha shoved his nose in.
"Naruto, I don't get it. Why are you even getting assignments from the Hokage? Last time you didn't explain shit," Sasuke said, staring like he expected more.
I glanced at him with a bit of irritation, but answered anyway. "Because I can do them. And because of special relations."
…
"Pff." Not getting anything else, the Uchiha's face twitched in annoyance and he looked away.
Still, he stayed, so I continued:
"We're splitting up. My goal is clear. Yours is to get one Heaven Scroll. Priority: take it from a team that's not from the Leaf. Like I told you, the real point of this exam is to show off the village's strength, not to stuff the chunin ranks. Because, basically, our income depends on what regular people think of us. You get it. You don't have to go all-out—do recon, for example. I don't think we'll be split longer than a day. The jinchuriki's team probably won't want to sleep in a forest full of mutated animals and venomous insects, so I'm guessing I'll regroup with you by sunset. And then, quick and easy—if you haven't done it yourselves by then—we take the scroll we need and go sleep in beds without extra 'neighbors.'"
In practice, it meant I was just going to go babysit Gaara, while my teammates tried not to die. And, if possible, do something useful.
At the end, I looked them over.
"Any questions left?"
While I talked, Sasuke kept flicking an annoyed look from Sakura to me and back. Hearing that last line, he finally decided to run his mouth:
"I'm not dealing with this dead weight again." The Uchiha glanced at Haruno.
She glared back, and I raised an eyebrow.
"Take her with you," he said. "I'll get the scroll myself."
And without letting us get a word in, Sasuke turned and bolted into the trees .
…Did piss hit his head or what? Like he trained with Kakashi a lot and now thinks he's hot shit.
Watching Sasuke disappear, my student clenched her fists.
"Naruto, can I go break his jaw?"
Her green eyes flashed.
"Sure," I said, "but it won't help. The Uchiha's useless to you, and you two probably won't be working together much anyway. Beating him up regularly to 'earn respect' isn't exactly efficient."
She grimaced, but looked back at me.
"Then how else can I help?"
Not just "get the scroll," either—she was hinting at whatever I'd thought up that "helps her Path."
"On the way here, I spotted Orochimaru. He's disguised as one of the Grass genin."
Sakura's eyes widened. Crystal clear she knew exactly who I meant.
"How about you test yourself on him?"
"Me?! You're suggesting I fight him?" She sounded seriously shaken, and a little scared.
"Exactly." I smiled to encourage her, then got a bit more serious. "I believe in you and what you can do. But I also see you don't believe in yourself. So I'm offering you a way to prove, in practice, how much you've grown."
Sakura dropped her eyes and hesitated hard.
"I'll be right there."
She looked up at me, thought for a second, then nodded firmly… and immediately got an embarrassing head-pat from me. When she puts on that serious little hamster face, she's so damn cute. I couldn't help it.
And yeah, my faith wasn't just empty words. After the body enhancement, Sakura kept growing fast under my supervision. We sparred a lot, she learned a bunch of techniques. By now, it added up.
"So this'll be after that jinchuriki reaches the tower?" Sakura asked once she got over the embarrassment.
"Yeah," I said. "For now, two options. One: you come with me—the original—and ask about Orochimaru on the way so we build your fight plan. But since we'll be watching Gaara, and he's… a pretty brutal guy, we might see some not-so-nice stuff. So option two: I leave you with a clone, and you plan in a calm setting. Or you can try without extra info, or dig it up yourself."
She thought again, weighing it.
"The first option makes me stronger… so that one," she decided, then glanced at me and looked away.
"Ooh, alright~" I said, making it obvious I knew the other reason too: she just wanted to stick around me longer. That made her get a little flustered again.
Then we moved out after the red-haired Sand shinobi.
While we traveled—hopping across dozens of trees—we didn't jump into tactics right away. Sakura had more questions:
"So if Orochimaru's here, other genin are in danger too. Did you send a clone to watch him?"
"Thinking right," I said, pleased. "But I probably won't need to interfere. I think the snake's here for an interesting specimen. Something with a really strong genome."
"So the ones in danger are you, Hinata, and… Sasuke," she said, and the last name came out with clear disgust.
"Exactly," I said. "But Hinata was the least noticeable back in the Academy. I personally took out Orochimaru's spy there, and I know he knows how our old classmates stack up. And I also know Orochimaru was really interested in the Sharingan. So I'm betting the Sannin goes straight for the Uchiha."
"Good. Serves him right," Sakura tossed out, not even asking if I was gonna save our "teammate."
After that, she finally started grilling me about what Orochimaru actually is. Meanwhile, we followed a few hundred meters behind Suna's team.
I could feel them clearly, and even see them at a distance with focused sphere-vision. With my soul power growing, that ability got way stronger—right now the Sand genin were basically in my palm.
