15 The Forest of ‘Death’! The Battle for Succession!

...

"Hello maggots and or worms!" Yelled Anko as she put her hands to her sides like a drill instructor. And with a devilish smile she leaned in to taunt us. "I congratulate for officially making it to round 2!"

While we all looked into the depths of the forest. I noticed that some of gazes of some my fellow participants express some type of anxiety.

Some familiar faces like orochimaru in disguise, gaara, and naruto stood out. That sound guy with the wrappings was something I would watch out for though. Sound waves are deadly in their ability to go through any guard after all.

The standard interaction between naruto and anko went on to happen with no real changes minus naruto easily dodging ankos kunai throws. It seems the training we did in our spare time made his senses a bit better.

'My body feels pretty light today.' I thought to myself as I did some small hops in place and rolled my shoulders and nodded after a quick confirmation. 'Yep, my body's in prime condition, great.'

While anko spoke about the rules and all that good stuff, I looked over towards Neji and TenTen. TenTen didn't look nervous, which made sense considering she could literally flood the forest with weaponry if she wanted too…. well more like a small part of the forest but that's still extremely hard to dodge. Neji didn't even look phased, he looked extremely calm and laid back as he usually did now a days.

Suddenly, I heard and felt a change in air flow in a direction I wasn't looking and on reflex caught something between my finger tips. Looking at it, it seemed to be a small needle with my sense of smell picking up some poison. 'Poison?' I thought as I looked around the contestants…. 'Who would want to poison me?'

…..

(Kabuto pov)

'Damn, I missed. That numbing agent would have let our plans go smoothly.' Kabuto thought as he pretending to be reading. 'Already a S rank in taijutsu and capable of beating up low level jounins when close and has decent mastery of gates. Gaara will struggle a bit.'

Kabuto had researched the competition enough to have an educated guess of the next stage contenders. If he had landed that agent, things would have gone smoother.

…..

(Back to Lee)

'So the exam began….. it's a very scary exam…. Or was supposed to be.' I thought to myself as I lazily stared at the fire in front of us. 'Neji's lazy ass didn't want to move too much. Which I understand considering he has the byakugan.'

Looking to our left we saw a bag full of the wrong type of scroll. 'But we are terribly unlucky….' While in my thoughts Neji patted his pants before getting up.

"A group above us." He calmly said while looking and TenTen. TenTen however only looked back before yawning. "You do realize how much of a pain it is to collect my weapons again right?" She said with a flat tone causing Neji to sigh.

"Fine, but this would have been twice now." Neji complained before reinforcing his legs with chakra then exploding up above. Sounds of fists beating flesh then began and went on for a while. Once done, Neji dropped down with an unhappy expression.

"Another dud." He complained before tossing it into the bag of other failed products. "Seriously, what is our luck? Isn't there supposed to be an even number of both?"

'Wait, if we have this many of the opposite scroll….' I thought for a bit before coming to a realization and smirking. 'That means we are a huge target for other teams now.'

Neji suddenly grew stern as he took a serious combat position. "A lot surrounding us, at least 4 groups in multiple directions. Some of the other guys we beat up are joined with them."

Groaning, I got up and stretched my arms a bit. Sitting on that log was a bit of a pain. "Alright, which ones the strongest you reckon?" I asked as I casually deflected a kunai with my gloves that have slight metal covering.

"The one behind us." He said as he used moved his slightly to the side dodging a kunai. "TenTen should be enough for the one in front. The one to our left is just watching by the looks of it."

Ah, well I guess it's time to clean up. Turning around, I used soru to disappear from the enemies view before appearing behind the sucker who threw a kunai at me earlier. Grabbing him from the back of the head, I jumped off the branch we were situated on before slamming his face into the cold hard dirt with enough strength to k.o. him. Surrounding me now were 3 ninjas. One of them was the Ninja with wrappings I didn't want to meet.

"Sound eh?" I questioned before cracking my neck. "Well the-first ones down, next ones gonna be…." Using soru again, I grabbed one of them before using soru again and using the one in my hands as a human weapon while going full speed.

A few nasty cracks were heard but they'll be alright…. I hope….. "three down…." Pausing I looked at the mummy. "You're gonna be last."

'Experienced' I immediately thought seeing how well he held his calm at seeing his teammates get kindly decimated. Hearing the sounds of screams and weapons hitting trees, I could guess what was happening to the other teams right now.

Using soru, I went close to the ninja who clearly couldn't react only to immediately change directions. A strong vibration was being emitted by him and my instincts screamed to not challenge it. The vibration would have injured my organs if I got closer to the main source.

"You're annoying." I told him only to be met with silence. "You're boring too." Again silence. "Your mothers fat." Wow really nothing.

'Nah I ain't gonna deal with this bullshit.' Getting a kunai from a pouch on my thigh, I took a giant breath and went into the first form of the seven heavens. 'Overwhelming power from a distance will be my solution.' Throwing the kunai, it seemed to have disappeared from the mummy's eyes before finding itself embedded into his skull. After he was done flopping lifelessly to the ground; I dug through his stuff and grabbed the scroll. Looking back at his grizzly face, I merely shrugged my shoulders before turning around.

A sea of weapons flooded the scene and many unconscious ninjas, some dead, flooded the area as well. TenTen was carefully picking up her weapons using chakra strings while Neji searched the bodies for the scroll we needed. Eventually the weapons were clear and Neji was smirking a bit.

Putting his hand up, he held the scroll we needed. Walking over to me, he smirked in a way that annoyed me. "See how effective sitting on our ass can be?" Well he's right…. But I won't say he's right…..

'Where is the other team though?' I only see three out of the four surrounding us.

"The team that was watching us left after you finished off your guys." Neji explained "The ones who led them here ran away as soon as the fighting started."

Nodding, I looked at TenTen who was drinking out of a canteen she stole from one of the bodies. In her other hand was snacks belonging to her fallen opponent.

"Well I suppose we can finally get out of the filthy forest." I mumbled while Neji kicked one of his victims bodies out of boredom and TenTen ate with her mouth open. 'What annoying bastards.'

....

"You're not the first ones to pass but you're not Injured so good job I guess." Anko said with a yawn as we had just work her up. While seated she reached for my scroll which I accidentally 'intentionally' let slip from my grasp making her look at me funny. "Pick it up brat, I don't got sleep to waste."

"Sorry," I said with a smile as I very slowly picked it to annoy her. "Ah my back hurts." I moaned aloud as I even slowly got back up. TenTen only rubbed my back gently to help with the act. "Instructor, here you go." I said as she reached out with a sigh.

*plop* Once again I dropped it causing Anko to become red in anger. "My bad miss Anko, my forearms are also in bad shape." I complained while TenTen started to massage my arms. Anko seeing this scoffed before picking it up.

"Damn kid." she mumbled before looking directly into my big round eyes. "What's your name?"

I looked at her for a good amount of timing and answered when she was just about to repeat herself "I don't know my head is aching pretty bad." And with a devilish smile, TenTen started rubbing my temples.

Anko realizing she was being messed around with quickly got up trying to deck me in the face only to find both me and TenTen out of her sight. Frustrated, confused, and sleepy, she looked around for a bit before sighing.

"I'll just get him when I see him." she mumbled before going to sleep. Neji had already walked in before the two of us. And man did TenTen have a laugh.

.....