"Are you sure about this?"

"Yes Hokage-sama, 18 participants made it to the tower in time. A preliminary round is advisable."

The Hokage slumped his shoulders in defeat and nodded his head. 5 days had passed since the beginning of this part of the Chunin exams and every team possible had already made its way to the tower, he just wishes not as many would've made it. Holding a preliminary round isn't something he sought to do, especially after what happened in the forest.

On the bright side - for him at least - the feeling of pride he felt for the amount of Konoha Shinobi that had made it to the tower was very rewarding, even more was that three out of the five konoha squads were rookie teams.

"Very well then, have a squad of ANBU collect those who were less fortunate and escort them out of the forest." He looked at his assistant with a stern face and added. "You know what to do about those who didn't make it."

Hiruzen isn't a fan of death, the mere thought of mostly young children - there were some old genins out there, Kami knows Kosuke is still alive only because he's too stubborn to kick the bucket - dying in such an undignified way was sickening to the very least. No matter how hard he tried to preach the use of lethal force only when necessary, there were always those who wouldn't listen and rejoiced in unnecessary bloodshed.

Such is the life of a Shinobi, he supposes.

—

Every arriving team had gathered around the arena in the middle of the tower, the eyes of Teams 7 and 10 set on Team 9 and their as of yet, absent member. None of them had been informed of what had happened with him after their encounter, they actually hadn't been informed about what had happened at all. The secrecy was so great they almost felt like Orochimaru was only a figment of their imaginations.

It definitely wasn't.

When Naruto had approached Kakashi to inquire about Neji's status the only answer he had gotten was 'We dealt with it', not that he knew what dealing with it implied, he guessed it most likely meant Neji's curse mark had been removed in some way. His sensei wasn't very sharing about the details though, the only thing he had gotten out of it was the name of what the treacherous Sannin had done to Neji.

Ten no Juin he called it, Orochimaru's very own Cursed Mark.

Sick bastard.

The Sandaime Hokage made his way to the front of the crowd with the Jounin sensei and a big statue of a hand holding a ram-seal behind. He stood there in front of the gathered Genin looking every bit as powerful as you would expect from a man of his reputation despite his age.

"It is with great honor that I congratulate you all for getting this far in the exams, you have made both your senseis and villages proud." Even though the majority of the Genin were Konoha Shinobi, there were two foreign teams and despite not holding any respect for the powerful man they couldn't help but feel smug at his words.

"I shall now tell you all about what's next to come in the following test but first, I must tell you what the real purpose of the Chunin exams is." Surprised looks could be seen in the faces of most of the gathered Genin, no doubt the ones who didn't look that way had already heard this little speech before.

"Isn't the point of the exams finding who deserves to be promoted, Hokage-sama?" Asked Shikamaru in his ever lazy tone.

"That is true..." The Hokage looked at him and nodded before turning his gaze back to the public, "but there's more to it than just that, the whole truth is that these exams started as a substitute for war."

A hand started rubbing Ino's chin as she thought hard about the Hokage's words, before giving up. "A substitute for war? What does that even mean?"

"These exams started shortly after the Great nations stopped fighting with each other. We all send our best, most promising Genin to fight and represent our villages in a somewhat controlled environment."

"Why is that necessary?" Asked Shikamaru.

"Feudal lords of all places attend these events, the Daimyo from all the great nations do as well, they are the ones who provide us with most of our mission income." Sarutobi looked around and could see some troubled looks around the Genin.

Naruto was one of those Genins, he didn't like the idea of being used that way even if it was for the good of his village, call him selfish but, isn't it a bit weird that the 5 kage and the leaders of the smaller villages send some of their young forces to situations where they're going to come face to face with death just for show?

"I know what some of you are thinking and I can agree to a certain degree but this is for the lack of a better word, a necessary evil, the exams allow for a simulation of battle between the nations where each of our leaders get to gauge our strengths and weaknesses while avoiding futile crushing of the other's military forces and useless bloodshed." He turned to look at his surrogate grandson for a second before moving forward with the test, it is a reality he and his comrades had to face at some point.

