I refuse to believe he's that dense she literally kissed him before he got deployed to war and made her feelings pretty clear.
Naruto: The Outsider's Resolve
CH_8.32 (297)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
At six in the morning, Takuma and Maruboshi stood in front of the house. Takuma was dressed in the standard shinobi gear with a slightly chunkier backpack full of the things he would need for the two-week assessment. Seeing that they didn't know anything about the assessment, they built a survival kit that would at least keep him dry and fed.
"How are you feeling?" asked Maruboshi.
"Good, refreshed," Takuma answered, rolling his shoulders. "The nervousness will hit full force when I get there." It had been like that since his school days. He would be fine until the final moment when the teacher distributed the test sheets and the restlessness and worry would raise their head.
"Remember to pay attention to your surroundings, and nothing is more important than keeping yourself safe. I do not know what they might throw at you; I doubt it will be easy," said Maruboshi.
Takuma nodded. He wasn't in the mood for difficult things and wanted to gradually ramp up his training until he returned to his pre-Yu state of routine. So, even though he wanted to perform well, he wasn't excited about it.
"I haven't said this enough, but I'm grateful that you let me stay for so long. I know I would've been a very different person without your kindness." Takuma bowed until his torso was parallel to the ground. He didn't think he would've been able to recover as much as he did without Maruboshi. "After I return, I'll collect my belongings and move to Ai's house while I look for a new place."
Not only had Maruboshi lived for a very long time, but he also enjoyed spending time in the great outdoors—foraging, hunting, fishing, and cooking his catch outside in his garden—a lifestyle Takuma disrupted with his arrival.He wanted Maruboshi to return to his life, and leaving would allow him to do that.
"I would not mind if you continue to live with me. I have come to enjoy the company," said Maruboshi.
Takuma stood up from his bow, surprised.
"Of course, I will charge rent, and you will have to share housekeeping duties, but if you do not mind having an old man like myself as a housemate, then I do not mind if we extend our current living situation."
Takuma's lower lip quivered briefly, and he bowed his head to hide it. He felt an overwhelming feeling wash over him, making him take a deep breath. "Thank you," he said, looking back up. "I will think about it and give you my answer when I return."
"Focus on the tasks they give you," said Maruboshi with a smile. "Now, get out of here. It wouldn't do to turn up late now, would it."
"I'll be off," Takuma said before walking out of the property with a warmth bubbling in his heart.
———
.
The meeting location provided in the scroll was one of the training fields reserved for high-level chunin and jonin. Takuma almost salivated as he entered the field because not only was it large and impeccably maintained, but it was also attached to a training facility with specialised equipment for targeted training.
There were other training facilities open to genin, but they weren't as good and were always overbooked. Takuma had used one while training his hearing for the Hidden Mist Jutsu, but from what he knew, this training facility was a state-of-the-art location. He could've accessed it through the Police Force, but he was so busy that he never had the time to make it happen.
He spotted a shinobi standing in the middle of the field who waved when he saw him.
"Welcome, Genin Takuma. I'm glad that you're on time. You have a busy day ahead of you, so let's waste no time and get started," the shinobi said with a polite smile. He took out a small scroll from his person and tossed it to Takuma. "In that scroll, you will find a set of clothes along with weaponry and some other supplies. Please remove everything you brought and equip the contents of the scroll."
"Is that necessary?" asked Takuma, pursing his lips.
"It's mandatory."
He saw no use in arguing and changed to the gear provided in the storage scroll out in the open field. The uniform was a boiler suit with a grey-and-green colour scheme; it was a perfect fit and allowed a full range of motion with comfortable margins that he suspected was tailor-made for him.
There were plenty of pockets, but not as many as he was used to. After joining the Police Force, he wore their uniform, but before that, he used to wear the standard shinobi gear without the flak jacket. But outside of the village, he always wore a flak jacket on missions because he needed pocket space.
Not only was he used to the pocket placement on the jacket, but he also had a system of what each pocket stored—all of which was programmed into his muscle memory. The new boiler suit rendered all of that useless. The provided gear included weapon pouches, which once again presented a similar problem because the ones he owned were customised to his exact preferences. These ones made his hand feel awkward when he reached for them.
But the biggest annoyance was the weapons themselves. Each shinobi had custom loadouts built to accommodate and match their combat style. The weapon loadout provided was the 'recommended' set—which wasn't bad and was recommended for a reason, but it didn't fit him.
Takuma sighed and looked at the black balaclava mask provided with the gear.
"Am I going to steal something?" he asked.
"Please put it on and head to this address. You have twenty minutes; you'll be disqualified if you're even a minute late." The shinobi took out a scroll and weaved hand seals for smoke to puff out from the fuinjutsu seals. "The countdown has started; please hurry."
The address was a very tight twenty minutes away from their location, so he needed to be fast if he wanted to make it in time. Takuma handed his gear over and said, "I want all my stuff back when this is over. Not a thing should be missing."
"Please be unbothered. Everything will be taken care of properly."
Takuma was already running as he put his mask on.
———
.
He thought there would be some obstacles on his way to the address. He expected an ambush —but nothing happened, and he reached the location without any hitches. He didn't have a watch, so he couldn't be sure if he made it in time or not, but he believed so.
The building on the address was an unoccupied, drab, three-storey office building with boarded windows. There were no instructions on what to do upon reaching the location, and he would've opted to stay out and observe the perimeter, but seeing that there was a time limit, he didn't want to fail just because he didn't go inside.
He approached the backdoor and found a dusty plaque slotted in a door.
[Recruitment. Head Inside.]
That affirmed his doubts, and he entered the building and found himself in a large hall that workers would have used if anyone worked in the building. But instead of office workers, the cafeteria was occupied by a dozen or more balaclava-wearing shinobi who all looked at him when he entered through the door.
The room was already quiet, but it felt like it dipped further into silence as Takuma walked inside. He observed the people who were obviously his competition. He didn't know how many people the ANBU was aiming to recruit, so he assumed the worst and treated it like there was only one open position. If he wanted his promotion, he would need to trump everyone.
And if ANBU had invited someone, there was no doubt that they would be competent at the least.
Takuma swept his gaze around the hall to roughly memorise physical features like gender, body shape, height, and eye colour to identify the people. He was surprised when he noticed a man with white pupils; there was only one clan in the entire world with that dojutsu bloodline.
A Hyuga was participating in the ANBU assessment.
Their eyes met, and the Hyuga furrowed his eyes in displeasure before looking away. Takuma couldn't blame him. It was rude to stare. Even after living in the world for over four years, he hadn't gotten used to the white-eyed clan. Their eyes were so striking that he couldn't help but stare.
One by one, the masked candidates approached an unmasked kunoichi dressed in standard Leaf gear standing behind the serving counter attached to a small kitchen. Just like the receptionists he had met during his visit to the headquarters and the shinobi he met in the training field, she was an ANBU employee.
"Hello, welcome to the ANBU assessments," the kunoichi addressed Takuma with a polite smile when it was his turn to step up the counter. "While there is no rule barring you from revealing your identities during the assessment process to other candidates, we are allocating a number to everyone to use as identification. You will be here on addressed as Number #13." She took out a key from a drawer with the number thirteen written on the green tab. "For now, please head to the room marked with the number thirteen and wait for further instructions... Do you have any questions?"
He thought about it for a moment before shaking his head.
"Excellent," the kunoichi smiled.
Takuma took the stairs to get up to his room. On the base of the stairs, a masked ANBU-nin was sitting on a stool with his hood pulled up. He was still like a statue and had an intense vibe that said not to talk to him.
As Takuma passed by, his eye was drawn to the number of gem-encrusted gold rings on the man's freshly manicured fingers; they looked absurdly expensive and, in his opinion, gaudy. He wasn't against jewellery and thought about getting a piercing and a chain someday to wear off duty—but he preferred a more subtle style.
As he climbed the first step, Takuma raised his right arm and weaved a simple hand seal to disrupt the chakra inside him to shatter the genjutsu cast over him by the ANBU-nin. It was a decently strong genjutsu, but it was piss and shit when compared to what Mikoto used on him to build up his genjutsu recognition. Despite having the ability where he was passively able to see through genjutsu eventually, Mikoto ignored it and taught him how to recognise and break genjutsu properly.
As his skill with genjutsu—casting and breaking—rose, his passive ability had only become much stronger. He had reached a level where he could see through low-level genjutsu from the moment they were cast. For stronger genjutsu, he was able to see through them faster.
If he had to estimate, it would've taken three more seconds before his ability would've seen through the ANBU-nin's genjutsu. It was always a confidence booster when he was able to sense and break a genjutsu before his ability kicked in—which didn't happen a lot when his opponent was Mikoto, who admitted (shamelessly bragged) that it was difficult for someone on her level to cast weak genjutsu.
Takuma arrived at room number thirteen and saw two doors facing each other. One had a big red cross, while the other had a green check mark painted roughly on it. He guessed that the genjutsu made it seem like the room with the red X-cross was the correct one. The test was most probably to see if the candidates could break through the jutsu.
As he slotted his key into the correct lock, a door a few rooms over opened, and a tall and slender man with long hair that reached his lower back stepped out of a room with the red X-cross. The man wore a balaclava, but his frown was visible through the eye-opening.
Their eyes met, and the man looked flustered at being seen getting caught in the genjutsu. Takuma simply nodded to the man and entered his room without waiting for a reply.
When Takuma entered the room, he froze at the sight of the interior.
The rooms of the wall were painted into colours—white on the upper half and light green on the lower half—it was a familiar paint job because it was used at his house. Whoever had painted had gone through the trouble to fade and wear out the paint job, so it looked old, just like in his home that hadn't been painted in years.
Then his eye fell to the wall on the left where a large cork board hung with blank paper sheets pinned all over it... just like how he had it in his living room.
And finally, there was a simple metal sheet table and a cheap plastic chair in the middle of the room. It didn't match his furniture, but Takuma wasn't thinking about it because there was a leaf-themed hard front mask sitting on the tabletop—just like the one he wore when he fought in the Ring as Scars.
It wasn't subtle.
By setting up the room, they were making a statement—that they knew about him... that they knew him.
Want to read ahead of schedule? Head over to Patreón [fictiononlyreader]. Link here and in signature.
Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
"How are you feeling?" asked Maruboshi.
"Good, refreshed," Takuma answered, rolling his shoulders. "The nervousness will hit full force when I get there." It had been like that since his school days. He would be fine until the final moment when the teacher distributed the test sheets and the restlessness and worry would raise their head.
"Remember to pay attention to your surroundings, and nothing is more important than keeping yourself safe. I do not know what they might throw at you; I doubt it will be easy," said Maruboshi.
Takuma nodded. He wasn't in the mood for difficult things and wanted to gradually ramp up his training until he returned to his pre-Yu state of routine. So, even though he wanted to perform well, he wasn't excited about it.
"I haven't said this enough, but I'm grateful that you let me stay for so long. I know I would've been a very different person without your kindness." Takuma bowed until his torso was parallel to the ground. He didn't think he would've been able to recover as much as he did without Maruboshi. "After I return, I'll collect my belongings and move to Ai's house while I look for a new place."
Not only had Maruboshi lived for a very long time, but he also enjoyed spending time in the great outdoors—foraging, hunting, fishing, and cooking his catch outside in his garden—a lifestyle Takuma disrupted with his arrival.He wanted Maruboshi to return to his life, and leaving would allow him to do that.
"I would not mind if you continue to live with me. I have come to enjoy the company," said Maruboshi.
Takuma stood up from his bow, surprised.
"Of course, I will charge rent, and you will have to share housekeeping duties, but if you do not mind having an old man like myself as a housemate, then I do not mind if we extend our current living situation."
Takuma's lower lip quivered briefly, and he bowed his head to hide it. He felt an overwhelming feeling wash over him, making him take a deep breath. "Thank you," he said, looking back up. "I will think about it and give you my answer when I return."
"Focus on the tasks they give you," said Maruboshi with a smile. "Now, get out of here. It wouldn't do to turn up late now, would it."
"I'll be off," Takuma said before walking out of the property with a warmth bubbling in his heart.
———
.
The meeting location provided in the scroll was one of the training fields reserved for high-level chunin and jonin. Takuma almost salivated as he entered the field because not only was it large and impeccably maintained, but it was also attached to a training facility with specialised equipment for targeted training.
There were other training facilities open to genin, but they weren't as good and were always overbooked. Takuma had used one while training his hearing for the Hidden Mist Jutsu, but from what he knew, this training facility was a state-of-the-art location. He could've accessed it through the Police Force, but he was so busy that he never had the time to make it happen.
He spotted a shinobi standing in the middle of the field who waved when he saw him.
"Welcome, Genin Takuma. I'm glad that you're on time. You have a busy day ahead of you, so let's waste no time and get started," the shinobi said with a polite smile. He took out a small scroll from his person and tossed it to Takuma. "In that scroll, you will find a set of clothes along with weaponry and some other supplies. Please remove everything you brought and equip the contents of the scroll."
"Is that necessary?" asked Takuma, pursing his lips.
"It's mandatory."
He saw no use in arguing and changed to the gear provided in the storage scroll out in the open field. The uniform was a boiler suit with a grey-and-green colour scheme; it was a perfect fit and allowed a full range of motion with comfortable margins that he suspected was tailor-made for him.
There were plenty of pockets, but not as many as he was used to. After joining the Police Force, he wore their uniform, but before that, he used to wear the standard shinobi gear without the flak jacket. But outside of the village, he always wore a flak jacket on missions because he needed pocket space.
Not only was he used to the pocket placement on the jacket, but he also had a system of what each pocket stored—all of which was programmed into his muscle memory. The new boiler suit rendered all of that useless. The provided gear included weapon pouches, which once again presented a similar problem because the ones he owned were customised to his exact preferences. These ones made his hand feel awkward when he reached for them.
But the biggest annoyance was the weapons themselves. Each shinobi had custom loadouts built to accommodate and match their combat style. The weapon loadout provided was the 'recommended' set—which wasn't bad and was recommended for a reason, but it didn't fit him.
Takuma sighed and looked at the black balaclava mask provided with the gear.
"Am I going to steal something?" he asked.
"Please put it on and head to this address. You have twenty minutes; you'll be disqualified if you're even a minute late." The shinobi took out a scroll and weaved hand seals for smoke to puff out from the fuinjutsu seals. "The countdown has started; please hurry."
The address was a very tight twenty minutes away from their location, so he needed to be fast if he wanted to make it in time. Takuma handed his gear over and said, "I want all my stuff back when this is over. Not a thing should be missing."
"Please be unbothered. Everything will be taken care of properly."
Takuma was already running as he put his mask on.
———
.
He thought there would be some obstacles on his way to the address. He expected an ambush —but nothing happened, and he reached the location without any hitches. He didn't have a watch, so he couldn't be sure if he made it in time or not, but he believed so.
The building on the address was an unoccupied, drab, three-storey office building with boarded windows. There were no instructions on what to do upon reaching the location, and he would've opted to stay out and observe the perimeter, but seeing that there was a time limit, he didn't want to fail just because he didn't go inside.
He approached the backdoor and found a dusty plaque slotted in a door.
[Recruitment. Head Inside.]
That affirmed his doubts, and he entered the building and found himself in a large hall that workers would have used if anyone worked in the building. But instead of office workers, the cafeteria was occupied by a dozen or more balaclava-wearing shinobi who all looked at him when he entered through the door.
The room was already quiet, but it felt like it dipped further into silence as Takuma walked inside. He observed the people who were obviously his competition. He didn't know how many people the ANBU was aiming to recruit, so he assumed the worst and treated it like there was only one open position. If he wanted his promotion, he would need to trump everyone.
And if ANBU had invited someone, there was no doubt that they would be competent at the least.
Takuma swept his gaze around the hall to roughly memorise physical features like gender, body shape, height, and eye colour to identify the people. He was surprised when he noticed a man with white pupils; there was only one clan in the entire world with that dojutsu bloodline.
A Hyuga was participating in the ANBU assessment.
Their eyes met, and the Hyuga furrowed his eyes in displeasure before looking away. Takuma couldn't blame him. It was rude to stare. Even after living in the world for over four years, he hadn't gotten used to the white-eyed clan. Their eyes were so striking that he couldn't help but stare.
One by one, the masked candidates approached an unmasked kunoichi dressed in standard Leaf gear standing behind the serving counter attached to a small kitchen. Just like the receptionists he had met during his visit to the headquarters and the shinobi he met in the training field, she was an ANBU employee.
"Hello, welcome to the ANBU assessments," the kunoichi addressed Takuma with a polite smile when it was his turn to step up the counter. "While there is no rule barring you from revealing your identities during the assessment process to other candidates, we are allocating a number to everyone to use as identification. You will be here on addressed as Number #13." She took out a key from a drawer with the number thirteen written on the green tab. "For now, please head to the room marked with the number thirteen and wait for further instructions... Do you have any questions?"
He thought about it for a moment before shaking his head.
"Excellent," the kunoichi smiled.
Takuma took the stairs to get up to his room. On the base of the stairs, a masked ANBU-nin was sitting on a stool with his hood pulled up. He was still like a statue and had an intense vibe that said not to talk to him.
As Takuma passed by, his eye was drawn to the number of gem-encrusted gold rings on the man's freshly manicured fingers; they looked absurdly expensive and, in his opinion, gaudy. He wasn't against jewellery and thought about getting a piercing and a chain someday to wear off duty—but he preferred a more subtle style.
As he climbed the first step, Takuma raised his right arm and weaved a simple hand seal to disrupt the chakra inside him to shatter the genjutsu cast over him by the ANBU-nin. It was a decently strong genjutsu, but it was piss and shit when compared to what Mikoto used on him to build up his genjutsu recognition. Despite having the ability where he was passively able to see through genjutsu eventually, Mikoto ignored it and taught him how to recognise and break genjutsu properly.
As his skill with genjutsu—casting and breaking—rose, his passive ability had only become much stronger. He had reached a level where he could see through low-level genjutsu from the moment they were cast. For stronger genjutsu, he was able to see through them faster.
If he had to estimate, it would've taken three more seconds before his ability would've seen through the ANBU-nin's genjutsu. It was always a confidence booster when he was able to sense and break a genjutsu before his ability kicked in—which didn't happen a lot when his opponent was Mikoto, who admitted (shamelessly bragged) that it was difficult for someone on her level to cast weak genjutsu.
Takuma arrived at room number thirteen and saw two doors facing each other. One had a big red cross, while the other had a green check mark painted roughly on it. He guessed that the genjutsu made it seem like the room with the red X-cross was the correct one. The test was most probably to see if the candidates could break through the jutsu.
As he slotted his key into the correct lock, a door a few rooms over opened, and a tall and slender man with long hair that reached his lower back stepped out of a room with the red X-cross. The man wore a balaclava, but his frown was visible through the eye-opening.
Their eyes met, and the man looked flustered at being seen getting caught in the genjutsu. Takuma simply nodded to the man and entered his room without waiting for a reply.
When Takuma entered the room, he froze at the sight of the interior.
The rooms of the wall were painted into colours—white on the upper half and light green on the lower half—it was a familiar paint job because it was used at his house. Whoever had painted had gone through the trouble to fade and wear out the paint job, so it looked old, just like in his home that hadn't been painted in years.
Then his eye fell to the wall on the left where a large cork board hung with blank paper sheets pinned all over it... just like how he had it in his living room.
And finally, there was a simple metal sheet table and a cheap plastic chair in the middle of the room. It didn't match his furniture, but Takuma wasn't thinking about it because there was a leaf-themed hard front mask sitting on the tabletop—just like the one he wore when he fought in the Ring as Scars.
It wasn't subtle.
By setting up the room, they were making a statement—that they knew about him... that they knew him.
Want to read ahead of schedule? Head over to Patreón [fictiononlyreader]. Link here and in signature.
Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
CH_8.33 (298)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
At a location far from the office building with the candidates, a group of ANBU-nin and department staff used another building as their base. They preferred to be in the same location as the examinees, but a Hyuga was participating in the assessment, and they didn't want to be seen by the Byakugan.
They were inside a spacious room with a large conference table in the centre and a wall lined with tons of bulky electronic equipment connected to the cameras in the office building all over the building; each numbered room had a pair of cameras to observe the candidates. Another wall was covered with bulky monitors that showed grainy images of the candidates as they sat in their rooms, individually customised to surprise and unsettle them.
"Are all candidates settled down?" asked a man codenamed Eisbar, who was given a mask inspired by the polar bear. Eisbar was an ANBU jonin in charge of the current recruitment round.
"Yes, sir," answered another ANBU-nin codenamed Swine. He was one of the chunin involved in the recruitment process.
None of the ANBU-nin in the room wore their masks, as no outsider was in their company. The staff were aware of the ANBU-nin's identity as it was unrealistic to work with people without knowing who they were; they needed to know if they were talking to the right person.
"Was anyone late to reach the location?"
"No."
Eisbar nodded as he stared at the monitors. It would've been embarrassing for everyone involved if a candidate selected to be a potential ANBU-nin couldn't do something as simple as reach the location on time. He looked at the wall clock; it had been ten minutes since the last candidates entered their rooms, and that was the cut-off period to escape the genjutsu cast by the ANBU-nin at the location.
The ability to use genjutsu wasn't required for an ANBU-nin—it was heavily preferred, but not a cause of disqualification. However, one of the most basic requirements was a competent ability to detect and break genjutsu.
"How many of them are still under the genjutsu?"
"Three of them."
A total of seventeen candidates were being assessed in the current round of assessment.
"Send them home," Eisbar said, waving his hand. Not even an hour had passed since the assessment started, and three people had already been eliminated. "Has Angler sent a list yet?"
Codename Angler was the ANBU-nin at the office building who had cast genjutsu over the candidates and wore a mask inspired by the anglerfish.
One of the staff gave Eisbar a sheet of candidates sorted by how quickly they had broken out of the genjutsu.
"One second—Number #13, Genin Takuma. That's impressive," said Eisbar with an approving nod. "Isn't he the one we're going to promote to chunin if we select him? I didn't know he was a genjutsu specialist."
The recruitment process was only a part of his responsibilities, and he had many more duties as a jonin; as such, he wasn't familiar with the candidates, having delegated the task to his subordinates. It was his plan to get familiar with the candidates in the coming two weeks so that he could decide who would be inducted into the department.
But he knew about Takuma because of the rank promotion.
The Department of ANBU employed shinobi of all ranks and capabilities as agents. They even had genin agents for specific use cases, such as going undercover as a civilian or low-level non-shinobi chakra wielder in a scenario where the agent had to hoodwink a sensory-nin who would immediately catch a chunin or above because of their large chakra reserves.
The current round of assessment targeted 'chunin-level' shinobi. Most candidates were already chunin rank, but there were a few like Takuma who the ANBU deemed worthy enough to be chunin and thus offered them rank promotion if they managed to join the department.
"Negative, sir," said another ANBU-nin, codenamed Lowe, who had been given a mask inspired by a lion. He was another chunin involved in the recruitment process. "Genin Takuma was a prizefighter in the underground fighting establishment called the Ring. His fighting style is predominantly taijutsu, with a secondary focus on ninjutsu. However, he learned genjutsu under Jonin Uchiha Mikoto before he was deployed to the Frost-Steam war—that's the most probable source of his skill."
"The Ring, eh," Eisbar muttered.
The Ring was an open secret that was allowed to exist for a myriad of greedy reasons, but if anyone asked, it was because it allowed the Leaf shinobi to train their fighting skills. The Ring had produced a few ANBU-nin, mostly genin, as the shinobi that gathered in those circles were generally street-smart and, thus, suitable for work that the department gave to their genin agents.
He didn't miss Takuma's connection with Uchiha and his employment in the Police Force. His relationship with Uchiha Mikoto was notable, but it wasn't anything special; they had plenty of clan shinobi with notable connections in their ranks, and Mikoto's son was an ANBU Captain.
