Five days passed in the blink of an eye.
The survival exercise in the Forest of Death ended in a flurry of chaos and the smell of barbecue.
The Iwagakure big shots had spent the whole way picnicking and taming Tailed Beasts, so they hadn't even bothered trying to steal anyone else's scrolls.
As Deidara put it, "Stealing from a bunch of rookies would be beneath us, yeah."
That led directly to an unexpected result.
An absurd number of teams passed the second round of this year's Chunin Ninja Exams.
On the high platform of the Central Tower.
Third Hokage Hiruzen Sarutobi looked down at the sea of people below. There were still at least twenty teams of examinees, and his old face darkened like the bottom of a pot.
"Ahem."
The chief examiner, Gekko Hayate, coughed twice and announced in his weak, sickly voice, "Since so many people passed the second exam, we'll be holding a preliminary round before the official matches begin. Ahem..."
As soon as he finished speaking.
A huge electronic screen on the tower wall lit up.
The examinees' portraits flashed across the screen like the spinning reels of a slot machine.
Hiruzen Sarutobi clenched his pipe between his teeth and stared fixedly at the screen.
His palms were slick with cold sweat.
He had only one wish.
Gods and Buddhas, please don't let Konoha's lone surviving team run into those Iwagakure monsters in the first round!
But the very thing he feared came to pass.
"Ding—"
A clear chime rang out.
The portraits on the screen slowly came to a stop.
First match: [Kiba Inuzuka (Konoha) VS Kurotsuchi (Iwagakure)]
"Oh, what a great start."
In the Iwagakure team, Deidara whistled loudly and slapped Kurotsuchi on the shoulder, relishing her misfortune.
"Do your best, Kurotsuchi. If