Bab 36: The Info Broker

Sakura's gaze flickered over to the two other members of Team Kurenai. As far as candidates for Sakura's yuri-yuri paradise were concerned, Hinata was pretty much off-limits; Hinata and Naruto were such a cute couple together… even though it meant that they would eventually produce the devil offspring Boruto. Himawari was like a wholesome ray of sunshine, though, just like her name implied.

Munch… munch… Choji was stuffing more crisps into his mouth, staring hungrily at Akamaru sitting atop Kiba's head…

"The hell you lookin' at, huh?" Kiba growled, noticing that Sakura was observing his dog. "I wouldn't try petting Akamaru here; he bites!"

"I guess it's true that the smallest dogs bark the loudest, huh?" Sasuke taunted him.

"Huh?" Kiba growled, his pointed canines showing as he grinned fiercely. "You wanna say that to my face one more time?"

"…" said Shino.

"Would you kindly stop bickering like schoolgirls?" a man's voice called out to them. "People are already nervous enough about the exam without you distracting them, so you'd better keep it down…"

The nine rookies turned to face the man who had just addressed them; a relatively tall and silver-haired young adult wearing glasses. Kabuto…

"You're all Genin, right?" he continued. "Rookies, fresh out of the academy?"

Sakura listened as Kabuto introduced himself, before giving them his speech about not underestimating the other candidates; it was all very much like the Hunter exams. Kabuto then proceeded to pull out some information cards from his pack, infusing them with his chakra.

'Exposition time,' said Inner Sakura, rolling her eyes.

The first card that Kabuto showed them was a map of the ninja continent, which showed how many participants each ninja village had sent: Hidden Sand had sent 10 teams, Hidden Rain had sent 7, Hidden Grass and Hidden Waterfall had both sent 2, Hidden Sound had sent 1, and the Hidden Leaf, as the host, had entered 29 teams.

It suddenly occurred to Sakura that they had completely missed the encounter with the most dangerous Hidden Sand team of them all. Since Sasuke was still incredibly cocky, he would no doubt get himself badly injured if it ever came to a fight and he wasn't prepared.

"Do you have ninja info cards for individual participants?" Sakura inquired. "For example, Gaara, from the Hidden Sand… and Tenten, from the Hidden Leaf?"

Something about the way Tenten had reacted to her was bugging her; the two of them had basically never interacted before in this timeline, so why had she acted so surprised when she had seen her breasts? And why had she seemed so convinced that she'd been trapped in a Genjutsu…?

"Tenten," said Kabuto, as he shuffled through his cards. "Any last name?"

"Not that I know of."

Kabuto continued rifling through his cards until he found the two that Sakura had requested.

"First up is Fūma Tenten. It took me a while, since you didn't know her last name," Kabuto began. "She's a year older than you lot: 20 D-ranked and 11 C-ranked missions accomplished to date. Her Jōnin-sensei is Might Guy…"

(This is headcanon I've made up specifically for this story, so don't be surprised if you can't find any proof. But if I had to give a reason for this choice… If you assume that Metal Lee is Tenten's son from a failed marriage with Rock Lee, you can kind of guess from his angular eyes that he has some Fūma blood in him, and if you put two and two together, and add to that Tenten's predilection for throwing weapons…)

Sakura's eyes widened in surprise. So, it turned out that Tenten was a remnant Fūma clan member of the Hidden Leaf. That meant she was one of Sasuke's very distant relatives…

"Tenten is considered highly skilled in Bukijutsu; swords, axes, maces, kusarigama, scythes, puppets, war fans, shuriken, kunai, the bow and arrow, she can use them all. She is also highly accomplished in various space-time Ninjutsu and Fūinjutsu, and she is said to have invented weapons that only she can use…"

Sakura frowned slightly; so far, there was nothing too eye-catching about her profile…

"Next up is Gaara of the Hidden Sand. He's got eight C-ranked missions under his belt, as well as one … whoa! One B-ranked; that's pretty impressive for a Genin. I don't have that much info on him apart from that, since he's a first timer and he's from way out in the desert, but apparently, he's never got injured on a mission; not even once."

"I want to know about Rock Lee, from the Hidden Leaf," Sasuke then asked.

Rock Lee's stats were pretty straightforward, and since he was in Tenten's team, they had the same number of accomplished missions. His resumé boiled down to: exceptional Taijutsu.

"Do you see now?" Kabuto asked them. "Each village has sent in their best and brightest to compete, so unless you take them seriously, you're not going to stand a chance, okay?"

Sakura didn't take his words seriously; most of the participants were in their late teens to early adulthood, but that just meant that they were fodder. The real danger came from the young prodigies who didn't need a second try to beat the Chūnin exams, and from the old monster lying in wait for the Sharingan…

Naruto began shivering… but Sakura knew him too well to think it was from fear. It was obviously from excitement, and it was about to burst out!

"The name's Uzumaki Naruto!" Naruto loudly announced to the room. "And I'm not gonna lose to any of ya, ya know!"

Many of the participants turned in their seats to stare at the loudmouth; and it's at that moment that Sakura caught a glimpse of a certain girl's distinctively crimson hair, down in the first row…

"Kabuto-senpai," Sakura asked tentatively, "who's that red-headed girl—"

Unfortunately for Sakura, she was rudely interrupted by an explosion of smoke; the exam's proctors, including the Hidden Leaf's best torturer, Morino Ibiki, had just appeared at the front of the class! There was at least a dozen of them, including a few familiar faces…

"You there in the back, shut up!" Morino Ibiki shouted. "Now, if we're all ready to start acting like adults, let's begin by laying down a few ground rules!"

Ibiki then turned to the blackboard and began writing the exam's rules, while the other proctors went to take their seats on the sides of the classroom.

An ominous silence fell over the room, punctuated only by the clacking of chalk against the blackboard, as the applicants collectively held their breaths in anticipation…