"Number #7, Chunin Hyuga Kojuro. Six seconds is impressive as well."
That was roughly the time it took to climb the stairs and reach the second floor. For most genjutsu users, it was extremely difficult to catch a Hyuga in a genjutsu as they could see the flow of chakra and would disrupt it before it could even hold effect—but that was only when they had their Byakugan active—with their eyes inactive, they were the same as anyone else.
"If I remember correctly, he's a tracking and infiltration specialist. Typical Hyuga," Eisbar commented. However, no one could deny that no one was better at tracking than a Hyuga. As long as Kojuro managed to stay in till the end, he was guaranteed to join ANBU.
The five people after Takuma broke their genjutsu well before they reached their rooms. The eight after them took a few more seconds and broke them by the time they reached their pair of rooms. The remaining went into the wrong rooms before breaking the genjutsu and then going into the right one.
"Alright then," Eisbar clapped. "Let's find out more about them... Bring in their belongings."
To test the candidates appropriately, they needed to know more about them and what better way to get to know them than the weapons they wield?
———
.
While Takuma was most definitely surprised upon seeing the room's interior, he quickly calmed down and closed the door behind him.
He quickly scanned the room and noticed the two wall-mounted cameras with red dot lights indicating that they were watching him. The only items in the room were the table, chair, cork board covered with blank paper sheets, and the 'Scars' mask.
He picked up the mask to confirm that it wasn't one of his masks stored in the storage locker. He hadn't seen them since his return, as they were packed away in a box in the back. The mask was brand new without a single scratch or embellishment, while all of his masks had seen use in fights. He then checked under the chair and table to see if there was anything, only to find nothing out of place. Finally, he went to the corkboard and looked through the pages to find a page with a single line of text.
[Number #13, remove your mask and wait for further instructions]
Takuma didn't follow the instructions immediately and took the corkboard off the wall to check behind it, but there was nothing there either. The only other thing of interest in the room was that the door had a post-box slot for someone to slip something in from the outside.
He sat down on the chair, and only then did he pull off his mask.
After taking a moment, Takuma realised that the things in the room weren't as surprising as he had first thought. The paint job of his house wasn't difficult to find. If the Police Force knew about him being Scars, then it wasn't surprising that the ANBU knew about it; moreover, he was no longer worried if people knew—in fact, he was ready to share the prizefighting part of his life with his loved ones.
The corkboard, however, did concern him. Had they looked into his storage locker, or had they broken into his house before he had left for the war? Perhaps both since, before he purchased a corkboard, important information was always posted on a wall in his house. All of it was encrypted in a mixture of two other-worldly languages, and while he knew it was near impossible to decrypt, he was worried that ANBU just might pull it off somehow.
But seeing that they had put up blank pages, he suspected they had nothing on him in that avenue.
Then there was the question of if this was all they knew about him. He doubted that. If it were him, he would like to lull the target into a false sense of comfort before striking hard to panic them. He wouldn't be surprised if they knew about his dealings with Enomoto.
While he had been careful to compartmentalise his life and keep things apart, he wasn't arrogant enough to think he hadn't made any mistakes. Just looking at his work at the Narcotics Taskforce would raise some doubts. If someone looked deeply into it, they would find something off. However, Takuma was confident they wouldn't find any incriminating proof to nail him for his dealings.
If someone wanted to ruin him, they would need Enomoto's help, and while he didn't believe the shady iryo-nin would do it—that help didn't need to be given willingly. There were ways to make Enomoto open his mouth through painful means and the ANBU was more than capable of doing that.
Takuma wanted to sigh deeply, but the cameras were watching, and he didn't want to give anything away.
A clicking sound came from the door, indicating that the lock on the door had been engaged.
He got up and tried the door; it was locked. The door was sturdy but not enough to stop him from breaking out. He guessed that the next test was about to commence, so he returned to his chair to wait. Time passed, but nothing happened. Takuma didn't have a watch, so he didn't know how many minutes had passed, but it felt close to an hour.
Takuma familiarised himself with the weapon pouches so that he could use them effectively. He laid out the weapons on the table to visualise the loadout and remember the quantity of all the different units to strategize how he might want to use his weapons during fights.
"Hmm?"
Takuma looked at the kunai in his hand. It looked normal, but something felt off about it. For a moment, he wasn't able to identify the problem, but when he tossed it in the air, he immediately recognised that the kunai was imbalanced when it leaned to the side in the air. It was a minute lean because the throw height was short, but he knew that the kunai would deviate over long distances.
He gazed at the spread on the table and suddenly couldn't trust anything. Were the explosive tags duds? Did they weaken the standard rope somehow to lower its fail point? Was the chemical mixture in smoke bombs altered so it wouldn't work properly? Questions about every piece of equipment raised his mind.
While Takuma thought that, he kept himself from looking up at the camera because he didn't want to give anything. He remembered his academy days when he had no money and picked up extra weapons from clearance bins, which often had flaws like chips or terrible balance. He learned to work with them, and while it had been three years since he had that problem, he felt like he could still pull it off.
They were trying to mess with his head, but it would take a lot more than this to get to him. Takuma sat up straighter and prepared to face whatever they were going to throw at him.
However, nothing happened... and six hours had passed.
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They were inside a spacious room with a large conference table in the centre and a wall lined with tons of bulky electronic equipment connected to the cameras in the office building all over the building; each numbered room had a pair of cameras to observe the candidates. Another wall was covered with bulky monitors that showed grainy images of the candidates as they sat in their rooms, individually customised to surprise and unsettle them.
"Are all candidates settled down?" asked a man codenamed Eisbar, who was given a mask inspired by the polar bear. Eisbar was an ANBU jonin in charge of the current recruitment round.
"Yes, sir," answered another ANBU-nin codenamed Swine. He was one of the chunin involved in the recruitment process.
None of the ANBU-nin in the room wore their masks, as no outsider was in their company. The staff were aware of the ANBU-nin's identity as it was unrealistic to work with people without knowing who they were; they needed to know if they were talking to the right person.
"Was anyone late to reach the location?"
"No."
Eisbar nodded as he stared at the monitors. It would've been embarrassing for everyone involved if a candidate selected to be a potential ANBU-nin couldn't do something as simple as reach the location on time. He looked at the wall clock; it had been ten minutes since the last candidates entered their rooms, and that was the cut-off period to escape the genjutsu cast by the ANBU-nin at the location.
The ability to use genjutsu wasn't required for an ANBU-nin—it was heavily preferred, but not a cause of disqualification. However, one of the most basic requirements was a competent ability to detect and break genjutsu.
"How many of them are still under the genjutsu?"
"Three of them."
A total of seventeen candidates were being assessed in the current round of assessment.
"Send them home," Eisbar said, waving his hand. Not even an hour had passed since the assessment started, and three people had already been eliminated. "Has Angler sent a list yet?"
Codename Angler was the ANBU-nin at the office building who had cast genjutsu over the candidates and wore a mask inspired by the anglerfish.
One of the staff gave Eisbar a sheet of candidates sorted by how quickly they had broken out of the genjutsu.
"One second—Number #13, Genin Takuma. That's impressive," said Eisbar with an approving nod. "Isn't he the one we're going to promote to chunin if we select him? I didn't know he was a genjutsu specialist."
The recruitment process was only a part of his responsibilities, and he had many more duties as a jonin; as such, he wasn't familiar with the candidates, having delegated the task to his subordinates. It was his plan to get familiar with the candidates in the coming two weeks so that he could decide who would be inducted into the department.
But he knew about Takuma because of the rank promotion.
The Department of ANBU employed shinobi of all ranks and capabilities as agents. They even had genin agents for specific use cases, such as going undercover as a civilian or low-level non-shinobi chakra wielder in a scenario where the agent had to hoodwink a sensory-nin who would immediately catch a chunin or above because of their large chakra reserves.
The current round of assessment targeted 'chunin-level' shinobi. Most candidates were already chunin rank, but there were a few like Takuma who the ANBU deemed worthy enough to be chunin and thus offered them rank promotion if they managed to join the department.
"Negative, sir," said another ANBU-nin, codenamed Lowe, who had been given a mask inspired by a lion. He was another chunin involved in the recruitment process. "Genin Takuma was a prizefighter in the underground fighting establishment called the Ring. His fighting style is predominantly taijutsu, with a secondary focus on ninjutsu. However, he learned genjutsu under Jonin Uchiha Mikoto before he was deployed to the Frost-Steam war—that's the most probable source of his skill."
"The Ring, eh," Eisbar muttered.
The Ring was an open secret that was allowed to exist for a myriad of greedy reasons, but if anyone asked, it was because it allowed the Leaf shinobi to train their fighting skills. The Ring had produced a few ANBU-nin, mostly genin, as the shinobi that gathered in those circles were generally street-smart and, thus, suitable for work that the department gave to their genin agents.
He didn't miss Takuma's connection with Uchiha and his employment in the Police Force. His relationship with Uchiha Mikoto was notable, but it wasn't anything special; they had plenty of clan shinobi with notable connections in their ranks, and Mikoto's son was an ANBU Captain.
"Number #7, Chunin Hyuga Kojuro. Six seconds is impressive as well."
That was roughly the time it took to climb the stairs and reach the second floor. For most genjutsu users, it was extremely difficult to catch a Hyuga in a genjutsu as they could see the flow of chakra and would disrupt it before it could even hold effect—but that was only when they had their Byakugan active—with their eyes inactive, they were the same as anyone else.
"If I remember correctly, he's a tracking and infiltration specialist. Typical Hyuga," Eisbar commented. However, no one could deny that no one was better at tracking than a Hyuga. As long as Kojuro managed to stay in till the end, he was guaranteed to join ANBU.
The five people after Takuma broke their genjutsu well before they reached their rooms. The eight after them took a few more seconds and broke them by the time they reached their pair of rooms. The remaining went into the wrong rooms before breaking the genjutsu and then going into the right one.
"Alright then," Eisbar clapped. "Let's find out more about them... Bring in their belongings."
To test the candidates appropriately, they needed to know more about them and what better way to get to know them than the weapons they wield?
———
.
While Takuma was most definitely surprised upon seeing the room's interior, he quickly calmed down and closed the door behind him.
He quickly scanned the room and noticed the two wall-mounted cameras with red dot lights indicating that they were watching him. The only items in the room were the table, chair, cork board covered with blank paper sheets, and the 'Scars' mask.
He picked up the mask to confirm that it wasn't one of his masks stored in the storage locker. He hadn't seen them since his return, as they were packed away in a box in the back. The mask was brand new without a single scratch or embellishment, while all of his masks had seen use in fights. He then checked under the chair and table to see if there was anything, only to find nothing out of place. Finally, he went to the corkboard and looked through the pages to find a page with a single line of text.
[Number #13, remove your mask and wait for further instructions]
Takuma didn't follow the instructions immediately and took the corkboard off the wall to check behind it, but there was nothing there either. The only other thing of interest in the room was that the door had a post-box slot for someone to slip something in from the outside.
He sat down on the chair, and only then did he pull off his mask.
After taking a moment, Takuma realised that the things in the room weren't as surprising as he had first thought. The paint job of his house wasn't difficult to find. If the Police Force knew about him being Scars, then it wasn't surprising that the ANBU knew about it; moreover, he was no longer worried if people knew—in fact, he was ready to share the prizefighting part of his life with his loved ones.
The corkboard, however, did concern him. Had they looked into his storage locker, or had they broken into his house before he had left for the war? Perhaps both since, before he purchased a corkboard, important information was always posted on a wall in his house. All of it was encrypted in a mixture of two other-worldly languages, and while he knew it was near impossible to decrypt, he was worried that ANBU just might pull it off somehow.
But seeing that they had put up blank pages, he suspected they had nothing on him in that avenue.
Then there was the question of if this was all they knew about him. He doubted that. If it were him, he would like to lull the target into a false sense of comfort before striking hard to panic them. He wouldn't be surprised if they knew about his dealings with Enomoto.
While he had been careful to compartmentalise his life and keep things apart, he wasn't arrogant enough to think he hadn't made any mistakes. Just looking at his work at the Narcotics Taskforce would raise some doubts. If someone looked deeply into it, they would find something off. However, Takuma was confident they wouldn't find any incriminating proof to nail him for his dealings.
If someone wanted to ruin him, they would need Enomoto's help, and while he didn't believe the shady iryo-nin would do it—that help didn't need to be given willingly. There were ways to make Enomoto open his mouth through painful means and the ANBU was more than capable of doing that.
Takuma wanted to sigh deeply, but the cameras were watching, and he didn't want to give anything away.
A clicking sound came from the door, indicating that the lock on the door had been engaged.
He got up and tried the door; it was locked. The door was sturdy but not enough to stop him from breaking out. He guessed that the next test was about to commence, so he returned to his chair to wait. Time passed, but nothing happened. Takuma didn't have a watch, so he didn't know how many minutes had passed, but it felt close to an hour.
Takuma familiarised himself with the weapon pouches so that he could use them effectively. He laid out the weapons on the table to visualise the loadout and remember the quantity of all the different units to strategize how he might want to use his weapons during fights.
"Hmm?"
Takuma looked at the kunai in his hand. It looked normal, but something felt off about it. For a moment, he wasn't able to identify the problem, but when he tossed it in the air, he immediately recognised that the kunai was imbalanced when it leaned to the side in the air. It was a minute lean because the throw height was short, but he knew that the kunai would deviate over long distances.
He gazed at the spread on the table and suddenly couldn't trust anything. Were the explosive tags duds? Did they weaken the standard rope somehow to lower its fail point? Was the chemical mixture in smoke bombs altered so it wouldn't work properly? Questions about every piece of equipment raised his mind.
While Takuma thought that, he kept himself from looking up at the camera because he didn't want to give anything. He remembered his academy days when he had no money and picked up extra weapons from clearance bins, which often had flaws like chips or terrible balance. He learned to work with them, and while it had been three years since he had that problem, he felt like he could still pull it off.
They were trying to mess with his head, but it would take a lot more than this to get to him. Takuma sat up straighter and prepared to face whatever they were going to throw at him.
However, nothing happened... and six hours had passed.
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CH_8.34 (299)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
"How are they doing?" Eisbar asked as he returned from his break. He was a fit middle-aged man of average height with light grey streaks all over his hair that well complemented his blacks, giving him a mature, charming salt-and-pepper look.
Six hours had gone by since they had locked the candidates in their rooms—rooms designed to make them uncomfortable. On top of that, being put under genjutsu only announced the start of the assessment. Being left alone for six hours would only drive them paranoid no matter how level-headed they could be.
"As expected, they're become quite restless," answered Swine.
Eisbar stepped closer to the monitors. Some candidates were pacing around their rooms, some stared into the cameras, and others fidgeted in their seats. None could relax as they were expecting the assessment to throw a task at them the moment they let their guards down, but they were all missing the point that being uptight for an extended period of time was just as detrimental.
The purpose of locking them in and going no-contact was partially to mentally beat them down and test to see how they handled it.
"Is... Is he sleeping?" Eisbar said, genuinely surprised when he saw a young man napping with his head on the table. He had a large afro of puffy, curly brown hair, a muscular build, and deeply tanned skin from staying outdoors under the sun. The cameras had no microphones, but the on-site staff could hear him snore when they passed his room.
"He has been like that for three hours now," said Lowe, handing Eisbar the candidate's profile. "Number #10, Chunin Sonaba Yazo."
"Is he in any way related to Jonin Sonaba Makina?" asked Eisbar.
"Her nephew."
The Sonaba family name had been attached to shinobi since the formation of the Hidden Leaf village, and the once civilian family had turned into a shinobi family where every single person in the next generation was a shinobi. They weren't anything special and only had produced two chunin before Sonaba Makina rose to the rank of an esteemed jonin.
Since then, the Sonaba family had exploded in popularity until it was known in the Hidden Leaf village even though the Sonaba family wasn't based there and called another city in the Land of Fire their home.
"A rogue hunter, huh. That's interesting," said Eisbar as he flipped through Sonaba Yazo's file. Rogue hunting was a trade open to anyone with the ability to capture the rogues and return them to the custody of the village that had declared them wanted. An adjacent field of bounty assassination also existed where anyone could target anyone else by putting a prize over their heads.
"Sonaba family are based near the Land of Rain border in Yogan City of the Natsu province," said Lowe.
"His choice of occupation makes sense, then."
The Land of Storms shared its boundaries with three of the five Great Shinobi Nations—the Land of Fire, the Land of Wind, and the Land of Earth. The country was known to be somewhat of a haven for rogues, as they could exist in the nation without the constant fear of being hunted by the Leaf, Sand, and Rock shinobi.
The Land of Storms was also the home to the Hidden Rain village, but the shinobi village mostly turned a blind eye to the rogues as long as they kept to a single region. While the rogues were a problem, the nation wasn't in a position to regulate them as it was locked in an intense civil war between the Hidden Rain village and the mercenary group known as the Akatsuki.
That turmoil had allowed the rogue activity to bloom and balloon in the nation and take root.
Due to its proximity to the border, the region near Yogan City saw heavy rogue activity. For that reason, there was a dense shinobi presence in the city of Yogan to hunt criminals and rogues who were either trying to leave or enter the nation.
"He'll fit well if he passes," said Eisbar. Rogue hunting was part of ANBU's responsibilities, and it was clear why Yazo was chosen as a candidate. He didn't know what to make of Yazo being so unbothered that he was sleeping for three hours, but he was one of the fastest people to break the genjutsu, so at least he wasn't incompetent.
"How did he react to the room?"
"He didn't like it and openly showed his displeasure to the camera but soon got over it."
"What about her?" Eisbar tapped the screen of another monitor. A young blonde woman had her legs up on the table as she leaned into her chair. She looked utterly bored and was listlessly staring at the ceiling.
"Number #3, Yamanaka Amami. She's a practitioner of her clan's hiden jutsu/hijutsu and has worked in T&I for the past two years. She has a near-perfect track record, no black spots in her history, and glowing recommendations from everyone we asked. She has even worked with us on a couple of cases during her tenure at T&I."
The ANBU collaborated with other departments across the Hidden Leaf for various reasons, including availing their services for ther ANBU's matters. While ANBU had agents more than capable of handling interrogations, some of the best information extractors were still under the employment of the Torture and Interrogation Department—which was why ANBU asked them to train their agents in the art of interrogation—and for that reason, when they encountered someone particularly adamant about keeping their mouth shut, they brought-in external interrogators to help.
ANBU maintained various two-way relationships. Using the information they collected through their spy system, they warned other departments; similarly, the other departments made ANBU aware when they found something strange.
After all, keeping the nation safe was a collaborative effort.
Eisbar sighed. "I don't want to fight with T&I about poaching again."
It had been a whole thing last time ANBU had taken someone from Torture and Interrogation—and this time, it was a Yamanaka; their clan's special jutsu made them extremely valuable in extracting information from people. Moreover, Torture and Interrogation's current head was a former ANBU-nin, Morino Ibiki, which was unfavourable because he knew how they worked.
He was sure to prevent talents from leaving his pool regardless of their history.
"She laughed when she saw the room and has since then ignored it completely," said Lowe.
"I guess it's not a surprise seeing that she's from T&I," said Eisbar before moving on to other candidates. "How are Takuma and Kojuro doing?"
"Number #7 has been using his Byakugan every twenty minutes to check his surroundings. He tries to hide it, but it's obvious that he's doing it. He had a visible reaction to the room initially, but I assume seeing into other's rooms made him realise that we are trying to unsettle them," Lowe replied, slightly peeved as the Byakugan rendered the rooms' tactics moot.
Lowe continued, "As for Number #13, excluding when he first entered the room, he hadn't looked into the camera in six hours. If he was affected, he's kept it under wraps... He walks for ten minutes every hour, but other than that, he stays seated, doing absolutely nothing. He was also the first to figure out that the weapons we gave them had something wrong with them."
Eisbar gazed at all of the monitors. All of them had something ANBU wanted. Any one of them could do the job decently well, but they didn't want decent—they wanted someone who could perform to their best under pressure. The purpose of the test was to stress test them and keep all those who didn't snap.
"In that case, it's been long enough. Let's start in earnest."
———
.
Takuma heard footsteps and the repeating sound of metal sliding against metal. His eyes went to the post-box slot on the doors, the only thing in the hallway that could produce such a sound. He got up and walked to the door, and sure enough, a package slid through it seconds later.
The package seemed to have a stack of paper inside and was sealed by a fuinjutsu tag. He released the seal and dumped its contents on the table—a thick stack of papers held together with a circular paper clip and two ball-point pens. The stack of paper was a long list of true-and-false statements and flipping to the last page showed that there were 578 questions.
The questions ranged from 'if his sleep was usually disturbed' to 'if he liked to tease animals' to 'if he got along with authority figures' to 'if he liked to dance.'
Takuma recognised this type of questionnaire but wondered about its purpose. Lying to make oneself look better was laughably easy with a quiz like this and the instructions on the first page said there were no pass-fail criteria for the test.
I shouldn't lie... completely, he said to himself as he thought about the cameras looking down on him. If the ANBU wanted them to answer the test, they must've considered they would lie and thus have ways to identify when a candidate was lying.
Takuma didn't really want ANBU to think of him as someone other than his true self and thus had no desire to lie on the test—but he didn't want them to know everything about him either.As he flipped through the pages, he could tell that if he filled it honestly, they would have a considerably complete view of who he was.
So, after taking a moment, he picked up one of the pens and started filling in his answers.
———
.
The ANBU team sat in their base and studied the completed questionnaires to learn more about the candidates.
"Yeah, Number #1 lied so much it's funny," one of the staff chuckled.
"Oof, Number #7 has some deep-seated issues, alright," said another staff member reading Hyuga Kojuro's questionnaire. "He's not at all optimistic about life. I guess the rumour about all of the Hyuuga being miserable is true."
"Number #2 abhors pressure, and this is just a straight-up confession that he will crumble at the first sign of it."
Eisbar sat on the head of the table, unhurriedly flipping through a questionnaire himself. He judged each answer and compared it against answers to other questions to see if there was a natural correlation or if the candidate had lied.
The aim of the questionnaire was to find out more about the candidates—and to see how they saw themselves. However, that was not all there was to it. People had a natural tendency to lie to make themselves more likeable to others, so candidates were expected to use the questionnaire to paint a favourable image of themselves to the examiners.
Lying was an elegant and complicated art; part of the test was to see if they could do it convincingly. They wanted to see if the candidates could deceive them into thinking they were someone other than themselves. There would come a time in every ANBU-nin's career when they would need to pretend to be someone else, and having that skill was highly preferred in an agent.
Of course, the department would love to know the truth about who they were employed, but if a candidate had the ability to deceive experienced ANBU-nin, then they were sure to be good at their jobs. Lying too much wasn't a problem if one could do it convincingly, but almost everyone who lied a lot did it poorly, and thus, gave themselves up. Even though the questionnaire asked the candidates to be honest, not lying was also a problem because deception was part and parcel about a shinobi, let alone and ANBU-nin.
"Number #10 is either the most well-adjusted man in the world, or he's really good at lying," said Swine, his highly positive tone showing that he liked Sonaba Yazo as a candidate.
"As expected of a Yamanaka," Lowe sighed as he read Yamanaka Amami's questionnaire. "Number #3 is definitely familiar with the test's base version we modified. I can't find a single error in how she used the questions to create her impression—she even added just the right amount of embellishments to make it utterly believable... I think she's a strong candidate."
While everyone discussed the candidates they were reading about, Eisbar silently read Number #13, Takuma's questionnaire.
If he had to give his impression in one word, it would be— "Genuine."
Eisbar took a deep breath. He couldn't tell if Takuma was lying or not. The impression he got from the questionnaire was that of a living human being with his fair share of problems like everyone else who lived while dealing with them.
