Chapter 6

Unknown-nin345: Hello there faithful readers! As I was looking over the reviews I was surprised at the number of reviewers who thought that Hinata was a futa (hermaphrodite), and while I did think about doing that at first, I decided to just make what Hinata's hiding an extremely embarrassing tattoo instead. Sorry to those who were hoping for a futa-Hinata, but I promise that the tattoo should at least get you to chuckle.

Oh, and I probably didn't mention this last chapter, but during the two weeks before Liana arrived, Naruto (along with a whole lot of his Kage Bushins) expanded his apartment, putting in a new room for Haku.

I think I've held you all up long enough, onto the Chunin Exams!

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or Mortal Kombat.

Naruto leisurely made his way to the site of the first portion of the Chunin Exams after an enjoyable morning of showering with Liana, something that he had been desperately missing ever since he had arrived in Konoha. While he might have appeared calm on the inside, Naruto was mentally running through a checklist of his supplies, memorizing everything he had in case he would need it.

When he arrived at the building the first portion of the exam would be held, Naruto found that Sasuke had already arrived. As he approached, the blonde gave a short nod to his black-haired teammate which was respectfully returned. While Sasuke disliked Naruto and thought that he was a no-name loser, he couldn't deny that the blonde had impressive skills. They didn't have to wait long for their third teammate who came jogging up shortly after Naruto had arrived, without a word being spoken the members of Team 7 entered the building.

When they reached the second floor Team 7 noticed that there was gathering of what looked like genin at one of the rooms but passed by them without giving the group a second thought and proceeded up to the third floor. There, Kakashi met them at the entrance to the room the exams would be taking place in and wished the three of them luck in the exams.

Naruto just let a chuckle go past his lips before he placed his cryo mask over the lower part of his face and kicked the door down. Naruto stepped into the room and was met with the annoyed stares of all the competitors who hadn't been fooled by the pathetic genjutsu on the second floor.

"What the fuck are y'all looking at?!" Naruto shouted to the crowd, each word accompanied by a small cloud of air from his cryo mask, as he used his control over the wind to conjure up a breeze that made his spiky hair sway. The lesser-willed genin turned away from the display and while the cocky ones glared at him, the few smart genin just nodded with respect before going about their business.

Suddenly, the blonde stepped out of the way of a fist sailing at the back of his head. He turned his gaze over his shoulder and found his assailant to be none other than the pink-haired harpy.

The pinkette seemed to be thrown off balance by the fact that Naruto actually dodged her fist before she started glaring at him, "What the heck do you think you're doing baka?! You've just painted a target on us!"

Naruto just shrugged, "So? If you can't handle the pressure then you shouldn't have entered the exam Haruno."

Before Sakura could reply to that, a shrill screech was heard as a blonde missile attached herself to the brooding Uchiha, "Sasuke-kun!" The pinkette turned her attention the blonde attached to Sasuke and started the customary shouting match between the two fangirls.

The rest of the rookies, along with almost all the other genin gathered and the chunin hiding in the next room, rolled their eyes and wondered what the heck the sensei's of the two girls must have smoking to allow them to enter the exams. The other rookies just ignored the three and engaged in light chatter until a voice garnered their attention.

"You know, you shouldn't make such a racket. A group of green genin such as you would be easy prey for the more experienced ones," stated a silver-haired, glasses-wearing genin of Konoha as he walked up to the rookies.

Naruto stared hard at the silver-haired teen, there was just something about him that felt familiar but the blonde couldn't put his finger on it. "Well that really depends on three things: their skills, our skills, and sheer dumb luck," Naruto said, quoting what one of his teachers at the Monastery said once.

The silver-haired teen nodded in acknowledgment, "That may be true, but what's also true is that some of you here are weaker than others. Look around; there are genin out there from other villages that would like nothing better than to beat you into a pulp just because of what village you serve." The nine rookies looked around and noticed that some of the Iwa genin out there were glaring pretty hard at them, causing a couple of the rookies to gulp nervously.

Naruto saw what was happening and decided to level the playing field, namely by drawing all the attention to himself.

He threw out an arm with finger pointing at nothing in particular, "Listen up you fucktards! The name is Uzumaki Naruto and I'm going to kick all your asses!" A bunch of the chunin watching through the one-way chalkboard started laughing hysterically at the blonde's declaration while the single jounin among them just chuckled in amusement.

The white-haired teen shook his head as he said, "You are either very confident or very foolish Naruto-kun." The teen suddenly found the tip of a sword resting comfortably against his jugular.

Naruto glared down at Kabuto as he rested one of his kodachi against the teen's neck, "I don't recall ever asking your opinion. And the way I see it, someone who hasn't even given their name really shouldn't be talking at all."

