Raizen woke before dawn, determination burning behind his single clear eye. Today was the day he would prove himself — to Takuma, to his rivals, and to himself. No more excuses. No more being the weak link.
He ran through his morning routine with precision.
Leaf concentration drill — steady.
Light stretches — limber and sharp.
A few rounds of accuracy practice in the backyard, kunai thudding into the target boards.
When he finished, sweat already dampening his collar, he felt focused. I'm ready.
At the door, his parents were waiting. His mother offered a soft smile, his father a hand clasp heavy with pride.
"Show them the weight of a Tsukihana," Jairo said firmly.
Even Taro was there, leaning against the wall. "Remember," he said with calm emphasis, "precision, not anger."
Raizen nodded. Their words rang in his chest like a mantra as he left for the Academy.
⸻
When he arrived, he froze. The courtyard was packed. Every single student in the Academy — general and Elite — stood gathered outside, whispering nervously.
Raizen scanned the crowd until he found them: Aika, Mizue, and Daichi, huddled together in conversation. He slipped up behind them.
"Boo."
All three jumped.
"Raizen!" Mizue gasped, then blinked. "Wait — do you know why everyone's outside?"
Raizen stared at them. "…You guys do know today's the midterm exam, right?"
Shock spread across their faces.
"WHAT?!" Aika yelped, nearly dropping her bag.
"In the General Course, no one told us!" Mizue hissed.
Raizen shook his head. "Of course they didn't. The point is surprise. Don't panic. My guess is they'll test the basics — chakra, weapons, taijutsu, maybe theory. If you've been studying, you'll be fine."
Aika paled. She was known for dozing through her lectures.
Before she could complain, a wave of crushing presence silenced the crowd.
⸻
Principal Kanzō stood atop the Academy roof, his chakra aura pressing down like a thunderhead. Every neck snapped toward him.
"Good morning, students." His voice rolled like stormwind. "You may wonder why you stand here instead of in your classrooms. The reason is simple: today is your midterm exam."
Gasps rippled through the field, but no one dared speak.
"You will be tested in five areas," Kanzō continued, his gaze sweeping the crowd. "Chakra control. Weapon accuracy. Taijutsu evaluation. Theory and academics. And finally…" his tone sharpened, "…a survival test in the wilderness."
The last words struck like lightning. General students trembled. Even some clan heirs shifted uneasily.
But Kanzō wasn't finished.
"The best five students from the general course… and the top student of the Elite Class… will receive rewards. Not just from me, but from the Raikage himself."
The courtyard erupted with wide-eyed stares. A reward from the Raikage was legendary. Clan kids whispered among themselves — even they coveted it, for there were things only the Raikage could grant.
Every student felt the fire ignite.
Kanzō raised a hand, and silence fell once more.
"Each exam will grant you points. Perform well in one, but fail in the others, and you will not stand at the top. Balance is everything. Consistency is everything. And to claim the Raikage's reward, you will need both."
His eyes narrowed. "Now. Let the exams begin."
⸻
The first test was announced: Chakra Control.
Students would run an obstacle course across the village's rivers and canals, their footing held only by chakra. Along the path lurked challenges:
• Hidden genin combatants waiting to ambush them.
• Genjutsu traps to ensnare the unfocused.
• Physical traps — wire snares, log swings, pits — which could spell doom for the careless.
It wasn't just a test of chakra. It was a test of composure, awareness, and survival instinct.
Raizen's pulse quickened. He glanced toward his rivals in the Elite class — Karui bouncing on her heels, Reina smirking with confidence, Samui calm as still water.
This is it, he thought, clenching his fists. I'll prove I belong.
As Kanzō's voice boomed across the courtyard, outlining the first test — a full chakra-control endurance course across Kumo's rivers, cliffs, and canals — Raizen's eye narrowed.
Most of the students gasped. Others whispered nervously. Karui smirked, Reina scoffed, and Tetsuo cracked his knuckles in excitement.
Raizen didn't move. He was already calculating.
Running around the village isn't the same as running through a field. The terrain alone will eat stamina — cliffs, stairs, narrow paths, bridges. If you sprint at full speed from the start, you'll burn out before the halfway point. And once you're drained, every trap, every ambush will feel like a wall. That's instant elimination.
He shifted his stance, eyes scanning the village's peaks in the distance.
Size… four to six kilometers across. Circumference, six to eight kilometers. With elevation? Call it closer to ten. For a general student, unconditioned… that's an hour, maybe more. Most will collapse halfway. For us Elites? Thirty, maybe forty minutes if we're serious. But even then — only if we pace ourselves.