If Yamanaka Amami had lied perfectly to create a positive yet believable picture that would impress anyone other than the current group who were expecting and wanted the candidate to lie, then Takuma had lied to show some fundamental flaws at the risk of some people having a lower opinion of him.
In doing so, he had made the impression feel genuinely authentic.
"Ah," Eisbar uttered as he realised what else Takuma had done.
As he read the questionnaire, the impression he got was that of an utterly mundane person with nothing interesting to point out. He made it feel like there was nothing overly special about him, but also made it so there was nothing egregiously wrong with him either. It was as though he had designed it so that people would forget about it after they put it down.
That was risky because a candidate would want to impress them to raise their chances.
Eisbar's instinct and experience told him that Takuma blended truths, half-truths, and lies to hide something he didn't want them to know. However, he couldn't tell what Takuma was trying to hide or distinguish what part of the camouflage was genuine and which parts were false.
He looked at the monitor and saw Takuma walking around the room, hands behind his back, without a hint of worry in his demeanour.
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Six hours had gone by since they had locked the candidates in their rooms—rooms designed to make them uncomfortable. On top of that, being put under genjutsu only announced the start of the assessment. Being left alone for six hours would only drive them paranoid no matter how level-headed they could be.
"As expected, they're become quite restless," answered Swine.
Eisbar stepped closer to the monitors. Some candidates were pacing around their rooms, some stared into the cameras, and others fidgeted in their seats. None could relax as they were expecting the assessment to throw a task at them the moment they let their guards down, but they were all missing the point that being uptight for an extended period of time was just as detrimental.
The purpose of locking them in and going no-contact was partially to mentally beat them down and test to see how they handled it.
"Is... Is he sleeping?" Eisbar said, genuinely surprised when he saw a young man napping with his head on the table. He had a large afro of puffy, curly brown hair, a muscular build, and deeply tanned skin from staying outdoors under the sun. The cameras had no microphones, but the on-site staff could hear him snore when they passed his room.
"He has been like that for three hours now," said Lowe, handing Eisbar the candidate's profile. "Number #10, Chunin Sonaba Yazo."
"Is he in any way related to Jonin Sonaba Makina?" asked Eisbar.
"Her nephew."
The Sonaba family name had been attached to shinobi since the formation of the Hidden Leaf village, and the once civilian family had turned into a shinobi family where every single person in the next generation was a shinobi. They weren't anything special and only had produced two chunin before Sonaba Makina rose to the rank of an esteemed jonin.
Since then, the Sonaba family had exploded in popularity until it was known in the Hidden Leaf village even though the Sonaba family wasn't based there and called another city in the Land of Fire their home.
"A rogue hunter, huh. That's interesting," said Eisbar as he flipped through Sonaba Yazo's file. Rogue hunting was a trade open to anyone with the ability to capture the rogues and return them to the custody of the village that had declared them wanted. An adjacent field of bounty assassination also existed where anyone could target anyone else by putting a prize over their heads.
"Sonaba family are based near the Land of Rain border in Yogan City of the Natsu province," said Lowe.
"His choice of occupation makes sense, then."
The Land of Storms shared its boundaries with three of the five Great Shinobi Nations—the Land of Fire, the Land of Wind, and the Land of Earth. The country was known to be somewhat of a haven for rogues, as they could exist in the nation without the constant fear of being hunted by the Leaf, Sand, and Rock shinobi.
The Land of Storms was also the home to the Hidden Rain village, but the shinobi village mostly turned a blind eye to the rogues as long as they kept to a single region. While the rogues were a problem, the nation wasn't in a position to regulate them as it was locked in an intense civil war between the Hidden Rain village and the mercenary group known as the Akatsuki.
That turmoil had allowed the rogue activity to bloom and balloon in the nation and take root.
Due to its proximity to the border, the region near Yogan City saw heavy rogue activity. For that reason, there was a dense shinobi presence in the city of Yogan to hunt criminals and rogues who were either trying to leave or enter the nation.
"He'll fit well if he passes," said Eisbar. Rogue hunting was part of ANBU's responsibilities, and it was clear why Yazo was chosen as a candidate. He didn't know what to make of Yazo being so unbothered that he was sleeping for three hours, but he was one of the fastest people to break the genjutsu, so at least he wasn't incompetent.
"How did he react to the room?"
"He didn't like it and openly showed his displeasure to the camera but soon got over it."
"What about her?" Eisbar tapped the screen of another monitor. A young blonde woman had her legs up on the table as she leaned into her chair. She looked utterly bored and was listlessly staring at the ceiling.
"Number #3, Yamanaka Amami. She's a practitioner of her clan's hiden jutsu/hijutsu and has worked in T&I for the past two years. She has a near-perfect track record, no black spots in her history, and glowing recommendations from everyone we asked. She has even worked with us on a couple of cases during her tenure at T&I."
The ANBU collaborated with other departments across the Hidden Leaf for various reasons, including availing their services for ther ANBU's matters. While ANBU had agents more than capable of handling interrogations, some of the best information extractors were still under the employment of the Torture and Interrogation Department—which was why ANBU asked them to train their agents in the art of interrogation—and for that reason, when they encountered someone particularly adamant about keeping their mouth shut, they brought-in external interrogators to help.
ANBU maintained various two-way relationships. Using the information they collected through their spy system, they warned other departments; similarly, the other departments made ANBU aware when they found something strange.
After all, keeping the nation safe was a collaborative effort.
Eisbar sighed. "I don't want to fight with T&I about poaching again."
It had been a whole thing last time ANBU had taken someone from Torture and Interrogation—and this time, it was a Yamanaka; their clan's special jutsu made them extremely valuable in extracting information from people. Moreover, Torture and Interrogation's current head was a former ANBU-nin, Morino Ibiki, which was unfavourable because he knew how they worked.
He was sure to prevent talents from leaving his pool regardless of their history.
"She laughed when she saw the room and has since then ignored it completely," said Lowe.
"I guess it's not a surprise seeing that she's from T&I," said Eisbar before moving on to other candidates. "How are Takuma and Kojuro doing?"
"Number #7 has been using his Byakugan every twenty minutes to check his surroundings. He tries to hide it, but it's obvious that he's doing it. He had a visible reaction to the room initially, but I assume seeing into other's rooms made him realise that we are trying to unsettle them," Lowe replied, slightly peeved as the Byakugan rendered the rooms' tactics moot.
Lowe continued, "As for Number #13, excluding when he first entered the room, he hadn't looked into the camera in six hours. If he was affected, he's kept it under wraps... He walks for ten minutes every hour, but other than that, he stays seated, doing absolutely nothing. He was also the first to figure out that the weapons we gave them had something wrong with them."
Eisbar gazed at all of the monitors. All of them had something ANBU wanted. Any one of them could do the job decently well, but they didn't want decent—they wanted someone who could perform to their best under pressure. The purpose of the test was to stress test them and keep all those who didn't snap.
"In that case, it's been long enough. Let's start in earnest."
———
.
Takuma heard footsteps and the repeating sound of metal sliding against metal. His eyes went to the post-box slot on the doors, the only thing in the hallway that could produce such a sound. He got up and walked to the door, and sure enough, a package slid through it seconds later.
The package seemed to have a stack of paper inside and was sealed by a fuinjutsu tag. He released the seal and dumped its contents on the table—a thick stack of papers held together with a circular paper clip and two ball-point pens. The stack of paper was a long list of true-and-false statements and flipping to the last page showed that there were 578 questions.
The questions ranged from 'if his sleep was usually disturbed' to 'if he liked to tease animals' to 'if he got along with authority figures' to 'if he liked to dance.'
Takuma recognised this type of questionnaire but wondered about its purpose. Lying to make oneself look better was laughably easy with a quiz like this and the instructions on the first page said there were no pass-fail criteria for the test.
I shouldn't lie... completely, he said to himself as he thought about the cameras looking down on him. If the ANBU wanted them to answer the test, they must've considered they would lie and thus have ways to identify when a candidate was lying.
Takuma didn't really want ANBU to think of him as someone other than his true self and thus had no desire to lie on the test—but he didn't want them to know everything about him either.As he flipped through the pages, he could tell that if he filled it honestly, they would have a considerably complete view of who he was.
So, after taking a moment, he picked up one of the pens and started filling in his answers.
———
.
The ANBU team sat in their base and studied the completed questionnaires to learn more about the candidates.
"Yeah, Number #1 lied so much it's funny," one of the staff chuckled.
"Oof, Number #7 has some deep-seated issues, alright," said another staff member reading Hyuga Kojuro's questionnaire. "He's not at all optimistic about life. I guess the rumour about all of the Hyuuga being miserable is true."
"Number #2 abhors pressure, and this is just a straight-up confession that he will crumble at the first sign of it."
Eisbar sat on the head of the table, unhurriedly flipping through a questionnaire himself. He judged each answer and compared it against answers to other questions to see if there was a natural correlation or if the candidate had lied.
The aim of the questionnaire was to find out more about the candidates—and to see how they saw themselves. However, that was not all there was to it. People had a natural tendency to lie to make themselves more likeable to others, so candidates were expected to use the questionnaire to paint a favourable image of themselves to the examiners.
Lying was an elegant and complicated art; part of the test was to see if they could do it convincingly. They wanted to see if the candidates could deceive them into thinking they were someone other than themselves. There would come a time in every ANBU-nin's career when they would need to pretend to be someone else, and having that skill was highly preferred in an agent.
Of course, the department would love to know the truth about who they were employed, but if a candidate had the ability to deceive experienced ANBU-nin, then they were sure to be good at their jobs. Lying too much wasn't a problem if one could do it convincingly, but almost everyone who lied a lot did it poorly, and thus, gave themselves up. Even though the questionnaire asked the candidates to be honest, not lying was also a problem because deception was part and parcel about a shinobi, let alone and ANBU-nin.
"Number #10 is either the most well-adjusted man in the world, or he's really good at lying," said Swine, his highly positive tone showing that he liked Sonaba Yazo as a candidate.
"As expected of a Yamanaka," Lowe sighed as he read Yamanaka Amami's questionnaire. "Number #3 is definitely familiar with the test's base version we modified. I can't find a single error in how she used the questions to create her impression—she even added just the right amount of embellishments to make it utterly believable... I think she's a strong candidate."
While everyone discussed the candidates they were reading about, Eisbar silently read Number #13, Takuma's questionnaire.
If he had to give his impression in one word, it would be— "Genuine."
Eisbar took a deep breath. He couldn't tell if Takuma was lying or not. The impression he got from the questionnaire was that of a living human being with his fair share of problems like everyone else who lived while dealing with them.
If Yamanaka Amami had lied perfectly to create a positive yet believable picture that would impress anyone other than the current group who were expecting and wanted the candidate to lie, then Takuma had lied to show some fundamental flaws at the risk of some people having a lower opinion of him.
In doing so, he had made the impression feel genuinely authentic.
"Ah," Eisbar uttered as he realised what else Takuma had done.
As he read the questionnaire, the impression he got was that of an utterly mundane person with nothing interesting to point out. He made it feel like there was nothing overly special about him, but also made it so there was nothing egregiously wrong with him either. It was as though he had designed it so that people would forget about it after they put it down.
That was risky because a candidate would want to impress them to raise their chances.
Eisbar's instinct and experience told him that Takuma blended truths, half-truths, and lies to hide something he didn't want them to know. However, he couldn't tell what Takuma was trying to hide or distinguish what part of the camouflage was genuine and which parts were false.
He looked at the monitor and saw Takuma walking around the room, hands behind his back, without a hint of worry in his demeanour.
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Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
- Location
- England
'affirmed' would suggest his doubts had been validated. I would suggest "relieved" instead.
TFTC. Great as always. Takuma being next level liar that even an ANBU trained for this can't catch him lmao.
- Location
- Madness realms
Takuma answering in a way that makes him bland and probably gives almost no information away should get him pretty good marks.
CH_8.35 (300)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
Three hours after the questionnaires were collected for evaluation, the candidates gathered in the hall on the ground floor. Takuma stood in the crowd wearing the provided 'Scars' mask; he was surprised when he was instructed to do so as he thought it was meant to mess with him—but everyone was now wearing a similar mask over the front of their balaclavas.
"You must be tired after sitting still for so long, so let's have you all stretch your legs," the gold-wearing ANBU addressed the crowd of candidates in a flat and almost uninterested voice. He wore a dark, full-body zip-up robe. Its hood cast a deep shadow over half of his face, making the jewellery adorning his hands the only noticeable feature. "For the next task, we want you to travel across the country in a certain amount of time..."
As he spoke, the staff distributed identical backpacks to the candidates.
"Unlike the written questionnaire, this is an elimination task. The passing criteria is to reach the final location by the decided-upon time. You can refer to the map and note inside the backpack for further details. That's all from my side. Your time has begun; you're free to leave."
The moment those words were uttered, the hall burst with activity. The candidates rifled through their backpacks for the aforementioned map, the note, and other resources they had been granted.
Takuma went to the corner of the room and sat down against the wall before going through the bag's contents at his own pace . As a collector of high-quality maps, Takuma owned a collection that covered a significant portion of the Land of Fire. He was lucky to live in a major national hotspot like Hidden Leaf Village, as he could even get maps of remote regions. He had by no means memorised them as there was too much but he recognised the area in the included map, which was barely serviceable but, to its credit, had enough information for anyone knowledgeable enough to chart a journey.
Multiple points were marked on the map, and according to the accompanying note, the candidates had to show their faces to the staff at the locations. That changed Takuma's understanding of the task. It was no longer about plotting the fastest course from point 'A' to point 'B', but plotting the fastest journey while hitting additional locations as well. He recognised that the ANBU-nin had barely given them any information about the task, and even the note was fairly minimal.
Was it because they were granting them freedom on how they wanted to complete the task, or was it because they wanted them to derive something from the limited information provided?
Takuma glanced up to see that some candidates were already leaving the building.
The note said they had five days to reach the final location, but as he glanced at the people leaving the building one after another, he could tell they were hurrying. Even though the passing criteria was reaching the location before the deadline with one more condition to be met, it was a fair assumption that the candidates would be ranked according to how quickly they reached the checkpoints and the final location.
And yet... he couldn't help but wonder what the motive behind this task was, especially after the last six hours.
So, Takuma decided not to compete in the race.
The passing criteria was reaching the final destination in five days while hitting all the checkpoints, and he would stick to that. The other candidates were his competition, but unless ANBU itself pitted him against them, he wouldn't participate or interfere.
Four days, he decided. He was giving himself a one-day safe cushion.
"Okay, let's start with leaving the village."
It was three in the afternoon, so a few hours of light remained. Like most of his travels, he would only move during the day and rest at night. He had sufficient bedding and a half-decent survival kit, so camping didn't seem like a problem. There was one field ration in the backpack, which meant the ANBU expected them to procure their meals after the first day. No money was included, which was fine because he could hunt—but he didn't want to hunt every day as it would take away from his four-day travel time.
However, all the checkpoints were in towns, meaning he could buy meals provided he had money.
All in all, Takuma didn't have anything he needed to do in the village, so after plotting the appropriate course using the map and his knowledge, he left the village and made the most of the daylight hours.
———
.
As the night arrived, over a hundred kilometres from the Hidden Leaf Village, a young man in his mid-twenties lay beside a small fire in a clearing. It hadn't even been an hour since the sky had turned completely dark, but he was getting ready to sleep so he could rise and set out at dawn.
Yaya Utamatsu had been a chunin for five years before ANBU invited him to participate in their recruitment process. His hometown was near the peaceful southern shores of the Land of Fire, but he had spent most of his career in the western part of the nation on the border of the Land of Rivers, a nation sandwiched between the Land of Fire and the Land of Wind.
He had suffered through the Third Shinobi World War and had fought on the frontlines against the Hidden Sand shinobi as a greenhorn genin. What had been a war deployment had turned into a decade-old posting by his own choice. He missed his hometown in the south, but he had built himself a new life in the west and even laid roots by marrying the girl of his dreams.
The ANBU invitation had been unexpected. He didn't think they had their eyes on him, but he was flattered that they considered him. Ultimately, he decided to go because he was promised a posting in the Hidden Leaf village if he passed. He and his family lived in the biggest city in the west, but there was no place better than the Hidden Leaf village for a shinobi and their family.
Not only was he interested in ANBU's work, but it would afford his future children better prospects, shinobi or not.
He had arrived at the Hidden Leaf Village two days in advance to see what it was like. He had been there once before for one of the three Chunin Exams—two of which were held in other nations—and he had only explored the city as a tourist during that visit. This time around, he had a friend as a guide who showed him what it was like to live in the city as a resident.
It was more crowded than he expected, but that could be solved if he and his family chose to live further away from the city centre. Despite knowing he was in the hub for Leaf shinobi, he was still surprised by the sheer number of shinobi everywhere. While two days were not enough to truly get to know a place, he had a positive impression, which made him feel comfortable about moving his family if he managed to pass.
As Utamatsu stretched his arms, he imperceptibly glanced around the silent, dark woods before closing his eyes. Thirty minutes later, a figure silently sneaked toward Utamatsu's campsite. They approached him from behind so the campfire wouldn't cast a shadow in the wrong direction. The figure moved slowly with a kunai in hand; their target was not Utamatsu but the backpack beside his head.
As the figure grabbed the bag and pulled back, the campfire hissed like a blowtorch and released a blinding flash that stung the figure's eyes as they immediately tried to back away—but Utamatsu was ready; he was up on his feet in under a second and threw a spritz bomb into the figure's face.
A spritz bomb was a small package containing a chemical mixture that irritated the eyes, nose, and mouth. Evidently, the figure was an ANBU candidate; he was wearing the gear given to them by the ANBU. As the spritz bomb overwhelmed the senses, Utamatsu kicked the backpack out of his assailant's hand before sweeping the legs. He pushed aggressively, wanting to end it quickly because the alternative was a full-blown fight—something he wished to avoid as there was a risk of injury, which would, at the very least, mean a severe disadvantage in later assessments.
He closed the distance and kicked the man in his head as hard as possible, hoping that would do the trick. It didn't knock the man, and he even managed to hit him with a stray kick as he blindly flayed around.
It was dark, and the candidate couldn't see properly because of the spritz bomb, so Utamatsu stopped moving; it erased his presence and instantly panicked the candidate, who had just haphazardly gotten up on his feet. But it was too late, as Utamatsu finished weaving hand seals for a D-rank Fire Release jutsu that created a handball-sized orb of fire. The fire orb flew and exploded behind the candidate's head, and while it didn't do significant damage, it massively disoriented him and knocked him to the ground.
Utamatsu finished the job with a kick to the head to knock his assailant out.
"That was close," Utamatsu sighed as he grabbed his knees—not from exhaustion, but from the tension of being ambushed.
He wasn't as surprised because he knew the possibility existed when he saw the instructional note inside the backpack. There was a rule in there stating:
—Killing or maiming of candidates to eliminate competition is strictly prohibited and will lead to instant disqualification and subsequent legal proceedings —
It was a reasonable rule as they were all Hidden Leaf shinobi, and killing or permanently disabling their own would be detrimental to their nation. The rule, however, didn't prohibit inflicting recoverable injuries as a means to eliminate competition, and he was sure some candidates would try to use that as a way to thin the herd.
However, the next rule provided a much more reliable method to eliminate competition.
—The provided stamp paper must be stamped by the staff member at each checkpoint. Inability to produce a fully stamped stamp paper at the final location would result in disqualification —
Utamatsu looked at the unconscious man who had gone for his backpack in an attempt to destroy his stamp paper. He dragged the man to the campsite and strip-searched him to find a stamp paper, but unfortunately, the man was smart enough not to bring his stamp paper to the ambush in case things went wrong, which they did in this case.
He looked around the dark woods. The man wasn't wearing a backpack; it could only be somewhere nearby. If he could find it and destroy the stamp paper, he would eliminate one person from the competition. However, he didn't know if he would be able to find it easily if it was hidden—and he didn't want to spend more time near another candidate.
But he needed to punish the man for attacking him...so he broke the man's forearm bone in a clean fracture before tying the broken arm to a rigid piece of wood, substituting it as a makeshift splint. It wasn't a serious enough injury to do permanent damage, but it was more than enough to eliminate the man from further assessments.
He packed up his stuff and left the campsite with a sigh. His plans had now changed—he would travel continuously until dusk the next day, when he would find a secure place to rest safely. As Utamatsu got on the road, he thought about the 'stamp paper' rule. There was more nuance to it than stated. Losing the stamp paper didn't mean instant disqualification. According to the wording, they needed to produce 'a stamp paper'—it didn't need to be the stamp paper they found in their backpack.
Even if a candidate lost their stamp paper, they could simply steal someone else's stamp paper and produce that at the final location. Each destroyed stamp paper reduced the number of people who could pass. The candidates who passed completely depended on whether they had a completed stamp paper at the end. It was fair to assume that they would be ranked based on who arrived first—but even if they did not, completing the journey early was overall more beneficial. Things would only become more chaotic as the exam dragged on, with candidates who had lost their stamp papers hunting others who still had theirs.
Utamatsu wasn't aiming to be the first, but he was undoubtedly aiming to reach the final destination before people started feeling desperate.
Want to read ahead of schedule? Head over to Patreón [fictiononlyreader]. Link here and in signature.
Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
"You must be tired after sitting still for so long, so let's have you all stretch your legs," the gold-wearing ANBU addressed the crowd of candidates in a flat and almost uninterested voice. He wore a dark, full-body zip-up robe. Its hood cast a deep shadow over half of his face, making the jewellery adorning his hands the only noticeable feature. "For the next task, we want you to travel across the country in a certain amount of time..."
As he spoke, the staff distributed identical backpacks to the candidates.
"Unlike the written questionnaire, this is an elimination task. The passing criteria is to reach the final location by the decided-upon time. You can refer to the map and note inside the backpack for further details. That's all from my side. Your time has begun; you're free to leave."
The moment those words were uttered, the hall burst with activity. The candidates rifled through their backpacks for the aforementioned map, the note, and other resources they had been granted.
Takuma went to the corner of the room and sat down against the wall before going through the bag's contents at his own pace . As a collector of high-quality maps, Takuma owned a collection that covered a significant portion of the Land of Fire. He was lucky to live in a major national hotspot like Hidden Leaf Village, as he could even get maps of remote regions. He had by no means memorised them as there was too much but he recognised the area in the included map, which was barely serviceable but, to its credit, had enough information for anyone knowledgeable enough to chart a journey.
Multiple points were marked on the map, and according to the accompanying note, the candidates had to show their faces to the staff at the locations. That changed Takuma's understanding of the task. It was no longer about plotting the fastest course from point 'A' to point 'B', but plotting the fastest journey while hitting additional locations as well. He recognised that the ANBU-nin had barely given them any information about the task, and even the note was fairly minimal.
Was it because they were granting them freedom on how they wanted to complete the task, or was it because they wanted them to derive something from the limited information provided?
Takuma glanced up to see that some candidates were already leaving the building.
The note said they had five days to reach the final location, but as he glanced at the people leaving the building one after another, he could tell they were hurrying. Even though the passing criteria was reaching the location before the deadline with one more condition to be met, it was a fair assumption that the candidates would be ranked according to how quickly they reached the checkpoints and the final location.
And yet... he couldn't help but wonder what the motive behind this task was, especially after the last six hours.
So, Takuma decided not to compete in the race.
The passing criteria was reaching the final destination in five days while hitting all the checkpoints, and he would stick to that. The other candidates were his competition, but unless ANBU itself pitted him against them, he wouldn't participate or interfere.
Four days, he decided. He was giving himself a one-day safe cushion.
"Okay, let's start with leaving the village."
It was three in the afternoon, so a few hours of light remained. Like most of his travels, he would only move during the day and rest at night. He had sufficient bedding and a half-decent survival kit, so camping didn't seem like a problem. There was one field ration in the backpack, which meant the ANBU expected them to procure their meals after the first day. No money was included, which was fine because he could hunt—but he didn't want to hunt every day as it would take away from his four-day travel time.
