The tense silence of the training ground settled over the four figures. Sasuke Uchiha glowered at Kakashi Hatake, whose single eye was fixed gravely on Naruto Uzumaki. Naruto, for his part, casually tossed the two silver bells up and down, their soft chimes the only sound in the clearing.
This left Sakura Haruno, who had been hiding in the foliage for most of the fight, utterly confused. What happened? How did Naruto get both bells?
Her confusion quickly curdled into a cold dread as another thought struck her. If Naruto had taken both bells by himself, that meant...
As if guessing her thoughts, a small smile touched Naruto's face as he glanced at the three of them. Just as Sakura's heart sank to her stomach, a bell arced through the air towards her. She caught it on instinct, its cool metal a shock against her palm. At the same time, the other bell landed neatly in Sasuke's waiting hand.
"That should do it, right?" Naruto said with a nod. "Well then, I'll be heading back first."
Smiling at Kakashi, he turned to leave.
"Hey! Don't you go anywhere!"
Once again, it was Sasuke who broke the silence, his voice tight with fury. He couldn't accept it. The boy who had always been the dead last, the class clown, was undeniably stronger than him. And Naruto's final act—casually gifting them the bells—felt less like teamwork and more like pity. It was as if his fragile, carefully guarded pride had been stomped into the dirt.
He threw the bell to the ground with a sharp clatter. Seeing Naruto actually pause, Sasuke turned his glare on Kakashi.
"I didn't get a bell," he stated, his voice ice-cold. "Send me back to the Academy." He then turned his face back to Naruto. "What you did was completely unnecessary!"
Watching Sasuke, Sakura bit her lower lip, her gaze shifting between the two boys. Finally, her resolve hardened. She, like Sasuke, threw her bell on the ground.
"I... I'm the same, Kakashi-sensei," she said, her voice trembling but firm. "Please don't send Naruto back to the Academy alone. If I'm not qualified, then I..."
"Hey, hey—you two."
Seeing his teammates suddenly erupt with such youthful bravado, even Naruto, who had other plans, had to stop. A sigh escaped him as he scratched his head. In that moment, he saw his two classmates for who they were. Their experience wasn't even a tenth of his, and their strength was a world apart, but he found he didn't dislike their spirit.
"The three of you," a calm voice cut in, "have all passed."
Kakashi's sudden declaration silenced them. Both Sakura and Sasuke looked up in surprise, while Naruto showed little reaction, simply turning his gaze to his teacher, waiting for an explanation.
"Ahem," Kakashi cleared his throat. "Those who abandon their comrades can never earn my acknowledgment. To be frank, this entire exercise was a test of that quality. And now, it's clear that all three of you have undoubtedly passed."
As he spoke, he nodded with satisfaction, watching the dawning realization on Sasuke's and Sakura's faces.
"Um, I'd like to say..." Naruto raised his hand, a questioning look on his face.
Kakashi saw the impending disruption and moved to cut it off. He couldn't let this kid ruin the perfect, lesson-learned atmosphere. "Alright! The test is over! We'll officially start missions tomorrow. Everyone, dismiss!"
As his voice fell, he vanished in a swirl of leaves, leaving the three Genin staring at each other. The shared moment of defiance had shattered the tension. Sakura and Sasuke, perhaps having used up all their nerve, both looked away, abashed. They silently packed their things and went their separate ways.
It was only after they were gone that the easygoing smile left Naruto's face, replaced by a gaze as deep and cold as the ocean depths.
In that case, what happened last night probably had nothing to do with Kakashi-sensei or the Third Hokage.
The unease he felt hadn't started with the bell test. It had begun the night before.
In the dead of night, Naruto, who had been sound asleep, suddenly opened his eyes. His gaze swept across the shadows outside his window. Without a sound, he changed his clothes and slipped out into the darkness. His pace was unhurried; he seemed to be deliberately slowing himself down, a lure for the predators he knew were following.
He didn't stop until he reached a deserted training ground deep in the forest.
"You've followed me all the way here," he said to the empty woods. "Why are you still hiding?"
As his voice fell, eight figures emerged from the shadows, surrounding him. Each wore a porcelain animal mask and the grey flak jacket of the ANBU Black Ops. He recognized the uniforms, but these weren't the men he had knocked out before.
And they certainly weren't the Third Hokage's men.
"By order of Lord Hokage, we are to meet with Naruto Uzumaki," the leader's voice was flat and perfunctory. "Come with us."
"Is that so?" Naruto replied calmly. "In that case, I'll go see Grandpa Third myself. I won't trouble you."
They paid his refusal no mind, closing in from all sides, their intent to take him by force unmistakable.
Seeing their coordinated advance, Naruto knew. His senses screamed a warning. The malice rolling off them was thick and suffocating, a familiar stench of assassins and killers. These were the big fish he had been waiting for.
But more importantly, his Observation Haki detected another presence, deeper in the darkness. A single, powerful source of malice so vile it felt like a stain on his perception—a mix of cold, murderous intent and a greedy, obsessive hunger.
Before he could react further, the fake ANBU attacked. The two closest to him drew kunai, their movements swift but careless. In their eyes, a jinchuriki was still just a Genin.
They never saw the attack. Before their blades could even draw blood, a wave of unseen pressure washed over them, and their consciousnesses simply switched off. They crumpled to the ground without a sound.
Genjutsu!?
The remaining operatives scattered like startled birds, their hands flying through seals. Naruto made no move to stop them, simply standing his ground. Secretly, his mind was a whirlwind of activity, memorizing their hand signs, his Haki tracing the flow of chakra in their bodies.
"Earth Style: Swamp of the Underworld!"
"Wind Style: Wind Scythe Technique!"
In the blink of an eye, multiple jutsu converged on him as the ground beneath his feet turned to mud. But to their astonishment, Naruto simply pushed off the air itself, rising into the sky with a practiced ease.
The Navy's Six Powers still come in handy, he thought with a private smirk.
Then, he unleashed his own power. An invisible wave of Conqueror's Haki exploded outwards, and the remaining ninja collapsed like puppets with their strings cut. He had already learned what he needed from their techniques. He formed a single hand seal, and a massive amount of chakra surged through his system.
A blade of wind, ten times larger than the one they had used, slashed forward, carving a deep trench through the forest.
This power is on par with a decent swordsman's flying slash, he noted, looking at his hand. With his current reserves, he could use an attack like this continuously. If I'd known this on the seas, Mary Geoise would be a crater.
As the attack tore through the ground, the source of the deepest malice—the hidden mastermind—began to move, fleeing with decisive speed. Too far to catch.
However, Naruto had no intention of letting him get away.
He casually ripped a tree trunk from the ground. Black Armament Haki instantly coated the wood, turning it into a spear of hardened obsidian. His body tensed like a bowstring.
SWOOSH!
The tree didn't fly; it launched like a cannonball, shattering the sound barrier as it disappeared into the night.
After throwing the makeshift projectile, Naruto landed softly on the ground. "Let me have a good look at you..." he whispered, reaching down to remove the mask of one of the unconscious figures.
He found only a corpse. Blood flowed from the man's mouth and nose. Unwilling to give up, he checked the others. All of them were dead, their bodies host to some kind of self-destruct mechanism.
He turned to look in the direction the mastermind had fled, his blue eyes as deep and cold as the abyss.
It's fine. Run while you can.
I can make mistakes countless times. But you... you only get to make one more.
[Chapter Complete]
***
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