His fists clenched, knuckles whitening.
If I go all out, I'll gas myself. If I hold back too much, I'll fall behind. So the key isn't just speed. It's timing.
He remembered his long training nights with Daichi — the sprints, the sparring, the endurance circuits that left his muscles screaming. His Sage Body had adapted to it all, building him into something tougher than most of these kids.
That's when the plan came to him, as clear as lightning across a storm.
I'll hold steady. Not too fast, not too slow. Let Karui burn herself out showing off. Let Reina waste her energy proving she's untouchable. Let Tetsuo stumble under his own weight. By the final stretch, they'll all be winded, slower, careless. That's when I'll strike. When their bodies betray them, mine will still hold. My stamina is my weapon. I'll snatch victory from whoever thinks they've already won.
He exhaled slowly, the burn in his chest steady and focused.
Karui caught his look and grinned. "What's with the serious face, blind boy? Already planning your excuse?"
Raizen didn't answer. He just smirked faintly.
No excuse. Just a plan.
A horn split the morning air—long and low, echoing off the peaks—and the entire field lunged forward as one. Sandaled feet slapped onto the canal, chakra blooming beneath soles in shimmering discs. The surface trembled, then steadied; a hundred ripples fanned outward like rings of glass.
Phase I — Waterways (hidden traps)
Kumogakure's lower canals wound like veins through the foothills. The water was cold and quick, hurrying along stone banks into tunnels carved by generations. Mist burned off in a pale ribbon as the sun climbed, and the first test of the day announced itself with the quiet hiss of current against heels.
Half a dozen children splashed in immediately, their chakra flickering with panic. Proctors in hip waders hauled them out without sympathy. Above them, Kanzō watched from a parapet, eyes flat as storm-iron. On a nearer rooftop, Takuma leaned against a rail with the posture of a cat trying to nap in the sun.
"Don't die," he yawned to no one in particular.
At the point, Reina skimmed the surface like a swallow, each pad of chakra tight and needle-precise. She didn't so much run as glide, hips low, shoulders loose, eyes flicking for tells: a change in reflection, a bulge beneath water, the whisper of a line strung across the channel. Twice she cut left at the last heartbeat, letting wire snares snap harmlessly in her wake. She didn't look back.
Karui came on like a firework, kicking up fan-shaped wakes with every stride. She caught a taut tripwire with a toe, stumbled—"Tch!"—and turned the fall into a forward roll, exploding back to her feet without breaking speed. Reckless, yes; but she was a storm with legs, and storms didn't ask permission from waves.
Samui moved with winter's patience. Her soles pressed the water in identical ovals, each placement measured to the grain. When a log on a pivot swung toward her, she didn't flinch—she shortened her step by half a palm and let the arc miss by the breadth of a fingertip. The proctor hidden behind the pivot blinked. He hadn't thought anyone would see that coming.
Omoi was a string of mutters and math: "…angle's wrong—if I step here, counter-swing there—no, no, delay by half—now." He slid under a crosswire, then flattened to his palms as a weighted net hissed by overhead. A heartbeat late and he would've been wrapped like a dumpling. He grimaced, then kept running, still whispering probabilities he pretended were prayers.
Tetsuo chose brutality over delicacy. When a snare caught around his ankle, he didn't stutter or stop—he yanked, roared, and ripped the line free with a spray of water, dragging a stake loose from a hidden anchor trench. He caught a swinging log on a forearm, teeth flashing, and shoved it back into its housing with a grunt that sounded disturbingly like laughter.
Daichi ran like the ground itself, steady and uncomplaining. A wire caught his calf; he stumbled, bent, and with a single precise pull freed himself without tearing skin or wasting time. A cross-current struck—he widened his stance and let it carry through him, weight dropping, breath even. His steps weren't pretty, but they were honest. He made time because he never stopped making time.
Mizue's eyes were everywhere at once. She caught reflections that didn't match, subtle ripples reaching out from nothing; she carved a path through the least noisy water, like threading a needle between traps. Twice she pointed left with her chin as she passed other students, and those who trusted her cue avoided a dunking. Those who didn't learned about snare knots.
Aika looked like she was about to die at least four times. Her first steps skidded; her third stride sent a fan of white water into her own face. Twice she windmilled her arms, almost hilariously. But grace arrived mid-chaos—somewhere between panic and stubbornness—until her feet began to find rhythm. She bounded from chakra pad to pad, light and close to the surface, nearly catching up to Mizue on a tight corner. When a low net popped up in a tunnel mouth, she dove into a slide, hands overhead, slicing beneath it like a stone skipped flat.
