CH_8.38 (303)

CH_8.38 (303)

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.

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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