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March 28: Night. Kakashi's Home.
Kakashi was laying on his futon with one arm on his forehead and was staring at the ceiling. Moonlight filtered through the window and partially illuminated his masked face. He closed his single visible eye but he couldn't fall asleep.
'Tomorrow I'll have a new set of students. A new team.' He exhaled slowly, the thought weighed heavier on his mind than he expected. He had gone through this cycle before. New graduates, new teams, fleeting expectations. But somehow this one felt different.
A cool draft came through the cracked window, stirring the curtain in the room in an otherwise quiet house.
"This time it's not just anyone. Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura…" Muttered the words in a soft tone to the empty air of his apartment.
Kakashi turned to his side, staring at the small framed photo by the wall.
'Obito. Rin. Minato-sensei.'
They were the reminder of his failures.
"…Hn." He let out a small breath of air through his nose. His eyes then moved to the photo nearby that consisted of him and his single special student.
'The new team. They're not Daichi.'
He thought the truth to himself without apology and turned back to stare at the ceiling.
'I got lucky with him,' Kakashi admitted. 'A genius, disciplined and sharp beyond his years… We made it work, even as a two-man cell. It was unconventional, but it worked.'
He recalled the way Daichi had outmaneuvered opponents with absurd efficiency and the sheer creativity he showed in missions. A prodigy who processed orders like the fastest machine and broke problems down into solvable parts with precision.
'Then again, he was a special case. He was already well trained by his grandfather and one of the Sannin when he came to me… And he is the only Genin who had the gall to say that the test was a mistake straight to my face.'
"The bell test was the wrong exam for this scenario."
Kakashi could still hear that sentence ringing in his ears.
The Jonin turned on his side and watched the line of moonlight climb the far wall. 'After everything that's happened, maybe he wasn't wrong.'
Kakashi's memories soon shifted. The Hokage's office. The files on the new Genins assigned to him. The reports he read on the forbidden scroll incident.
"This team though…" Kakashi frowned. "It's not the same. This time, it's just three normal academy kids. Well… almost."
Sasuke's name lingered in his mind longer than the others. 'His Sharingan awakened during that fight. And despite the arrogance he's shown in the academy, he threw himself in harm's way to protect his classmates.'
Kakashi recalled the detailed report on the incident. The chaos Mizuki unleashed, Naruto's reckless courage, and Sasuke's surprising resolve to shield his classmate who couldn't protect himself. 'He was willing to take a blade for a classmate he calls an idiot. That certainly matters. And Naruto has a spine like iron and a courage that won't let him back down against anyone… And then there's Sakura… She bravely chose to fight when it counted. They're all different from the academy reports.'
He let the images of the three settle into his head—imperfect, loud, young. And in those files, Kakashi saw the first glimpse of what could be his first successful four man team.
'They may not have had the teachers and training that Daichi had. But they're already far better than the teams I've gotten in the past.'
Kakashi looked at the photo of his old team again and suddenly he was also reminded of what he could lose. 'Will I repeat the same mistakes?'
He shut his eye, to clear away the depressing thoughts but another voice rang in his head again.
"The bell test was the wrong exam for this scenario."
'Daichi.' Kakashi opened his eye again, staring into the ceiling's shadows. The boy had thrown those words at him without hesitation, bold and unflinching. He thought back to the Genin exam he gave the boy and the other two.
'Three children who had never fought together, placed in a situation designed to fracture trust. I saw their weaknesses clearly, but Daichi found the flaw in the very foundation of my test. He was right—it wasn't about teamwork for strangers. It was about fear. Fear of failure. Fear of betrayal. I exploited that.'
The irony didn't escape him. A boy not yet a genin had forced him to reexamine the very method he inherited from his own sensei.
Kakashi thought about the upcoming survival test and compared Daichi's Genin team and the members of the new Team 7.
'Daichi had the discipline and the drive, but his arrogance was in isolating himself from his possible teammates and it nearly cost him everything. Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura on the other hand… They already have bonds, even if they are fragile. Maybe that's the key. Maybe they can succeed where Daichi's team couldn't.'
Kakashi sat up, leaning forward, elbows on knees. His eye wandered back to the photograph. Obito's words rang in his ears—words that felt eternal.
"Those who break the rules are scum… but those who abandon their comrades are worse than scum."
"…Worse than scum, huh." He murmured it to himself, voice quiet, almost reverent.
The Jonin's eye went to the two bells pinned on the wall. The two bells lightly jingled as soft wind blew in.
"You're right, Daichi. The usual bell test won't work this time… I know what to do."
Kakashi got up from his bed and went to the shelf in his room. He opened it and rummaged through his things and soon found what he was looking for. He came near the wall and pinned that item near the two bells he already had.
The Jonin nodded to himself and went back to bed.
"It'll be a different test this time. But regardless, they all pass together, or not at all," he said to himself and the empty room. He shut his single eye and eased his breathing. 'All three of you… Don't be stupid tomorrow.'
As Kakashi went to sleep, on the wall three bells hung quietly.
—-
March 29. 6am. Training Ground 3.
Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke made it right on time and stood at the center of the training area 3. They looked around and there was no sign of Kakashi.
"He did say 6am, right?" Naruto asked with some doubt.
Yawn! "Yeah. That's what he said." Sakura replied after failing to hold back a yawn. Sasuke meanwhile stayed silent and he observed the area. 'There's no one here. What is he doing?'
