"What? A Five Nations Joint Chunin Exam?!"
Naruto's shout shot straight into the sky, startling the sparrows on the treetops into flight.
Leaves fluttered down in all directions. Even Sasuke, who had been focused on training his Lightning Release, could not help but rise to his feet, the shock in his eyes briefly overwhelming his hunger for power.
"That's right."
For once, Kakashi was not his usual lazy, half-hearted self. When he spoke of this exam, his expression was unusually serious. He tucked away the newest volume of Icha Icha Paradise and said in a solemn tone,
"This joint Chunin Exam between the Five Great Nations is an unprecedented super exam for the entire shinobi world.
And it is not just the ninja of the Five Great Nations. Kusagakure, Otogakure, Amegakure, Takigakure, Hoshigakure, and countless smaller hidden villages have also announced that they will participate.
This will be a grand event for the entire shinobi world. Countless geniuses, elites, and monsters will appear in this exam. Secret technique users will be everywhere. Bloodline users will be everywhere. Even someone as monstrous as Konome showing up would not be strange!"
"So awesome!"
A blazing fire lit up Naruto's blue eyes. He clenched his fists, his whole body trembling.
The trembling was not fear at the strength of the coming opponents. It was because he was so excited he could barely contain himself. His muscles, his bones, even his scalp tingled as if charged with electricity.
Back when he was bullied by his classmates, Konome had once told him something he had never forgotten.
The reason he was called a monster was because he did not have enough power.
Just like Konome. Her body weight was clearly abnormal, yet no one dared call her a monster to her face, let alone look at her with disgust. All anyone did was gaze at her with admiration and call her Konoha's greatest genius.
And now, the strongest genin in the entire shinobi world would gather for this exam. If he could achieve a good result here, if he could even take first place, then he too could earn the title of genius.
This was the chance he had been waiting for all along.
The dark life he had lived, bullied, looked down on, and hated, had been saved once by the faint dawnlight that was Konome. Now it was finally about to step into true brightness.
Sasuke was just as stirred by Kakashi's words, perhaps even more than Naruto. His breathing had already grown heavier.
When the Uchiha massacre happened, he had hidden in the hospital wallowing in grief and self-pity. But while he had been doing that, Konome had gone out and killed Kumogakure shinobi, becoming the hero of Konoha's Ninja Academy.
From that moment on, he had understood one thing with brutal clarity.
Every tragedy came from weakness.
If he had possessed power like Konome's, then he would have been able to stop the Uchiha tragedy.
That was why he had trained with everything he had, chasing strength without rest. Yet the more he trained, the more sharply he came to understand the gap in talent.
At the Academy, everyone called him a genius, but in his own heart, he had never dared accept that title.
It could not be helped. The people around him were too strong.
Naruto Uzumaki, with the Uzumaki bloodline, who trained with hundreds of shadow clones at once and possessed chakra as vast as the sea. Konome Taketori, whose true limits were impossible to see. Hatake Kakashi, the former greatest prodigy, who had graduated at five, become chunin at six, and jounin at twelve. And Might Guy, who had become a Konoha jonin through pure taijutsu alone, with the legendary Eight Gates capable of granting power beyond the Kage level once opened.
Compared to monsters like them, Sasuke had begun to harbor deep doubts even about his own Sharingan.
Could these eyes alone really allow him to surpass those monsters?
That question had been gnawing at his confidence the entire time, leaving him increasingly lost about where his talent actually stood.
There had even been a time when, whenever someone called him a genius, he could only laugh bitterly and mock himself with the words:
"A genius among ordinary people, but an ordinary person among geniuses."
And now, this was the moment to test himself.
Were Konome and Naruto simply too abnormal, or was he really just ordinary?
The answer would finally be revealed in this super exam.
"Ahh…"
Having eaten her fill and with a tree serving as a backrest, Konome let out an involuntary yawn. Compared to Naruto and Sasuke, who looked like they were on fire from head to toe, she seemed like nothing more than a lazy salted fish.
She was not excited at all. If anything, she was sleepy.
They only had to take the joint exam.
As the chief proctor, Konome had far more to think about.
How could she keep the foreign ninja from causing trouble? How would she settle the thousand or so shinobi likely to arrive from outside the village? How difficult should the written exam be? Morino Ibiki probably would not be able to intimidate that many foreign genin. Would the courage test even work against the shinobi of the Five Great Nations? The terrain in the Forest of Death was far too dangerous. Some sections that involved her experiments would have to be sealed off. There would be too many examinees, so the pass rate had to be lowered. The Heaven and Earth Scroll elimination rate was still too low.
Even now, Anko, Morino Ibiki, and Genma Shiranui still had not come to Root to find her. Judging by the time, the written test questions were probably already finalized.