Dozens of minutes of wandering passed. But it couldn't go on forever, and after a bit more time, that team stepped into an open clearing and finally ran into their first enemies.
A Rain genin team. All of them had umbrellas and oxygen tanks. The shortest and the average-height ones wore hoods and had hats on top. The third—biggest, and apparently the leader—only had his head wrapped in bandages.
Instead of fighting, the Sand and Rain teams started talking. I noticed other, more familiar shinobi who'd spotted those six just seconds ago. They were nearby.
Hinata's team—meaning her, plus Kiba, Akamaru, and Shino.
Sakura and I headed over. They were standing on a thick branch (well… not that thick by this forest's standards), arguing whether they should go over to those six or not.
"We'll just look! We won't jump in!" Kiba yelled at Aburame, emotional as hell.
"Bad idea, I'm telling you," Shino replied coldly. "Six of them. No point risking it when we've got plenty of time."
"Kiba-kun, I'm against it too," Hinata said politely. "Like Shino-kun says, we really do have a lot of time left. The exam just started."
"Oh, screw you guys!" Kiba growled. He crouched and jumped in the direction he smelled those genin… but he didn't even make it five meters before something grabbed him right across the back and yanked so hard it knocked the air clean out of him, flinging him back toward the branch.
"You should listen to your teammates' opinion, Kiba," I said from behind him, and then the "something" set him down on the branch.
He turned and saw threads dispersing in the wind, and me looking at him with annoyance.
"One of the teams up ahead will give you a lot of trouble. Pick a weaker target."
"Naruto! What the hell are you doing?!" Inuzuka snapped toward me, recognized me instantly, and rushed me.
He got slapped and flew off the tree.
Sakura was up on the branch with us too, and Hinata's team—meaning besides her, Shino and Akamaru, who I'd placed nearby with a thread earlier—looked at us.
"God, he's so damn rabid," I said, shaking my head. Then I looked at the others. "How's the exam going? Anyone besides those guys?" I pointed toward where something like a fight was happening between Suna and Rain.
"Good." Hinata nodded, turning off her Byakugan. "We already got the scroll we needed," she said, then shyly looked away at the end.
"Oh yeah? You're fast. Nice work," I said with a smile, stepping in and ruffling Hinata's hair.
"So why'd you show up?" Shino asked. "To visit your girl… or?"
"The first," I said, reassuring Aburame. Then I turned my head a little to the side and down, where there were already thumps of someone climbing.
A second later, a battered Kiba jumped back onto the branch. He was breathing a bit hard now, not as furious—but his eyes still said he wanted me dead.
"So," I said, "in the direction your short-sighted teammate was about to run to, there's an execution of the Rain team happening right now. One of them—like I can feel—was literally just ground into a pulp and splattered all over the clearing. The same thing's about to happen to the other two."
"…Sounds like some kind of shit. Why the hell should we believe you?!" Kiba spat, voice full of anger.
"You don't have to," I said, shrugging. "Give it a couple minutes and you'll see for yourself. Suna's team has the One-Tail's jinchuriki. If you walked into that, you could've died just as easy. That's also why I'm here."
My eyes flicked to Hinata, careful.
After my words, said in a lazy, almost melancholic tone, Kiba clenched his fists and was about to move again—but froze in place.
"The blood smell's already here," I said with a snort, sensing the air fill with that iron stink. "You feel it just fine, don't you? Anyway, I wasn't trying to put you down. I'm just stating facts. If you wanna go look, go ahead—the Sand team already left." I glanced at the stunned Inuzuka with his eyes wide open, then turned to Hinata and Shino. "Alright, good seeing you again. I'm kinda busy. We can talk about it tomorrow at the tower. I suggest you head there now. I've still got stuff to do. Bye-bye."
I waved, nodded to Sakura, and we left Team Eight alone.
After that, they still decided to check what happened to the Rain team. But when they got closer, Kiba ditched the idea—because it reeked too much of blood. The others weren't exactly dying to go stare at corpses either, so they all went straight to the destination together. Right call. The sight really wasn't pleasant. At least they'd sleep without nightmares tonight.
After that, nothing interrupted mine and Sakura's path, same as nothing interrupted Suna's. Except we ran into a weird big tiger that looked familiar. It stared at me, eyes bulging, then—clamping its hind legs onto a tree—arched its whole body and played "I'm a branch." The camouflage was pretty trash, but since it didn't touch us, we left it alone.
All in all: 118 minutes to finish the second stage. Suna's team cut the previous record in half, and Gaara reached the building without a single scratch. The examiner and ANBU would have plenty to be shocked by today.
Though Anko still hadn't made it to the designated spot yet—she was destined to show up later.
Sakura and I just stayed in the woods, kept talking about one multi-gender snake, and waited.
And it didn't even take half an hour before the snake reminded us he existed. The Sannin ran into Sasuke, and Sakura and I moved in closer so I could watch the meeting.
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