A/N : If there is any errors, please tell me so I can fix them. I also wrote this chapter in third person. I hope its okay.
[ JINICHI WATARU ]
The scratching of pencil against paper was the only sound in Room 301, save for the heavy, rhythmic ticking of the wall clock. The air was thick with sweat, fear, and the oppressive, silent presence of a dozen Chunin leaning against the walls, their clipboards feeling like metaphorical executioner blades, their eyes tracking every movement made by the Genin's seated before them.
Jinichi sat near the middle row, his eyes fixed on the paper before him. Question one was a cipher code so dense it looked like random ink spills.
' I don't even know what I'm looking at…Skip.'
Question two demanded a complex mathematical vector calculation predicting the bounce trajectory of a shuriken thrown from a moving tree branch under high-wind conditions.
'What am I? einstein? Skip.'
He didn't even need to read question three to know that no normal Genin was meant to answer these legitimately.
' Sigh…Of course…there really is no way to pass without cheating,
Fine.. I guess It's about time I use it.' Jinichi thought, taking a slow, steady breath.
He closed his eyes halfway, turning his focus inward, letting a small, focused pulse of chakra gather at center of his forehead. He didn't need hand signs for this. Like a clan kid activating their dojutsu, he held onto the familiar feeling of his new element and let it shift his perception.
'Shingan.' Jinichi announced in his head. (A/N: it means Mind's eye in Japanese.)
' One of the elements I got from using the tickets was mind, which allows me to read the thoughts of whom I choose but with a few conditions.'
'Alright focus, I can't afford to be reckless with this element. In a room filled with veteran shinobi, any abrupt surge in chakra would be instantly detected.
And targeting an examiner's mind was out of the question—their mental defenses would send the backlash of my intrusion back into my skull, backfiring so bad that I would be knocked out for the count. And that's if I'm lucky.
I have to limit myself strictly to surface-level thoughts, skimming the shallowest layer of consciousness from my fellow examinees in the room.'
Extending his awareness like a faint, imperceptible mist, Jinichi let his mind drift over the sea of anxious candidates.
'—oh god, I'm going to fail, my dad is going to kill me—'
'—the trap tension ratio? What the hell is a trap tension ratio?!—'
'—if I get caught cheating one more time, I'm out—'
Jinichi filtered through the waves of panic searching for someone who had an idea of what they were doing.
Increasing the range his Shingan, Jinichi began lightly brushing against the consciousness of Sakura Haruno. Instead of a static vault of knowledge, her mind was a rapid, loud stream of real-time panic layered over flawless academic recitation.
'Question two... if shinobi A throws a shuriken from point B... the wind resistance vector is...' She mentally rattled off the complex formula without missing a beat, but another, far louder voice in her head was practically screaming in tandem.
'Oh my god, what about Naruto?! He's completely hopeless at written tests! The questions are way too hard for him! If he scores a zero, Sasuke-kun and I will be dragged down and fail too! What do I do?! No, focus, Sakura, focus! Just answer the questions! Question three...'
'Yeesh..' Jinichi winced slightly at the sheer volume of her internal anxiety, but he quickly wrote down the vector math onto his paper before she could mentally derail further.
'Got it,' Jinichi thought, pulling his awareness away from the chaotic pink-haired kunoichi.
Instead of trying his luck with someone like Shikamaru Nara—who despite his brilliant tactical mind was notoriously lazy and likely lamenting about his current predicament rather than focusing on the exam—Jinichi further expanded his range toward the other side of the room.
He spent the next thirty minutes carefully bouncing his perception between a stressed Rain Genin and a highly focused Grass kunoichi, piecing together the answers for questions four through eight. It was tedious work, filtering out their internal anxieties to isolate the actual physics and cipher solutions, but it kept him off the radar of the Chunin's.
To them, Jinichi simply looked like an examinee lost in deep thought, methodically filling out his paper.
By the time he reached question nine, a highly complex cryptogram, his makeshift sources had completely stalled out in confusion, stumped by the complex code staring at them.
'Seems like they're stuck. Well then,
Back to the old reliable bookworm, AKA Sakura.' Jinichi thought.
He shifted his focus, tuning his frequency back toward Sakura Haruno to grab the final set of answers.
But the moment his mental probe brushed against Sakura's consciousness, a sharp, static-like friction jolted through his temples.
Jinichi frowned slightly, keeping his eyes firmly on his paper. Something was wrong. The anxious mess that was Sakura's mind was entirely gone. In its place was a singular, highly focused, and distinctly different presence occupying her headspace.
'Alright, let's see here...' an internal voice echoed, entirely lacking Sakura's frantic tone.
'Wow, Forehead really went all out memorizing this junk. Question nine is completely decoded. I'll just memorize this sequence and get back to my own body...'
Jinichi's eyes widened slightly.
'Ino Yamanaka.'
The blonde kunoichi was sitting two seats behind Sakura, slumped forward. She had used her clan's Mind Transfer Jutsu to hijack Sakura's body and steal the answers.
Before Jinichi could pull away, the foreign presence inside Sakura's mind suddenly spiked with alarm.
'Wait...' Ino's thoughts sharpened, radiating immediate suspicion.
'What is that? Is someone else in here?!'
Because Ino was actively projecting her consciousness using her clan's jutsu, her sensitivity to mental probes was drastically heightened. She could feel his telepathic probe brushing against her jutsu.
Panic flared in Jinichi's chest. He instantly severed the connection, snapping his telepathic net back into his own core like a retracted whip. He slumped slightly in his chair, taking a slow, controlled breath to mask the sudden spike in his heart rate.
'That was close. The Yamanaka clan's sensitivity to telepathy is no joke' Jinichi thought, wiping a cold bead of sweat from his brow. If a Yamanaka caught him poking around in someone's mind, he'd be dragged before the Konoha Interrogation Force by the end of the day.