Clustered around them were other names the Elite had already learned to clock:
• Atsuro (Kamizuru), all tendon and focus, running with his torso low, occasionally flicking a hand; a small blur of dark insects fanned ahead of his path like feeling fingers, tasting the air for wire-oil and trap varnish.
• Kaien (Mabui), short and whip-fast, cutting tight angles like his feet wrote lightning sigils on stone; he stutter-stepped to change cadence and never met a trap on its timing.
• Riku (Funato), amphibious by bloodline rumor, who seemed to sit a fraction deeper into the water than anyone else—a glide that shaved effort where everyone else fought the current.
They hit the first checkpoint under a low bridge—a slate arch black with spray—and stamped their bands against lacquered wood where a chūnin waited with a brush. Ink marks appeared on forearms with a satisfying snap of chakra.
The course knifed into narrower channels. The traps tightened.
A cluster of students hit a lattice of crossing tripwires strung just below the surface. Samui halted two steps early, heel drawing a crescent in the film as her chakra compressed; she gestured with a flick of her wrist, and three students behind her stopped on instinct. Karui didn't. She barreled in, wires kissing her shins. The nets leapt; she tore free before they closed, but lost two precious seconds to fury and tangled mesh, spitting curses through her teeth.
Reina sailed over the entire lattice on three long strides and didn't spend a thought on those behind her.
Tetsuo tried to leap too—and clipped the wire with a toe. The net snapped up; he flexed, and the rope exploded into snapping fibers that caught two unlucky general-course kids, yanking them into the canal like hooked fish. Proctors waded in.
"Out," one said, bored, to the sputtering pair.
Tetsuo didn't look back.
The waterway ended in a bottleneck—a sluice gate opened just enough to funnel the field one-by-one into a culvert. The pressure boosted them into the light and onto slick stone steps where the canal splayed into town.
A third of the field was already gone.
Phase II — Streets & Ambushes (genin on the hunt)
Kumo's streets were carved to control choke points—stone switchbacks, narrow alleys, sudden staircases dropping from one terrace to the next. Flags snapped between rooftops. Vendors had shuttered their stalls for the exam; heavy awnings drooped like sleeping wings, hiding corners from above and below.
Smoke popped. Thin gray rolled low across the tile. Then the first genin landed with a clap of sandals and a barked, "Move!"
The ambush was fast: three from the front, two from above, one slingshot in from a side alley. Kunai dulled, but fists not friendly.
Karui howled, delighted. "Finally!" She met the first genin like a thrown hammer—low kick to the shin, overhand fist that cracked knuckles against forearm, a pivot that turned his charge and sent him skidding into stone. A second attacker dropped from an awning; Karui slid under, planted, and mule-kicked him into a crate stack that exploded into slats.
"Keep running!" a proctor shouted, but Karui was already gone—momentum was her sacrament.
Reina didn't waste a strike unless it was guaranteed. She let two genin overcommit, gliding past their arms so cleanly it looked choreographed. When a third tried a sweep, she stepped on his ankle with precise malice and popped a backfist into his jaw while he hissed. She ran on with a small, cruel smile.
Samui was a metronome. A genin lunged, and she redirected with a palm to the elbow, a tiny step that turned his body left, her foot placing at his ankle. He discovered gravity. She was already past him, breath even.
Omoi defended like a man holding a delicate cup in a hurricane. His hands were where they needed to be—barely—because he guessed where they had to be two steps ahead. He took one punch on the shoulder to preserve balance and hissed to himself about the angles of the next corner. When a genin grabbed for his wrist, Omoi rotated his elbow over the grip and snapped a short jab to the throat—not enough to injure, just enough to discourage.
Daichi didn't flinch from contact. A genin slammed into him chest-first; Daichi took two fast hooks to the ribs with the grim patience of a wall, then answered with a single compact body shot that foldered the older boy like a pocketknife. He put a hand on Mizue's shoulder—"Go"—and turned to shoulder-check a second attacker into a stairwell post.
Mizue was angles and intention. She stepped where feet were going to be rather than where they were, attacking joints while the rest of the world chased heads. She used a rooftop support like a springboard to skim past a grappling genin, raking a palm along nerves in his forearm; his hand died for two seconds, just long enough for her to smear dirt in his eyes and keep moving.