"Where the hell is he? I'm so ready to get the real test started. Believe it!" Naruto hopped from one foot to the other as he looked around.
"Stop yelling, Naruto. Just sit quietly till sensei gets here." Sakura groaned tiredly and sat down on the ground.
Naruto groaned and flopped onto the nearest stump. "This is torture. My ramen cooks in three minutes! This is… worse than three minutes!"
Sakura held her head in her arms. 'It's only six. He's going to be even more annoying than usual if sensei doesn't show up soon.'
They waited for several minutes and slowly time went by. Sasuke closed his eyes and tried to bring himself to the best state possible for the test.
"He's late!"
Until a shout interrupted his focus and made him frown. He opened his eyes and saw Naruto's scowl.
"It's only been twenty minutes, Naruto. Just calm down." Sakura said to her teammate. Not having breakfast and skipping dinner made her particularly irritable at that moment.
"That's late!" Naruto threw both hands up. "Aren't teachers supposed to be on time!? Iruka-sensei was on time!"
"Urg! Don't make me knock you out before the test you dumbass!" Sakura said with clenched fists and looked at the blonde boy.
"Eehh!" Naruto took a step back and decided to wisely shut his mouth.
Sasuke kept quiet but his gaze tracked the borders of the training ground. He checked the treeline again and sensed no one. 'He's not here yet and these two are already hungry and getting irritated. That's going to affect their performance in the test… Was this his plan?'
Sasuke let out a quiet breath and stood calmly with hands in his pockets. Sakura mentally reviewed the survival training she had done in the academy while Naruto squatted and drew doodles in the dirt with a twig, then erased them with his sleeves and drew them again.
The minutes stretched. The early light turned from warm to bright.
By 7:00, Naruto had tried to balance a leaf on the tip of his nose. And by 7:20 he was on his back and describing cloud shapes.
"Bunny," Naruto said.
Sakura didn't look up as she replied. "They're just clouds."
"That one's a duck with a sword."
"Hn," Sasuke grunted as he glanced at the cloud from the corner of his eyes.
Soon as time went by, Naruto and Sakura were dozing off while Sasuke silently stood keeping an eye out for his sensei's arrival.
'Where in the world is he?'
—-
Leaf Village: Cemetery. 8:10 am.
Kakashi stood in front of a grave with his hands in pockets and his head tilted down. He sighed as he looked at the name inscribed on it.
Minato Namikaze.
Kakashi had been standing in front of that grave in thought for almost an hour. 'Sensei, I know they've worked together already. But… I'm still not sure. I… I don't know if I should place my faith in them.'
At that moment he sensed the presence of someone coming near him. The footsteps came near him and Kakashi internally sighed. 'I should have guessed he'd come here.'
"Morning," Daichi said.
"Morning," Kakashi replied.
Daichi remained silent for a moment before finally speaking. "You always come here before big changes. Well, here or the Memorial stone."
Kakashi glanced at his now former student and then turned his eye back to his deceased teacher's grave. "Old habits. Some things don't change, no matter how many years pass."
Daichi didn't push further. He let the silence stretch before shifting the subject. "You know, you've got a team waiting on you."
"They'll manage," Kakashi replied smoothly, but there was a faint smile beneath the mask. "You're supposed to be watching a patient."
"I am," Daichi replied, stepping up beside him. "My clone is with Shizune. If something happens, I'll know."
Kakashi's eye curved. "You're getting quite good at being in two places at once."
The corner of Daichi's mouth slightly curled up. 'You have no idea.'
"How is Lady Tsunade?" Kakashi asked.
"Better than expected. The serum is working faster than my projections. Cell and organ stabilization is holding. Her chakra reserves are recovering steadily. Give it a little more time and she'll be back to her old self." The boy replied with a small smile.
Kakashi exhaled softly. "That's a relief to hear."
Daichi glanced at Kakashi's belt and saw three bells tied to it instead of two. 'Three bells?'
"You've added another bell. Are you changing the traditional bell test?" Daichi asked with a raised brow.
"Something like that… I've been thinking about it and I've decided to do something different this time."
Kakashi's reply made Daichi's eyes narrow. 'He must have his reasons.'
For a long moment, neither spoke. The sounds of wind and birds were the only noise. Finally, Daichi straightened. "It's time you meet your new students."
Kakashi tilted his head. "So eager to hand me a headache already?"
"Oh, please. I have a feeling you're just as eager to start this exam and see how this all goes down, aren't you?."
Kakashi didn't say any words to his student and merely kept his eyes forward.
Daichi looked at the quiet man and sighed. "Look. They're waiting. And they're going to keep waiting until you show up. I'm pretty sure they're already annoyed at your tardiness. At least try to make a good first impression." Daichi replied, his tone carrying a faint note of dry humor.
Finally Kakashi chuckled, low and brief. "I'll keep that in mind." He turned around and slowly walked away. "You're going to be watching aren't you?" He asked with a sigh.
"Yup. But don't worry. You won't even know I'm there. I just really really want to know how they're going to perform in your test." Daichi's cheeky reply made Kakashi groan internally. Seconds later, he vanished in a swirl of leaves.
Daichi looked at the grave of the Fourth Hokage and soon followed after Kakashi.
Author's Note:
I wrote this chapter and the bell test because I wanted to show Daichi's influence on Kakashi, Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura.
If you enjoy my story then please take a moment to review and rate. A thumbs up always helps.
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https://www..com/MonkWithAPen
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