He forced himself to wait. He stared blankly at question nine, counting down five agonizingly slow minutes while the rest of the room scribbled away.
Finally, when he was certain Ino had safely retreated to her own body two rows back, Jinichi gently extended his awareness back toward Sakura's seat.
Instantly, the familiar, deafening wave of anxiety washed over his mind.
'What the hell was that?! Did I zone out?!' Sakura's internal voice screamed in a panic.
'Ugh, whatever! Focus, Sakura! Question nine is...'
Jinichi let out a silent breath of relief. His pencil hit the paper once more, smoothly copying down the final cryptogram solution directly from her mind.
"Number 47! You and your team, OUT!"
A loud, harsh voice shattered the silence of the room. A sentinel pointed a gloved finger at a terrified Grass Genin.
"Five infractions. You were caught using shitty eye-reflection tricks. Leave immediately!"
"No! Please! Give me one more chance!" the boy pleaded, but two Chunin grabbed him by the arms, dragging him out of the room alongside his bewildered, furious teammates.
And that was only the beginning. Every few minutes, another kunai would embed itself into a desk with a resounding THWACK, followed by a cold command from one of the Chunin.
"Number 12, out!"
"Number 73, you and your team are done!"
The tension in the room soared to a suffocating pitch. Desperation bled through the air as the clock ticked closer to the forty-five-minute mark.
Across the aisle, Naruto Uzumaki was practically vibrating in his seat. Sweat poured off his face in sheets, his pencil trembling wildly over a completely blank test paper. His internal panic was so loud and chaotic that Jinichi didn't even need his Mind element to sense it—the kid was on the absolute verge of a complete psychological breakdown.
"Time's up for the first nine questions!" Ibiki's booming voice cut through the heavy silence like a guillotine.
The entire room flinched. Ibiki stood at the front, his arms crossed over his chest, his scarred face twisted into a menacing, cruel grin.
"Now... it is time for the tenth and final question," Ibiki announced, his dark eyes sweeping over the remaining candidates.
"But before I give it to you, there are a few extra rules you must accept."
He paused, letting the silence stretch until the air felt heavy enough to crush a man.
"This tenth question is a choice," Ibiki said softly, his voice dripping with malice.
"You may choose not to take it. If you choose not to take the tenth question, your score for this test becomes zero—meaning you fail, along with your teammates, and you may try again next year."
Relief washed over several Genin in the room, but Ibiki raised a hand, his smile widening.
"However... if you choose to take the tenth question and you answer it incorrectly... you will be stripped of your right to ever take the Chunin Exams again. You will remain a Genin for the rest of your lives."
A collective wave of horror paralyzed the room.
"What kind of foolish rule is that?!" a Rain Genin screamed, jumping out of his seat.
"There are people here who have taken this exam three times!"
"Laughable, don't blame us for your inability to grow as a shinobi." Ibiki chuckled darkly.
"You were unlucky enough to get me as your proctor this year. I make the rules. If you aren't confident, raise your hand, forfeit now, and come back next year with your pathetic teammates. But if you stay and fail... your career as a ninja is over."
The room descended into a nightmare of hesitation. One by one, trembling hands began to rise.
"I... I forfeit!"
"Number 59, out! Team 4, leave!"
As group after group surrendered and walked out the door, the mental toll on the remaining candidates grew unbearable. Jinichi sat quietly, his eyes fixed on Ibiki.
He knew this was the final psychological filter—a test of absolute resolve under the threat of permanent failure. Aoi hadn't even blinked, her posture completely unfazed, while Kisuke looked almost bored by the drama.
Several rows away from Jinichi, the bright orange jumpsuit of Naruto Uzumaki stood out starkly against the tense gloom of the classroom. The blonde boy was gripping his head, his body trembling visibly beneath the suffocating pressure of Ibiki's ultimatum. Slowly, agonizingly, his shaking hand began to rise into the air.
Jinichi watched closely from his seat wedged between the Rain Genin. For a fraction of a second, it looked as though the stubbornly loud boy was actually going to break and surrender.
SLAM!
Naruto's palm crashed down onto his wooden desk with the force of a thunderclap, shattering the heavy, suffocating silence of the room.
"DON'T UNDERESTIMATE ME!" Naruto roared at the top of his lungs, leaping out of his chair and glaring directly at Ibiki with a fiery, unyielding rage.
"I DON'T RUN AWAY! I'LL TAKE YOUR STUPID TENTH QUESTION! EVEN IF I GET STUCK AS A GENIN FOR THE REST OF MY LIFE, I'M STILL GOING TO BECOME HOKAGE! BELIEVE IT!"
'And true to his word, he did become Hokage as a Genin.' Jinichi thought cynically as the thought caused a small smile to grow on his face.
The declaration echoed off the stone walls, vibrant and absurdly loud.
The lingering fear in the room seemed to evaporate instantly. Candidates who had been on the verge of raising their hands slowly pulled them back, inspired—or perhaps shamed—by the absolute, unshakeable stupidity and bravery of the loudmouthed boy.
Three rows ahead, Jinichi saw Aoi's rigid shoulders noticeably relax. She let out a soft, amused huff, shaking her head as she muttered under her breath,
"What an idiot..."
Ibiki stared at Naruto for a long, silent moment. Slowly, the terrifying, sadistic scowl on the proctor's severely scarred face vanished, replaced by a genuine, highly amused smirk.
"Is that so?" Ibiki murmured, sweeping his sharp eyes over the remaining seventy-eight candidates. No one else was moving. No one else was raising their hand.
Ibiki leaned back against the teacher's podium, chuckling softly to himself.
"Well then... for those of you remaining... I congratulate you. You have all passed the first exam."