Chapter 36: Chapter 36 Ichibi

In the Konoha Forest, at a training ground with three wooden stakes.

The fallen leaves swirled down in the wind and were instantly torn apart by sharp blades.

Thud thud thud!

Three kunai accurately hit the bullseye, prompting a sigh of admiration from the girl with two buns on her head.

"Bullseye, Neji, you're amazing."

"If it's just this level, it can't be said to be amazing." Neji said with a cold face.

"Three thousand one hundred twenty-one! Three thousand one hundred twenty-two!" Lee gritted his teeth, doing one-handed push-ups nearby.

"That's already very good. After all, Neji is a genius." Tenten reassured.

"A genius?" Neji tightened his knee pads and his gaze shifted to Lee beside him, "Uchiha Sasuke is the real genius. Only by fighting him can I know the gap."

"Neji, what do you think about that Shinobi God thing?" Tenten seemed to suddenly remember something and asked nervously.

"The sudden talk about Hokage-sama dying during the Chunin Exams and now Guy-sensei being summoned back by Hokage-sama."

"I'm not sure." Neji said expressionlessly, "The higher-ups will definitely have a solution. It's not something we should worry about."

"Even though that's what you say, the Chunin Exams will definitely be affected." Tenten said worriedly, "After all, it concerns Hokage-sama, and if things go wrong, the Chunin Exam smight be canceled."

"Canceled?" Lee, who was sweating profusely from his upside-down push-ups, looked at the two and said, "Didn't Guy-sensei tell us it's unlikely to be canceled? He said that we should just focus on training."

"It's really hard to say in this situation now. After all, that Shinobi God's words might be…" Tenten hesitated at this point.

The Shinobi God revealed secrets about the Uchiha and Hyuga Clans respectively, and Neji standing next to her was the victim of the Hyuga Clan's Caged Bird.

"It's fake." Neji said calmly, "The village has already come out to refute the rumor and told us not to pay attention to the words of the Shinobi God."

"Yeah, especially since the other party most likely be our enemies." Tenten sighed and said, "I wonder who this Shinobi God really is?"

"It's probably someone from the village, right? Didn't Guy-sensei say that people outside the village can't receive those sudden messages in their minds?" Lee continued talking as he sweated.

Neji didn't say anything and continued with his own training, but his gaze becoming even calmer.

A genius of the Hyuga Clan?

Born into original sin, with the Caged Bird, there was no need for any genius.

All the Hyuga Clan needed was to preserve the main family's slaves. As long as they could survive, continuing like ugly beasts was irrelevant.

"What's the deal with that message?" Shikamaru, lying lazily on the grassy slope, stared with dead-fish eyes.

Asuma suddenly had something come up, and probably returned to the Hokage Tower. After all, he was the Hokage's son, so he was probably very worried about Sandaime's situation.

The Ino-Shika-Cho trio suddenly found themselves with some free time. Shikamaru lounged around while Ino continued training, and Choji sat on the side munching on potato chips.

Hearing this, Choji, munching on his chips, squinted his eyes and said, "Didn't the village say it was fake news."

"Who would believe that?" Shikamaru mumbled, "The incident with the Hyuga Clan was real, wasn't it? Last year's top rookie should be from the branch family, right?"

"Who told you that?" Ino, who had stopped training, heard their conversation and walked over to ask.

"I heard it from my father." Shikamaru said, putting a blade of grass in his mouth, staring at the cotton candy clouds drift by in the sky with dead-fish eyes, "That genius of the Hyuga Clan probably has the Caged Bird Cursed Seal on his forehead too."

Hearing this, Ino sighed, "There's nothing we can do about the matters of big clans."

"Yeah." Shikamaru agreed, staring at the blue sky for a moment before suddenly asking, "Ino, do you have a conflict with that guy Naruto?"

Ino was stunned for a moment when she heard this, then answered in a panic, "No, no, why are you asking?"

"Didn't you deliberately avoid Naruto last time?" Shikamaru continued, "I'm just a little confused. When we went to submit the application form for the Chunin Exams today, why there were only Sakura and Sasuke from Team 7?"

"I don't know what's wrong with Naruto. He used to crave recognition so much, but now, he seems to have lost all his drive."

"I don't know about that either." Ino said with a smile, "Besides, I've had my share of conflicts with him, so there's nothing strange about that."

"Yeah, who knows what that guy is up to." Shikamaru complained.

"Naruto?" Choji, who was eating potato chips, turned to them and suddenly said, "I saw him recently, and he seemed to be with a little girl."

"A little girl?" Ino was slightly surprised.

"Probably an orphan from the village." Choji shoveled the potato chips into his mouth, "I saw them at the barbecue restaurant."

"That guy Naruto, I feel like he doesn't even seem like a Shinobi anymore."

"Yeah, who knows. I haven't seen him train lately." Shikamaru sighed and said, "Last time I saw him, he wasn't even wearing his forehead protector."

"How is it possible?" Ino was shocked. "Naruto wanted a Shinobi's forehead protector so much before, how could he…"

"It's hard to say." Shikamaru stood up and looked out from the hillside.

His gaze rose from the grassy plain, past the swaying grass, over a fleeting white bird, and finally landed on a few small black dots in the distance.

"Those people are Shinobi from Sunagakure, right?"

Hearing this, Ino and Choji also looked in that direction, and cold sweat immediately formed on their foreheads.

On the grassland some distance away from them, a Shinobi carrying a gourd had a gloomy look on his face, and the other two Shinobi, a man and a woman, also looked at the three of them with unfriendly expressions.

The two groups locked eyes, and the Ino-Shika-Cho trio felt a chill down their spines. It's like a fear of being watched by a predator.

Fortunately, the three Sunagakure's Shinobi did not continue to walk towards them, but changed direction and headed towards the Hokage Tower.

"That guy with the gourd is scary." Ino said with a lingering fear on her face, patting her chest in relief.

"I hope we don't run into them during the Chunin Exams." Shikamaru swallowed his saliva and agreed with a pale face.

"Crunch! Crunch!" Choji was frightened and tilted his head back to pour a bag of potato chips into his mouth.

"Temari, I heard that there is also a Jinchuriki in this village." Kankuro, who was walking on the road carrying a puppet on his back, asked his sister, Temari.

"Yes, it's the most powerful one, Kyubi." Temari had a huge folding fan hanging behind her back, and she was wearing a shoulder-baring fishnet dress, with a slightly displeased look on her face.