Ever since suddenly becoming chief proctor, all kinds of trivial matters had piled up around her. Konome was already starting to regret agreeing to Hiruzen Sarutobi's request.
The three of them were lost in their own thoughts, and for a moment, the training ground fell quiet.
After announcing the news, Kakashi had been closely observing the expressions of the three before him.
Two blazing, one deadened. But none of them showed fear toward the exam itself.
He could not help nodding inwardly before continuing,
"In any case, that's the situation. I've already filled out the registration forms for all of you. Once the ninja from the other villages arrive, I'll submit them.
Your task from now on is to train hard and fight for good results in the coming exam.
I've got other business to attend to, so I'm leaving first."
Naruto nodded frantically, but when he heard that Kakashi was about to leave right after arriving, his eyes instantly flattened into lines.
"Kakashi-sensei, the exam is about to start. Aren't you going to prepare special training for us?"
Ruffling his silver hair into an even bigger mess, Kakashi gave the three of them a dead-eyed look.
"No. I think with your current strength, self-training is more than enough."
That really was what he thought, not just an excuse to slack off.
Naruto and Sasuke had both gone down the path of nin-taijutsu because of Konome's influence. Their route was completely different from Kakashi's balanced all-rounder style. He had already taught them everything he could. There was no meaningful special training he could offer them now.
And more importantly, he had great confidence in his students' strength, especially in the most ridiculous monster of them all, Konome.
He might have said that people comparable to her could appear in the exam, but in his heart he knew the truth. A genius like that might not appear even once in several thousand years. The odds of actually meeting one were absurdly low. As for someone stronger than her, such a freak simply could not exist in this world.
Special training really was unnecessary.
The most important thing was that the latest volume of Icha Icha Paradise had only just gone on sale at the Konoha bookstore this morning, and he had not had time to read it yet.
Though he looked calm, Kakashi was actually more impatient than Naruto and Sasuke.
"Announcement over. I wish you all excellent results in the upcoming exam. Bye."
Without waiting for a response, Kakashi formed a hand seal and vanished in a puff of smoke.
A light breeze twisted through the smoke and scattered it. Kakashi's figure was already gone. Once again, only Naruto, Sasuke, and Konome remained on the empty Training Ground Three.
"Kakashi-sensei is really the complete opposite of Guy," Naruto muttered, clicking his tongue. He bent down to pick up the orange outer jacket on the ground, shook it twice, then used it like a towel to wipe the sweat off his face.
"We're all taijutsu-focused fighters. Kakashi-sensei can't help us much."
Sasuke still gave Kakashi a fair assessment. After training under him for five years, he understood that much. Still, the fact remained that neither of them had a suitable teacher for this stage.
Guy's training style focused on tempering willpower and pushing the body to its physical limit. It had indeed helped Naruto and Sasuke in the past. But now, with the Chunin Exam closing in, simple physical training was not going to produce immediate results.
Creak. Crack.
Boom.
At that moment, the big tree Konome had been sitting against finally gave way. It snapped, the trunk with her skewer still embedded in it smashing into the ground hard enough to kick up a cloud of dust.
As the wind carried the dust away, Konome stood there perfectly clean, not a speck on her.
She waved lazily at Naruto and Sasuke.
"I need to go too. Keep training."
"W-wait!"
Sasuke suddenly called out to stop her. His fingers clenched tightly around the wide sleeves of his kimono, his expression shifting back and forth as if he were making some momentous decision.
Konome, who had been about to leave, saw the awkwardness on his face and immediately understood that he wanted something from her. For the Sasuke who had already changed so much from canon, she was willing to offer a bit of help within reason.
"What is it?"
"I…"
Looking at Konome's gentle, beautiful face, Sasuke found himself unable to speak for a moment.
He knew full well that her true nature was nothing like that face. Beneath that warm, kind, and sunny exterior was the heart of a witch. Just imagining himself handing over his body for her to study filled him with dread.
Off to the side, Naruto, who had been collecting his clothes and preparing to leave, immediately froze when he saw the boy and girl facing each other in the distance.
Then, like a thief, he twisted his neck and started sneaking glances at them from the corner of his eyes.
Even though he had given up on Konome romantically, he still absolutely had to see what was going on.
Of course, the furtive spying was impossible to hide from two dojutsu users.
With his eyes turning scarlet, Sasuke blinked meaningfully at Konome, then glanced toward Naruto.
"That thing you mentioned before, I agree."
That thing from before?
Konome blinked, briefly thrown off by Sasuke's cryptic phrasing. Then, seeing the Sharingan he had deliberately activated, she immediately remembered.
Before, she had asked to study a living Uchiha. She had hoped Sasuke could serve as a test subject, but he had rejected her in terror.
Now he was agreeing?