However, all the checkpoints were in towns, meaning he could buy meals provided he had money.
All in all, Takuma didn't have anything he needed to do in the village, so after plotting the appropriate course using the map and his knowledge, he left the village and made the most of the daylight hours.
———
.
As the night arrived, over a hundred kilometres from the Hidden Leaf Village, a young man in his mid-twenties lay beside a small fire in a clearing. It hadn't even been an hour since the sky had turned completely dark, but he was getting ready to sleep so he could rise and set out at dawn.
Yaya Utamatsu had been a chunin for five years before ANBU invited him to participate in their recruitment process. His hometown was near the peaceful southern shores of the Land of Fire, but he had spent most of his career in the western part of the nation on the border of the Land of Rivers, a nation sandwiched between the Land of Fire and the Land of Wind.
He had suffered through the Third Shinobi World War and had fought on the frontlines against the Hidden Sand shinobi as a greenhorn genin. What had been a war deployment had turned into a decade-old posting by his own choice. He missed his hometown in the south, but he had built himself a new life in the west and even laid roots by marrying the girl of his dreams.
The ANBU invitation had been unexpected. He didn't think they had their eyes on him, but he was flattered that they considered him. Ultimately, he decided to go because he was promised a posting in the Hidden Leaf village if he passed. He and his family lived in the biggest city in the west, but there was no place better than the Hidden Leaf village for a shinobi and their family.
Not only was he interested in ANBU's work, but it would afford his future children better prospects, shinobi or not.
He had arrived at the Hidden Leaf Village two days in advance to see what it was like. He had been there once before for one of the three Chunin Exams—two of which were held in other nations—and he had only explored the city as a tourist during that visit. This time around, he had a friend as a guide who showed him what it was like to live in the city as a resident.
It was more crowded than he expected, but that could be solved if he and his family chose to live further away from the city centre. Despite knowing he was in the hub for Leaf shinobi, he was still surprised by the sheer number of shinobi everywhere. While two days were not enough to truly get to know a place, he had a positive impression, which made him feel comfortable about moving his family if he managed to pass.
As Utamatsu stretched his arms, he imperceptibly glanced around the silent, dark woods before closing his eyes. Thirty minutes later, a figure silently sneaked toward Utamatsu's campsite. They approached him from behind so the campfire wouldn't cast a shadow in the wrong direction. The figure moved slowly with a kunai in hand; their target was not Utamatsu but the backpack beside his head.
As the figure grabbed the bag and pulled back, the campfire hissed like a blowtorch and released a blinding flash that stung the figure's eyes as they immediately tried to back away—but Utamatsu was ready; he was up on his feet in under a second and threw a spritz bomb into the figure's face.
A spritz bomb was a small package containing a chemical mixture that irritated the eyes, nose, and mouth. Evidently, the figure was an ANBU candidate; he was wearing the gear given to them by the ANBU. As the spritz bomb overwhelmed the senses, Utamatsu kicked the backpack out of his assailant's hand before sweeping the legs. He pushed aggressively, wanting to end it quickly because the alternative was a full-blown fight—something he wished to avoid as there was a risk of injury, which would, at the very least, mean a severe disadvantage in later assessments.
He closed the distance and kicked the man in his head as hard as possible, hoping that would do the trick. It didn't knock the man, and he even managed to hit him with a stray kick as he blindly flayed around.
It was dark, and the candidate couldn't see properly because of the spritz bomb, so Utamatsu stopped moving; it erased his presence and instantly panicked the candidate, who had just haphazardly gotten up on his feet. But it was too late, as Utamatsu finished weaving hand seals for a D-rank Fire Release jutsu that created a handball-sized orb of fire. The fire orb flew and exploded behind the candidate's head, and while it didn't do significant damage, it massively disoriented him and knocked him to the ground.
Utamatsu finished the job with a kick to the head to knock his assailant out.
"That was close," Utamatsu sighed as he grabbed his knees—not from exhaustion, but from the tension of being ambushed.
He wasn't as surprised because he knew the possibility existed when he saw the instructional note inside the backpack. There was a rule in there stating:
—Killing or maiming of candidates to eliminate competition is strictly prohibited and will lead to instant disqualification and subsequent legal proceedings —
It was a reasonable rule as they were all Hidden Leaf shinobi, and killing or permanently disabling their own would be detrimental to their nation. The rule, however, didn't prohibit inflicting recoverable injuries as a means to eliminate competition, and he was sure some candidates would try to use that as a way to thin the herd.
However, the next rule provided a much more reliable method to eliminate competition.
—The provided stamp paper must be stamped by the staff member at each checkpoint. Inability to produce a fully stamped stamp paper at the final location would result in disqualification —
Utamatsu looked at the unconscious man who had gone for his backpack in an attempt to destroy his stamp paper. He dragged the man to the campsite and strip-searched him to find a stamp paper, but unfortunately, the man was smart enough not to bring his stamp paper to the ambush in case things went wrong, which they did in this case.
He looked around the dark woods. The man wasn't wearing a backpack; it could only be somewhere nearby. If he could find it and destroy the stamp paper, he would eliminate one person from the competition. However, he didn't know if he would be able to find it easily if it was hidden—and he didn't want to spend more time near another candidate.
But he needed to punish the man for attacking him...so he broke the man's forearm bone in a clean fracture before tying the broken arm to a rigid piece of wood, substituting it as a makeshift splint. It wasn't a serious enough injury to do permanent damage, but it was more than enough to eliminate the man from further assessments.
He packed up his stuff and left the campsite with a sigh. His plans had now changed—he would travel continuously until dusk the next day, when he would find a secure place to rest safely. As Utamatsu got on the road, he thought about the 'stamp paper' rule. There was more nuance to it than stated. Losing the stamp paper didn't mean instant disqualification. According to the wording, they needed to produce 'a stamp paper'—it didn't need to be the stamp paper they found in their backpack.
Even if a candidate lost their stamp paper, they could simply steal someone else's stamp paper and produce that at the final location. Each destroyed stamp paper reduced the number of people who could pass. The candidates who passed completely depended on whether they had a completed stamp paper at the end. It was fair to assume that they would be ranked based on who arrived first—but even if they did not, completing the journey early was overall more beneficial. Things would only become more chaotic as the exam dragged on, with candidates who had lost their stamp papers hunting others who still had theirs.
Utamatsu wasn't aiming to be the first, but he was undoubtedly aiming to reach the final destination before people started feeling desperate.
Want to read ahead of schedule? Head over to Patreón [fictiononlyreader]. Link here and in signature.
Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
CH_8.36 (301)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
A dirty wild boar trudged out of the woods, looking around the flat meadow for any predators. When it decided the field was clear, the boar found a good patch of grass and put its snout down to get food in his belly. While scarfing down the grass, it felt the presence of something in the surroundings and snapped up its head,preparing to bolt into the woods at the first sign of trouble.
The meadow, however, was empty and thus safe. The boar was cautious but returned to eating only to hear the crunch of grass. That was all it could process, as by the time it registered the human rising from the ground, a precise strike to the head ended its life in an instant.
"Funds secured," Takuma said to himself.
It was the middle of the second day, and he had yet to reach the first checkpoint. He lifted the dead boar and settled it over his shoulder, and while it would be more than difficult for an average person to lug around, it wasn't much for a shinobi like him. He wasn't planning to butcher the boar to get the meat because he could not preserve it for his five-day journey.
This was why he had planned a detour and routed his course through a nearby unrelated village before reaching the first checkpoint town. He would sell the boar in that village, giving him enough to eat and board comfortably in the checkpoint towns. It added to his time, and made it so that he would cut it close before reaching the first checkpoint town, but yielded greater benefits in the end.
He could have hunted near the first checkpoint town and sold the catch there, but he didn't want to give the other candidates any ideas. He didn't want to gather attention to him and make himself a target in the future, so it was better to stay under the radar as long as possible.
In half an hour, Takuma found himself in a village with a population size of around a couple hundred people. It was a place where everyone knew everyone, so the moment he stepped into the settlement, people stared—though it might have just been the strange tactical gear.
As they whispered, Takuma approached an old man sitting at a roadside tea shop.
"Good day. May I know where I can find a butcher?" Takuma shrugged his shoulders, bearing the boar. "I want to sell my hunt."
"You can go down the road from here and take the second turn to your right," said the old man before asking: "Are you a shinobi, boy?"
Takuma nodded before a thought came to mind. "Did someone dressed like me pass through here today?" he asked.
"Not that I know of."
The question didn't raise any suspicions of his; it was close enough to the Hidden Leaf that the town might see a shinobi every month, so it was a good sign that he was the only one taking the route.
He thanked the old man before making his way to the village butcher, who immediately purchased the wild boar from him. They were in the boonies, so the food prices were much lower, and even then, Takuma gave the butcher a good deal because he wasn't trying to make a profit.
When he left the shop, many villagers gathered to look at him as though he were the entertainer of the week, which he supposed he was, given his getup.
And seeing that he had an audience, he asked, "Where can I buy some clothes?"
———
.
Igabi Kyusu sat in a pub at the first checkpoint town. It was attached to the town's biggest and only inn. By his estimates, he had been one of the first people to arrive at the town but had remained there as others moved on.
He had no interest in completing the journey first or even being in front of the pack. The sole passing criterion was to complete the journey in the allocated time, which was his goal, but he wanted to be in the middle of the pack just to be safe.
Kyusu had stayed to get a measure of his competition—to see who was thirsty or worried enough to get first and those who had decided just to complete the task. Seventeen candidates had left the Hidden Leaf village, and he had spotted twelve of them during his time in the town. The rest of them had either reached and left the town before his arrival, or hadn't arrived yet—which seemed less likely because more than enough time had passed to reach the first checkpoint lazily.
Currently, four candidates, including him, had booked rooms in the inn, and two more were boarded elsewhere. It was only the second day, so many candidates had chosen to move on from the town right after getting their stamps.
Kyusu glanced at a woman sitting alone in the corner. She was the ANBU staff member responsible for stamping the candidates' papers. The included notes didn't give them any clue about her location, but it was quite easy to find her.
What had given her away to him was that, despite being in a pub, not one man had tried to hit on her when she was sitting alone. If that wasn't enough of a giveaway, the barman always glanced at her from time to time to see if she was still there.
A figure walked through the pub's front door. He was wearing the gear ANBU had given the candidates. Kyusu, dressed in civilian clothes, leaned into his chair and brought his drink to his lips as he observed the late newcomer. The candidate only had his black balaclava on, but Kyusu had memorised other candidates' body shapes and general appearance to know that the figure was Number #13.
The split between those who continued to cover their faces and those who ditched their masks was half-and-half. Kyusu had kept his face hidden and even found a pair of unassuming civilian clothes to spy on people without gaining attention.
A masked man attracted attention, causing people in the pub to stare. The exam candidates had become the talk of the town as more than a dozen masked people had passed through their little town, and some were even renting a room at the inn for the night.
Number #13 swept his eyes throughout the pub a couple of times until he spotted the ANBU staff. He approached her and very publicly, without speaking a word to confirm, put his stamp paper on the table before her, confident that she was from ANBU. The woman smiled as she pressed the stamp against his paper.
Kyusu guessed Number #13 would stay in town for the night and leave at dawn like the other candidates. Technically, it was dangerous for the candidates to live in the same building, as it increased the risk of having their stamp papers destroyed, but there was an unspoken understanding between those hanging back that they didn't need to be at each other's throats.
Of course, that didn't mean that they could be completely at ease like fools. Unspoken understanding meant nothing if someone got greedy and decided to strike in the slumber hours—which was why Kyusu had decided to keep tabs on all candidates in the town.
Number #13 sat down at the bar between two civilians, one of whom shifted away to put a little more distance between them. The pub was too loud for Kyusu to hear the conversation between the barman and Number #13, but he could guess that they were talking about a room for the night.
From what Kyusu knew, there were a couple of rooms free, but it was up to Number #13 if he wanted to live in the same building as other candidates or find someplace else—which would've been easier if he had entered the town earlier in the day—small towns like this shutdown much earlier than big cities.
It seemed that Number #13 had decided to look for another place, so Kyusu got up to find where he was boarding for the night. As he headed to the door, he looked back at the bar just in case and saw the ANBU staff faintly smiling at him. He gave her no response and exited the pub a second after Number #13, only to find no sign of him on the street. Even shinobi's favourite, the rooftops, were empty.
Where did he go? Kyusu wondered before he stepped into a shallow puddle of water with mud underneath that caked his feet.
"Ah, shit," he groaned.
He considered going around to see if he could spot Number #13 but decided against it. Instead, Kyusu just made a note of him in his mind. Someone not trying to be first didn't mean they weren't serious—everyone was gunning for the same job, and sooner or later, they would have to step into the competition regardless of how they preferred things.
———
.
At the bar, Takuma, dressed in second-hand casual clothes he had picked up earlier in the day, glanced at the man who had just left the pub and was now standing in front of the building. He seemed to be a candidate stalking the pub to look for other candidates. It was evident that he would have eyes on him when he reached the first checkpoint town, so he changed into civilian clothes, hid his backpack and most of his weapon—which made him feel utterly uncomfortable—and then entered the pub to scout the busiest part of the town to see if the ANBU staff member was inside.
If he didn't leave the pub in fifteen minutes, it was a signal for the Water Clone he had created beforehand to enter with the ANBU candidate gear appearance. He found the staff member almost instantly. She was sitting alone at a table meant for four; even though she was dressed casually, she was a little bit too put together, with a demeanour slightly different from the rest of the townsfolk.
Takuma reckoned those were subtle hints for candidates with a keen eye. He watched his water clone complete the stamp and sat down beside him at the bar, where they exchanged possession of the stamp paper.
The moment the Water Clone entered the pub, while everyone was looking at him, Takuma was looking at them. A masked weirdo made a lot of heads turn, but only a few people then turned to look at the ANBU staff member—some of those who turned looked at her because other candidates wearing gear must've approached her, but there would also be a couple who were candidates.
He immediately spotted a candidate because of their straight posture despite having three sake bottles on the table. But his suspicions were confirmed when he followed the clone outside. Knowing a candidate's face wasn't valuable information yet, but that could change in the future—so, Takuma memorised his face in case he needed to spot it in a crowd.
He waited for another fifteen minutes before leaving the pub to sleep in another place he got for half the price of the inn.
———
.
As the sun rose to its apex on the third day, the candidates who had been travelling without taking breaks at night started to arrive at the final location: a hunting outpost on the edge of a large cover of woods.
The first one to arrive was Number #6, Karo Jinzatan, who had pulled an overnighter between the first and second day, having only got four hours of sleep the night before. The moment he saw the ANBU mark spray-painted on the side of the cabin, all energy left him as he knew he had reached his destination.
It was by fast the farthest he had travelled in the last three days—and he had completed an emergency delivery mission with lives at stake if he was late.
He was utterly exhausted.
The area was absolutely beautiful, with a lush, deep forest on one side and mountains in the distance on the other side. He could even hear a bubbling stream nearby. Jinzatan wasn't a man who enjoyed the wilderness, but he thought he wouldn't mind staying a couple of days at the cabin.
With over two days to enjoy himself while all the candidates caught up, it seemed like the thing to do. The cabin door opened, and an unfamiliar ANBU-nin with a leopard's mask stepped out. She was dressed in standard ANBU gear but didn't have any weapons on her. It looked like she had been relaxing until he arrived.
"Ah, we have our first arrival. Congratulations, you're the fastest. What number are you?"
"Six, ma'am," Jinzatan replied.
"Call me, Leopard. Okay, Six, give me your stamp; let's see if you did it properly because you came here mighty fast," said Leapord.
Jinzatan proudly presented his stamp, which was a picture of Hokage Mountain with the Hidden Leaf village in the foreground. Each stamp was a single-colour layer, which, when laid one atop the other, completed the picture.
"There's one layer missing," said Leopard.
"Impossible. I went through all four checkpoints and got the stamps," Jinzatan immediately protested.
"I know, I know, no need to get anxious and combative. The missing stamp is from the final location," Lowe chuckled.
Jinzatan cleared his throat to hide how embarrassed he felt. He had nearly become angry in front of an ANBU-nin during the assessment.
"Unfortunately, I don't have the final stamp with me. It's on the other side of this forest back with my colleague... If you sprint straight through, it'll only take you ten minutes to reach the other side. Run along and get your stamps complete," Leopard said with a light tone, but there was something openly hidden behind it.
A weight settled in Jinzatan's chest as he looked at the forest, which got darker the deeper he stared into it. He wasn't an idiot and knew that the run through the forest wouldn't be a victory road stroll. If he had to guess, there was something waiting for him inside which would stop him from crossing through.
"Sure, I will get to that," said Jinzatan. "It's beautiful here, isn't it? I hear a stream nearby. I'm really sweaty and smelly. I should go there and take a dip."
"Sure, that's a good idea, but do it after you get the stamp completed. Go... right now," said Leopard with a firmness in her voice.
Jinzatan put on a tight smile before walking into the woods. He looked back and saw Leopard staring at him, and she continued to do so until he disappeared.
———
.
It had been three minutes since Jinzatan had entered the forest, and he had faced no opposition. Maybe that would've relieved others, but he had been more nervous with each passing second. He could hear the noise of the forest and the voices of the animals—it was simultaneously silent and deafening, putting him on edge.
I should hurry, he told himself and picked up speed
But the moment he put pressure on his foot to push off, a trio of kunai emerged from a thicket and thumped into a tree beside him. Jinzatan instantly started sprinting while throwing zig-zag routes through the trees to make himself a difficult to hit. He located a thick branch and jumped, only to get kicked in the back while he was in mid-air. As he fell, he turned his head only to catch a glimpse of a greenish-brown robe disappearing between the trees. He course-corrected, knocking his ribs against a tree but managed to regain his balance just before he landed on the ground.
His senses were stretched taut as he knew and understood that there was an ambush waiting for him in the forest. He needed to cross it and get out as soon as possible before they got their hands on his stamp paper.
But as Jinzatan's feet touched the ground, two arms burst out from the ground and tried to grab his legs. If not for his quick reaction, he would've been pulled into the ground. He jumped to avoid the hands wanting to drag him down, and when he looked down, there was no one there except for two, arm-shaped holes.
He landed on a thick branch and pressed his back into the trunk before looking around. There were woods in every direction without a sign of it ending in sight.
And even though he couldn't see them, Jinzatan knew they were there.
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The meadow, however, was empty and thus safe. The boar was cautious but returned to eating only to hear the crunch of grass. That was all it could process, as by the time it registered the human rising from the ground, a precise strike to the head ended its life in an instant.
"Funds secured," Takuma said to himself.
It was the middle of the second day, and he had yet to reach the first checkpoint. He lifted the dead boar and settled it over his shoulder, and while it would be more than difficult for an average person to lug around, it wasn't much for a shinobi like him. He wasn't planning to butcher the boar to get the meat because he could not preserve it for his five-day journey.
This was why he had planned a detour and routed his course through a nearby unrelated village before reaching the first checkpoint town. He would sell the boar in that village, giving him enough to eat and board comfortably in the checkpoint towns. It added to his time, and made it so that he would cut it close before reaching the first checkpoint town, but yielded greater benefits in the end.
He could have hunted near the first checkpoint town and sold the catch there, but he didn't want to give the other candidates any ideas. He didn't want to gather attention to him and make himself a target in the future, so it was better to stay under the radar as long as possible.
In half an hour, Takuma found himself in a village with a population size of around a couple hundred people. It was a place where everyone knew everyone, so the moment he stepped into the settlement, people stared—though it might have just been the strange tactical gear.
As they whispered, Takuma approached an old man sitting at a roadside tea shop.
"Good day. May I know where I can find a butcher?" Takuma shrugged his shoulders, bearing the boar. "I want to sell my hunt."
"You can go down the road from here and take the second turn to your right," said the old man before asking: "Are you a shinobi, boy?"
Takuma nodded before a thought came to mind. "Did someone dressed like me pass through here today?" he asked.
"Not that I know of."
The question didn't raise any suspicions of his; it was close enough to the Hidden Leaf that the town might see a shinobi every month, so it was a good sign that he was the only one taking the route.
He thanked the old man before making his way to the village butcher, who immediately purchased the wild boar from him. They were in the boonies, so the food prices were much lower, and even then, Takuma gave the butcher a good deal because he wasn't trying to make a profit.
When he left the shop, many villagers gathered to look at him as though he were the entertainer of the week, which he supposed he was, given his getup.
And seeing that he had an audience, he asked, "Where can I buy some clothes?"
———
.
Igabi Kyusu sat in a pub at the first checkpoint town. It was attached to the town's biggest and only inn. By his estimates, he had been one of the first people to arrive at the town but had remained there as others moved on.
He had no interest in completing the journey first or even being in front of the pack. The sole passing criterion was to complete the journey in the allocated time, which was his goal, but he wanted to be in the middle of the pack just to be safe.
Kyusu had stayed to get a measure of his competition—to see who was thirsty or worried enough to get first and those who had decided just to complete the task. Seventeen candidates had left the Hidden Leaf village, and he had spotted twelve of them during his time in the town. The rest of them had either reached and left the town before his arrival, or hadn't arrived yet—which seemed less likely because more than enough time had passed to reach the first checkpoint lazily.
Currently, four candidates, including him, had booked rooms in the inn, and two more were boarded elsewhere. It was only the second day, so many candidates had chosen to move on from the town right after getting their stamps.
Kyusu glanced at a woman sitting alone in the corner. She was the ANBU staff member responsible for stamping the candidates' papers. The included notes didn't give them any clue about her location, but it was quite easy to find her.
What had given her away to him was that, despite being in a pub, not one man had tried to hit on her when she was sitting alone. If that wasn't enough of a giveaway, the barman always glanced at her from time to time to see if she was still there.
A figure walked through the pub's front door. He was wearing the gear ANBU had given the candidates. Kyusu, dressed in civilian clothes, leaned into his chair and brought his drink to his lips as he observed the late newcomer. The candidate only had his black balaclava on, but Kyusu had memorised other candidates' body shapes and general appearance to know that the figure was Number #13.
The split between those who continued to cover their faces and those who ditched their masks was half-and-half. Kyusu had kept his face hidden and even found a pair of unassuming civilian clothes to spy on people without gaining attention.
A masked man attracted attention, causing people in the pub to stare. The exam candidates had become the talk of the town as more than a dozen masked people had passed through their little town, and some were even renting a room at the inn for the night.
Number #13 swept his eyes throughout the pub a couple of times until he spotted the ANBU staff. He approached her and very publicly, without speaking a word to confirm, put his stamp paper on the table before her, confident that she was from ANBU. The woman smiled as she pressed the stamp against his paper.
Kyusu guessed Number #13 would stay in town for the night and leave at dawn like the other candidates. Technically, it was dangerous for the candidates to live in the same building, as it increased the risk of having their stamp papers destroyed, but there was an unspoken understanding between those hanging back that they didn't need to be at each other's throats.
Of course, that didn't mean that they could be completely at ease like fools. Unspoken understanding meant nothing if someone got greedy and decided to strike in the slumber hours—which was why Kyusu had decided to keep tabs on all candidates in the town.
Number #13 sat down at the bar between two civilians, one of whom shifted away to put a little more distance between them. The pub was too loud for Kyusu to hear the conversation between the barman and Number #13, but he could guess that they were talking about a room for the night.
From what Kyusu knew, there were a couple of rooms free, but it was up to Number #13 if he wanted to live in the same building as other candidates or find someplace else—which would've been easier if he had entered the town earlier in the day—small towns like this shutdown much earlier than big cities.
It seemed that Number #13 had decided to look for another place, so Kyusu got up to find where he was boarding for the night. As he headed to the door, he looked back at the bar just in case and saw the ANBU staff faintly smiling at him. He gave her no response and exited the pub a second after Number #13, only to find no sign of him on the street. Even shinobi's favourite, the rooftops, were empty.