Aika… surprised people. She ducked under an elbow, slid between legs with a twist that left a genin flailing, and popped up to plant a heel kick into a thigh that killed a step completely. She didn't stay to admire her work; she ran with the breathless panic of someone who'd nearly been crushed by midterms in a classroom… and discovered she could sprint through a different kind of test.
Above, a trio of clan kids from minor houses made noise:
• Atsuro (Kamizuru) flicked his sleeve; a tiny swarm lifted, then burst like black confetti in the faces of two ambushers. They flinched for the barest heartbeat to swat—and three general kids slipped past untouched. "Don't get used to it," he muttered, more to himself than anyone, recalling his bees with a tiny twist of chakra.
• Kaien (Mabui) used speed as deception—he stuttered his cadence so a genin's timing broke like a bad rhythm, then sent the older boy into a wall with a hip-check that was ninety percent balance theft, ten percent malice.
• Riku (Funato) didn't fight so much as flow. He dropped his weight a fraction going downhill, letting gravity do work, then dialed it up with a long-stride piston up the next stair, face set and breath controlled.
New smoke bombs rolled. A wire trap hissed from a mailbox slot, a whirling bundle of blunted shuriken whining at knee height.
"Down!" someone yelled.
Samui folded like a hinge. Reina vault-stepped a stoop. Omoi flattened. Tetsuo… kicked it. The tangle clanged away. He grinned.
Across the lane, a general-course student took a genin's elbow to the jaw and crumpled. A proctor's hand was on him in a blink, hauling him to the curb and lifting a red flag. "Out."
The survivors hit the second checkpoint, bands stamped, hearts pounding, chests burning. Forearms were already purpling; a few trickles of blood brightened knuckles. The race didn't care. It climbed.
Phase III — The Mountain Path (genjutsu gauntlet)
The final leg wasn't built to test raw legs alone. It was carved to test minds.
The mountain path switchbacked toward the upper terrace where the Academy's training fields sprawled below the Raikage's tower. Wind pressed at shirts; a hawk cried somewhere above cloud height. The stone cut narrow at places, a ledge barely a shinobi's width. Genjutsu hung here like spider silk—thin, invisible, lethal by patience.
The first illusion was gentle: a phantom rope across the trail. Those who'd been scolded about traps all morning skidded to a halt—then cursed at themselves when other kids ran "through" it without harm. The second was crueler: a perfectly normal stretch of path that attacked with a whisper—stop, rest, just for a breath—and students who gave in found their muscles seizing as their minds sank into syrup.
Reina felt the tug like a fingernail along the back of her neck. She bared teeth and blew a harsh exhale out her nose—not today—and carved through, fast as spite.
Karui hit a different wall entirely. A false turn presented itself—a generous left with smooth stone—while the real path kinked right over an ugly rock with sharp outcrops. She chose speed over suspicion, took the left, and ran smack into painted stone. Her forehead bounced, the illusion cracked, and she staggered back swearing, stars popping behind her eyes. She shook herself like a dog and kept running, angrier and therefore faster, which helped until it didn't.
Samui slowed. Her control was a cord wrapped around her middle, a tie that let her feel when the world tugged wrong. She tapped two fingers against her wrist every time something felt "off," a physical metronome against a mental one. A false pit yawned; she stepped into it deliberately and did not fall. A smile, tiny and private, touched her mouth. She ran on.
Omoi's greatest enemy was himself. "If it's a right fork, then the left is fake—unless they know I'll think that—no, think like Takuma: lazy trap, obvious trap…" He paused for too long; two students passed him, panting, and he flushed with shame. The shame snapped him out of a small glamour that had been convincing him his shins ached more than they did. "Che," he said to the mountain, and regained his rhythm.
Daichi met a genjutsu that showed him home—warm rice, a stool, the scratch of a broom—and he kept walking anyway, jaw tight. He didn't bother to dispel it. He let it hang on him like a wet cloak and took another step, then another, because life was a series of steps you didn't want to take but did anyway. The illusion frayed and fell off. He didn't notice when it went.
Mizue had studied genjutsu theory the way she studied everything: practically. She bit the inside of her cheek when the cliff to her right "expanded" into a wide path; the pain spiked white through her brain, and the false space collapsed to its real, narrow self. "Hah," she said softly, pleased with herself, then immediately ducked as a hallucinated raven screamed into her face. "Nice try."
Aika tripped into a false hole with a yelp and slapped both palms onto stone with everything she had, chakra flaring. She only slid a hand's breadth before she caught herself, face to rock, breathing like a hunted thing. She didn't move for a full second. Then she pushed to hands and knees, then feet, and kept going, less graceful now but more stubborn.
