The academy hadn't changed.
Karura walked through the front doors and the familiar smell hit her first. The hallways were the same pale sandstone she remembered from her own graduation, lined with doors and notice boards and the occasional motivational posters that nobody read unless they didn't want to pay attention in class.
She'd graduated from this building less than a year ago. It felt like a lifetime.
Mai walked beside her, cracking her knuckles. Pakura walked on her other side, arms folded. They moved through the hallway together.
Room 203 was on the second floor. The door was open. Voices drifted out, the murmur of two dozen conversations happening at once.
They walked in.
The room was a standard academy lecture hall, tiered rows of desks climbing from a flat floor at the front to the back wall. Windows along the left side let in bars of afternoon light that cut across the rows in dusty stripes. A proctor's desk sat at the front, empty.
Eighteen genin were already inside.
Karura looked over the room. Six teams of three, scattered across the tiered seating, some clustered together, some spread out. The noise dropped by half when Team Ebizo entered the doorway. Heads turned. Eyes found them. Conversations paused mid-sentence.
She felt it. Every genin in this room knew who they were. Team Ebizo. The puppet girl. The Scorch Style user. The extreme taijutsu specialist who couldn't use ninjutsu or genjutsu. The team that had completed A-rank missions as first-year genin, the team that every sensei in the village used as a measuring stick when their own students fell short.
Karura could see the unfriendliness in their faces.
"Oi! What the hell are you all staring at huh? You wanna fight?!" Mai barked.
"Let's not make enemies with our comrades." Karura gently placed her hand on Mai's shoulder.
"You guys are lucky, Karura is so forgiving. I'd pluck your eyes out for glaring at me like that, you know? You should thank her." Mai snorted.
Their glares only increased in intensity as they took seats. They were near the middle of the room, a row to themselves. Karura sat and pulled her scarf down. Mai leaned back in her chair and put her feet up. Pakura sat with her arms crossed.
Karura looked at the other teams.
A trio in the front row caught her attention first. Two boys and a girl, all around thirteen or fourteen. One of the boys had a wrapped puppet strapped across his back. Karura recognized the shape.
He was carrying a Million.
A mass-produced version, built from the designs she'd sold to the Brigade months ago. All standardized and reproduced for puppet masters across Suna's puppet division. Her design. Her innovation. On someone else's back.
A small warmth bloomed in her chest. She'd built those plans at her workbench, alone, with nothing but her own hands and knowledge. And now another Sand shinobi was going into the Chunin Exams carrying her work. Using it. Trusting his career to the thing she'd made.
She couldn't help but smile.
Two rows behind the puppet team, a group of older genin sat slouched and relaxed. Three of them, two boys and a girl, all fourteen or fifteen. They didn't look at them with the nicest of expressions.
One of them, a broad-shouldered boy with face paint, leaned over to his teammate and spoke loud enough to carry.
"That's them? That's the famous Team Ebizo?" He snorted. "They're kids. The puppet girl is what, six?"
"Eight was what I heard." his teammate said. A girl with short brown hair and flat eyes.
"Eight. An eight-year-old in the Chunin Exams. And we're supposed to believe she's completed A-rank missions?" The painted boy shook his head. "The village has lost its mind. We've been grinding C-ranks and D-ranks for three years and these brats walk in here like they own the place because their sensei is famous."
"Maybe they earned it?" the third member said quietly. A thin boy who didn't look like he agreed with his teammates but didn't look like he'd argue either.
"Earned it." The painted boy laughed. "Right. An eight-year-old completed an A-rank mission. Sure. That's definitely not because of her sensei."
Mai's feet came off the desk.
"Hey." Her voice carried across the room like a thrown rock. "Doodle face. If you want your face smashed in, keep talking. My fists are feeling itchy."
The painted boy grit his teeth. His teammate put a hand on his arm. He shrugged it off but didn't respond. The room's murmur dipped again, twenty-some pairs of eyes bouncing between Mai and the veteran team.
"Ignore that loser. We don't need to prove anything to people who've failed this exam before." Pakura said.
The painted boy flushed red. His hands gripped the edge of his desk as he stood up in a rage.
The door opened again.
Three boys walked in. The room's attention shifted instantly, pulled toward the entrance. Because these weren't just any genin.