Where did he go? Kyusu wondered before he stepped into a shallow puddle of water with mud underneath that caked his feet.
"Ah, shit," he groaned.
He considered going around to see if he could spot Number #13 but decided against it. Instead, Kyusu just made a note of him in his mind. Someone not trying to be first didn't mean they weren't serious—everyone was gunning for the same job, and sooner or later, they would have to step into the competition regardless of how they preferred things.
———
.
At the bar, Takuma, dressed in second-hand casual clothes he had picked up earlier in the day, glanced at the man who had just left the pub and was now standing in front of the building. He seemed to be a candidate stalking the pub to look for other candidates. It was evident that he would have eyes on him when he reached the first checkpoint town, so he changed into civilian clothes, hid his backpack and most of his weapon—which made him feel utterly uncomfortable—and then entered the pub to scout the busiest part of the town to see if the ANBU staff member was inside.
If he didn't leave the pub in fifteen minutes, it was a signal for the Water Clone he had created beforehand to enter with the ANBU candidate gear appearance. He found the staff member almost instantly. She was sitting alone at a table meant for four; even though she was dressed casually, she was a little bit too put together, with a demeanour slightly different from the rest of the townsfolk.
Takuma reckoned those were subtle hints for candidates with a keen eye. He watched his water clone complete the stamp and sat down beside him at the bar, where they exchanged possession of the stamp paper.
The moment the Water Clone entered the pub, while everyone was looking at him, Takuma was looking at them. A masked weirdo made a lot of heads turn, but only a few people then turned to look at the ANBU staff member—some of those who turned looked at her because other candidates wearing gear must've approached her, but there would also be a couple who were candidates.
He immediately spotted a candidate because of their straight posture despite having three sake bottles on the table. But his suspicions were confirmed when he followed the clone outside. Knowing a candidate's face wasn't valuable information yet, but that could change in the future—so, Takuma memorised his face in case he needed to spot it in a crowd.
He waited for another fifteen minutes before leaving the pub to sleep in another place he got for half the price of the inn.
———
.
As the sun rose to its apex on the third day, the candidates who had been travelling without taking breaks at night started to arrive at the final location: a hunting outpost on the edge of a large cover of woods.
The first one to arrive was Number #6, Karo Jinzatan, who had pulled an overnighter between the first and second day, having only got four hours of sleep the night before. The moment he saw the ANBU mark spray-painted on the side of the cabin, all energy left him as he knew he had reached his destination.
It was by fast the farthest he had travelled in the last three days—and he had completed an emergency delivery mission with lives at stake if he was late.
He was utterly exhausted.
The area was absolutely beautiful, with a lush, deep forest on one side and mountains in the distance on the other side. He could even hear a bubbling stream nearby. Jinzatan wasn't a man who enjoyed the wilderness, but he thought he wouldn't mind staying a couple of days at the cabin.
With over two days to enjoy himself while all the candidates caught up, it seemed like the thing to do. The cabin door opened, and an unfamiliar ANBU-nin with a leopard's mask stepped out. She was dressed in standard ANBU gear but didn't have any weapons on her. It looked like she had been relaxing until he arrived.
"Ah, we have our first arrival. Congratulations, you're the fastest. What number are you?"
"Six, ma'am," Jinzatan replied.
"Call me, Leopard. Okay, Six, give me your stamp; let's see if you did it properly because you came here mighty fast," said Leapord.
Jinzatan proudly presented his stamp, which was a picture of Hokage Mountain with the Hidden Leaf village in the foreground. Each stamp was a single-colour layer, which, when laid one atop the other, completed the picture.
"There's one layer missing," said Leopard.
"Impossible. I went through all four checkpoints and got the stamps," Jinzatan immediately protested.
"I know, I know, no need to get anxious and combative. The missing stamp is from the final location," Lowe chuckled.
Jinzatan cleared his throat to hide how embarrassed he felt. He had nearly become angry in front of an ANBU-nin during the assessment.
"Unfortunately, I don't have the final stamp with me. It's on the other side of this forest back with my colleague... If you sprint straight through, it'll only take you ten minutes to reach the other side. Run along and get your stamps complete," Leopard said with a light tone, but there was something openly hidden behind it.
A weight settled in Jinzatan's chest as he looked at the forest, which got darker the deeper he stared into it. He wasn't an idiot and knew that the run through the forest wouldn't be a victory road stroll. If he had to guess, there was something waiting for him inside which would stop him from crossing through.
"Sure, I will get to that," said Jinzatan. "It's beautiful here, isn't it? I hear a stream nearby. I'm really sweaty and smelly. I should go there and take a dip."
"Sure, that's a good idea, but do it after you get the stamp completed. Go... right now," said Leopard with a firmness in her voice.
Jinzatan put on a tight smile before walking into the woods. He looked back and saw Leopard staring at him, and she continued to do so until he disappeared.
———
.
It had been three minutes since Jinzatan had entered the forest, and he had faced no opposition. Maybe that would've relieved others, but he had been more nervous with each passing second. He could hear the noise of the forest and the voices of the animals—it was simultaneously silent and deafening, putting him on edge.
I should hurry, he told himself and picked up speed
But the moment he put pressure on his foot to push off, a trio of kunai emerged from a thicket and thumped into a tree beside him. Jinzatan instantly started sprinting while throwing zig-zag routes through the trees to make himself a difficult to hit. He located a thick branch and jumped, only to get kicked in the back while he was in mid-air. As he fell, he turned his head only to catch a glimpse of a greenish-brown robe disappearing between the trees. He course-corrected, knocking his ribs against a tree but managed to regain his balance just before he landed on the ground.
His senses were stretched taut as he knew and understood that there was an ambush waiting for him in the forest. He needed to cross it and get out as soon as possible before they got their hands on his stamp paper.
But as Jinzatan's feet touched the ground, two arms burst out from the ground and tried to grab his legs. If not for his quick reaction, he would've been pulled into the ground. He jumped to avoid the hands wanting to drag him down, and when he looked down, there was no one there except for two, arm-shaped holes.
He landed on a thick branch and pressed his back into the trunk before looking around. There were woods in every direction without a sign of it ending in sight.
And even though he couldn't see them, Jinzatan knew they were there.
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CH_8.37 (302)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
ANBU-nin codenamed Leopard reclined on a patio chair inside the cabin deck with a thin, gauze-like cloth spread over her face. She hated wearing her mask when relaxing and, even though she was at work, it felt like a vacation because all she had to do was 'supervise'.
"Ma'am."
Leopard didn't bother to pull the cloth down as one of her subordinates for the duration of the assessment process appeared beside her. He was dressed in green-and-brown robes and his gear and ANBU mask were painted in dark forest colours to disguise them further into their surroundings.
"Oh, is it over?" she asked, mundanely.
"Six's stamp paper has been destroyed."
"Unfortunate. How did he do?"
"He was too exhausted to survive past the halfway mark."
The task asked the candidates to cover the distance under an allocated period. The ANBU expected the candidates to race for the first position in an attempt to showcase their ability, and there was nothing wrong with that. However, all candidates had been told that the assessment process would last around two weeks, so the ANBU expected them to realise that they needed to be ready to face challenges during that time.
Exhausting themselves to come first even though the passing criteria simply asked them to be there before a deadline was an illogical move. If the entire assessment had been considered a mission, Number #6 would not have been able to complete it due to poor decision-making. They were testing the candidates' decision-making abilities when given limited information. The candidates didn't know what would happen after they reached the final location or if they would be given a rest after completing the task—they needed to be in a condition to continue and face anything that was thrown at them.
Even though getting a stamp at the four checkpoints was as easy as finding the person with the stamp—it didn't mean they shouldn't be prepared for the unexpected. The task wasn't meant to be a puzzle where the game dropped hints regarding what was coming. It was intended to be similar to an actual mission where things often went wrong without notice, and agents were required to be prepared to handle them.
"He asked if he could bring another stamp paper for another try," said the subordinate.
"Show him the way out and send him home," she said. The candidate had to enter the woods immediately upon reaching the cabin, and there was no going back once they entered.
Leopard enjoyed half an hour of silence and peace until another candidate arrived at the cabin. She groaned as she put her mask on before pulling herself off the patio chair and walking down the steps to greet the new arrival.
Number #7, Hyuga Kojuro.
According to the file, he was nearly eighteen years old and had been a chunin for almost four years. He had the typical pale Hyuga skin, white Byakugan pupils, and shoulder-length seaweed green hair. He wasn't wearing his balaclava mask because it was useless; his eyes gave him away instantly anyway—but he wore a sash around his forehead to hide it.
Even with his eyes hidden, his face looked like he hadn't smiled in a decade and had lost the ability to do so somewhere along the way.
"Welcome, Seven," she said. "Congratulations on reaching the final destination. Show me your stamp paper to confirm that you stopped by the checkpoints." Kojuro presented his stamp paper with four stamps. "Excellent. However, there's one more stamp remaining that you need to get. That stamp is across the forest. It will take ten minutes to pass through the woods, so go and get that stamp."
The Hyuga didn't ask her any questions and gazed at the forest for a few seconds before silently heading inside.
"Not a talkative one, is he." She sighed before returning to her chair to rest. It was tough work being an ANBU-nin.
Fifteen minutes later, a subordinate came over to notify her that Hyuga Kojuro had successfully passed through the woods.
———
.
At the fourth checkpoint town, Number #1 and Number #9 sat together in a restaurant for a midday meal. The two shinobi had teamed up and promised to look after each other for the task's duration. They had arrived at the town two hours ago and were resting before proceeding to the final location.
"I bet there's going to be some catch at the final location," said Number #9 as he set down his chopsticks over an empty bowl.
"Absolutely. This entire thing's been too easy," replied Number #1.
"I looked at the stamp paper carefully. The stamp isn't complete yet. I think there's going to be some twist with that."
"There's a town nearby, but the final location is some distance away." Number #1 pointed on the map sitting between them on the table. "Maybe getting the final stamp won't be as easy as walking up to the person. There's a pocket of woods beside the location. I reckon it will be something like finding the final stamp bearer in those woods—or something like that, anyway."
"Hmm," Number #9 nodded. "We should scout the location in secret before openly showing ourselves. It'll be better if we know something before walking into whatever the ANBU has planned for it."
There was silence on the table. Number #9 looked up when he didn't get a reply and saw Number #1's eyes swimming over the map with a furrow between his eyes.
"Something wrong?" asked Number #9.
"Uhmm, no, nothing. I was just thinking about something," Number #1 leaned into his chair with a sigh before standing up. "I'll go wash my hands."
"Sure, I'll pay up," said Number #9. He waited until Number #1 was out of view before looking at the map to see if he had missed something. Even though they had allied with each other, they were still competitors, and he didn't want to be at a disadvantage by not knowing something the other guy had found.
As Number #9 poured over the map, Number #1 walked over to the washing sinks in the corner, but instead of washing his hands, he patted around his body and reached into the pockets and pouches until he found his stamp paper.
"Found it," he whispered with an elated smile—before ripping the stamp paper into a few pieces and slipping them back into the same pocket.
He washed his hands and then returned to the front of the store, where Number #9 was waiting for him after he had paid their bill.
"Ready to leave?"
"Yes, let's go."
They left the store and were walking when Number #1 suddenly stopped in the middle of the road.
"Huh, h-how did we..."
He looked bewildered, immediately taking out a kunai while looking at the townsfolk as though they were in danger. Mostly to scare the hell out of them as being near a shinobi fight was equal to forfeting their lives.
"Woah, what are you doing?" asked Number #9, stepping away.
Number #1 immediately reached into one of his pockets, panic gripping his face, only to freeze for a moment before pulling out ripped pieces of his stamp paper with a shaky hand. He looked up at Number #9. "...What d-did you do?"
"Come on, man. I didn't do anything," said Number #9, but he took out his kunai because he knew it wasn't going to end well.
"You will pay!" Number #1 yelled as he charged at Number #9, triggering panic in the street as the townsfolk scattered.
Inside the teashop across from the restaurant, a girl dressed in a long skirt and a plain top rested her head in her arms on the table as though she was sleeping. She opened her eyes and sat up with a soft sigh before picking up the warm cup of tea to take a sip.
A moment later, a mischievous smile along with a giggle appeared on Number #3, Yamanaka Amami's face as the commotion broke out
———
.
The sun was about to set on the third day, and Number #17, Orikashi, was on his way to the fourth checkpoint town. He was a chunin in his late twenties who had participated in the Third Shinobi World War and had been posted at the Hidden Leaf Village during the Nine-Tails incident. He had been through a lot during his career, so when the ANBU showed interest in him, he knew he deserved an offer. To ensure that the ANBU didn't make a mistake by missing out on him, he decided to help them out by eliminating undeserving candidates.
He started by stalking one of his prey straight from the Hidden Leaf Village. On the second day, he caught them in a trap before ripping their stamp paper and destroying most of their gear. On the third day, he laid ambush on two separate candidates and jeopardised their positions by freeing them of their stamp papers.
It prevented him from being first in the task. However, he considered this an acceptable trade-off as it was still early in the assessment process, and he would have other opportunities to showcase his abilities to the ANBU. As he made his way to the fourth checkpoint town, he planned on finding one more prey in the town to hunt and take out of the game.
In truth, he wanted to target more, but he didn't actually have the time to do so if he wanted to reach the final location with some contingency time in case the ANBU had something planned.
I could cut out other undeserving ones in future tasks, thought Orikashi. There were young shinobi among the candidates who weren't good choices for the ANBU due to their lack of experience. He had already done three of them a favour by eliminating them early so they wouldn't get their hopes up.
As Orikashi was running along the road, he looked back when he heard a noise and saw a candidate closing in on him at a quick pace. He didn't know the candidate's number but recognised the mask with the red and yellow swirl pattern. He had seen the man from close at the office building in Hidden Leaf Village, and he was absolutely enormous.
His instincts told him that interacting with this man would be bad, so he picked up the pace to put some distance between them—but the man had closed the distance between them in five minutes and was only a few dozen metres behind him.
Orikashi realised that the man was trying to catch up to him, and seeing that he couldn't outrun him, he decided to face the guy to see what he wanted.
"I notice you trying to catch up to me. May I know how I can help you, friend," he asked, noticing the massive afro on the man's head, which wasn't noticeable before because of the balaclava.
"I have been—"
Orikashi didn't give him a chance to speak and rushed him with his kunai to gain an advantage with an element of surprise. The man dodged the kunai strike, but Orikashi pushed on stringing one strike after another, leaving no opportunity for a counter. Not a single one made contact. The large, muscle-bound man was light on his feet and gracefully dodged all his attacks with minimal movement.
Orikashi switched tactics by pulling back to attack with ninjutsu—but the moment he tried to do so, the man shifted into an offensive stance to launch a palm strike to the chest within the span of half a second.
Orikashi crossed his hands to block the palm strike only to feel a bestial strength assault his body, sending him flying to the woods lining the road. He barely regained control of himself as he smashed through a tree and immediately hid in the foliage, abandoning the idea of facing him head-on. He erased his presence and patiently waited for the man to walk into the woods to launch an ambush.
A few seconds passed, but there were no signs of the man, which made Orikashi nervous from not having his opponent in his view. Just as he thought about moving, he heard the leaves shuffle behind him and looked back to see the man jumping at him.
When did he get behind me?!
The man stabbed Orikashi just underneath the shoulder blade and left a kunai in his back. Orikashi turned around mid-air and launched a volley of shuriken, thinking the man would be coming after him, but he was absent.
When Orikashi landed on the ground, he realised their positions had changed. He was now on the ground, and his opponent was in the position to attack from stealth. He bit back a groan as he pulled out the kunai that was digging into his back and made a quick decision to abandon the fight and flee.
A part of his brain told him to take care of the situation because it was sure to become a problem later on—but seeing how their fight had turned out till now, he was at a disadvantage and would fare better under other circumstances. He also didn't want to get injured to the point where he could no longer compete in the assessment.
Orikashi took out the smoke bombs he had stolen from his prey and threw them to the ground to create a smokescreen to create an opportunity to escape. He immediately ran in the opposite direction from the fourth checkpoint town because anyone would assume he would go toward the town—and it seemed to work as he ran without any sign of the man for a full couple of minutes.
However, as he jumped toward a tree branch, his eyes caught the glint of a kunai stuck in its base. The explosive tag attached to it was already burning, and exploded when he stepped onto the branch. He lost his balance and was blown away at the same time, crashing head-first into a tree, the impact of broke against his skin, causing him to bleed.
Orikashi realised that in an attempt to avoid the fight to not get injured, he had gotten even more hurt. As he ran, he had a decision to make—continue to flee or take the fight. The man stepped out from behind a tree Orikashi was running toward.
Hiss fists were glowing with a yellowish-red tint that looked like some sort of Fire Release ninjutsu. Too fast to stop, Orikashi ran right into a body-blow. The man's fist pressed all the air out of his body, but before he could gasp, a compact explosion smashed him into the ground.
"Three people attacked me today to take my stamp paper," said the man, his voice muffled behind his mask. "I asked them how they lost theirs—and they all gave me a description that matched you."
"So wh-what? T-This was w-what—reven-n-ge?" asked Orikashi, finding it absurd.
"Revenge? They attacked me. Why would I take revenge for them," the man scoffed. "This was supposed to be a simple task; there was no reason to mess with others—but of course, there are always people like... I'm not doing this for revenge; I'm doing this because I don't like you, you fuck."
Orikashi opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but the man kicked him in the head, knocking him out.
———
.
Number #10, Sonaba Yazo, burned the three stamp papers he found on the man he had just knocked out. He could've returned the stamp papers to the victims, but that would've required him to travel back to the previous checkpoint towns—and he wasn't going to do that for people who had attacked him, even though he understood why they had done it.
Eliminating competition was all well and good, but only when necessary. There was no need to go after each other during the current task, so it really bothered him when he found that someone had targeted not one, or two, but three candidates for the sake of competition.
It pissed him enough to go after the guy. Yazo looked down and sighed before slinging the prick over his shoulder. It wasn't right to leave him alone in the woods, so he was going to take him to the next checkpoint town and leave him in the care of the ANBU staff member.
Just like he had done with the three other candidates who had attacked him.
———
.
As the third day ended, Takuma laid his sleeping bag in an empty room he had rented inside some guy's house for the night to avoid the inns at the third checkpoint town. He had crossed two checkpoints without any obstacles and was planning to do the same the next day with the goal of arriving at the final location before sunset.
From the village chatter, apparently, someone had dumped three injured shinobi in the town. It wasn't surprising, given how the rules were written, but it was still a matter of concern as he was sure a considerable number of candidates would be looking to recover the stamp papers they had lost by taking others'.
If he didn't play it carefully, he would be pulled into that conflict irrespective of his wishes.
Want to read ahead of schedule? Head over to Patreón [fictiononlyreader]. Link here and in signature.
Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
"Ma'am."
Leopard didn't bother to pull the cloth down as one of her subordinates for the duration of the assessment process appeared beside her. He was dressed in green-and-brown robes and his gear and ANBU mask were painted in dark forest colours to disguise them further into their surroundings.
"Oh, is it over?" she asked, mundanely.
"Six's stamp paper has been destroyed."
"Unfortunate. How did he do?"
"He was too exhausted to survive past the halfway mark."
The task asked the candidates to cover the distance under an allocated period. The ANBU expected the candidates to race for the first position in an attempt to showcase their ability, and there was nothing wrong with that. However, all candidates had been told that the assessment process would last around two weeks, so the ANBU expected them to realise that they needed to be ready to face challenges during that time.
Exhausting themselves to come first even though the passing criteria simply asked them to be there before a deadline was an illogical move. If the entire assessment had been considered a mission, Number #6 would not have been able to complete it due to poor decision-making. They were testing the candidates' decision-making abilities when given limited information. The candidates didn't know what would happen after they reached the final location or if they would be given a rest after completing the task—they needed to be in a condition to continue and face anything that was thrown at them.
Even though getting a stamp at the four checkpoints was as easy as finding the person with the stamp—it didn't mean they shouldn't be prepared for the unexpected. The task wasn't meant to be a puzzle where the game dropped hints regarding what was coming. It was intended to be similar to an actual mission where things often went wrong without notice, and agents were required to be prepared to handle them.
"He asked if he could bring another stamp paper for another try," said the subordinate.
"Show him the way out and send him home," she said. The candidate had to enter the woods immediately upon reaching the cabin, and there was no going back once they entered.
Leopard enjoyed half an hour of silence and peace until another candidate arrived at the cabin. She groaned as she put her mask on before pulling herself off the patio chair and walking down the steps to greet the new arrival.
Number #7, Hyuga Kojuro.
According to the file, he was nearly eighteen years old and had been a chunin for almost four years. He had the typical pale Hyuga skin, white Byakugan pupils, and shoulder-length seaweed green hair. He wasn't wearing his balaclava mask because it was useless; his eyes gave him away instantly anyway—but he wore a sash around his forehead to hide it.
Even with his eyes hidden, his face looked like he hadn't smiled in a decade and had lost the ability to do so somewhere along the way.
"Welcome, Seven," she said. "Congratulations on reaching the final destination. Show me your stamp paper to confirm that you stopped by the checkpoints." Kojuro presented his stamp paper with four stamps. "Excellent. However, there's one more stamp remaining that you need to get. That stamp is across the forest. It will take ten minutes to pass through the woods, so go and get that stamp."
The Hyuga didn't ask her any questions and gazed at the forest for a few seconds before silently heading inside.
"Not a talkative one, is he." She sighed before returning to her chair to rest. It was tough work being an ANBU-nin.
Fifteen minutes later, a subordinate came over to notify her that Hyuga Kojuro had successfully passed through the woods.
———
.
At the fourth checkpoint town, Number #1 and Number #9 sat together in a restaurant for a midday meal. The two shinobi had teamed up and promised to look after each other for the task's duration. They had arrived at the town two hours ago and were resting before proceeding to the final location.
"I bet there's going to be some catch at the final location," said Number #9 as he set down his chopsticks over an empty bowl.
"Absolutely. This entire thing's been too easy," replied Number #1.
"I looked at the stamp paper carefully. The stamp isn't complete yet. I think there's going to be some twist with that."
"There's a town nearby, but the final location is some distance away." Number #1 pointed on the map sitting between them on the table. "Maybe getting the final stamp won't be as easy as walking up to the person. There's a pocket of woods beside the location. I reckon it will be something like finding the final stamp bearer in those woods—or something like that, anyway."
"Hmm," Number #9 nodded. "We should scout the location in secret before openly showing ourselves. It'll be better if we know something before walking into whatever the ANBU has planned for it."
There was silence on the table. Number #9 looked up when he didn't get a reply and saw Number #1's eyes swimming over the map with a furrow between his eyes.
"Something wrong?" asked Number #9.
"Uhmm, no, nothing. I was just thinking about something," Number #1 leaned into his chair with a sigh before standing up. "I'll go wash my hands."
"Sure, I'll pay up," said Number #9. He waited until Number #1 was out of view before looking at the map to see if he had missed something. Even though they had allied with each other, they were still competitors, and he didn't want to be at a disadvantage by not knowing something the other guy had found.
As Number #9 poured over the map, Number #1 walked over to the washing sinks in the corner, but instead of washing his hands, he patted around his body and reached into the pockets and pouches until he found his stamp paper.
"Found it," he whispered with an elated smile—before ripping the stamp paper into a few pieces and slipping them back into the same pocket.
He washed his hands and then returned to the front of the store, where Number #9 was waiting for him after he had paid their bill.
"Ready to leave?"
"Yes, let's go."
They left the store and were walking when Number #1 suddenly stopped in the middle of the road.
"Huh, h-how did we..."
