"The Forest of Death…"
Upon hearing the name, the examinees lifted their heads with grave expressions and looked out toward the drill grounds ahead.
It was as if a cold, murderous pressure was radiating out from the place.
"Why it's called the Forest of Death—you'll be getting a very real feel for that soon enough." Anko Mitarashi wore a vicious expression.
"Ha, no matter how hard you try to scare me, it won't work!"
Naruto was the first to leap out.
—He wasn't even afraid of that terrifying fox-demon, so what's a Forest of Death?!
"Idiot," Sasuke face-palmed.
[I did a tally—Sasuke's single most frequent line is calling Naruto an idiot]
[Lmao, if that's not true love what is]
[Getting ulcers worrying over Naruto, dying]
[His heart burns for Naruto, dying]
But Naruto had clearly pissed off the head proctor.
"Oh, is that so? You've got spirit." She flung a kunai straight at him.
"—!"
Compared to the original story, Naruto was a good deal stronger.
He simply sidestepped—only lost a tuft of blond hair—but Anko Mitarashi had already moved to stand behind him.
"A little strength goes to your head, and suddenly nobody else matters. Brats like you are usually the ones who die first, you know."
"Ugh… damn it…"
To teach Naruto a lesson, Anko Mitarashi had let some of her killing intent leak out too.
"Proctor." Hanabi tapped Anko Mitarashi on the shoulder. "Your kunai."
"Hmph, looks like your teammate is way more reliable than you are. Thanks." Anko Mitarashi took the kunai back, then patted Naruto on the shoulder. "But if you keep relying on your teammates to bail you out of everything, you're going to die a lot worse."
Anko Mitarashi let Naruto go and returned to her spot.
[Naruto's been watching Hanabi pull crazy stunts every day and wanted to try one himself, so he actually pulled a crazy stunt]
[Hahaha, my teammate can do it, so I can too, huh]
[Play stupid games, win stupid prizes]
[Sky cleared, rain stopped, Naruto thought he had a shot again]
But just when the audience thought this little scene was wrapping up, the picture cut again—this time landing on a Grass-nin in a conical hat.
The Grass-nin narrowed her eyes.
Then, the scene shifted into a flashback.
The flashback setting was, remarkably, the exact moment Anko Mitarashi had thrown her kunai earlier.
After Anko Mitarashi's kunai had passed through where Naruto had been standing, it kept flying forward and looked like it was about to reach this Grass-nin.
The Grass-nin kept her conical hat low; her face was hidden.
But just as the kunai was about to graze her hair, the kunai was brought to a dead stop in midair.
A steel wire shimmered into view, catching the kunai a single hair's breadth in front of the Grass-nin.
"It almost cut off your hair there. You alright?"
Hanabi's figure appeared right in front of the Grass-nin, and she reached out to take the kunai.
"Ah. I'm fine." The Grass-nin's voice was off.
"Oh, that's good then."
[Like hell she's good]
[Run, Director Hanabi's already locked onto you!]
[This Grass-nin has gotta be hiding something]
[Anyone my wife locks onto is definitely no good]
[Hahahaha]
"That person. Hyuga Hanabi. A genius, truly. A pity…" The Grass-nin watched Hanabi intently. "A probe, was it? Or…"
On the other side, Anko Mitarashi hadn't noticed there was such a big fish hiding among the examinees.
Because this Grass-nin wasn't just anyone—he was one of the legendary Sannin, Orochimaru.
Before the Second Exam, he'd killed the actual Grass-nin and used the Vanishing Facial Copy Technique to take over her identity.
If you were going to talk about the Chūnin Exams, you couldn't leave out Orochimaru.
In a sense, Orochimaru was also a "protagonist" here.
Unlike the later whitewashed version of Orochimaru, the current one was still pure evil.
At this point, the camera cut over to the "consent forms" in Anko Mitarashi's hands.
"Anyone taking part in the Second Exam has to sign this consent form. Otherwise the liability's on me. Your task this time is an extreme survival drill. And within this drill, your assignment is to complete a specific objective—simply put, it's a battle for the scrolls."
Anko Mitarashi held up two scrolls.
The Heaven Scroll and the Earth Scroll.
"There are twenty teams in total right now. Ten teams will get the Heaven Scroll, ten teams will get the Earth Scroll. For the duration of the exam, you're going to be fighting each other for them. Once you've collected both a Heaven Scroll and an Earth Scroll, you head to the tower in the center to complete the exam."
Anko Mitarashi talked while laying out a map to walk them through it.
"The exam lasts 120 hours. Five days flat."
"Five days?! What about lunch?!" Choji Akimichi felt the pressure hit.
"Take care of that yourself. Nature's a free pantry," Anko Mitarashi said, arms folded.
"—But there are also man-eating beasts out here. Poisonous insects and toxic plants everywhere you look too." Kabuto Yakushi played the straight man, laying the panic on thick.
"Now the failure conditions," Anko continued. "First: any team that fails to reach the tower with all three members and both a Heaven Scroll and an Earth Scroll within the time limit. Second: any team that loses a member or has a member rendered unable to continue. Last: the scrolls cannot be opened before reaching the destination."
Anko pointed off to the side: "Once you've signed the consent form, you exchange scrolls at the station to the side, then follow the staff to your designated entry point."
The Forest of Death had forty-four entry points in total; there were twenty teams on site. All the teams would be sent in staggered, with a set interval between them.
"Last thing I'll tell you—don't die out there!"
And with that, the pre-exam briefing was done.
"Oh my?"
Team 7 was closest to the exchange station, so the three of them were the first ones in.
When Hanabi went over to do the scroll exchange, she found the proctors here looking like they were bracing for war.
Kotetsu Hagane and Izumo Kamizuki in particular—they were watching her like she was a thief.
"Of course you're the first one in," Kotetsu Hagane muttered.
"After the exam papers got swapped last time, we got chewed out by Proctor Ibiki for ages last night," Izumo Kamizuki added.
"We've already checked in advance. This time, the scrolls haven't been tampered with."
"But we can't be sure you won't still swap them."
Hanabi cocked her head. "Sensei, that's mean—I'd never do a thing like that."
"No no no, you came over first precisely because you wanted to do exactly that!" Sasuke thought to himself.
[Lmao, she actually wants to pull it again]
[Dying, if Director Hanabi pulls it off this time, another round of mass disqualifications 23333]
[Fire prevention, theft prevention, Hanabi prevention]
[Dying, even the proctors are traumatized]
Honestly, Hanabi had been tempted to do exactly that.
But seeing these proctors look so pitiful, Hanabi decided to behave herself this time.
Pulling it off once was good content value. Doing it a second time would just be repeating the gag to pad things out~