Kabuto smirked slightly and adjusted his glasses, seemingly not caring about the fact that he was very close to having his throat slit, "I see then, how rude of me. My name is Yakushi Kabuto and, unlike you, this is not my first time taking the Chunin Exams."

As Naruto removed his blade from Kabuto's throat and slid it back into the sheath, Sakura asked, "So this is your second time taking the exam Kabuto-san?"

The white-haired teen chuckled slightly, "Hardly, apparently you are underestimating the difficulty of the exam. Since the Chunin Exams occur twice each year, this is my seventh time taking the exams." Ignoring Kiba's shout of 'You must suck then!' he pulled out a stack of cards and said, "As such I've managed to develop a technique to store the information I've gathered easily."

The black-haired Uchiha strutted up to Kabuto and asked, "Do you have any info on individuals?" At Kabuto's nod Sasuke said, "Then I want to see the ones for Sabaku no Gaara and Uzumaki Naruto."

"Aw, you made it too easy," Kabuto whined before he pulled out two cards from his deck and channeled a small amount of chakra into them. "All right, first up is Sabaku no Gaara. He's got 8 C-ranks completed and 1 B-rank. Wow, a B-rank as a genin, and apparently he's returned from every mission without so much as a scratch. Other than that I got nothing since he's a relative newbie to the game."

With that Kabuto slid the card back into his deck and held up the other one he had pulled out, "Now then, Uzumaki Naruto. He's your teammate, as I'm sure you already know, with his sensei being Hatake Kakashi. He's got 35 D-ranks, 1 C-rank, 1 B-rank, and an A-rank; impressive for a genin not even six months into his career. He's proficient in kenjutsu and average in all other ninja aspects aside from his nonexistent skill in genjutsu. And there's a rumor floating around that he has a unique ke--" Whatever Kabuto was going to say was cut off as he was slammed into the wall by Naruto, who had his arms crossed over Kabuto's chest so that he could rest both of his combat knives on the silver-haired teen's throat.

"I know you weren't just about to say that, right Kabuto-san?" Naruto questioned as his blades lightly bit into the older genin's throat, drawing a tiny hint of blood.

A series of smoke clouds erupted in the front of the room, announcing the arrival of the proctors. The lone jounin standing there stepped forward and shouted, "You two in the back! Separate now!" Naruto reluctantly backed off from Kabuto and slid his knives back into their hidden sheaths in his boots as the jounin continued speaking, "The rest of you listen up! From now on, any unsanctioned fighting will result in your team's immediate expulsion from the exam. Am I understood?"

At the lackluster replies, the trenchcoat-wearing jounin just snorted, "I'm Morino Ibiki, the head proctor for the first part of the Chunin Exams. Now, come up to one of the chunins standing here at my sides and take a number. Once you get it find your seat." Seeing the slow movements of the genin, the bear-like Ibiki let out a small bit of killer intent and shouted, "Move it NOW!"

Once all the genin had been seated, Ibiki smirked darkly. "Now then, the exam will be just that: a written test. There are ten questions you have to answer. Every time we catch you cheating, you lose two points out of the total ten you can get. If you get caught five times, you get thrown out. Finally, if even one member of a team fails, then the other two members fail as well." At that moment Naruto could feel two glares hit his back, most likely from his teammates, causing him to begin to think up plans for pranking the two. "Begin!"

Immediately the sounds of pencils scratching on paper and muttered curses filled the room as the genin started on the first exam. Slowly, the genin started to figure out the hidden meaning in the proctor's instructions and started cheating as inconspicuously as they possibly could.

Naruto himself was simply waiting for either Sakura or some other genin to finish the exam so he could put his plan into effect. Soon enough, the blonde saw one of the other genin in his row finish their exam. With an unseen smirk Naruto stood up, ignoring the stares he was getting from everyone else and walked over to where the genin who had finished his exam sat. Without saying anything, Naruto leaned over that genin's shoulder and started memorizing a couple of the answers written. Once he was certain he had gotten the answers in his head, Naruto went back to his seat and filled out the answers on his own sheet.

When he finally put his pencil down, Naruto noticed that practically everybody in the room was staring at him. After looking around in confusion, Naruto looked back up at the bandana-wearing jounin and blandly stated, "You never said we couldn't leave our seats."

Ibiki pinched the bridge of his nose to calm his rising frustration. Seeing that a couple of the other genin were getting ready to imitate what the blonde had just done he shouted, "Anybody who does what HE just did will automatically fail!" The frightened genin quickly turned their eyes back to their tests, causing a couple of the chunin to snicker.