The first one through the door was tall for twelve. Sandy brown hair, sharp features, narrow eyes. He wore a simple black jacket and pants with mesh armour underneath., and a brass container sat at his hip sealed.
Rasa.
Behind him, Shigezane entered quietly. Dark hair falling across his face, water canteen on his hip. He briefly looked around before he took a seat.
Toma came last. Small. Thin. Dark circles under his eyes. He sat at the end of the row, apart from his teammates. Near them. Not beside them.
Rasa didn't sit.
He stood in the aisle between the rows of desks, his narrow eyes locked on one person. Looking at one specific girl with sandy-brown hair and a yellow scarf and indigo eyes who was sitting in the middle row between her teammates.
Karura felt the stare before she identified its source. A prickling at the back of her neck. She turned.
A boy she'd never met was looking at her like she'd killed his family.
"You're the puppet girl, aren't you?" Rasa asked sharply.
The room went quiet.
Karura looked at him.
"I'm Karura," she smiled politely with a nod.
"I know who you are." He said it like the words tasted rotten. "Everyone in this village knows who you are. Puppet girl. Cactus girl. The prodigy. The genius. The girl who completed missions far above her rank, became Lady Chiyo-sama's protege and changed the entire Puppet Master Corps with her designs."
He took a step closer.
"Everyone talks about you. Every jonin. Every chunin. Every vendor in the market and every kid in the academy. I can't walk down a single street in this village without hearing your name."
He was five feet from her now. Close enough that Karura could see the veins in his temples and the tremor in his fists.
"Your reputation is a bunch of crap. Overblown. There's no way someone that looks like you could have accomplished even half of what everyone is saying. In this exam, I'm going to destroy you. I'm going to prove to every person in this village that you're nothing. A joke. A fraud. A little girl with wooden dolls who got lucky and got famous for it."
Mai laughed at the supposed challenger while pointing at him. That was undoubtedly one of the funniest things she's ever heard in her life and she was laughing at him.
"If you want to make Karura your rival, you gotta at least be able to get through me first, loser." Mai wiped the tears from her eyes.
Rasa looked disgusted at Mai. "Aren't you that cripple who couldn't use ninjutsu or genjutsu? How did you even become a ninja?" Rasa was genuinely thrown off for a moment.
"A cripple, eh?" Mai leaped from her desk, appearing in front of Rasa with her fist pulled back.
"Mai, no!" Karura barely caught her in time with her chakra strings.
Mai's fist was inches away from landing on Rasa's face. He didn't even manage to put any sort of guard up. It looked like he didn't even know she was inches away from sending him flying. Rasa flinched in enraged shock. As he was about to slug her himself as she was stuck, Mai was flung back toward her seat by Karura.
"Let's try to avoid starting any fights before the exam… We might be disqualified and disappoint Ebizo-sensei who believed in us." Karura told Mai.
"But that punk was asking for it!" Mai glared at Rasa who was glaring back at her.
"I know. It's okay. Maybe you'll get to fight him later in the exam, but for now, we need to be on our best behavior…" Karura whispered.
"Consider yourself lucky, fat nose! Pray we don't see each other later in the exam. For your sake!" Mai laughed, not even taking him seriously.
"Rasa," Pakura suddenly spoke. "We were in the same academy class."
Rasa's head snapped toward her.
"You've had personal training from the strongest shinobi in the village since before we graduated, and you still haven't managed to do half of what she did in her first year." Pakura continued.
"Shut your mouth, Pakura. Like the girl who always trailed behind me in the academy can say anything to me at all." Rasa scoffed.
"I'm not the same girl I was back then."
"I doubt there's much of a difference now."
The door at the front of the room slammed open.
The sound was like a thunderclap. Every head in the room snapped toward it.
A man stood in the doorway.
He was tall and scary. Deep-set eyes, dark and flat. A Suna flak jacket, closed and buttoned. Several chunin flooded him behind him. Two Chunin on each side of him, carrying stacks of paper.
"My name is Sota," he said. "I am the proctor for the first stage of the Chunin Exams. You have exactly five seconds to sit down and shut up before I disqualify every person still standing."
Everyone who wasn't sitting down, immediately sat down.
Sota's eyes swept the room.
