The days after New Year flew by, and six or seven months passed in the blink of an eye.
Xue Ge's life remained regular and stable. Missions, training, missions, training-the cycle repeated, and both his strength and experience grew steadily.
Team Minato completed another S-rank mission over those six months. However, it was nowhere near as difficult as the mission in Rōran had been, and the four of them completed it with a few scares but no real danger.
The dispute between Konoha and Kumogakure continued into July before finally coming to a temporary halt. Not because the two sides had reached an agreement, but because someone had stepped in to mediate.
That mediator was Sunagakure's delegation.
It was year 43 of Konoha, four or five years after the end of the Second Shinobi World War.
Sunagakure and Konoha had become enemies during the Second Shinobi World War, and Sunagakure had been seeking opportunities to restore friendly relations with Konoha. The Chunin Ninja Exams that Konoha and Sunagakure had agreed last year to jointly host in Konoha offered an excellent opportunity.
Generally, villages held their own Chunin Ninja Exams, while other villages merely sent delegations to observe the exams and assess their potential. Jointly hosted Chunin Ninja Exams did happen, but they were relatively uncommon.
Having come in good faith, Sunagakure first mediated the conflict between Kumogakure and Konoha. Although the two sides still failed to settle their dispute, they at least agreed to resume talks after the Chunin Ninja Exams.
This also gave Kumogakure a way to back down gracefully.
As the first jointly hosted Chunin Ninja Exams held by Konoha and Sunagakure since the Second Shinobi World War, in which they had been the two main combatants, this event carried considerable symbolic significance.
Besides Konoha and Sunagakure, the