"Kakashi-sensei... this..."
As they watched the dust ahead settle, Uzumaki Naruto clutching his crotch, Second Pillar frowning slightly, and Haruno Sakura's face turning pale all looked toward the still-confident Kakashi.
As they spoke, the legs in the middle of that crater—not shallow, but not particularly deep either—suddenly drooped. Chiba's head and upper body were buried in the earth, leaving only his lower half sticking straight up like an upside-down onion. From the look of it, he had probably stopped breathing.
This was clearly too much!
At the very least, he was seriously injured!
Maybe someone had died!
No! This was no longer a matter of going too far. This was a huge disaster!
Just as Team 7 fell silent, the other rookie Genin saw the scene as well. Looking at that motionless lower body, especially those limp feet, they could all imagine Chiba unconscious—or dead—beneath the soil.
"Asuma-sensei!"
At the same time, Ino Yamanaka could no longer hold herself back. Looking at the scene, she called out to Asuma ahead, her voice full of anxious concern.
Shikamaru Nara and Akimichi Choji wore the same anxious, stunned expressions.
"Kurenai... Kurenai-sensei, th-this... nothing really happened, right?"
After hearing Team 10 speak up, Kiba Inuzuka from Team 8 could not help speaking as well. His face showed anxiety and worry, unable to make sense of the situation.
At the same time, Shino Aburame and Hyuga Hinata beside him stepped forward as well. Shino even stopped Hinata from using her Byakugan to inspect the situation.
They might have been rookie Genin, but they knew the ironclad rules: fighting between fellow villagers was prohibited, and fellow Konoha ninja killing one another in a fight was even more forbidden.
Although what they were seeing had arisen from a spar between their teachers, spars were actually difficult