"That's better." Sota said. He walked to the proctor's desk at the front and the two chunin began distributing papers, one sheet per person, face-down.
"The first stage of the Chunin Exams is a written examination. You have ninety minutes. The test contains fifteen questions."
He placed both hands on the desk.
"This is not an academy test. You will not be graded on memorization. You will be graded on whether your answers demonstrate the judgment and wisdom required of a chunin. A chunin leads teams. A chunin makes decisions that determine whether people live or die. If your answers suggest you lack that judgment, you fail. It doesn't matter how many questions you get right."
His dark eyes moved across the room again.
"The passing threshold is ten correct answers out of fifteen. However, there is a caveat. Question fifteen will not be revealed until the final ten minutes of the exam. You may choose to answer it or leave it blank. If you attempt question fifteen and answer incorrectly, your entire team fails. If you leave it blank, your score stands as it is."
Murmurs rippled through the room. The veteran team exchanged glances. The puppet team's leader gripped his pencil tighter.
"The choice to attempt the final question is individual, but the consequence is collective. One teammate's failure eliminates all three." Sota's voice didn't change. "Choose carefully."
He looked at the clock on the wall.
"Turn your papers over. Your ninety minutes begin now."
Papers rustled. Pencils scratched. The Chunin Exams had begun.
Karura turned her paper over and read the first question.
A four-person squad is assigned to escort a merchant caravan through the desert. On the second day, your team encounters evidence of a recent bandit attack on a separate caravan: destroyed wagons, scattered goods, no survivors. Tracks suggest the bandits number between six and ten and are moving parallel to your route. Your client insists on continuing. Your squad's medic is injured and operating at reduced capacity. Describe your course of action and justify your reasoning.
She picked up her pencil and began to write.
The questions were hard. Every answer had trade-offs and the "right" choice depended on priorities you had to identify for yourself.
Question four asked about identifying poisons. Three symptoms were described and you had to identify the toxin, the antidote, and the time window for treatment. Karura knew it because she was a puppeteer. Poison and puppeteers went hand in hand.
Question seven presented a scenario where your team was outnumbered three to one in unfamiliar terrain with a wounded teammate who would slow your retreat. The question wasn't "how do you win." It was "what do you prioritize and why." There wasn't a single right answer. There were answers that showed you understood what mattered and answers that showed you didn't.
Question eleven asked you to evaluate a mission report and identify three errors in the team leader's decision-making. The report was dense and realistic. Finding the errors required understanding not just what went wrong, but why the team leader thought it was right at the time.
Karura worked through them steadily. The answers came from experience and textbooks. She'd traveled throughout the Land of Wind. She's been through a lot in her opinion despite being on the field for almost a year. Her team should have the advantage compared to other teams because they had a lot of high-ranked missions. The type of missions that chunin and higher usually take.
She glanced sideways. Mai was chewing her pencil, her brow furrowed, glaring at question six. Mai wasn't dumb, far from it, but written tests didn't seem like where she'd do her best work from what Karura could tell.
Pakura was writing fast. Her pencil hadn't stopped moving since the exam began. Confidence oozed from her body. Even a small smirk was present on her face.
The minutes ticked by. Pencils scratched. Someone coughed. A chair creaked.
At the eighty-minute mark, Sota spoke.
"Put your pencils down."
The scratching stopped.
"Question fifteen." He reached into his vest and produced a single sheet of paper, which he held up for the room to see. "As I stated at the beginning, this question is optional. If you attempt it and answer correctly, it will count toward your score. If you attempt it and answer incorrectly, your entire team is eliminated."
He set the paper face-down on his desk.
"Before I reveal the question, I'll give you the choice. Raise your hand if you want to opt out. Your score will stand as it is. You will not be penalized for choosing not to answer."
The room was still.
Karura had answered fourteen questions. She was confident in at least twelve of them. Twelve out of fourteen was above the passing threshold of ten. She didn't need question fifteen. The safe choice was to opt out, protect her score, protect her team.
She looked at Mai. Mai looked back. A small nod.
She looked at Pakura. Pakura's arms were folded. She wasn't raising her hand. She wasn't opting out.
Nobody on Team Ebizo raised their hand.