Everyone could see reason in the Hokage's words, it was disturbing to say the least to think that a battle of Genin could serve as a deterrent for war to the great nations but in some weird way it made sense.

Shikamaru still thinks it's a risky system at best, surely you can't hope to keep the balance of the nations this way, is the amount of missions a village gets truly an accurate testament of their power? It's somewhat unnerving that they had to put their lives at stake as a performance for the Daimyos, feudal lords and other important visitors but they all understood that's what was required of them from their villages.

They would comply, it's not like any of them had been forced to participate.

"Now onto the next part of the ex-"

"Hokage-sama If I may." A very sickly looking jounin with brown hair tied in a bandana stepped up in front of the Hokage. "I Gekkō Hayate would like to explain this part of the exams as the third proctor."

The Hokage chuckled and gave the man a polite nod as he stepped back with the Jounin senseis and the past proctors of the exams.

"As you all heard, my name is Gekkō Hayate and I will be the proctor for the third test of the exams. Now, before we go any further, I must inform you that too many of you reached the tower in time. A preliminary round will be necessary." Just as Hayate expected, groans and complaints from the Genin were heard all over the room.

"The third round of these exams will be a tournament consisting of One on One matches. As Hokage-sama said, we only want to show our important visitors the best." Hayate waved his hand and a couple of Chunin assistants left the room only to come back with a digital screen behind them.

"You will all face a randomly selected opponent in a battle, the winner of the match gets to compete in the main event, from this point forward you will all be judged as individuals, if any of you wishes to leave the exams or doesn't think themselves capable of handling this you may quit without fear of repercussion for your teammates." Hayate then went into a fit of coughs that made every single aspirant wonder if he should really be out here monitoring the exams.

"I quit!" Said Kabuto, startling most of the present Genin. "I'm almost out of chakra, I'm too tired to continue."

Hayate nodded. "Yakushi Kabuto is out of the competition."

Anko and Ibiki watched as he left and started having a conversation of their own about it, the face didn't ring any bells for Ibiki but Anko had been a part of the exams enough time to recognize his face, it was actually a bit embarrassing for her to just now be noticing that Kabuto always quits at this stage of the exams despite his circumstances, maybe this wasn't exactly the reason why Kakashi's brat found him suspicious but it truly is something worth looking into.

"That actually makes some sense." Kakashi muttered quietly in Hiruzen's ear.

"What do you mean, Kakashi?" He asked.

Kakashi turned to look at the teen leaving the arena as his brow furrowed in thought and replied. "Anko and I watched him during the whole of the test through the monitors, he never did anything suspicious, but he never did anything that would have left him as tired as he claims to be either, his team ambushed a team rather easily on their way to the tower and that was the only battle they ever had, clearly he's just pretending to be tired."

Hiruzen didn't bother to speak a reply to Kakashi's explanation but nodded in acknowledgement and discreetly did a few hand signs for the hidden ANBU in the room to trail Kabuto and see where he's going now, it would seem he really is some sort of spy, after everything that had happened in the forest, Hiruzen was pretty sure he knew who he was working for.

"If that is all then we may proc-" A door opening in the far left of the room interrupted Hayate's explanation and caught everyone's attention. Out of the door walked a recently awakened Neji, looking rested and stoic, like he always does. Without uttering a single word Neji made his way to his team and stood next to them, dismissing their concerns in the process.

"Right... Well, if no one else is going to quit we may proceed, because there's an odd number of participants, one of the matches will be a three-way match. The rules are quite simple, the match is over when one of you can no longer fight, is unconscious or dead. If I deem a match is over, I will jump in and end it myself in hopes of avoiding unnecessary killing." Hayate eyed the Genin and gave pointed looks to some of the more unbalanced ones.

The proctor started babbling some more stuff but Sakura completely shut whatever it was he was saying and focused on one of the Genin, specifically a sound Genin.

