It had taken Liumu's trio only three days to reach the rendezvous point. Besides, the earlier a team arrived, the stronger it was bound to be.
Liumu flexed his fingers excitedly, hoping some "kind souls" carrying an Earth Scroll would come galloping over.
Boom, boom, boom.
The ground shook, and the sound of boulders shattering grew louder and louder.
From afar, Liumu's trio watched the stone statue drawing steadily closer, a sense of familiarity stirring in their minds.
"You again!"
"You again!"
As they looked at the three Iwa ninja atop the statue, both teams were momentarily stunned.
"You woke up so soon?" Suiguang asked with apparent "concern." "Also, those clothes of yours look like..."
The three Iwa ninja exchanged silent looks. Seeing Liumu's excited expression, they still could not shake the shadow of that devastating punch from their minds.
"You're not here to..."
The big Iwa ninja frowned as he spoke, a terrible thought instantly appearing in his mind.
Seeing this, Liumu leaped onto the statue's head and stood beside the big Iwa ninja, replying with a bright smile, "Doesn't the rule say we have to collect both the Heaven and Earth Scrolls to pass? We only have a Heaven Scroll right now. All we're missing is an Earth Scroll."
As he spoke, Liumu feigned a sudden realization and gave the big Iwa ninja a "gentle" pat on the back, sending him stumbling.
"Since you got here so quickly, don't tell me you've already collected both scrolls?"
The yellow-haired Iwa kunoichi beside him answered reflexively, "We have."
"Tch!" Hearing that, the big Iwa ninja shot his hopeless teammate a furious glare.
Liumu raised his eyebrows and smiled. "I knew you had what it took. Look, we're practically old acquaintances now. How about lending us one?"
Lend?
Was this lending?
Who asked to borrow something with a clenched fist?
And when had he ever said they had what it took? He had only just said that himself.
The big Iwa ninja did not dare voice his anger, but he still asked timidly, "What happens if we don't lend it to you?"
Liumu looked momentarily taken aback, then answered with a smile, "We're friends. If you won't lend it, then you won't. What else could happen?"
Seeing that Liumu did not seem inclined to attack, all three Iwa ninja breathed a sigh of relief.
But what Liumu said next left all three utterly speechless.
"Still, this is the rendezvous point. People come and go, and there are bound to be plenty of loose tongues. Say, if three naked bodies were put on display here, would..."
A threat!
A naked threat!
Yet faced with Liumu's threat, the three Iwa ninja did not dare refuse.
After all, the situation really was just as Liumu had said. This was the rendezvous point for the second exam, and more teams would arrive as time passed.
If Liumu became unhappy and blew away the clothes they had stolen again, then...
Humiliating themselves was one thing, but they could not disgrace their village.
"Take it, take it, take it!" As he spoke, the big man pulled the Earth Scroll from the ninja tool pouch on his back and practically forced it into Liumu's hands.
Losing the Earth Scroll was fine. They could steal another one from someone else.
But once they lost face, they truly could not get it back.
"Look at you. What are you doing? Don't force yourself, my friend." Despite his words, Liumu's hands honestly accepted the Earth Scroll before taking the big man's hand and shaking it repeatedly. "What a good man! A good man! Well, we'll leave you to it... We'll be off."
"Not forcing myself at all. Go on, go on!"
Hearing that Liumu was leaving, the big Iwa ninja hurriedly urged him along as though driving away a god of plague.
Watching Liumu's trio leave, the big Iwa ninja snorted and cursed angrily, "When have I ever had to put up with this kind of crap?"
The rendezvous point for the exam, which also served as the venue for the third round's individual matches, was built as an enormous stone chamber.
When Liumu's trio arrived, they immediately drew the attention of quite a few people inside.
Among them, besides the Jonin from the various ninja villages, the white-haired woman's team that Liumu had encountered earlier had indeed already arrived.
Kakashi handed the Heaven and Earth Scrolls to the presiding Kumogakure examiner, marking the completion of Liumu's team's second exam.
"Kakashi, over here."
On the stone chamber's second floor, several ninja wearing Konoha forehead protectors waved repeatedly at Liumu's trio.
Yuhi Shinku was among them.
"I never expected you to be Konoha's first team to finish the second exam!"
The nearby Konoha Jonin gathered around Liumu's trio, still watching the entrance as they waited to see which ninja village the next team would belong to.
Kakashi's reputation as a genius had long spread throughout Konoha. Whether because of his father, Hatake Sakumo, or his own talent, there was ample reason for everyone to remember his name.
But...
This was the Chunin Exams, after all. Against competitors five or six years older than him, even a genius surely would not have much of an advantage.
Yet who could have imagined that Kakashi's team, whose average age was only eight or nine, would actually be the first to arrive?
Faced with the Jonin's praise, Kakashi silently looked toward Liumu, who was leaning against the wall and joking with Suiguang, and did not tell them what he had seen earlier.
"Liumu, is Lord Jiraiya really amazing? He's one of the legendary Sannin, after all! He taught you your skills, right?"
Leaning against the cool wall with a relaxed expression, Liumu took off his jacket as he said, "Master Jiraiya really is amazing. A lot of the moves he knows are ones I've never seen."
He recalled Master Jiraiya's Icha Icha Paradise, which he had once read...
Moves... I suppose there's nothing wrong with calling them that.
Liumu prided himself on having watched countless films. What kind of moves had he not seen? Yet even so, compared with Jiraiya, he was still trash.
"Can you tell me about Lord Jiraiya?" Suiguang sat down just as Liumu had, looking at him expectantly.
"Ugh, it's hot!" Liumu muttered with a frown, shifting to the side as he told Suiguang, "Either you go on top and I go underneath, or I go on top and you go underneath. Leaning together like this is way too hot."
Suiguang: ???
Liumu had not expected Jiraiya's charm to have already "corrupted" a little girl Suiguang's age.
What a... terrible influence!
Thud!
Just then, a dull sound suddenly came from the entrance. The three Iwagakure ninja then walked in and handed over the scrolls they had obtained anew.
"Iwagakure."
A Konoha Jonin quietly alerted the others upon seeing the arrivals.
Hearing this, Liumu sighed inwardly.
Judging by the Konoha Jonin's reactions to the Iwa ninja's arrival, it seemed that not only did the Land of Earth remain wary of Konoha, but Konoha itself was equally on guard against ninja from that great nation.
The three Iwa ninja were not actually weak. In particular, once the big ninja summoned the Stone Giant, his combat strength could double. But their luck was bad, and they had run into a frea... a genius like Liumu, whose sheer strength overcame all technique.
Liumu could quite understand why they were the third team to arrive.
Before you continue