In the brightly lit throne room of Sun Stream Plaza, Arthur's eyes slowly lifted upon sensing Rin's team were finally walking the wide dirt trail leading directly to the wooden gates of the Leaf Village.
Through each of them, he saw the sheer volume of foot traffic. Dozens of Genin teams from different hidden villages marched along the road, some in front, some trailing behind.
Arthur spotted familiar faces in the crowd. There was Fū walking with her teammates. A few paces away marched Shira, the taijutsu specialist from the Sand Village.
Arthur held no interest in them for now since they were pawns meant for a different game.
His attention was instead on someone who was standing atop the high gates, looking down at the arriving participants: Margaret.
In the original history of this filler arc, Shikamaru Nara was supposed to be the one standing on that wall, organizing the arrivals. But Arthur had killed Shikamaru in the Forest of Death and later revived him to return to the Leaf.
Because Shikamaru died as a Genin, he never earned his Chūnin vest.
'So Margaret's going to be proctoring this exam?' Arthur deduced.
The moment the thought crossed his mind, Margaret stepped off the ledge and landed squarely in the dirt right in front of the Waterfall team.
"Oh my gosh!" she screamed as her voice carried over the crowd. Then stepped forward and tightly grasped Fu's hand. "Fū, it's been way too long!"
"Marge!" Fu replied with a wide smile.
The two then started bouncing up and down with glee.
"You look so grown now!" Margaret beamed.
Fū's partners stood stiffly on either side of her, clearly embarrassed by the loud, sudden attention drawn to their squad.
Margaret didn't seem to care.
When she turned her head, she waved her free hand to call out, "And you came, too, Shira!"
Shira stepped out of the marching line to greet her. Then he calmly expressed that it had indeed been a while.
The last time any of them had seen each other was back in the Land of Waves, fighting in the taijutsu tournament Arthur had secretly hosted.
"How's Rock Lee?" Shira wondered, looking around the gate.
"He'll be in the exams, too," Margaret assured him, "so you can count on things being fun!"
She then took a step back as her eyes swept over the rest of the arriving Genin. When her gaze landed on Rin's team, Arthur watched Margaret's face shift. There was a brief flash of confusion about her features.
She, like him, knew the original timeline well. Margaret was clearly expecting Ajisai and her specific squad of Rain Genin to walk through this trail. But Arthur had explicitly chosen not to disguise Rin's team as Ajisai's team.
Margaret stared at them for a second longer, trying to place their faces, but ultimately failed. Rin, Shigeru, and Kaiyo kept their expressions blank as they walked past Margaret and entered the Leaf Village without being questioned.
The village streets were loud and packed with vendors, merchants, and visiting shinobi—to no surprise.
Rin navigated the familiar roads perfectly, despite feeling like a ghost walking through her old home.
Her team soon made their way to the Ninja Academy to turn in their registration papers, where two Leaf shinobi sat behind a table.
"Alright," the shinobi on the left said, taking the forged documents from Rin's hand. "You three will be taking the exams, correct?"
"That's right," Shigeru replied.
"I see you weren't accompanied by a Jōnin leader," the shinobi on the right asked. "Mind if we ask why?"
"No reason," Rin said.
"We're more than smart enough to take on any challenge the Leaf throws at us!" Kaiyo finished, pumping her arms to sell the act of an arrogant, overconfident rookie.
The proctor sighed before stamping their papers. With that, the registration process had smoothly finished.
There were no illusions placed anywhere to weed out the weak before the test even began. Arthur knew exactly why: the proctors were different. Shikamaru wasn't running the logistics, which meant the mechanics of the first stage were going to be entirely different, too.
Then there was Danzo Shimura, who was also missing from the equation. He had played a slight role behind the scenes by warning the village elders of the Rain Village's potential threat and manipulating the exam's security.
But Margaret had killed Danzo.
Sitting on his throne hundreds of miles away, Arthur analyzed that the only real threat to his operation in this arc was the otherworlders. Surely more of them had to be involved in the exams.
And if he knew them well, they would have undoubtedly warned the Leaf and the Sand leadership about the true antagonists of this event: Fugi and Hōichi.
Fugi's plan was simple. The Sand loyalist intended to use Hōichi to extract the One-Tail directly from Gaara while the Kazekage was distracted by the exams.
The only problem Arthur had right now was determining exactly when Margaret and her friends would choose to act on their foreknowledge to stop the plot. That was why he gave Rin's team a specific instruction: observe, record, and do not engage.
Outside the Academy, the team stopped near the courtyard wall.