Sakura isn't a medical genius - yet - but she as well as Naruto and Team 10 watched how Neji attacked this Zaku guy's arm relentlessly, watching it swell like it did at the time, she had been convinced that it was going to explode and here he was now, arm heavily bandaged but otherwise functional.

He had to have received medical attention, and very good medical attention for that matter, how did he do it? How did he find someone to fix up the extensive damage done to his arm?

The sound of the screen going through a rapidly series of names managed to snap Sakura out of her own musing, it kept on rolling for a few more seconds until it stopped in a pair of names that made a certain Hyuga smirk.

"Hyuga Neji and Akado Yoroi stay here, the rest of you go to the balconies." Doing as instructed by the proctor the genin teams went up the stairs on the corners of the room into the balconies where they were joined by their respective Jounin senseis.

"Are you both ready?" Hayate looked at both remaining Genin and received a nod as an answer, he raised his right arm and let it fall back down as he yelled "Hajime!"

Letting his arm fall forwards, Hayate jumped out of the way and let the combatants face each other. Yoroi and Neji eyed each other with a completely calm visage, without having to waive any hand-seals the Hyuga prodigy's Byakugan came to life.

"You Hyugas think you're so good." Yoroi snarled and rushed forward, he started throwing fist after fist at Neji but the Hyuga barely had to make an effort to dodge the strikes and found himself calmly analyzing the weird fighting style of his opponent. His hits looked to be attempts at grabbing him rather than actual hits, top that with the weird flow of chakra in both of his hands and it wasn't hard for Neji to figure out what was going on.

"You're trying to absorb my Chakra, it's a pity your skills do not match your ability." Neji didn't generally care much for trash talk during a battle, but this was different for him, he felt a need to prove something ever since his defeat in the forest. He also felt like he wasn't trash talking his opponent as much as he was simply stating a fact.

"Says the guy who's only dodging, is that all you side-branch Hyuga are good for, running from a fight?" Never one to question his sensei's directives, Yoroi chose to rile up the Hyuga a little, it's not like it was hard to, all it took was a mention of the side branch.

Neji started fuming and seething in rage, he wanted to close up every single tenketsu and then some more in the bastard that dared speak ill of his family, he will pay for his transgressions and Neji is going to make sure of it.

That voice started speaking again in Neji's head but this time he was ready for it, he had been warned by Hatake, the restriction seal relied solely on his will to fight it, a Hyuga needs no such power to overcome adversity, Neji's a prodigy, it's his destiny to best Yoroi.

Neji took a deep calming breath to focus his attention again on the task at hand, he felt his rage starting to recede at the same time the voice talking to him slowly faded away in the distance, it was after calming down that his Byakugan and its 360 degree view caught sight of the Jounin in the room looking ready for something.

He hadn't noticed it of course, but as soon as the side branch had been bad-mouthed in his presence, rage started taking over him and powering the curse mark he had been bestowed by the treacherous sannin, it had started to activate and while it didn't fully take over him this time, it was visible on his face.

Now under the influence of only his thoughts, Neji smirked condescendingly at his opponent and ran toward him. Not expecting to be attacked in such a way after the display the Hyuga had put on, Yoroi was too late to react, he tried to get a hold of Neji but his arm was instantly targeted by the faster boy. Making short work of him, Neji sealed off the tenketsu on his attacking arm and then went on to punish the other, rendering him incapable of defending himself or attacking for that matter.

Neji then placed a hard fist on his right cheek for good measure in what could only be described as a very un-hyuga way, Yoroi dropped limp on the floor after that, completely out-cold.

"Winner: Hyuga Neji!"

Naruto could see how on edge Kakashi had been for the entirety of Neji's match, specially after the seals started appearing on his skin again, it truly was something disturbing to feel, yes, everyone saw how that seal started extending itself through Neji, but not everyone could feel it, that energy so vile and so disturbing.