Seeing the heavy look on Sasuke's face, Konome's expression immediately brightened with clear delight.
The three-tomoe Sharingan created through stimulation with Hashirama cells was just brute force producing miracles.
What she had always wanted to see was the special chakra that, according to the Second Hokage's records, was born in the Uchiha brain the instant extreme emotion erupted.
Could that unique chakra be artificially replicated?
But living Uchiha subjects were too rare, and when extreme emotion appeared, it happened far too fast. If it was not done inside a proper lab, it was difficult to capture. The last time Sasuke evolved from one tomoe to two, she had missed it.
"Naruto?"
"Ah?"
Konome suddenly turned and looked toward Naruto, whose ears were practically standing straight up. He jerked upright in shock, his whole body screaming guilty conscience.
"Sasuke and I need to talk about something. Could you…"
"Okay. I won't disturb you."
Even though the training ground was public space, and even though the bitterness in his chest felt like he had swallowed a lemon whole, Naruto still obediently turned and left the moment Konome asked.
He had no resistance whatsoever when it came to her requests.
That had been true five years ago, and it was still true now.
Besides, he knew those two training maniacs well enough. He knew Sasuke and Konome could not possibly be talking about romance.
It was probably something about researching ninjutsu again.
Still, they had never gone out of their way to hide it from me before…
His jacket hung over his left shoulder, his forehead protector hooked on the right. With both hands shoved into his pockets, Naruto walked toward Konoha proper.
He wanted Ichiraku ramen.
Naruto's figure gradually disappeared into the trees, but Konome kept watching until he was truly out of sight.
Ever since the Orochimaru incident, human experimentation had become an absolute taboo in Konoha.
Studying the Sharingan and Uchiha blood undeniably fell into that category.
A bright-hearted person like Naruto was simply not suited to that darkness.
If he found out Konome and Sasuke were carrying out human experimentation, then he would inevitably be plunged into anguish.
Should he report it to the Third Hokage, or should he protect two of his closest companions?
And once he had agonized over it and finally made a choice, no matter which side he chose, he would only end up miserable.
Konome saw no reason to put him through that.
So there was no point telling him in the first place.
After dealing with Naruto the Peeping Tom, Konome turned back to Sasuke, whose crimson eyes were fixed on her.
"What do you want?"
"I'll let you study my Sharingan in exchange for Thunder Sword, Kiba."
Now that he had finally made up his mind, Sasuke no longer hesitated.
Whether it was for the Chunin Exam a month from now or for the nin-taijutsu path he wanted to walk in the future, he needed a powerful lightning-based blade.
So he really had been after that pair of swords.
Konome smiled knowingly. For a shinobi skilled with a blade, nothing was more tempting than a suitable weapon.
"One time? That is nowhere near enough to match the value of Kiba."
The moment she heard his proposed terms, she rejected them outright.
If Sasuke needed help, she could give him a favor for free.
But if he wanted a trade, then the value had to be equal.
In her previous life, she had suffered badly from that exact issue.
When she thought people were friends, she would often let them take the better end of money-related exchanges without a word.
Then when she later needed their help and got stonewalled, one sentence from them stayed with her forever:
"When I asked you to do things before, didn't I already pay you?"
At the time, she had felt wronged. She had given so much and still received no gratitude.
Only later had she realized the truth. She had simply been stupid.
A favor had to remain a favor, and could not involve money.
A transaction had to remain a transaction, and could not involve sentiment.
Mix the two together, and you lose on both ends.
"Then what will it take to get the Thunder Sword?"
Sasuke had not expected even selling his body would fail to buy Kiba, and anxiety crept into his heart. His immaturity in negotiation was so obvious that Konome almost felt bad about pressing him.
After thinking for a while, she finally said,
"How about this? From today onward, you serve as my Sharingan test subject, and in return I'll give you the right to use Kiba."
"The right to use it?"
Sasuke repeated the unfamiliar phrase to himself, then quickly understood.
He would only have the right to use it. In other words, he would essentially be renting Kiba by offering his body as a research subject. The moment Konome no longer needed him as an experiment, the Thunder Sword would have to be returned.
It was fair enough on paper, but Sasuke was still unwilling.
With Konome's terrifying talent for ninjutsu, she might fully understand his Sharingan in just a few days.
If that happened before he had even become fully accustomed to Kiba, then it would be taken back. Would that not make this whole exchange a complete loss?
And even if she learned nothing at all, but simply lost interest in him, then the Thunder Sword would still be reclaimed.
No matter how he looked at it, Kiba would never truly become his regular weapon.
That went completely against the reason he wanted it in the first place.
"I want full ownership of the Thunder Sword," Sasuke said after taking a deep breath, pushing the initiative completely into her hands.
"Name your price."
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