Forty-five minutes later, Ibiki stood up from his seat at the front of the room, "Alright that's it! Pencils down!" Once he saw that all the genin had complied with the instruction he resumed speaking, "I'm sure that you all noticed that the tenth question was blank. That is because I'm going to give it to you now."

After pausing to listen to some of the mutterings of the genin, Ibiki smirked slightly, "But before we get to it I need to tell you about the added rules of the tenth question…the rules of desperation." Throughout the room, all the genin tensed in nervous anticipation. "First, for the tenth question, you must decide whether or not you will take it."

"Choose?!" a blonde girl from Suna shouted. "What happens if we choose not to take it?!"

The girl was immediately silenced by the dark glare Ibiki sent her way. "Should you choose not to take it, your points will automatically be reduced to zero. You fail…along with your teammates!"

"What the hell kinda rule is that?" One genin shouted and was followed by another, "Of course we'll take the tenth question!"

Ibiki ignored their outbursts, his whole posture saying that he couldn't care less, and stayed silent for a moment before he continued speaking, "And now…the other rule." Seeing that he once again had their attention, the bandana-wearing jounin mentally smirked, "If you choose to take it…and answer incorrectly…that person will lose the right to ever take the Chunin selection exam again."

"What kind of stupid rule is that?!" one Kiba Inuzuka shouted. "There are loads of genin here who've taken the exam before now!" A couple genin began muttering in aggravation.

Ibiki started chuckling lowly before he suddenly stopped and let loose a mild blast of KI (killer intent), "Well that's just your rotten luck. This year…it's my rules."

A tense silence filled the room as each of the genin weighed their options. Suddenly, genin from each of the villages started raising their arms and proclaiming that they couldn't go on. Team by team, more and more of the genin filed out of the exam room until there was a little over half of the original number of genin left in their seats.

Ibiki, looking around at the still remaining genin, decided to take one last stab at whittling down the numbers, "Remember, if you answer the question wrong you will fail and will remain a genin…forever." A couple of the genin decided they couldn't take the pressure and signaled they couldn't continue.

The tokubetsu jounin took one last look around but paused at one particular genin. In his glance he had seen many expressions on the faces of the genin: nervous, determined, icy calm, and even just plain apathetic. But a certain spiky-blonde-haired brat had the fucking nerve to be sleeping during his exam!

'Ah hell no,' Ibiki thought as he pulled out a kunai quickly threw it at the snoozing Naruto, knowing that the kunai would simply hit the metal mask the blonde was wearing. What happened next surprised everyone there.

Naruto stopped the kunai with one finger without getting pierced by the metal tip (thanks to a little bit of wind manipulation). The blonde opened his eyes and lazily stared at the head proctor, "You know... it's kinda rude to throw a knife at someone who's napping."

"Aren't you worried about being a genin forever?" Ibiki asked with an eyebrow raised.

Naruto snorted in response, "Hell no. And even if I do become a genin forever, so what? It's not like I need to be a specific rank to be Hokage anyway. I'll see this exam through to the end."

"Is that your final answer?" the bandana-wearing jounin inquired.

"I never go back on my word. That's my unbreakable nindo, my ninja way," Naruto stated with a vicious smirk. All throughout the room the various genin could feel their spirits lift and become emboldened through that simple statement.

As his gaze swept over the remaining genins, his thoughts were a little miffed, 'Damn that brat… 72 genins which means 24 teams. Now I owe Anko 100 ryou, she'll never let me live this down.'

"If that's really your answer then I have only one thing to say to you." Ibiki paused to build up the suspense before he smirked, "You all pass." The room suddenly became so silent that you could have heard the tiniest pin in the world drop on the softest carpet possible, then almost all of the genin started shouting at the same time. A sudden, but brief, blast of killer intent that came out of nowhere suddenly brought the shouting to a stop; Ibiki looked around the room as he tried to spot where the KI came from, to no avail.

"So, um, what about the tenth question?" a certain pink-haired banshee asked.

The leader of the Torture and Interrogation department snorted in amusement, "There never was a tenth question. Or…I suppose you could say that your decision to either stay or leave was the tenth question."

"Then what about the first nine questions?!" the blonde kunoichi from Suna shouted. "If everything was riding on the tenth question than the first nine were pointless!"

Ibiki shook his head, "No, the first nine had a separate purpose…one that involved another skill set most shinobi should possess. I'm sure that most of you came to the conclusion that in order to pass, you had to cheat. In other words, gather vital information that would determine the fate of your teammates…and of yourself." In the silence that followed Ibiki started to slowly remove his bandana as he said, "In times of war the right information can mean the survival of your teammates, but if you gather it poorly and are caught…well see for yourself."

