"Tap... tap tap tap... tap... tap... tap..."
Amid the fading smoke, chunks of stone bounced and rolled out, scattering across the floor. One after another, they struck the shoes around the smoke with sharp taps, then bounced and rolled a little farther before finally coming to a stop.
The sound of rolling stones echoed through the classroom.
At that moment, aside from those rolling sounds, the classroom had fallen completely silent. A strange, heavy silence hung in the room.
So fast!
And without any warning. If I charged in now...
At the same time, the three Sound Village ninja, who had been about to make their move, all held their breaths as they watched the burst of smoke ahead of them gradually dissipate.
To be honest, they had only just reacted. That attack had come too quickly and without warning. They had not noticed it at all; only when they heard the commotion did they realize what had happened and instinctively stop themselves from attacking.
That was close!
At the same time, on the other side, Gaara peered through a gap in the crowd at the thinning smoke and listened to the stones rolling about before slowly lowering his hand.
Who was that?
Still holding the pose he had assumed to release his puppet, Kankuro could not help rising onto his tiptoes to look toward the smoke, seemingly wanting to find out who was even more impatient than he was.
Pretty capable, aren't they? On Konoha's turf, too...
Temari, who was comparatively more composed, was also trying her best to peer ahead through the gaps in the crowd.
To be honest, Temari was quite startled at that moment.
This was Konoha's territory, after all. Though this was an international Chunin Exams and this area could barely be considered an international