He looked bewildered, immediately taking out a kunai while looking at the townsfolk as though they were in danger. Mostly to scare the hell out of them as being near a shinobi fight was equal to forfeting their lives.
"Woah, what are you doing?" asked Number #9, stepping away.
Number #1 immediately reached into one of his pockets, panic gripping his face, only to freeze for a moment before pulling out ripped pieces of his stamp paper with a shaky hand. He looked up at Number #9. "...What d-did you do?"
"Come on, man. I didn't do anything," said Number #9, but he took out his kunai because he knew it wasn't going to end well.
"You will pay!" Number #1 yelled as he charged at Number #9, triggering panic in the street as the townsfolk scattered.
Inside the teashop across from the restaurant, a girl dressed in a long skirt and a plain top rested her head in her arms on the table as though she was sleeping. She opened her eyes and sat up with a soft sigh before picking up the warm cup of tea to take a sip.
A moment later, a mischievous smile along with a giggle appeared on Number #3, Yamanaka Amami's face as the commotion broke out
———
.
The sun was about to set on the third day, and Number #17, Orikashi, was on his way to the fourth checkpoint town. He was a chunin in his late twenties who had participated in the Third Shinobi World War and had been posted at the Hidden Leaf Village during the Nine-Tails incident. He had been through a lot during his career, so when the ANBU showed interest in him, he knew he deserved an offer. To ensure that the ANBU didn't make a mistake by missing out on him, he decided to help them out by eliminating undeserving candidates.
He started by stalking one of his prey straight from the Hidden Leaf Village. On the second day, he caught them in a trap before ripping their stamp paper and destroying most of their gear. On the third day, he laid ambush on two separate candidates and jeopardised their positions by freeing them of their stamp papers.
It prevented him from being first in the task. However, he considered this an acceptable trade-off as it was still early in the assessment process, and he would have other opportunities to showcase his abilities to the ANBU. As he made his way to the fourth checkpoint town, he planned on finding one more prey in the town to hunt and take out of the game.
In truth, he wanted to target more, but he didn't actually have the time to do so if he wanted to reach the final location with some contingency time in case the ANBU had something planned.
I could cut out other undeserving ones in future tasks, thought Orikashi. There were young shinobi among the candidates who weren't good choices for the ANBU due to their lack of experience. He had already done three of them a favour by eliminating them early so they wouldn't get their hopes up.
As Orikashi was running along the road, he looked back when he heard a noise and saw a candidate closing in on him at a quick pace. He didn't know the candidate's number but recognised the mask with the red and yellow swirl pattern. He had seen the man from close at the office building in Hidden Leaf Village, and he was absolutely enormous.
His instincts told him that interacting with this man would be bad, so he picked up the pace to put some distance between them—but the man had closed the distance between them in five minutes and was only a few dozen metres behind him.
Orikashi realised that the man was trying to catch up to him, and seeing that he couldn't outrun him, he decided to face the guy to see what he wanted.
"I notice you trying to catch up to me. May I know how I can help you, friend," he asked, noticing the massive afro on the man's head, which wasn't noticeable before because of the balaclava.
"I have been—"
Orikashi didn't give him a chance to speak and rushed him with his kunai to gain an advantage with an element of surprise. The man dodged the kunai strike, but Orikashi pushed on stringing one strike after another, leaving no opportunity for a counter. Not a single one made contact. The large, muscle-bound man was light on his feet and gracefully dodged all his attacks with minimal movement.
Orikashi switched tactics by pulling back to attack with ninjutsu—but the moment he tried to do so, the man shifted into an offensive stance to launch a palm strike to the chest within the span of half a second.
Orikashi crossed his hands to block the palm strike only to feel a bestial strength assault his body, sending him flying to the woods lining the road. He barely regained control of himself as he smashed through a tree and immediately hid in the foliage, abandoning the idea of facing him head-on. He erased his presence and patiently waited for the man to walk into the woods to launch an ambush.
A few seconds passed, but there were no signs of the man, which made Orikashi nervous from not having his opponent in his view. Just as he thought about moving, he heard the leaves shuffle behind him and looked back to see the man jumping at him.
When did he get behind me?!
The man stabbed Orikashi just underneath the shoulder blade and left a kunai in his back. Orikashi turned around mid-air and launched a volley of shuriken, thinking the man would be coming after him, but he was absent.
When Orikashi landed on the ground, he realised their positions had changed. He was now on the ground, and his opponent was in the position to attack from stealth. He bit back a groan as he pulled out the kunai that was digging into his back and made a quick decision to abandon the fight and flee.
A part of his brain told him to take care of the situation because it was sure to become a problem later on—but seeing how their fight had turned out till now, he was at a disadvantage and would fare better under other circumstances. He also didn't want to get injured to the point where he could no longer compete in the assessment.
Orikashi took out the smoke bombs he had stolen from his prey and threw them to the ground to create a smokescreen to create an opportunity to escape. He immediately ran in the opposite direction from the fourth checkpoint town because anyone would assume he would go toward the town—and it seemed to work as he ran without any sign of the man for a full couple of minutes.
However, as he jumped toward a tree branch, his eyes caught the glint of a kunai stuck in its base. The explosive tag attached to it was already burning, and exploded when he stepped onto the branch. He lost his balance and was blown away at the same time, crashing head-first into a tree, the impact of broke against his skin, causing him to bleed.
Orikashi realised that in an attempt to avoid the fight to not get injured, he had gotten even more hurt. As he ran, he had a decision to make—continue to flee or take the fight. The man stepped out from behind a tree Orikashi was running toward.
Hiss fists were glowing with a yellowish-red tint that looked like some sort of Fire Release ninjutsu. Too fast to stop, Orikashi ran right into a body-blow. The man's fist pressed all the air out of his body, but before he could gasp, a compact explosion smashed him into the ground.
"Three people attacked me today to take my stamp paper," said the man, his voice muffled behind his mask. "I asked them how they lost theirs—and they all gave me a description that matched you."
"So wh-what? T-This was w-what—reven-n-ge?" asked Orikashi, finding it absurd.
"Revenge? They attacked me. Why would I take revenge for them," the man scoffed. "This was supposed to be a simple task; there was no reason to mess with others—but of course, there are always people like... I'm not doing this for revenge; I'm doing this because I don't like you, you fuck."
Orikashi opened his mouth, wanting to say something, but the man kicked him in the head, knocking him out.
———
.
Number #10, Sonaba Yazo, burned the three stamp papers he found on the man he had just knocked out. He could've returned the stamp papers to the victims, but that would've required him to travel back to the previous checkpoint towns—and he wasn't going to do that for people who had attacked him, even though he understood why they had done it.
Eliminating competition was all well and good, but only when necessary. There was no need to go after each other during the current task, so it really bothered him when he found that someone had targeted not one, or two, but three candidates for the sake of competition.
It pissed him enough to go after the guy. Yazo looked down and sighed before slinging the prick over his shoulder. It wasn't right to leave him alone in the woods, so he was going to take him to the next checkpoint town and leave him in the care of the ANBU staff member.
Just like he had done with the three other candidates who had attacked him.
———
.
As the third day ended, Takuma laid his sleeping bag in an empty room he had rented inside some guy's house for the night to avoid the inns at the third checkpoint town. He had crossed two checkpoints without any obstacles and was planning to do the same the next day with the goal of arriving at the final location before sunset.
From the village chatter, apparently, someone had dumped three injured shinobi in the town. It wasn't surprising, given how the rules were written, but it was still a matter of concern as he was sure a considerable number of candidates would be looking to recover the stamp papers they had lost by taking others'.
If he didn't play it carefully, he would be pulled into that conflict irrespective of his wishes.
Want to read ahead of schedule? Head over to Patreón [fictiononlyreader]. Link here and in signature.
Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
- Location
- England
Missing word, should be "knock the man out".
"weapons" should be plural.
Last edited:
TFTC. Takuma is gliding thru this test. It's going to be an easy win for sure.
Respectable.
- Location
- North Wales
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
Even if he himself doesnt pass, ensuring that the position doesnt go to someone whose ethos he fundamentally disagrees with is worth a little extra effort. ANBU, like it or loathe it, is an important institution within the village. You don't want it filled with fuckheads.
CH_8.38 (303)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
Two candidates ran into each other on the fourth day as they left the fourth checkpoint at dawn.
Number #16, Yaya Utamatsu.
Number #5, Igabi Kyusu.
Both of them had their masks on and faced each other cautiously. They subtly put a distance between each other where they felt comfortable enough to react if the other launched an attack. They had seen injured candidates stripped of their stamp papers and didn't want to suffer the same fate.
Utamatsu pulled a kunai from his pouch but raised his hands above his head. "I don't want any trouble, but if you want to go at it, I won't go down easy..." He had survived an ambush on the first day, but he thought himself lucky that he had escaped unscathed.
"Neither do I," Kyusu replied before pointing at the road leaving the town, "but we are going the same way, and frankly, I'm not thrilled about having a travel companion."
"Fair enough. Let's stagger our exits; fifteen minutes is enough. What do you think?" said Utamatsu with a shrug.
"Sounds good, but I want to leave later."
"That's fine with me. I'll go ahead first, but I want at least a kilometre's distance between us if you catch up because of a difference in pace."
Kyusu nodded and gestured for Utamatsu to leave first, who ran along the road while he took cover under a nearby building's shadow to wait out his fifteen minutes. He wanted to be second because he didn't want to have someone at his back, even if they were a safe distance away, as that could change at any moment—and he didn't want to risk it when he was so close to the final location.
He looked at the blue-orange sky. Assuming everything went well, he was to reach the final location around lunchtime. Even if the ANBU tried to pull something, which he absolutely expected, he didn't want to deal with the twist without some visibility.
———
.
The sun had already set on the fourth day by the time Takuma arrived at the final location. It had been a long day. He started at the third checkpoint town at dawn, passed through the fourth checkpoint town at around noon, and finally reached his destination just before it turned dark.
It felt good that the past few days had all gone according to plan, and he had hit his targets without any problems. The entire task had been a long, tiring, but smooth journey. Despite his precautions of staying away from popular inns and boarding houses, using the water clone to get the stamps, and exercising caution while leaving the towns to dodge eyes, he had fully expected to run into other candidates, but to his welcome surprise, it had been an easy road.
He noticed the log cabin with the ANBU symbol painted on the side wall, illuminated by a gas lamp above it. He was at the right place. The lights inside the cabin were on, so he headed to the front door and knocked. The faint murmurs of conversation inside stopped. Takuma stepped back until his back touched the deck railing and gripped the kunai inside his weapon pouch when he heard footsteps from inside.
The door opened, and a masked woman stepped out. If not for the ANBU mask, the combination of casual tank top, hotpants, and not a single weapon on her body made it feel like she was answering the door to collect delivery rather than being part of the recruitment process.
"Oh, congratulations on getting here." She sounded lethargic as she closed the door behind her, stepped out barefoot and asked him to follow her to the gas lamp on the side wall.
Even though it looked like she was the most careless shinobi, Takuma's instinct told her that if he tried to headlock her from behind, she would be able to evade or attempt to turn it around on him.
"Everything looks fine," she said after looking at his stamp paper, "but you need one more stamp, and the person who has it is on the other side of the woods. It only takes ten minutes to cross, so go ahead and get it now."
"I can't go in the morning?"
"You sorta have to go now."
"Fine," said Takuma, choosing not to argue about it. He knew there would be some twist, and if he had to guess, something inside the forest would aim to eliminate him from the running.
"Be careful in there. It's night, and you don't want to... trip," said the ANBU-nin
"Got it," said Takuma before snatching the gas lantern off the nail from which it was hanging. "I hope you don't mind since, y'know... I don't want to trip."
"Not at all. Please help yourself," said the ANBU-nin with a smile in her voice.
"Thank you," said Takuma before heading inside the woods with the gas lantern.
———
.
"We have another one heading inside."
Inside the woods, a group of six ANBU-nin sat around a small fire beneath an earthen half-done created by an Earth Release ninjutsu. It blocked light in one direction so it wouldn't alert the candidates even though they were given hints that something was waiting for them inside the woods.
"And here I thought all of them would be smart enough to time their arrival during the light hours," said the ANBU-nin codenamed Ant, the team leader for the duration of the task, as he sat up on his sleeping bag.
The group was stationed inside the woods as a final obstacle to the candidates before they got their final stamp and successfully completed their task.
"Let's move out," said Ant.
Moving through the woods at night was more challenging as there was no light. Until now, all the candidates had timed their arrival during the day in case there was a twist, which was the type of thinking they wanted to see in the candidates.
"Don't take it easy or go easy on him because it's night-time."
Their objective wasn't to eliminate the candidate at all costs, as that was detrimental to the assessment process. There was no sense in pushing the candidates to a point where they would be unable to participate afterwards, but they had to test them somehow, so the woods section of the task observed how long the candidates took to pass through it while protecting their stamp paper as a group of hostiles tried to keep them in the forest as long as possible.
The team restrained themselves to a level where getting out without entering a fight for life was possible.
"I see light," said one of the ANBU-nin.
An orange-yellow light travelled in the distance. It was the candidate.
"Don't lose track of him," Ant advised his team before giving the order to split up.
Ant skipped from branch to branch and was in range in ten seconds to start the combat situation. To the candidate's credit, he sensed them coming at a fair distance and immediately increased his sprints along with not only throwing zig-zags but also changing altitude by switching between grounds and trees.
He's bold, thought Ant. The candidate continued to carry a lantern. It had the advantage of illuminating his surroundings, decreasing the risk of taking a wrong step, thus increasing his ability to go fast in the uneven forest terrain. The same couldn't be said for the ANBU team, who still had to be careful, making them slower.
However, the lantern had a big disadvantage of constantly giving away their location. If it were an actual mission scenario where the candidate had to shake a tail, the lantern would've acted like a beacon, making it impossible.
An agent charged at the candidate from the side, who dodged the body check by digging his feet into the ground and stopping a step before the collision trajectory. He got going almost immediately afterwards but was stopped by a volley of shuriken at his feet. The previous agent made a grab for a backpack, but the candidate hastily turned his back away just as the fingertips brushed against the fabric.
The candidate tried to run away, but Ant jumped down before him, cutting off his path. The candidate didn't look deterred and threw a haymaker. Ant crossed his arms to block the strike, but his eyes almost popped out when he felt a monstrous force slam into his body and send him flying through a couple of trees.
The stoppage was enough time for the entire team to take position. They saw Ant blown away and adjusted their team strategy without a shared word. An agent unhesitantly entered melee range and was immediately put on the back foot in the face of the candidate's aggressiveness—but it was a planned ruse. As the two engaged in combat, a second agent rushed into the candidate's blind spot with a kunai.
The candidate was taken aback and dropped the lantern on the ground as he stumbled, twisting to face a knife fight with another agent behind him. And if that was not enough, a third agent came in with a sliding tackle, aiming to take out his legs. The lantern sat on the ground, illuminating the area. No one attempted to take or break it, as the agents didn't want to fight in the darkness.
The candidate acted decisively and jumped high to avoid the sliding tackle. As he was in the air, he weaved hands seals. The agents fell back, anticipating a ninjutsu and even prepared themselves for a counterattack. One of the agents threw a triplet of shuriken in an attempt to disrupt the ninjutsu, but the candidate showed excellent environmental awareness and body control as he turned his body in mid-air to use his backpack as a shield.
He landed on the ground and slammed his palms on the ground. The earth shook and jumped as a dome rose around him. The agents, who had been expecting an offensive ninjutsu, switched their actions when they saw a defensive ninjutsu. Two agents prepared to hit the dome from opposite directions, while the other got ready when the candidate appeared from within the doom. But before they could attack the dome, a screeching ball of harsh fire struck it. The top blew up before the fire stuck to the wall and melted the remaining structure.
Ant emerged from behind a shattered tree with smoke rising from his mouth and nose.
The candidate couldn't be allowed to have breathing room but because they weren't trying to kill, they needed to substitute the threat of lethality with constant pressure.
"Go in—"
Before Ant could complete his sentence, the light from the lantern dimmed as a thick fog filled their surroundings. Everyone on the team recognised the Hidden Mist Jutsu. It was already dark, but the thickening fog blocked out everything until they were completely blind to anything that wasn't present in their immediate vicinity.
"He's in the same position as us!" Ant yelled, reminding his team that the candidate couldn't see in the fog. However, that didn't change the fact that they had lost track of the candidate; if they didn't find him soon, they'd lose him.
Fortunately, they had a member who could counter the Hidden Mist Jutsu. A moment later, a strong gust of wind swept through the area, forcefully taking away the thick mist.
"I have eyes on the target!" yelled another member.
It took the team less than a minute before they had firmly caught up with the candidate, who had already passed the halfway mark—the majority of which was covered before the team had made contact with him. It was a little too far for Ant's preference, but the night had its advantages and disadvantages.
Clang. Clang!
Hmm? Ant heard a metallic sound echo through the forest. It sounded like two kunai striking against each other.
Clang. Clang!
Suddenly, he heard something cutting through the air and skipped down to a lower branch to avoid a shuriken zooming past him.
Two seconds later, two dim spots of light zoomed into their direction, and everyone immediately recognised the explosive tags and immediately dove away from them a moment before they exploded.
Ant felt the force brush him and switched to travelling on the ground as a safety precaution.
Clang. Clang!
He felt his chakra tremble when the suspiciously identical metallic sound entered his ears. Genjutsu! Ant hastily disrupted his chakra to break the genjutsu before it could take hold of him. The same couldn't be said about his teammates. He saw two of them trip and fall to the ground while the nearest to him stopped running and covered his ears while groaning painfully.
Ant slapped the man nearest to him on the back to disrupt his chakra. "Get the others free. I'm going ahead," he ordered before rushing towards the candidate.
He was already impressed by the candidate, but the test had to continue until they exited the forest or lost their stamp paper. Ant took the risk of picking up his speed and closed the gap between them until he was right behind the candidate and returned the favour by throwing an explosive tag tied to a kunai ahead of them.
The candidate halted and jumped back to clear out of the explosion radius. He stayed on his feet but remained uncharacteristically still and even seemed uncomfortable from his body language. Ant saw that as an opportunity to hold the candidate until his team caught up again and attacked him.
He emerged from a bush, swinging at the candidate with a kick, who barely stepped out of the way. Ant dipped both hands into pouches and launched a barrage of senbon and shuriken. The candidate did a perfect job deflecting and avoiding the weapons while closing the distance to enter melee range.
Taijutsu wasn't Ant's proficiency, and he had experienced the candidate's explosive force, so he didn't take any chances by engaging in a head-on fight—and took advantage of the terrain around them and ran between the trees, keeping the candidate chasing. When he realised that Ant wasn't willing to engage and tried to run away, he cast a Fire Release ninjutsu to shoot more than half a dozen small fireballs at the candidate. It was only a D-rank jutsu, lacking any real power, but it produced ten fireballs, which Ant masterfully aimed at and around the candidate to stop him from making a break for it.
Suddenly, the ground beneath the candidate's feet sunk in the shape of a square, throwing him off balance. It was an Earth Release ninjutsu; the rest of the team had caught up. An agent emerged from the darkness and struck the candidate from behind, sending him stumbling forward. Another agent entered combat and slammed his shoulder into the candidate's chest, sending him to the ground.
The candidate quickly got up and put his guard up, but he was already surrounded. An agent threw a chain, which rattled as it wrapped around the candidate's arm, who was taken off his feet when the agent pulled on the chain as hard as possible. To finish the team play, another agent descended from the canopy on top of the candidate, pinning him to the ground and pushing him into the dirt.
It was over.
All they had to do now was to find the stamp paper.
However, just as Ant breathed out and let his shoulder relax, the candidate turned into a mass of water, which splashed and spilt on the forest floor.
"Huh," uttered the agent who was holding the candidate down as he looked at his drenched clothes and hand dripping with water.
The team stood stunned for a few seconds as their brains processed what had happened.
"Water clone," said one of the agents proficient with Water Release ninjutsu. "It can only exist when the user is nearby. He has to be somewhere in the range!"
"Let's go!" Ant barked the order, and the team rushed towards the wood's exit, hoping they would catch him.
Alas, they were too late. They emerged from the forest to find the candidate sitting on a large rock, waiting for them. He stood up when he saw them and asked,
"This counts as a pass, right?"
Ant couldn't help but chuckle at the blase tone, as though everything that had just happened was par for the course. A water clone had baited him and his team, caught most of the team in a genjutsu, and almost gave them the slip—all the while, the real one strolled through the forest, keeping safely away from the combat. Even if they had found out about the clone much earlier, it wouldn't have changed the outcome because the distance between them would've been difficult to cover up before the candidate was out of the woods.
He could feel the mix of frustration, amusement, and begrudging respect coming from his men.
"Yes, that's a pass. Well done Thirteen."
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Number #16, Yaya Utamatsu.
Number #5, Igabi Kyusu.
Both of them had their masks on and faced each other cautiously. They subtly put a distance between each other where they felt comfortable enough to react if the other launched an attack. They had seen injured candidates stripped of their stamp papers and didn't want to suffer the same fate.
Utamatsu pulled a kunai from his pouch but raised his hands above his head. "I don't want any trouble, but if you want to go at it, I won't go down easy..." He had survived an ambush on the first day, but he thought himself lucky that he had escaped unscathed.
"Neither do I," Kyusu replied before pointing at the road leaving the town, "but we are going the same way, and frankly, I'm not thrilled about having a travel companion."
"Fair enough. Let's stagger our exits; fifteen minutes is enough. What do you think?" said Utamatsu with a shrug.
"Sounds good, but I want to leave later."
"That's fine with me. I'll go ahead first, but I want at least a kilometre's distance between us if you catch up because of a difference in pace."
Kyusu nodded and gestured for Utamatsu to leave first, who ran along the road while he took cover under a nearby building's shadow to wait out his fifteen minutes. He wanted to be second because he didn't want to have someone at his back, even if they were a safe distance away, as that could change at any moment—and he didn't want to risk it when he was so close to the final location.
He looked at the blue-orange sky. Assuming everything went well, he was to reach the final location around lunchtime. Even if the ANBU tried to pull something, which he absolutely expected, he didn't want to deal with the twist without some visibility.
———
.
The sun had already set on the fourth day by the time Takuma arrived at the final location. It had been a long day. He started at the third checkpoint town at dawn, passed through the fourth checkpoint town at around noon, and finally reached his destination just before it turned dark.
It felt good that the past few days had all gone according to plan, and he had hit his targets without any problems. The entire task had been a long, tiring, but smooth journey. Despite his precautions of staying away from popular inns and boarding houses, using the water clone to get the stamps, and exercising caution while leaving the towns to dodge eyes, he had fully expected to run into other candidates, but to his welcome surprise, it had been an easy road.
He noticed the log cabin with the ANBU symbol painted on the side wall, illuminated by a gas lamp above it. He was at the right place. The lights inside the cabin were on, so he headed to the front door and knocked. The faint murmurs of conversation inside stopped. Takuma stepped back until his back touched the deck railing and gripped the kunai inside his weapon pouch when he heard footsteps from inside.
The door opened, and a masked woman stepped out. If not for the ANBU mask, the combination of casual tank top, hotpants, and not a single weapon on her body made it feel like she was answering the door to collect delivery rather than being part of the recruitment process.
"Oh, congratulations on getting here." She sounded lethargic as she closed the door behind her, stepped out barefoot and asked him to follow her to the gas lamp on the side wall.
Even though it looked like she was the most careless shinobi, Takuma's instinct told her that if he tried to headlock her from behind, she would be able to evade or attempt to turn it around on him.
"Everything looks fine," she said after looking at his stamp paper, "but you need one more stamp, and the person who has it is on the other side of the woods. It only takes ten minutes to cross, so go ahead and get it now."
"I can't go in the morning?"
"You sorta have to go now."
"Fine," said Takuma, choosing not to argue about it. He knew there would be some twist, and if he had to guess, something inside the forest would aim to eliminate him from the running.