With that statement, Ibiki fully removed his bandana to show the startled genin what lay beneath. A vicious scar ran along the top of his head along with scattered holes that showed just what kind of torture the tokubetsu jounin had gone through. All throughout the room a majority of the genin were either unaffected or felt sick to their stomachs (a certain pinkette actually let loose her breakfast on the genin sitting next to her).

"Remember this lesson well," Ibiki said as he tied his bandana back onto his head.

"But wait," the same kunoichi from Suna started with her eyes narrowed, "what about the tenth question?"

Ibiki actually gave off a small smile, "Question ten was the true purpose of the first exam. The 'Take or Not Take' aspect, the willingness to put your life on the line or not. Obviously both are tough choices, so the tenth question is designed to test this. To see if you were willing to take a true leap of faith, that is what chunins face when they are assigned missions."

Ibiki clasped his hands behind his back as he continued to explain, "Say you get assigned a mission to retrieve a vital document. The amount of enemy ninjas, their abilities, etc, are unknown to you. Do you simply reject the mission because you are afraid? The answer is HELL NO!" Some of the genin jumped at his sudden shout. "No matter what the danger is, there are going to be missions out there that you cannot avoid. The ability to be courageous and to survive any hardship… that is something you will need if you want to become a chunin. Those genin just now who refused to take the tenth question, don't deserve to become chunin in my opinion."

The scarred jounin let his gaze slip over the room, "However those of you who have stayed to take the tenth question have proven you have the guts to become a chunin that will be in charge of small-time missions. You all have passed the first part of the Chunin Examinations; I wish you all luck with the rest of the exam."

Before the genin could begin to celebrate a ball of black cloth suddenly crashed though one of the windows, scaring the hell out of a lot of the genin. The cloth unraveled with a small of mount of kunai making sure that it clung to the walls, revealing the words: "The super sexy second examiner has arrived!" Still in his position behind the unrolled cloth, Ibiki chuckled to himself, 'Heh, she always did have a flair for the dramatic.'

"This is no time to be celebrating!" the figure that had appeared out of the cloth shouted. "The second part of the Exam begins now! Follow me!" Utter, stunned silence met the statement.

Ibiki poked his head around the curtain and muttered, "Bad timing Anko."

The purple-haired tokubetsu jounin blushed lightly before she did a quick head count and turned to Ibiki with a scowl, "You let twenty-four teams pass?"

The scarred jounin just glanced to the side before he muttered, "A certain fishcake we know decided to instill some confidence in these brats."

Anko snorted in amusement, "Bah, I'll have the numbers cut at least in half by the time I'm through with them." Throughout a whole lot of the genins' head one thought was prevalent: 'AT LEAST in half?' Before the thought could last long though, Anko shouted once again, "Now to Training Ground #44!"

Once all the genin had left, Ibiki set about collecting the exam papers. When he reached the one that belonged to a certain blonde-haired fishcake his eyes narrowed at the note:

'Dear Scarhead,

I have extremely good reason to believe that the white-haired kid you saw me introducing to my knives is a spy. My reason: he knows about a certain aspect concerning me and the elements. The Hokage will know what I'm talking about. Keep at least a couple Anbu watching the spy, his name is Yakushi Kabuto. Also, when I was grappling with him he felt AT LEAST to be at the same level as Hatake Kakashi.

--- Uzumaki Naruto, future Hokage.'

After sending off a quick message to the Hokage on a small bird Ibiki chuckled, 'Uzumaki Naruto huh? Interesting guy.'

~~ With the chunin hopefuls at Training Ground #44 ~~

"Welcome…to Training Ground #44," Anko stated with a wide smile. "Of course, to chunin and jounin here in Konoha it has another name: the Forest of Death. You all will soon come to know why."

After looking around to see if any of the genin had anything to say she continued speaking, "Over the course of the next five days, you will spend that time in the forest in an all-out…scroll battle." To emphasize this Anko held up to scrolls, one mostly white while the other was mostly black. "In order to pass this portion of the exam you must reach the tower located in the middle of the forest with both of these scrolls, one heaven scroll and one earth scroll."

"Inside this forest, you will all be fighting to the death."

~~ {CHAPTER END} ~~

Unknown-nin345: Well that's the end of Chapter six, sorry it's a little lacking in the action department as well as being short but don't worry, next chapter will be Naruto clashing with Orochi-teme. Will Naruto win? Will he even survive? (of course Naruto will, he's the star of the story)

For those of you wondering about Naruto's mission stats, here's my reasons for each rank: D-rank= should be obvious, C-rank= the one he took with Haku and Liana, B-rank= when Naruto took down Mizuki with Kage Bushin pwnage, A-rank= the mission to Nami.

Also in the next couple chapters will be Naruto's promised payback on Haku and Hinata (which might also lead to my first yuri lemon).