How was someone capable of that kind of energy, a former disciple of one of the kindest men on earth no less, the Sandaime never talked about Orochimaru with him and he knew it was because he felt guilty about his departure.

He refused to believe anything the Hokage had done was the cause for Orochimaru's actions.

Focusing his attention back at the matter at hand, Naruto just now realized he didn't even notice when Kakashi had lifted his headband to reveal his Sharingan eye, oh how he wished he could do that too, alas, it wasn't meant to be, at least not until it was strictly necessary, the Hokage told him.

"I thought you had dealt with it." Naruto could faintly hear the sound of Hayate calling out Ino and Hinata down to fight in the arena but didn't really pay much attention, there were other more pressing matters at hand.

"I did." Kakashi's reply was short and perhaps a little rude, he realized this as he sighed and covered his sharingan eye again. "The curse mark for all we know it's impossible to remove, not even Jiraiya-sama found a way to get rid of it, the seal the Hokage and I placed on Neji keeps it at bay but it's completely dependent on his will."

Naruto nodded his understanding and closed his eye in thought, he could faintly remember reading about such a restraining seal in some of the more advanced material he hasn't yet learned and mastered, even though he couldn't remember what it's called. Not even the legendary Jiraiya had been able to remove the curse mark, that thought made him take the whole ordeal as a challenge.

Deciding to think about the curse mark at a later date, he stole a glance at the stoic Neji and sighed, oh how he disliked him, not a single moment when Neji had been nice to him was stored in his memory and that's because Neji was always rude.

In a weird way, Naruto found comfort in knowing that he was rude to everyone.

Still, Naruto had always been a kind, compassionate and noble person, he refuses to believe there's not even one redeeming quality about him, perhaps the way to make Neji tolerable was finding out what made him the way he is now, worse case scenario he finds out that Neji is a dick just because and nothing changes.

"Winner: Hyuga Hinata!" The voice of Hayate calling the match made Naruto focus on reality once again, he had lost the entirety of the match but judging by how unscathed Hinata seemed, it probably hadn't been all that interesting...

Hinata.

That's just it, who would know better about Neji than his own family? Naruto decided then and there that he would approach her about it after the exams were over.

"Will Aburame Shino and Abumi Zaku please come down?" Called out Hayate, bringing up a name a certain Pink-haired Kunoichi was very interested in.

"Sensei..." Sakura had been quietly listening to Kakashi and Naruto talk while she watched the matches but this was something she needed to ask. "That guy Zaku, Neji almost blew up his arm when he was possessed, how is he fine?"

Kakashi focused his attention on the sound genin and thought hard, he remembered watching such a thing through the monitors in the forest, what he doesn't remember seeing is him getting treatment in the forest and he was sure, no one had given him or his teammates treatment ever since they got into the forest. How did they evade the surveillance systems in the forest?

"Are both contestants ready?" Kakashi saw both genin nod and decided to file away his concerns for a later time, it was best he paid close attention and learned as much as he could from these mysterious individuals.

Back in the arena Shino and Zaku jumped away from each other and stared the other down, deciding to take action Zaku started channeling chakra through his un-bandaged arm and shot a Zankuuha at Shino who, much to his surprise, didn't even try to dodge.

The Jutsu hit full force and instead of dropping to the ground a bleeding mess like Zaku had hoped, Shino burst into a swarm of bugs that all rushed at Zaku from different directions, he jumped back and performed another Zankuuha to clear out the area.

Standing in front of Zaku was Shino, both hands on his pockets looking his forever but confident stoic visage. "It's best that you give up now, why? Because my bugs can eat your chakra out if you try to attack me and I can do the same should you try and attack them."

Zaku was indeed surrounded, but he was nowhere near beat. "Don't understimate me stupid tree-hugger!" He removed the bandages covering up his other arm to reveal there was nothing wrong with it other than a few bruises.

In the balconies Sakura looked even more shocked and turned to look at her sensei only to find a similar puzzled look on his face.