Atsuro sent his little cloud forward again; it hit a shimmering line of chakra and faltered, confused. He didn't try to break the illusion—he just threw a pebble into the "safe" gap and, when it bounced off invisible glass, smirked, took the uglier route, and saved himself a headache.
Kaien stutter-stepped through three glares, flickers of mirrored self that tried to "nudge" him off his cadence. He answered by breaking rhythm altogether—fast-fast-slow-slow-fast—a dancer prying a musician off the beat.
Tetsuo saw a wall where there wasn't one. He did not like walls. He headbutted it. The wall disagreed with this course of action and ceased to exist.
One by one, students peeled off the path, led gently by proctors when their eyes went glassy or their steps went irrationally confident. The field thinned to something lean: Elite, a handful of clan heirs, and a few general kids who refused to break.
And then the mountain did its last cruel thing: it gave them the finish in sight. The terrace opened above—banners snapping, a chalked line waiting, proctors already holding brushes and boards—and the sight of it tore useful breath from chests. Those who had learned nothing sprinted. Those who had learned everything held cadence by force.
Far down the switchbacks, somewhere out of anyone's attention, a pair of footfalls did not change rhythm at all. They were not fast. They were not slow. They were inevitable.
The Last Bend
The leaders—Reina, Samui, Karui, with Kaien and Riku threatening, Omoi still in it by math and will, Daichi grinding in their shadow, Mizue and Aika a terrace below—hit the final bend with lungs like coals and legs full of knives. The wind smelled like stone and lightning. Voices rose from the terrace: classmates cheering, heckling, praying. A chūnin blew a short blast to mark the last hundred meters.
Reina's chin lifted. Mine. She lengthened her stride, sharp and dangerous, even if her calves protested with white-lipped pain.
Karui refused to be second to anyone. She dug and the trail dug back; she gave more. Her vision tunneled, which felt like victory until the path tried to curve and she tried not to.
Samui kept the same pace she'd held for ten minutes. It was not exciting. It was not heroic. It was a pace designed by someone who understood the difference between winning the moment and winning the race.
Omoi nearly made a terrible decision—sprinting to pass in a narrow place—then calculated the odds of falling and decided not to die today. "Later," he told his pride, and his pride, surprisingly, listened.
Daichi did not look like a runner at all. He looked like a promise made to himself and then kept. He passed a clan kid who had two more inches of leg and one less ounce of will.
Mizue and Aika traded places three times on a stairwell, each sacrificing a little to help the other catch a breath at a bad landing. They were not in contention for first. They were in contention with who they had been last month.
On the terrace, Kanzō's arms folded behind his back. Takuma's eyes were barely open, but he was not missing anything.
The leaders fell into the last straightaway, each body admitting the price it had paid. The finish line was an idea painted white on rock. The mountain held its breath.
From the lower switchback, a set of footfalls—measured, even, undramatic—ticked like a metronome getting louder.
No one in front turned their head. No one could afford to.
They were exactly where the test wanted them: emptied, honest, nothing left but what they truly had.
And somewhere behind them, something that had not yet needed to show its teeth finally smiled.
The last hundred meters was chaos dressed as triumph.
Reina led the charge, her smirk fixed despite the tightness around her eyes. Each step slapped sharp against the stone. She refused to let anyone see her fatigue, even as her calves screamed and her chakra pads wavered. I'll be first. I have to be first.
Behind her, Karui was a blur of rage and willpower. Her breath came ragged, but she surged anyway, teeth bared. She'd nearly tripped three times on the mountain path, but it didn't matter — not if she could cross before Reina. "You're mine, Reina!" she snarled, voice half-choke, half-roar.
Samui didn't answer. She ran the way she had all race: steady, silent, her breathing even when others wheezed like dying bellows. She wasn't first, not yet, but her pace hadn't cracked. Her eyes flicked from Reina's swaying arms to Karui's stumbling heel strikes. They're burning out.
Kaien (Mabui) tried to burst between them, using a last-second stutter-step to throw Reina's rhythm, but his knee buckled on a chakra slip. He staggered and barely caught himself, the opening gone.
Omoi muttered frantically. "Too fast, too soon—don't overtake here, no space—wait for the straight—wait—!" His hesitation cost him precious seconds.
Daichi was still there. His face was pale, sweat streaming, but his stride never broke. He had taken more punishment from traps and genin than most, yet he kept coming, his fists pumping in dogged rhythm. Students in the watching crowd murmured — the civilian boy had no right to still be standing with clan heirs. Yet he was.