"Be careful in there. It's night, and you don't want to... trip," said the ANBU-nin
"Got it," said Takuma before snatching the gas lantern off the nail from which it was hanging. "I hope you don't mind since, y'know... I don't want to trip."
"Not at all. Please help yourself," said the ANBU-nin with a smile in her voice.
"Thank you," said Takuma before heading inside the woods with the gas lantern.
———
.
"We have another one heading inside."
Inside the woods, a group of six ANBU-nin sat around a small fire beneath an earthen half-done created by an Earth Release ninjutsu. It blocked light in one direction so it wouldn't alert the candidates even though they were given hints that something was waiting for them inside the woods.
"And here I thought all of them would be smart enough to time their arrival during the light hours," said the ANBU-nin codenamed Ant, the team leader for the duration of the task, as he sat up on his sleeping bag.
The group was stationed inside the woods as a final obstacle to the candidates before they got their final stamp and successfully completed their task.
"Let's move out," said Ant.
Moving through the woods at night was more challenging as there was no light. Until now, all the candidates had timed their arrival during the day in case there was a twist, which was the type of thinking they wanted to see in the candidates.
"Don't take it easy or go easy on him because it's night-time."
Their objective wasn't to eliminate the candidate at all costs, as that was detrimental to the assessment process. There was no sense in pushing the candidates to a point where they would be unable to participate afterwards, but they had to test them somehow, so the woods section of the task observed how long the candidates took to pass through it while protecting their stamp paper as a group of hostiles tried to keep them in the forest as long as possible.
The team restrained themselves to a level where getting out without entering a fight for life was possible.
"I see light," said one of the ANBU-nin.
An orange-yellow light travelled in the distance. It was the candidate.
"Don't lose track of him," Ant advised his team before giving the order to split up.
Ant skipped from branch to branch and was in range in ten seconds to start the combat situation. To the candidate's credit, he sensed them coming at a fair distance and immediately increased his sprints along with not only throwing zig-zags but also changing altitude by switching between grounds and trees.
He's bold, thought Ant. The candidate continued to carry a lantern. It had the advantage of illuminating his surroundings, decreasing the risk of taking a wrong step, thus increasing his ability to go fast in the uneven forest terrain. The same couldn't be said for the ANBU team, who still had to be careful, making them slower.
However, the lantern had a big disadvantage of constantly giving away their location. If it were an actual mission scenario where the candidate had to shake a tail, the lantern would've acted like a beacon, making it impossible.
An agent charged at the candidate from the side, who dodged the body check by digging his feet into the ground and stopping a step before the collision trajectory. He got going almost immediately afterwards but was stopped by a volley of shuriken at his feet. The previous agent made a grab for a backpack, but the candidate hastily turned his back away just as the fingertips brushed against the fabric.
The candidate tried to run away, but Ant jumped down before him, cutting off his path. The candidate didn't look deterred and threw a haymaker. Ant crossed his arms to block the strike, but his eyes almost popped out when he felt a monstrous force slam into his body and send him flying through a couple of trees.
The stoppage was enough time for the entire team to take position. They saw Ant blown away and adjusted their team strategy without a shared word. An agent unhesitantly entered melee range and was immediately put on the back foot in the face of the candidate's aggressiveness—but it was a planned ruse. As the two engaged in combat, a second agent rushed into the candidate's blind spot with a kunai.
The candidate was taken aback and dropped the lantern on the ground as he stumbled, twisting to face a knife fight with another agent behind him. And if that was not enough, a third agent came in with a sliding tackle, aiming to take out his legs. The lantern sat on the ground, illuminating the area. No one attempted to take or break it, as the agents didn't want to fight in the darkness.
The candidate acted decisively and jumped high to avoid the sliding tackle. As he was in the air, he weaved hands seals. The agents fell back, anticipating a ninjutsu and even prepared themselves for a counterattack. One of the agents threw a triplet of shuriken in an attempt to disrupt the ninjutsu, but the candidate showed excellent environmental awareness and body control as he turned his body in mid-air to use his backpack as a shield.
He landed on the ground and slammed his palms on the ground. The earth shook and jumped as a dome rose around him. The agents, who had been expecting an offensive ninjutsu, switched their actions when they saw a defensive ninjutsu. Two agents prepared to hit the dome from opposite directions, while the other got ready when the candidate appeared from within the doom. But before they could attack the dome, a screeching ball of harsh fire struck it. The top blew up before the fire stuck to the wall and melted the remaining structure.
Ant emerged from behind a shattered tree with smoke rising from his mouth and nose.
The candidate couldn't be allowed to have breathing room but because they weren't trying to kill, they needed to substitute the threat of lethality with constant pressure.
"Go in—"
Before Ant could complete his sentence, the light from the lantern dimmed as a thick fog filled their surroundings. Everyone on the team recognised the Hidden Mist Jutsu. It was already dark, but the thickening fog blocked out everything until they were completely blind to anything that wasn't present in their immediate vicinity.
"He's in the same position as us!" Ant yelled, reminding his team that the candidate couldn't see in the fog. However, that didn't change the fact that they had lost track of the candidate; if they didn't find him soon, they'd lose him.
Fortunately, they had a member who could counter the Hidden Mist Jutsu. A moment later, a strong gust of wind swept through the area, forcefully taking away the thick mist.
"I have eyes on the target!" yelled another member.
It took the team less than a minute before they had firmly caught up with the candidate, who had already passed the halfway mark—the majority of which was covered before the team had made contact with him. It was a little too far for Ant's preference, but the night had its advantages and disadvantages.
Clang. Clang!
Hmm? Ant heard a metallic sound echo through the forest. It sounded like two kunai striking against each other.
Clang. Clang!
Suddenly, he heard something cutting through the air and skipped down to a lower branch to avoid a shuriken zooming past him.
Two seconds later, two dim spots of light zoomed into their direction, and everyone immediately recognised the explosive tags and immediately dove away from them a moment before they exploded.
Ant felt the force brush him and switched to travelling on the ground as a safety precaution.
Clang. Clang!
He felt his chakra tremble when the suspiciously identical metallic sound entered his ears. Genjutsu! Ant hastily disrupted his chakra to break the genjutsu before it could take hold of him. The same couldn't be said about his teammates. He saw two of them trip and fall to the ground while the nearest to him stopped running and covered his ears while groaning painfully.
Ant slapped the man nearest to him on the back to disrupt his chakra. "Get the others free. I'm going ahead," he ordered before rushing towards the candidate.
He was already impressed by the candidate, but the test had to continue until they exited the forest or lost their stamp paper. Ant took the risk of picking up his speed and closed the gap between them until he was right behind the candidate and returned the favour by throwing an explosive tag tied to a kunai ahead of them.
The candidate halted and jumped back to clear out of the explosion radius. He stayed on his feet but remained uncharacteristically still and even seemed uncomfortable from his body language. Ant saw that as an opportunity to hold the candidate until his team caught up again and attacked him.
He emerged from a bush, swinging at the candidate with a kick, who barely stepped out of the way. Ant dipped both hands into pouches and launched a barrage of senbon and shuriken. The candidate did a perfect job deflecting and avoiding the weapons while closing the distance to enter melee range.
Taijutsu wasn't Ant's proficiency, and he had experienced the candidate's explosive force, so he didn't take any chances by engaging in a head-on fight—and took advantage of the terrain around them and ran between the trees, keeping the candidate chasing. When he realised that Ant wasn't willing to engage and tried to run away, he cast a Fire Release ninjutsu to shoot more than half a dozen small fireballs at the candidate. It was only a D-rank jutsu, lacking any real power, but it produced ten fireballs, which Ant masterfully aimed at and around the candidate to stop him from making a break for it.
Suddenly, the ground beneath the candidate's feet sunk in the shape of a square, throwing him off balance. It was an Earth Release ninjutsu; the rest of the team had caught up. An agent emerged from the darkness and struck the candidate from behind, sending him stumbling forward. Another agent entered combat and slammed his shoulder into the candidate's chest, sending him to the ground.
The candidate quickly got up and put his guard up, but he was already surrounded. An agent threw a chain, which rattled as it wrapped around the candidate's arm, who was taken off his feet when the agent pulled on the chain as hard as possible. To finish the team play, another agent descended from the canopy on top of the candidate, pinning him to the ground and pushing him into the dirt.
It was over.
All they had to do now was to find the stamp paper.
However, just as Ant breathed out and let his shoulder relax, the candidate turned into a mass of water, which splashed and spilt on the forest floor.
"Huh," uttered the agent who was holding the candidate down as he looked at his drenched clothes and hand dripping with water.
The team stood stunned for a few seconds as their brains processed what had happened.
"Water clone," said one of the agents proficient with Water Release ninjutsu. "It can only exist when the user is nearby. He has to be somewhere in the range!"
"Let's go!" Ant barked the order, and the team rushed towards the wood's exit, hoping they would catch him.
Alas, they were too late. They emerged from the forest to find the candidate sitting on a large rock, waiting for them. He stood up when he saw them and asked,
"This counts as a pass, right?"
Ant couldn't help but chuckle at the blase tone, as though everything that had just happened was par for the course. A water clone had baited him and his team, caught most of the team in a genjutsu, and almost gave them the slip—all the while, the real one strolled through the forest, keeping safely away from the combat. Even if they had found out about the clone much earlier, it wouldn't have changed the outcome because the distance between them would've been difficult to cover up before the candidate was out of the woods.
He could feel the mix of frustration, amusement, and begrudging respect coming from his men.
"Yes, that's a pass. Well done Thirteen."
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CH_8.39 (304)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
The ANBU had set up a temporary camp to house the candidates. It was a bunch of tents around a campfire and was located near a small stream. After Takuma had passed through the woods, the ANBU-nin he'd escaped showed him the way to the camp. Instead of immediately going to the camp, though, Takuma first went to the stream to clean up a day's worth of sweat and grime and wash his gear before making his presence known to his fellow candidates.
He changed into the clothes he had purchased on his detour and headed to the camp. He was spotted before he could even say anything. The candidates were sitting on logs around a campfire when they noticed him walking in. Everyone except bar one had their faces covered. Most either had the balaclava or the hard front mask on, but the only woman on the ground had one bandana covering her lower face with another one tied in her hair; it looked much more comfortable than the thick balaclava or the hard Scars mask Takuma had on. Then there was the Hyuga with his bare face, but covered eyes; the balaclava and mask wouldn't hide his eyes, which gave away his identity.
"Oh, we have another," said one of the candidates. He wore a mask with a blue ocean wave pattern, but Takuma knew what he looked like underneath it because it was the same candidate who had been stalking the inn's pub at the first checkpoint town. "Come, sit down. You must be hungry. They gave us a stash of field rations."
The candidate with the big afro hairstyle tossed a field ration at Takuma.
"Thank you," he replied.
"Don't mention it," said the tall and buff guy with the afro. "You can dry your clothes over there." He pointed at a couple of somewhat-occupied makeshift racks hanging near the campfire. Takuma would've refrained from leaving his clothes in the open, but the ANBU-nin had informed him that the camp was a 'safe zone' until the task's deadline and that the candidates were barred from sabotaging each other while they were there.
That was the reason why he had chosen to wash his clothes in the first place.
"We're going by our numbers, so introduce yourself to the group. I'm Five, nice to meet you."
"...I'm Thirteen," Takuma replied as he hung his clothes on the rack.
One by one, everyone around the camp introduced themselves by their numbers.
"You had the bad luck of arriving at the cabin at night, huh," said Sixteen, who Takuma noted had lengthy limbs. "I don't think I could've escaped them if they had the advantage of darkness."
"It worked out well, fortunately," Takuma said humbly. However, the truth was that not only had he planned to arrive at the final location at night so that he was in perfect condition every day, but he also preferred his odds in the dark.
The darkness narrowed the view of the ANBU team; the moment they found the clone, they stopped looking for anything else. Moreover, the Water Clone Jutsu had the flawed quirk of a clone's body where affected parts of it would momentarily distort when taking a substantial hit. In the daytime, that would've alerted the ANBU team that they were chasing a clone.
"So you've been sitting here since you arrived?" asked Takuma as he took a seat.
"Pretty much," said Three, the woman.
That meant he had one whole day to recover and relax. Three days on the road wasn't much for him, and he had been getting regular rest at night, but fatigue built up regardless; a free day would reset his condition, which was important since he wanted to be on top of his game.
"We've been discussing what the ANBU will make us do next to pass the time. Any thoughts?" asked Three, resting her chin on her palm as she gazed at him in interest.
Takuma considered the question. They could throw many challenges at them; he tried to think about what he would do if he were in ANBU's shoes. However, it was difficult because he had no idea what they were looking for in the candidates.
"I... think we'll be moved to a place with people next," he started. "Activity happens in a settlement with people rather than in the middle of nowhere. You wouldn't find bigwigs of a criminal group in a base inside a forest but in a city with luxury. Even thugs lower on the ladder need common amenities like food, water, and other stuff that make living tolerable. While you can get them in a mountain somewhere, it's difficult and costly... so if they're going to send us on the field as agents, then they need to test how we perform in a village, town, or a city."
He had spent two months in Yu, so he understood the attractions of a city, its people, and its economy. People wanted control, and there was nothing to control in untouched nature away from civilization—it was among droves of people that could be controlled. Humans were social animals; being stuck with the same handful of people with nothing to do would seem like a dull hell for many people.
"That's an intelligent take," said Seven, the Hyuuga, giving Takuma a nod.
"We've been thinking that they would either team us up or pit us against each other—openly, this time," said Five.
"Or both," said Ten, the afro guy.
"Teamwork and competition. Makes sense," Takuma nodded as he opened his field ration pack.
The lack of tension among the candidates stuck out to him like a paper cut. They were all competitors aiming for the same job, yet there they were, acting all buddy-buddy. There was nothing wrong with being friendly, and he liked the fact that none were being assholes, but seeing every single one of them chatting at the campfire felt off.
He expected at least one to keep to themselves, and yet everyone was present.
As he poured the curry rice pack into the pot provided in the backpack, he discerned something he hadn't put a finger on till now. Even though he was being cautious in the company of strangers, he couldn't sense an iota of danger from his competitors—all of them were hiding behind a friendly facade and were doing it beautifully.
They managed to make him feel comfortable enough to have him give a real answer to a question, which revealed his thought process and thus gave them insight into him. It was a team effort that started when he stepped into the camp. They were strangers, competitors, and yet they had worked with each other perfectly.
He was in admirable company.
"I must say, this is nice," said Takuma, pulling up a facade to join the team with a slow nod.
"I totally get what you mean," said Three with a joyous giggle.
———
.
The task's deadline passed without fanfare except for a large explosion in the woods caused by one of the candidates. After Takuma, three more candidates tried to make it through the woods. Only two of them—Number #4, a man, and Number #14, a woman—survived the forest and reached the camp.
On the sixth day, Leopard, Ant, and the ANBU team arrived at the camp for the first time.
"Your batch started with twenty candidates, and after nearly a week of testing, twelve were weeded out, leaving you eight as eligible prospects," said Leopard. Unlike before, when she wore loungewear, she looked professional and decked in ANBU gear. "Don't mistake this for an achievement. Personally, I don't think the tests were difficult or even sufficiently challenging... These guys went too easy on you," she pointed to Ant and his team.
Ant stood beside her, still as a rock. Either he didn't agree with her assessment or didn't care for her agree with her—either way, her words bounced off him.
"Before we move on to the next stage of the assessment, we will be announcing the results of this task—to be exact, how long it took for everyone to pass through the woods," said Leopard.
Ant stepped forward and listed the numbers in ascending order for how long they had taken.
Number #7 — 8 minutes
Number #13 — 12 minutes
Number #16 — 13 minutes
Number #10 — 14 minutes
Number #14 — 14 minutes
Number #5 — 16 minutes
Number #3 — 17 minutes
Number #4 — 19 minutes
——
.
Ant observed the candidates and how they all had glanced at Seven, the Hyuga, when they heard his time. He was the only person to take the single-digit minutes for a distance marked as ten minutes to travel. It showcased the terrifying gift of Byakugan that the illustrious Hyuuga clan possessed.
During Seven's turn, Ant and his team had failed to spot Seven, much less catch up to and engage with him. He had undoubtedly used his Byakugan to not only avoid them completely but also use the power of his eyes to pathfind a route of least resistance through the dense woods to traverse it in record time.
The team had no chance of catching or slowing him down from the very start.
Thirteen came second by fooling the team with the water clone gambit while he made it through the woods without ever engaging with them, much like Seven. He hadn't completed it sooner because he had to remain within a certain range from the clone or lose control of it. Thirteen had to stop every time he felt his clone on the edge of the permitted limit, which added two minutes.
In many ways, it was more frustrating than not catching the Hyuuga's shadow.
Then there was Sixteen, who the team had trouble keeping up with. Ant didn't know if it was because they were in a forest or if he was always like this, but Sixteen was agile and moved in a way that, even if Ant wasn't holding back, he would still find it challenging to keep up with him. Sixteen had an impressive presence of mind and situational awareness; he made the unknown woods feel like he had been there hundreds of times and knew every tree and branch on the back of his hand.
Ten wasn't good at losing a tail during a chase, but he made it up with his ability to constantly be on the move. The team was always on him, attacking him every ten seconds, yet they could never pin him down for more than a few seconds. He would evade or strong-arm their attacks until he found an opening. From the moment they made contact till the end of the woods, the team always had an 'upper hand,' yet Ten always gave them the slip.
From experience, Ant could tell that Ten was more familiar with hunting than fleeing and used that familiarity in one department to make up for a lack of skill in another department.
It was an appreciable show of adaptability.
Fourteen had started very strong. It took the team a whopping seven minutes to find her, which showed excellent stealth abilities, and even after they made contact, she slipped between the trees, sneaked into the foliage, and travelled with hushed steps that an entire group lost sight of her multiple times—and even though it took her a long time to pass through the forest, to be so elusive for that long was an impressive feat.
The ANBU could use someone like Fourteen on missions requiring high stealth.
Five had a weak performance in the woods. They found him quickly, never lost track of him, and trapped him several times. His backpack got damaged, and he almost lost possession of his stamp paper. While he managed to escape them and exit the woods, Ant and the team agreed that it was barely an acceptable performance but their review would show their opinion when they sent it back to Hidden Leaf Village.
Ant knew, of course, that everyone had their strengths and weaknesses, but Five would have to show some firm strengths to balance his lacklustre performance.
Three was the most bizarre of them all. The team wasn't told about the candidates' identities or capabilities to make it more fair and allow the candidates to surprise the team. So they were utterly surprised that the moment they found Three, two of their members suddenly turned to attack the team with explosive tags, smoke bombs and weapons—essentially emptying their arsenals.
It became clear that Three was from the Yamanaka clan, but at the moment, they were occupied by why the people they had known for years were suddenly attacking them during a recruitment exercise. She created chaos and took advantage of the chaos to make a run for it. Ant and another member caught up to her and gave her a hard time, but in the end, she crossed the threshold without losing her stamp paper.
Three was the only candidate who turned the team against themselves. Even if they didn't like it, the team fairly added her feat to their review.
Four was unfortunate. He was the last to arrive at the final location. He panicked when he lost his backpack, which had a lot of essential gear, and even damaged his weapons belt, which he then had to carry, occupying one of his hands. He was clearly used to the forest terrain, traversing it smoothly, which allowed him to stay in the game.
But then he used a particularly strong Fire Release ninjutsu, burning a patch of trees to char and caused a commotion. If this were a real combat situation, he would have alerted other enemies, making the task more difficult. While the ninjutsu allowed him to break free and escape, the team didn't appreciate it as the correct choice.
They held the opinion that Four could've shaken them off if he had just calmed down and assessed the situation.
———
.
"For the next part of the assessment, we will pair you together," Leopard announced.
The candidates weren't surprised. Takuma and the others had speculated that they would team up for the next challenge, and their speculation was correct.
She continued, "As I said, things have been too easy till now, so we want to add some stakes, some real danger to spice things up. I want you all to have put some skin in the game. If I had a say, I would've shipped you all off to the Land of Earth or made you participate in the Steam-Frost War—but I can't do that because we can't have unproven recruits operating on foreign territory."
Takuma would've quit on the spot if they made him participate in a war he had just returned from.
"Because we can't do that, we're going to do the next best thing. The location for the next challenge is one day's travel north from here—at the seat of the Fire Daimyo, the capital of the Land of Fire: Ember Imperial City."
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He changed into the clothes he had purchased on his detour and headed to the camp. He was spotted before he could even say anything. The candidates were sitting on logs around a campfire when they noticed him walking in. Everyone except bar one had their faces covered. Most either had the balaclava or the hard front mask on, but the only woman on the ground had one bandana covering her lower face with another one tied in her hair; it looked much more comfortable than the thick balaclava or the hard Scars mask Takuma had on. Then there was the Hyuga with his bare face, but covered eyes; the balaclava and mask wouldn't hide his eyes, which gave away his identity.
"Oh, we have another," said one of the candidates. He wore a mask with a blue ocean wave pattern, but Takuma knew what he looked like underneath it because it was the same candidate who had been stalking the inn's pub at the first checkpoint town. "Come, sit down. You must be hungry. They gave us a stash of field rations."
The candidate with the big afro hairstyle tossed a field ration at Takuma.
"Thank you," he replied.
"Don't mention it," said the tall and buff guy with the afro. "You can dry your clothes over there." He pointed at a couple of somewhat-occupied makeshift racks hanging near the campfire. Takuma would've refrained from leaving his clothes in the open, but the ANBU-nin had informed him that the camp was a 'safe zone' until the task's deadline and that the candidates were barred from sabotaging each other while they were there.
That was the reason why he had chosen to wash his clothes in the first place.
"We're going by our numbers, so introduce yourself to the group. I'm Five, nice to meet you."
"...I'm Thirteen," Takuma replied as he hung his clothes on the rack.
One by one, everyone around the camp introduced themselves by their numbers.
"You had the bad luck of arriving at the cabin at night, huh," said Sixteen, who Takuma noted had lengthy limbs. "I don't think I could've escaped them if they had the advantage of darkness."
"It worked out well, fortunately," Takuma said humbly. However, the truth was that not only had he planned to arrive at the final location at night so that he was in perfect condition every day, but he also preferred his odds in the dark.
The darkness narrowed the view of the ANBU team; the moment they found the clone, they stopped looking for anything else. Moreover, the Water Clone Jutsu had the flawed quirk of a clone's body where affected parts of it would momentarily distort when taking a substantial hit. In the daytime, that would've alerted the ANBU team that they were chasing a clone.
"So you've been sitting here since you arrived?" asked Takuma as he took a seat.
"Pretty much," said Three, the woman.
That meant he had one whole day to recover and relax. Three days on the road wasn't much for him, and he had been getting regular rest at night, but fatigue built up regardless; a free day would reset his condition, which was important since he wanted to be on top of his game.
"We've been discussing what the ANBU will make us do next to pass the time. Any thoughts?" asked Three, resting her chin on her palm as she gazed at him in interest.
Takuma considered the question. They could throw many challenges at them; he tried to think about what he would do if he were in ANBU's shoes. However, it was difficult because he had no idea what they were looking for in the candidates.
"I... think we'll be moved to a place with people next," he started. "Activity happens in a settlement with people rather than in the middle of nowhere. You wouldn't find bigwigs of a criminal group in a base inside a forest but in a city with luxury. Even thugs lower on the ladder need common amenities like food, water, and other stuff that make living tolerable. While you can get them in a mountain somewhere, it's difficult and costly... so if they're going to send us on the field as agents, then they need to test how we perform in a village, town, or a city."
He had spent two months in Yu, so he understood the attractions of a city, its people, and its economy. People wanted control, and there was nothing to control in untouched nature away from civilization—it was among droves of people that could be controlled. Humans were social animals; being stuck with the same handful of people with nothing to do would seem like a dull hell for many people.