"That was easier than expected," Kaiyo said, exhaling a long breath.
"Just remember why we're here," Shigeru explained in a sharp tone.
Rin agreed. Like the other two, she knew the rules of the infiltration: they were strictly prohibited from discussing their mission objectives or saying Arthur's name aloud.
Alice was more or less still in this village. One wrong word could easily blow their cover.
"The exams start in a few hours," Rin announced. "Meet back here when you're done."
Arthur watched as Shigeru and Kaiyo split up. They were heading toward the different clan districts to scout the village's internal defenses. Rin stayed behind to understand who the participating teams were and gauge their threat levels.
She had to be extra careful since they were disguised as Rain ninjas, representing a village completely closed off from the outside world. They were automatically the most suspicious in the perimeter.
A second later, a small brown bird dropped from the tree branches above. It fluttered around Rin's head while chirping.
"Sorry about that," a deep, manly voice called out.
Rin turned her head to see none other than Jugo walking toward her.
"It seems as though he's taken a liking to your chakra," Jugo gently said. He then extended a finger as the bird flew onto his knuckle.
"Oh, you don't have to apologize," Rin replied. "It's only natural."
Arthur watched the interaction closely. A moment later, two more ninjas entered the scene: Hinata Hyūga and Shino Aburame.
"We should get going," Hinata softly said, looking up at Jugo.
"Right," he replied. He then gave Rin a polite nod. "Will be seeing you."
As the three of them walked away, the puzzle pieces snapped together in Arthur's mind. With Orochimaru's hidden villages destroyed and his experiments liberated, Jugo had been fully integrated into the Leaf's military structure, meaning he had joined Team 8 by directly replacing Kiba.
And if Jugo was participating in this exam, there was a high chance Karin was, too. Only one other team had a missing slot that she could likely be placed in.
"We're gonna be late, Naruto!" a female voice shouted from the street corner.
Rin turned her head toward the noise. Walking down the road, arguing loudly, were Sakura Haruno, Naruto Uzumaki, and Karin Uzumaki.
"Keep rushing me, female cuz, and I'll drop my ramen," Naruto replied, carefully balancing his bowl as he walked.
"I told you to stop calling me that!" Karin yelled in annoyance. "Just be happy your dad let you enter this exam in the first place."
The three of them paid no mind to the lone Rain kunoichi watching them as they headed toward the exam hall.
Rin couldn't help but be surprised by Minato's son. Naruto had grown taller, his face had lost its childhood roundness, and his clothes were different from that bright orange jumpsuit he used to wear.
Naruto now officially sported the same orange and black jacket he was supposed to wear as he got older. The only difference was that the jacket hung open, revealing a tight green jumpsuit worn underneath it.
The influence of his taijutsu training with William was permanently etched into his wardrobe.
Rin felt a painful urge rise in her chest. She wanted to talk to him. She wanted to pull Minato's son into an alleyway and reason with him about everything she knew was still to happen—about how the world was breaking like Arthur had shown her.
But she didn't move. She swallowed the urge and forced it back down into her stomach.
Rin knew that speaking to him would be the biggest mistake she could make. She was disguised as an enemy kunoichi on an imperative mission. More importantly, she knew Arthur was constantly watching her every move from the throne room.
Any sign of treason would be dealt with instantly.
Arthur himself was not the least bit surprised by the scene playing out through Rin's eyes. Naruto was older, and he sported his normal attire, just like Sasuke had adapted to his standard gear early.
The only real change to the timeline was that Naruto had never left the village to train with Jiraiya. And based on Karin's comments, it seems as though his suspension was finally uplifted.
'No William around him,' Arthur noted.
If Arthur were to guess, Naruto still had many shadows lurking around him. Their absence only meant they were either deployed elsewhere or waiting for a specific moment to strike should something happen to the boy.
With no other teams passing through, Rin felt the need to move.
Standing in the crowded courtyard was suffocating anyway, so she walked away from the Academy and let her feet carry her through the paved roads of the village.
In just a matter of moments, the noise of the commercial district faded as she soon found herself standing before the main cemetery.
It was the funeral lot Arthur had won from Tsunade during the Hokage Day festival in Tanzaku Town. He still technically legally owned the land under a different name.
Arthur watched her approach the gates. He knew she would come here since she always checked the cemetery when she infiltrated the village.
As she turned the corner to see her gravesite, she froze. Arthur's focus sharpened instantly. Standing perfectly still in front of a polished black memorial stone with his hands buried deep in his pockets was Kakashi Hatake.