Mizue and Aika were farther back, but even they pushed, eyes burning. Mizue's precision carried her through a false shimmer near the finish, while Aika nearly collapsed into it — only to be hauled upright by Mizue's shove. The two kept going, slower but together.
The line drew closer. Fifty meters. Forty. Thirty.
Reina snarled as Karui lunged at her side. Their shoulders brushed, both teetering, neither willing to yield. Samui narrowed the gap behind them with cold efficiency.
The terrace crowd roared.
And then — the sound.
A steady cadence of footfalls behind them. Not ragged, not desperate. Even. Unshaken.
The noise cut through the chaos like a drumbeat. Step. Step. Step.
Students craned their necks. On the last switchback below, a figure rose into view, stride unbroken, breath steady. His hair was damp with sweat, his fists relaxed at his sides. He looked nothing like someone who had just run the gauntlet of Kumo's canals, streets, and mountains.
Raizen.
Gasps rippled across the onlookers.
"What the—he's been holding back—"
"Was he pacing this whole time?!"
"Impossible—"
Reina's smirk cracked, just for an instant. Karui cursed aloud. Samui's eyes narrowed faintly. Daichi's jaw set.
Twenty meters.
Raizen surged past Omoi, whose mutters broke into a shocked gasp. Past Kaien, still limping from his stumble. Past Daichi, who growled but couldn't find another gear. Past Samui, who for the first time all day looked surprised.
Fifteen meters.
Reina pushed harder, but her body betrayed her — her stride shortened, her arms flailed. Karui was worse, every breath a gasp, every step a gamble.
Ten meters.
Raizen's Sage Body held steady. His lungs still drew deep, his strides still full. He accelerated, aura burning with the weight of weeks of grind.
Five meters.
Reina and Karui clawed for the line, faces twisted with fury.
Raizen swept past them both.
The crowd erupted as his foot stamped across the finish line first, stone cracking under the force.
The proctor's brush snapped against his band, marking him first.
Behind him, Reina stumbled across, eyes blazing with humiliation. Karui collapsed to her knees, panting, teeth grinding. Samui crossed next, expression unreadable but her gaze lingering on Raizen a moment longer. Daichi staggered in after, fists clenched but head high. Omoi, Kaien, Mizue, and Aika followed, battered but unbroken.
⸻
From above, Principal Kanzō's lips curved faintly.
And on the rooftop shadow, Takuma yawned, but his eyes glinted with interest.
"Not bad, kid," he murmured. "Not bad at all."
The finish line still buzzed with chatter. Students who had dropped out early gaped from the sidelines, whispering furiously.
"Did you see that?"
"He came out of nowhere—"
"Raizen Tsukihana… he paced the whole time…"
"Unbelievable…"
Even some of the proctors muttered to each other, impressed despite themselves.
Reina stood with her fists balled, chest heaving. Her glare could have cut stone.
"He stole it," she spat. "He didn't earn it—he waited like a coward."
Karui snarled, still on her knees, sweat streaking her brow. "Next race, I'll burn him into the ground. He won't have time to hide behind his precious pacing."
Samui straightened her uniform calmly. She said nothing, but her eyes lingered on Raizen longer than the others. She'd noticed what none of the rest had — his control. His patience. She filed it away quietly.
Daichi bent over, palms on his thighs, sucking in breaths. His eyes rose to meet Raizen's across the terrace. There was no bitterness, no mockery — just a spark of rivalry. I'll catch you, his gaze promised.
Mizue and Aika stumbled up moments later, exhausted but grinning. "You—" Aika wheezed between breaths, "—you crazy bastard." Mizue just shook her head, laughing weakly.
Above them, Principal Kanzō folded his arms. His voice carried like thunder.
"This is the difference between talent and strategy. A true shinobi knows when to spend their strength and when to save it. Remember this lesson."
Then, more quietly, from the rooftop:
Takuma stretched, yawning, smoke curling from the corner of his mouth. "Hn. Pacing, timing, patience. Not bad." His eyes narrowed slightly. "But don't think stamina alone wins wars, kid. You'll need more than lungs and legs."
Raizen ignored the noise around him. He wasn't smiling, wasn't gloating. His fists rested at his sides, still trembling from the surge of effort.
Inside, though, his vow hardened.
This was only the first test. I'll show them again. And again. Until no one doubts that I belong here.
Thunder cracked over the peaks, as if echoing the promise.