"That's an intelligent take," said Seven, the Hyuuga, giving Takuma a nod.
"We've been thinking that they would either team us up or pit us against each other—openly, this time," said Five.
"Or both," said Ten, the afro guy.
"Teamwork and competition. Makes sense," Takuma nodded as he opened his field ration pack.
The lack of tension among the candidates stuck out to him like a paper cut. They were all competitors aiming for the same job, yet there they were, acting all buddy-buddy. There was nothing wrong with being friendly, and he liked the fact that none were being assholes, but seeing every single one of them chatting at the campfire felt off.
He expected at least one to keep to themselves, and yet everyone was present.
As he poured the curry rice pack into the pot provided in the backpack, he discerned something he hadn't put a finger on till now. Even though he was being cautious in the company of strangers, he couldn't sense an iota of danger from his competitors—all of them were hiding behind a friendly facade and were doing it beautifully.
They managed to make him feel comfortable enough to have him give a real answer to a question, which revealed his thought process and thus gave them insight into him. It was a team effort that started when he stepped into the camp. They were strangers, competitors, and yet they had worked with each other perfectly.
He was in admirable company.
"I must say, this is nice," said Takuma, pulling up a facade to join the team with a slow nod.
"I totally get what you mean," said Three with a joyous giggle.
———
.
The task's deadline passed without fanfare except for a large explosion in the woods caused by one of the candidates. After Takuma, three more candidates tried to make it through the woods. Only two of them—Number #4, a man, and Number #14, a woman—survived the forest and reached the camp.
On the sixth day, Leopard, Ant, and the ANBU team arrived at the camp for the first time.
"Your batch started with twenty candidates, and after nearly a week of testing, twelve were weeded out, leaving you eight as eligible prospects," said Leopard. Unlike before, when she wore loungewear, she looked professional and decked in ANBU gear. "Don't mistake this for an achievement. Personally, I don't think the tests were difficult or even sufficiently challenging... These guys went too easy on you," she pointed to Ant and his team.
Ant stood beside her, still as a rock. Either he didn't agree with her assessment or didn't care for her agree with her—either way, her words bounced off him.
"Before we move on to the next stage of the assessment, we will be announcing the results of this task—to be exact, how long it took for everyone to pass through the woods," said Leopard.
Ant stepped forward and listed the numbers in ascending order for how long they had taken.
Number #7 — 8 minutes
Number #13 — 12 minutes
Number #16 — 13 minutes
Number #10 — 14 minutes
Number #14 — 14 minutes
Number #5 — 16 minutes
Number #3 — 17 minutes
Number #4 — 19 minutes
——
.
Ant observed the candidates and how they all had glanced at Seven, the Hyuga, when they heard his time. He was the only person to take the single-digit minutes for a distance marked as ten minutes to travel. It showcased the terrifying gift of Byakugan that the illustrious Hyuuga clan possessed.
During Seven's turn, Ant and his team had failed to spot Seven, much less catch up to and engage with him. He had undoubtedly used his Byakugan to not only avoid them completely but also use the power of his eyes to pathfind a route of least resistance through the dense woods to traverse it in record time.
The team had no chance of catching or slowing him down from the very start.
Thirteen came second by fooling the team with the water clone gambit while he made it through the woods without ever engaging with them, much like Seven. He hadn't completed it sooner because he had to remain within a certain range from the clone or lose control of it. Thirteen had to stop every time he felt his clone on the edge of the permitted limit, which added two minutes.
In many ways, it was more frustrating than not catching the Hyuuga's shadow.
Then there was Sixteen, who the team had trouble keeping up with. Ant didn't know if it was because they were in a forest or if he was always like this, but Sixteen was agile and moved in a way that, even if Ant wasn't holding back, he would still find it challenging to keep up with him. Sixteen had an impressive presence of mind and situational awareness; he made the unknown woods feel like he had been there hundreds of times and knew every tree and branch on the back of his hand.
Ten wasn't good at losing a tail during a chase, but he made it up with his ability to constantly be on the move. The team was always on him, attacking him every ten seconds, yet they could never pin him down for more than a few seconds. He would evade or strong-arm their attacks until he found an opening. From the moment they made contact till the end of the woods, the team always had an 'upper hand,' yet Ten always gave them the slip.
From experience, Ant could tell that Ten was more familiar with hunting than fleeing and used that familiarity in one department to make up for a lack of skill in another department.
It was an appreciable show of adaptability.
Fourteen had started very strong. It took the team a whopping seven minutes to find her, which showed excellent stealth abilities, and even after they made contact, she slipped between the trees, sneaked into the foliage, and travelled with hushed steps that an entire group lost sight of her multiple times—and even though it took her a long time to pass through the forest, to be so elusive for that long was an impressive feat.
The ANBU could use someone like Fourteen on missions requiring high stealth.
Five had a weak performance in the woods. They found him quickly, never lost track of him, and trapped him several times. His backpack got damaged, and he almost lost possession of his stamp paper. While he managed to escape them and exit the woods, Ant and the team agreed that it was barely an acceptable performance but their review would show their opinion when they sent it back to Hidden Leaf Village.
Ant knew, of course, that everyone had their strengths and weaknesses, but Five would have to show some firm strengths to balance his lacklustre performance.
Three was the most bizarre of them all. The team wasn't told about the candidates' identities or capabilities to make it more fair and allow the candidates to surprise the team. So they were utterly surprised that the moment they found Three, two of their members suddenly turned to attack the team with explosive tags, smoke bombs and weapons—essentially emptying their arsenals.
It became clear that Three was from the Yamanaka clan, but at the moment, they were occupied by why the people they had known for years were suddenly attacking them during a recruitment exercise. She created chaos and took advantage of the chaos to make a run for it. Ant and another member caught up to her and gave her a hard time, but in the end, she crossed the threshold without losing her stamp paper.
Three was the only candidate who turned the team against themselves. Even if they didn't like it, the team fairly added her feat to their review.
Four was unfortunate. He was the last to arrive at the final location. He panicked when he lost his backpack, which had a lot of essential gear, and even damaged his weapons belt, which he then had to carry, occupying one of his hands. He was clearly used to the forest terrain, traversing it smoothly, which allowed him to stay in the game.
But then he used a particularly strong Fire Release ninjutsu, burning a patch of trees to char and caused a commotion. If this were a real combat situation, he would have alerted other enemies, making the task more difficult. While the ninjutsu allowed him to break free and escape, the team didn't appreciate it as the correct choice.
They held the opinion that Four could've shaken them off if he had just calmed down and assessed the situation.
———
.
"For the next part of the assessment, we will pair you together," Leopard announced.
The candidates weren't surprised. Takuma and the others had speculated that they would team up for the next challenge, and their speculation was correct.
She continued, "As I said, things have been too easy till now, so we want to add some stakes, some real danger to spice things up. I want you all to have put some skin in the game. If I had a say, I would've shipped you all off to the Land of Earth or made you participate in the Steam-Frost War—but I can't do that because we can't have unproven recruits operating on foreign territory."
Takuma would've quit on the spot if they made him participate in a war he had just returned from.
"Because we can't do that, we're going to do the next best thing. The location for the next challenge is one day's travel north from here—at the seat of the Fire Daimyo, the capital of the Land of Fire: Ember Imperial City."
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CH_8.40 (305)
New
Fiction
Feel free to ask me questions.
Takuma decided that the ANBU were assholes when they didn't reveal the pairings at the camp and instead declared they would only announce them when they reached the capital city. They were clearly trying to make it hard for the candidates by decreasing the time they would get to establish each other as teammates.
The group of ANBU-nin and candidates took breaks on their way to the Ember Imperial City, where Leopard explained more about the upcoming challenge.
"Time after time, batches of candidates much like yourself mistake that because it's our recruitment process, we control everything. They're not completely wrong, but as you say, we left you guys to your devices for the past five days. They think that, because it's an assessment process, we aren't going to push you to real danger—and if things go wrong, we will be there to stop it. However, let me make one thing clear to you: we don't have complete control over the testing process. The danger you face is real... and to emphasise that point, we are going to drop you in a situation where our inherent limited control will become clear."
If Takuma was being honest, he thought that as well. There was only so much they could push the candidates during a test. Overdoing it would actively deter the candidates from joining.
"Since we can't send you to an active hostile territory, we are using the capital city as the location. I'm sure you all know why that is."
"Samurai," Seven vocalised everyone's thoughts.
The Ember Imperial City was the seat of power for the Fire Daimyo and his court. The city and the surrounding region had close to no real shinobi influence as they were exclusively maintained by the samurai clans retained by the Fire Daimyo. Shinobi still got jobs from the region, but the samurai controlled everything from governance to maintenance in the name of the Lord Daimyo.
Like the shinobi, samurai were people who had developed chakra into tools of violence and war. They were two very different cultures that once clashed during the Warring States Era of history until the shinobi banded together to form the Hidden Villages around the globe and swore fealty to their respective Daimyo, making the two sides allies, which led to a stabilisation of the Great Nations.
"Indeed," Leopard nodded. "The Daimyo's samurai and we, shinobi, are allies, but we are two firmly separate entities. We will be asking you to do certain tasks in the capital city, and if something goes wrong and you attract the attention or even the ire of the samurai, we might be able to get you out of it—but we will have to go through complicated bureaucratic channels, and that stuff always takes a lot of time. Who knows what might happen during that time, and trust me… you don't want to find out. Samurai might tout their code and honour, but they're just as nasty as anyone else."
Takuma inferred they were about to do something illegal in the capital city that might get them into trouble. He looked around the group and saw the implications dawn on everyone. They wanted the candidates to believe that whatever they were about to go through was real and not some controlled simulated setup, which would've been difficult to accept if shinobi were involved as ANBU could rig that.
Introducing an external force outside their control automatically made everything real.
"What will we be doing there?" asked Five.
Leapoard laughed. "It won't be fun if I tell you."
No candidate except for perhaps Three was amused, judging by her snort. During the journey, Takuma got to talk to some of the other candidates. He was running between Ten and Sixteen, who were the quieter ones among the group but were open to talk if someone got a conversation rolling.
"What do you think they'll have us do?" Takuma asked. He had some ideas of his own, but as the saying went, two heads were better than one. Moreover, there was an atmosphere of group speculation among the candidates, as though they were trying to beat ANBU at their own game.
"Stealing from the Daimyo's collection at his home," said Sixteen with a good-hearted chuckle.
"Imagine if they actually made us do that," said Takuma, laughing as well.
"We would be either caught or hunted for the rest of our lives. That type of thinh takes time, people, and planning to pull off decently. Even then, you can't eliminate the risk of getting caught," said Ten.
"Yeah, I guess the Fire Daimyo's palace would be swimming with samurai," said Sixteen.
"I have been to the capital once with my aunt. It feels like the Hidden Leaf, but instead of shinobi, the place is full of armoured samurai on every street," said Ten, making Takuma wonder about his background. "Whatever they plan to make us do, I think it'll involve us having run-ins with samurai, and we are going into their home turf without much preparation—she talked about danger; I think that's dangerous enough for my taste."
"Agreed," Sixteen sighed.
"Who do you want to be paired with the most and least?" asked Takuma before raising one hand and putting the other on his chest. "I swear not to get offended if I'm the least favourite..."
"Why don't you go first," said Sixteen, eyeing Takuma from behind his half-yellow and half-purple mask.
"To be honest, I don't have a preference. Rather than skill, I'm looking for someone who I gel with from a personality point-of-view because it makes working together so much easier—but if you don't get along, it can turn into a horrible experience. Unfortunately, I don't know either of you well enough to know if we will gel."
Takuma briefly glanced at Five running ahead of them; if he had to choose one, Five would be his choice as he had shown some smart actions by observing the candidates as they approached the ANBU staff for their stamp.
"But I do have a least favourite." Takuma looked around before subtly wagging four fingers so that only Ten and Sixteen would see it.
Four was the last to arrive, the slowest, and had set off a large explosion in the woods. Takuma didn't know his circumstances, but he had a regretful look of self-blaming after he arrived at the camp. It clearly felt like he had made a mistake in the woods, which ruined his performance.
Takuma had nothing against the guy, but he didn't want to be paired with the weakest link.
"I'd like the Hyuga," said Ten, straightforward with his desire. "He was the first and fastest to complete the task, and possesses the Byakugan. Having someone like him on the same side is a boon any way you look at it."
Choosing the best-performing candidate as the favourite was the boring answer no one could find a fault in. Takuma wondered if Ten answered truthfully because he really thought that or if he was trying to avoid the question.
"As for the person I don't want to get paired with... Three. I don't know what it's about her, but I get the creeps from her," said Ten with a nod.
"I heard that."
Just then, Three, who had been running behind them, passed by Ten, whispering into his ear and laughing when she saw him almost stumble on his feet, rubbing his arms as he felt a cold shiver down his spine.
"See, that's what I'm talking about," he said.
Had she been listening from the start? Among the candidates, Takuma had a deeper impression of Three. Even though everyone had a facade of friendliness, she had acted too carefree during their short time at the camp. She talked freely as though not at all worried about leaking information, and yet Takuma didn't think she had ever given actionable information. And when she was not talking and just listening, her gaze felt like she was seeing through his masks and directly at him. It wasn't unsettling, but it made him constantly worry he was giving something away.
"What about you?" Ten asked Sixteen.
"I would like to pair with you, Thirteen," said Sixteen, surprising Takuma.
"Really?"
"Uh-huh. As you said, a compatible personality is more important. I find you much easier to talk to than Seven. And I was impressed that you took the second shortest time despite going through the woods at night."
"Oh, come on, doesn't that make me the second option?" Takuma slumped his shoulders. "Your preference would've been Seven if he had a more outgoing personality."
Sixteen shrugged. "The allure of the Byakugan is hard to deny."
Takuma couldn't refute that.
"As for the one I don't want to get paired with? I don't have anyone like that. The ANBU selected everyone for a reason, and those who made it this far must be competent. I think I'll work it out with anyone they decide to assign me."
"That's an admirable attitude, Sixteen. You're in second place on my list," Ten patted Sixteen on the shoulder.
Something told Takuma that Ten wasn't just saying that to be nice or because of his facade.
"Thank you," said Sixteen.
After travelling nonstop for a day, they had the city in their view, with the main route crowded with travellers and merchants. The moment they spotted the first samurai travelling away from the city, Leopard had them move off the main road and travel ten minutes into the wide meadows until they had privacy.
"Alright, now that we're here, I will give you your pairings and your assignments," said Leopard.
The pairings were—
Seven and Fourteen
Sixteen and Five
Ten and Four
Thirteen and Three
Takuma turned to look at his teammate and found her looking at him. Even though she wore her teal blue mask with royal blue splashes, he could feel her smiling behind it. She walked to him leisurely with her hands behind her back and stopped right before him. She was so close that he could see the almost white flecks in her pale green eyes.
"Looking forward to working with you, teammate... I have great expectations of you; don't disappoint me, will you."
He felt that the next few days would be challenging. If he weren't careful, he would get eaten whole by the woman before him—but he wasn't the type to just roll over and let someone walk all over him.
"Don't worry, I'll carry you to the finish line, so just sit there and be pretty."
He wanted to smile when he saw her eyes twitch.
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Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
The group of ANBU-nin and candidates took breaks on their way to the Ember Imperial City, where Leopard explained more about the upcoming challenge.
"Time after time, batches of candidates much like yourself mistake that because it's our recruitment process, we control everything. They're not completely wrong, but as you say, we left you guys to your devices for the past five days. They think that, because it's an assessment process, we aren't going to push you to real danger—and if things go wrong, we will be there to stop it. However, let me make one thing clear to you: we don't have complete control over the testing process. The danger you face is real... and to emphasise that point, we are going to drop you in a situation where our inherent limited control will become clear."
If Takuma was being honest, he thought that as well. There was only so much they could push the candidates during a test. Overdoing it would actively deter the candidates from joining.
"Since we can't send you to an active hostile territory, we are using the capital city as the location. I'm sure you all know why that is."
"Samurai," Seven vocalised everyone's thoughts.
The Ember Imperial City was the seat of power for the Fire Daimyo and his court. The city and the surrounding region had close to no real shinobi influence as they were exclusively maintained by the samurai clans retained by the Fire Daimyo. Shinobi still got jobs from the region, but the samurai controlled everything from governance to maintenance in the name of the Lord Daimyo.
Like the shinobi, samurai were people who had developed chakra into tools of violence and war. They were two very different cultures that once clashed during the Warring States Era of history until the shinobi banded together to form the Hidden Villages around the globe and swore fealty to their respective Daimyo, making the two sides allies, which led to a stabilisation of the Great Nations.
"Indeed," Leopard nodded. "The Daimyo's samurai and we, shinobi, are allies, but we are two firmly separate entities. We will be asking you to do certain tasks in the capital city, and if something goes wrong and you attract the attention or even the ire of the samurai, we might be able to get you out of it—but we will have to go through complicated bureaucratic channels, and that stuff always takes a lot of time. Who knows what might happen during that time, and trust me… you don't want to find out. Samurai might tout their code and honour, but they're just as nasty as anyone else."
Takuma inferred they were about to do something illegal in the capital city that might get them into trouble. He looked around the group and saw the implications dawn on everyone. They wanted the candidates to believe that whatever they were about to go through was real and not some controlled simulated setup, which would've been difficult to accept if shinobi were involved as ANBU could rig that.
Introducing an external force outside their control automatically made everything real.
"What will we be doing there?" asked Five.
Leapoard laughed. "It won't be fun if I tell you."
No candidate except for perhaps Three was amused, judging by her snort. During the journey, Takuma got to talk to some of the other candidates. He was running between Ten and Sixteen, who were the quieter ones among the group but were open to talk if someone got a conversation rolling.
"What do you think they'll have us do?" Takuma asked. He had some ideas of his own, but as the saying went, two heads were better than one. Moreover, there was an atmosphere of group speculation among the candidates, as though they were trying to beat ANBU at their own game.
"Stealing from the Daimyo's collection at his home," said Sixteen with a good-hearted chuckle.
"Imagine if they actually made us do that," said Takuma, laughing as well.
"We would be either caught or hunted for the rest of our lives. That type of thinh takes time, people, and planning to pull off decently. Even then, you can't eliminate the risk of getting caught," said Ten.
"Yeah, I guess the Fire Daimyo's palace would be swimming with samurai," said Sixteen.
"I have been to the capital once with my aunt. It feels like the Hidden Leaf, but instead of shinobi, the place is full of armoured samurai on every street," said Ten, making Takuma wonder about his background. "Whatever they plan to make us do, I think it'll involve us having run-ins with samurai, and we are going into their home turf without much preparation—she talked about danger; I think that's dangerous enough for my taste."
"Agreed," Sixteen sighed.
"Who do you want to be paired with the most and least?" asked Takuma before raising one hand and putting the other on his chest. "I swear not to get offended if I'm the least favourite..."
"Why don't you go first," said Sixteen, eyeing Takuma from behind his half-yellow and half-purple mask.
"To be honest, I don't have a preference. Rather than skill, I'm looking for someone who I gel with from a personality point-of-view because it makes working together so much easier—but if you don't get along, it can turn into a horrible experience. Unfortunately, I don't know either of you well enough to know if we will gel."
Takuma briefly glanced at Five running ahead of them; if he had to choose one, Five would be his choice as he had shown some smart actions by observing the candidates as they approached the ANBU staff for their stamp.
"But I do have a least favourite." Takuma looked around before subtly wagging four fingers so that only Ten and Sixteen would see it.
Four was the last to arrive, the slowest, and had set off a large explosion in the woods. Takuma didn't know his circumstances, but he had a regretful look of self-blaming after he arrived at the camp. It clearly felt like he had made a mistake in the woods, which ruined his performance.
Takuma had nothing against the guy, but he didn't want to be paired with the weakest link.
"I'd like the Hyuga," said Ten, straightforward with his desire. "He was the first and fastest to complete the task, and possesses the Byakugan. Having someone like him on the same side is a boon any way you look at it."
Choosing the best-performing candidate as the favourite was the boring answer no one could find a fault in. Takuma wondered if Ten answered truthfully because he really thought that or if he was trying to avoid the question.
"As for the person I don't want to get paired with... Three. I don't know what it's about her, but I get the creeps from her," said Ten with a nod.
"I heard that."
Just then, Three, who had been running behind them, passed by Ten, whispering into his ear and laughing when she saw him almost stumble on his feet, rubbing his arms as he felt a cold shiver down his spine.
"See, that's what I'm talking about," he said.
Had she been listening from the start? Among the candidates, Takuma had a deeper impression of Three. Even though everyone had a facade of friendliness, she had acted too carefree during their short time at the camp. She talked freely as though not at all worried about leaking information, and yet Takuma didn't think she had ever given actionable information. And when she was not talking and just listening, her gaze felt like she was seeing through his masks and directly at him. It wasn't unsettling, but it made him constantly worry he was giving something away.
"What about you?" Ten asked Sixteen.
"I would like to pair with you, Thirteen," said Sixteen, surprising Takuma.
"Really?"
"Uh-huh. As you said, a compatible personality is more important. I find you much easier to talk to than Seven. And I was impressed that you took the second shortest time despite going through the woods at night."
"Oh, come on, doesn't that make me the second option?" Takuma slumped his shoulders. "Your preference would've been Seven if he had a more outgoing personality."
Sixteen shrugged. "The allure of the Byakugan is hard to deny."
Takuma couldn't refute that.
"As for the one I don't want to get paired with? I don't have anyone like that. The ANBU selected everyone for a reason, and those who made it this far must be competent. I think I'll work it out with anyone they decide to assign me."
"That's an admirable attitude, Sixteen. You're in second place on my list," Ten patted Sixteen on the shoulder.
Something told Takuma that Ten wasn't just saying that to be nice or because of his facade.
"Thank you," said Sixteen.
After travelling nonstop for a day, they had the city in their view, with the main route crowded with travellers and merchants. The moment they spotted the first samurai travelling away from the city, Leopard had them move off the main road and travel ten minutes into the wide meadows until they had privacy.
"Alright, now that we're here, I will give you your pairings and your assignments," said Leopard.
The pairings were—
Seven and Fourteen
Sixteen and Five
Ten and Four
Thirteen and Three
Takuma turned to look at his teammate and found her looking at him. Even though she wore her teal blue mask with royal blue splashes, he could feel her smiling behind it. She walked to him leisurely with her hands behind her back and stopped right before him. She was so close that he could see the almost white flecks in her pale green eyes.
"Looking forward to working with you, teammate... I have great expectations of you; don't disappoint me, will you."
He felt that the next few days would be challenging. If he weren't careful, he would get eaten whole by the woman before him—but he wasn't the type to just roll over and let someone walk all over him.
"Don't worry, I'll carry you to the finish line, so just sit there and be pretty."
He wanted to smile when he saw her eyes twitch.
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Note: All the chapters will eventually be posted on public forums.
MrRobot
In doubt there's always the Sun!
Takuma that is not how you avoid creating crushes on the ninja wrold. Quite the opposite in fact.
TFTC.
His response felt un-Takuma like tho. This is the first time that I remember seeing him play the gender card or at least it could be misconstrued like that from her perspective.
He raised a flag here. Takuma's temporary teammate has something to prove with a chip on her shoulder on top of that. I think he should have let this one pass.
His response felt un-Takuma like tho. This is the first time that I remember seeing him play the gender card or at least it could be misconstrued like that from her perspective.
LordOfPears12
Cat girl headpatter
- Location
- Land of pizza,pasta and lasagna.
I think he is trying to get a feel for her character, since all of the group so far have been interacting rather loosely. I think it was a verbal snipe at her skill.
I think each team will try to act as a sabotuer and the other the defenders for an objective in the city as the exam.
Love this fic, Been refreshing daily the site. Thanks for writing