“Only 10 teams? Looks like the first stage was tougher than previous exams. Well, good for you guys; your petition is reduced. Now I will tell the rules of the stage. Listen carefully; I am not going to repeat myself.” Seeing everyone paying attention, the elite Jonin started speaking once again.

  “The sed exam will be simple. There are a total of 12 scrolls hidden in the valley. We will give each team the location of 2 different scrolls…” A mischievous smile came on his face before he tinued, “Each scroll is a ticket to go toward the stage; only one person per scroll.” He stopped, letting the details sink in for everyone.

  ‘We will hree scrolls each, then,’ Kaida said through the mental link.

  ‘That means collision with oeam is almost certain,’ Itachi said.

  ‘But I don’t think that’s all; otherwise, it will be easy,’ Kabuto added.

  After some time, the Jonin tinued, “Getting a scroll is just one objective. The sed one is to survive for 3 days in there. In those three days, you search for scrolls. If you don’t find one, search for teams that have one. All in all, no matter what you do, ultimately, the only thing that matters at the end of those three days will be if you have the scroll or not.

  You guys are not allowed t anything other than a kunai and ay ste seal with you; it will be your responsibility to find food during those 3 days. After three days, you guys will have to submit your scroll to me in 5 hours; otherwise, you will be disqualified. Even if you have all 12 scrolls with you, and at st, if during the stage you want to give up, burn this seal and stay in your pce for 10 minutes; someone will e to your rescue.

  But keep in mind you will be disqualified from the exam as soon as you do that,” the Jonin said, and then some other ninja started distributing many seals to each partit.

  ‘Iing; this seal tinuously stores and transmits chakra in the surrounding. I am pretty sure with this they will be able to track us even if we don’t burn this tag,’ Kaida informed through the mental link.

  “That doesn’t seem like a problem to me,” Kabuto said.

  ‘It was more like ara knowledge type of thing than a warning,’ Kaida said.

  ‘He is just trying to show off his fuinjutsu skills,’ Itachi said with a straight fabsp;

  “Absolutely not,” Kaida replied in the mental link.

  ‘Yes, you are,’ Kabuto chimed in too.

  “You twanging up ohat’s unfair.”

  “Life is unfair, my friend.”

  While they were having this type of versation, their faces remained pletely stoic.

  “Does anyone have any doubts?” the instructor asked, but after only getting silen return, he tinued, “Good, now on to the part. It will be unfair if everyo the same treatment, even though some of you performed much better than others in the first round,” the instructor said, holding the results of the first exam in his hand.

  “So I have three rewards here. The team that came first choose first, then the sed team, and the third team will get whatever is left.” The instructor said and then listed the rewards:

  *Getting a ce to start the exam one hour before others.*

  *Getting food supply for 3 days.*

  *Location of all 3 scrolls.*

  “All three of them are looking great; what should we choose?” Kabuto said through the mental link.

  “Food is out of the option; we all go three days without food. Also, we find food in the mountains. As for the location of the three scrolls, it’s not like the location we will get won’t be given to others. Maybe by the time we reach the third scroll, someone else may have already taken it,” Kaida said.

  “Then that leaves us with just oion. Also, we will know who has the other two rewards ara time, so there is nothing wrong with choosing the first one,” Itachi said and the ahead.

  “Sir, we would like to choose the first reward.”

  “Okay, sed team, your turn.”

  Darui nodded his head, and without any discussion with his teammates, said, “We would like the sed reward.”

  ‘With food out of the problem, we focus on finding the scrolls,’ he thought.

  “Good, thehird team will get the location of three scrolls rather than two. Everyone else, you have to wait here for another hour, while team 3 proceed for the exam.”

  Getting the signal, Itachi and the team nodded and started going toward the ninja who had the scroll with the locations of the scrolls. After getting that, they started going deeper into the valley.

  “See you.” Before they could go out of the range of the testants, Kaida turned and made direct eye tact with Deidara, who was already burning a hole in their backs with his gaze.

  “I will fug kill you!” Deidara shouted at the top of his lungs.

  “You're enjoying this too much,” Itachi said, shaking his head.

  “Man, I just hope I get paired up against him i stage,” Kaida said with a refreshing smile on his fabsp;

  …

  Kaida and the team made their way through the twists and turns of the valley when suddenly a lightning bolt fell from the sky right in front of them. The tree that was impacted by the lightning was buro a crisp.

  “This terrain is much more dangerous than the Forest of Death,” Kaida said.

  “Yes, we ’t take the risk of moving without any prote. Kaida, use your es,” Itachi said.

  Even though he didn’t specify the full process, Kaida uood it. He quickly made hand signs.

  Poof, poof, poof!

  Three shadow es appeared o him one by owo of them used Transformation Jutsu and transformed into loallic rods, while one of the es picked them up and started running ahead of the group, pnting the bigger rod a little distance away from the group every time.

  Even though the current ninja world was not stifically advahe simple cept of a lightning rod was still on.

  After running for some more time, anhtning stroke down, but the rod absorbed all the impact, and si transmitted all of the lightning into the ground, the damage was not so substantial that the e would get dispersed.

  With their security firmed, the three of them started running at full speed toward the first location, the goal for one hour clear in their minds:

  ‘Find those two scrolls first, then ambush aeam for the location of the other scroll or food, depending on whie they find first. For that, they have to find those two scrolls in one hour and then go back to the starting location. Otherwise, oher teams get dispersed in the Lightning Valley, it will bee increasingly difficult to find them in this vast nd.’ These type of thought going in their mind.

  Uanding this, all three of them were going toward the first location at their full speed. After running acc to the dire for 20 minutes while also moving just rapidly, they reached the first location and were dumbfounded by what they were seeing.