Across the room, the veteran team was whispering furiously. The scarred boy's hand twitched toward the air, hesitated, dropped back to his desk. His female teammate shook her head. The thin boy stared at the ceiling.
One hand went up. A genin from a team in the back row. Then a second hand from the same team. The third member looked at his teammates, swallowed, and raised his hand.
"That team opts out," Sota said. "Your papers will be scored as they are. You may remain seated."
No other hands went up.
"Very well." Sota turned the paper over and read aloud.
"Question fifteen. Your team has been assigned to deliver a classified scroll to an allied village. Midway through the journey, you intercept a distress signal from a Sand patrol unit under attack three kilometers off your route. Intel suggests the attacking force outnumbers the patrol two to one. Diverting to assist will delay your delivery by at least six hours and risks exposing the classified scroll to enemy forces. Continuing your mission means the patrol may be annihilated before reinforcements arrive. What do you do?"
The room was silent.
"You have ten minutes. Begin."
Karura stared at the question. It wasn't a knowledge test. It wasn't a tactics test. It was a values test. Mission or comrades. The scroll or the patrol. The objective or the people.
She thought about Ebizo's words by the campfire in the badlands. The reason you start isn't the reason you stay. The reason you stay is the person standing next to you.
She thought about the miners in the Land of Salt. About the boy with the missing fingers. About choosing to free a hostage family when the mission only required them to kill a crime lord.
She picked up her pencil and wrote.
Divert to assist the patrol. Secure the classified scroll on my person using a sealing technique, minimize the risk of exposure while engaging the enemy force. The mission is important. The scroll is important. But shinobi are not tools to be discarded when the situation doesn't favor them. I don't abandon those I can help and save. Not with what I can do. Help the patrol, eliminate the enemy, and resume the delivery. The delay is a cost. Losing comrades is a price we can't afford. A price we should never afford.
She set her pencil down. At least her answer didn't abandon the scroll. She'd written a plan that accomplished both, the rescue and the delivery, even if the delivery came late. But she knew what answer the village probably wanted. A straightforward answer. An answer that prioritized the mission at all costs. An answer that suggested her comrades that fell into trouble, could only blame themselves for not being strong enough to save themselves.
The ten minutes passed in silence. Sota collected the papers. The chunin assistants gathered them into stacks and began reviewing, marking, sorting. The room sat in tense quiet while pencils scratched on the other side of the proctor's desk.
It took twenty minutes.
Sota stood. He held a single sheet of paper with results.
"Seven teams pass. One team is eliminated."
He read the team designations. Team Ebizo. Team Third Kazekage. Five others. Passing scores listed beside each.
The team in the back row, who had opted out of question fifteen, had passed with the minimum.
One team, a group Karura hadn't tracked, failed. Their scores were below the threshold. They stood, collected their things, and left the room without speaking. The door closed behind them.
Seven teams. Twenty-one genin.
"Congratulations," Sota said. The word carried no warmth. "You've passed the first stage. The second stage will begin at the southern gate of the Demon Desert. Make your way there as soon as possible with no delays. Head straight there and nowhere else or you risk being disqualified from the Chunin Exams."
He turned and walked out. The chunin assistants followed. The door closed.
The room exhaled.
Mai slumped in her chair. "That last question was pretty easy."
"It was straightforward," Pakura said.
"I know right?"
"What did you put?" Karura asked curiously. The question was not easy for her at all.
"I said save the patrol and fight the enemy and deliver the scroll a little bit late." Mai shrugged. "How could I pass up the opportunity to further improve my taijutsu?"
Pakura scoffed at her. "The mission comes above all, idiot. I thought you knew that."
"I did freaking solve the mission! I just took a little detour along the way."
"What about you, Karura? I know you probably wrote something crazy, right? I can't see you doing what the examiners expected from a Sand shinobi." Pakura asked.
"It wasn't crazy…" Karura defended herself. "It's a little similar to what Mai wrote."
"I don't believe you." They both said.
Karura didn't bother defending herself against both of them. She covered her face with her scarf, gathered her things and started walking. As she passed the row where Rasa's team sat, she felt his eyes on her again. That same burning stare. That same intensity.
She didn't look at him.
The three of them walked out of the academy and into the late afternoon sun. The streets of Suna spread before them, golden and warm. They walked toward the Demon Desert.