Seeing the state of his teammates, Orochimaru didn't rush them to leave. He walked over to Manji, took a canteen of water from his hip pouch, and handed it to her, asking gently: "Are you scared?"
Manji's face flushed slightly as she took the canteen and drank a mouthful. Hearing Orochimaru's question, her large, dewy eyes were filled with determination: "Big Brother, with you by my side, Manji isn't scared of anything!"
Orochimaru stroked Manji's head and smiled warmly.
Tsunade, returning after setting up the Ninjutsu traps, gazed at Orochimaru's smile, slightly dazed. This version of Orochimaru was drastically different from the decisive, ruthless killer in battle. He was like a different person, radiating a gentle aura that was hard not to get lost in.
Tsunade stared, realizing she understood Orochimaru less and less. She didn't know which one was the real Orochimaru: he was wicked, yet gentle; ruthless, yet kind and approachable.
The only thing Tsunade could be sure of was that Orochimaru was like a magnet, firmly drawing her in, leaving her unable to pull away.
At this thought, Tsunade involuntarily paused in her steps.
Jiraiya, noticing her strange behavior, followed her gaze and immediately understood. He nudged Tsunade, winking and teasing: "Heh heh, you like Orochimaru, don't you?"
Tsunade snapped out of her daze and, hearing the sudden question, stammered in defense: "W-what? Of course not!"
"Haha, don't worry, I won't tell anyone!" Jiraiya said with a laugh.
Tsunade held her two hands in front of Jiraiya, making a series of sharp "crunch, crunch—" cracking sounds by clenching her fists. She said fiercely: "If you dare tell anyone, hmph!"
With that, she ignored Jiraiya and quickly headed toward Orochimaru.
What Tsunade failed to notice was how much teasing, and how much bitterness and melancholy, were mixed into Jiraiya's smile.
Orochimaru didn't play favorites. He also comforted Chi and Hyūga Bluebird, giving them pointers on combat experience and methods of response during a fight.
Seeing Tsunade and Jiraiya return, Orochimaru took out the mission map and began to examine it with everyone.
The black-and-white scroll was about the size of a baby's fist in thickness and an adult's palm in length. When they untied the string and unrolled it, they were surprised to find it was completely blank—nothing was drawn on it.
Tsunade, Bluebird, and the others let out various sounds of surprise.
Orochimaru frowned slightly, carefully feeling the scroll's texture and the surface of the paper. He focused his senses.
As his fingers slid across it, a subtle, almost undetectable chakra fluctuation slowly emanated from the blank paper.
Orochimaru smiled faintly and injected his own chakra into it.
Poof! The scroll's surface gave a soft pop, and white smoke billowed out. When the smoke cleared, everyone was astonished to find that the blank paper now clearly displayed a black-and-white map.
It was a detailed map of Training Ground 18!
They saw that the entire Training Ground 18 was crisscrossed with streams, covered in forests, and intermittently blocked by small hills and mounds roughly a hundred meters high.
Just as everyone continued to unroll the scroll to find the exit, they suddenly realized that the map was only half a scroll long!
It didn't even mark the exit!
Orochimaru was briefly stunned to see only half a map. His heart sank. He correctly guessed that this half-map likely contained a great deal of false information.
It was now clear that this exam wasn't just testing the candidates' strength, leadership, and mission execution ability after acquiring information; it was also testing their capacity to identify false intelligence, analyze mission information, and successfully complete the mission by extracting valuable data.
This meant that the original ideal passing rate—ten maps, ten squads—had to be discarded. The competition would be even more brutal and intense, and the number of passing teams would be greatly reduced!
At this thought, Orochimaru felt a little speechless. With these layers of difficulty, is this really just a Chūnin Exam?
Tsunade, having been educated as a talented successor in a major clan, was the first to calm down after Orochimaru. She analyzed: "It seems this exam will be much harder than we thought. This map is likely just a mission item, and these repeating terrains are probably fake..."
"Wait!" Orochimaru suddenly shouted, his eyes flashing at Tsunade's comment. Could it be...
Everyone looked at Orochimaru with curious eyes.
Orochimaru didn't take the time to explain. He was eager to confirm his suspicion. He grabbed the map, compared it to the position he and Tsunade had designated as their location, adjusted the map's orientation, and looked closely again.
Sure enough, there was a problem with the map's drawing method, and his own line of thinking had been flawed. If it hadn't been for Tsunade's accidental reminder, he would have missed the true information the map was intended to convey.
Scanning the map repeatedly, the smile at the corner of Orochimaru's mouth grew wider. After deciphering the hidden information in the map, he put the scroll down. He gave Tsunade an appreciative smile and began to explain to the others: "I was thinking about this the wrong way at first. If it weren't for Tsunade's reminder, we would have missed the true information contained in this half-map!"
Orochimaru looked at Manji, Jiraiya, and the others, who were all confused, including Tsunade. He didn't offer a detailed explanation, but instead unrolled the scroll on the ground in its upright position and had everyone look at it. Then, he rotated it 180 degrees, laid it out upside down, and had them look at it again.
Seeing the realization dawn in everyone's eyes, he said calmly: "This map uses a unique overlay-and-duplicate drawing method, which is a form of intelligence processing. It presents two different patterns when viewed from different angles."
"When we look at it right-side up, we see half a map! When we look at it upside down, we see some overlapping sections on the map! By comparing the two, we can supplement the missing parts and assemble the complete map!"
Seeing everyone nod in understanding, Orochimaru took out a blank scroll and a pencil.
He closed his eyes, rapidly comparing and reassembling the two maps he had seen in his mind to piece together the complete map.
After about a quarter of an hour, Orochimaru suddenly opened his eyes, a glint of focus flashing in his dark-golden pupils. With an arrogant smile, the pencil in his right hand moved like a flying dragon ("shaa, shaa, shaa—"), moving across the blank scroll like a sprite dancing across the paper.
Under the admiring and reverent gazes of his teammates, in just a few dozen breaths, Orochimaru had sketched out a complete map of Training Ground 18.
The gray-black pencil strokes appeared vividly on the paper, forming a clear, rectangular map.
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