Early morning
As the morning light of the fresh day sprinkled the lands of Konoha, the always deserted entrance of the Forest of Death became inexplicably lively. Normal Konoha Shinobi, members of different Shinobi Clans, as well as ordinary villagers, flocked here invariably.
Standing on top of a temporary high platform, Kuroto muttered with a dissatisfied expression, “Many of the population gathered here don’t even have the power to protect themselves should a creature of Forest of Death suddenly attack them… sigh, now we have to deploy people to make sure that this doesn’t happen.”
With a single glance, Kuroto even spotted many vendors in the area, pushing their carts and selling snacks to the population gathered there.
Shisui–who was standing beside Kuroto–said with a smile, “Well, you can’t blame them Kuroto-san… something like a real-life simulation assessment for trainees at the academy has never happened in Konoha before, so people are curious, and because of so many things that you have done in the academy since you became Principal, every assessment carried out by the academy has become an important thing in the village, all the parents and clans worry about their children, and the impact their performance in the assessment is going to cause.”
Sometimes Shisui can’t help but admire Kuroto more and more. No matter what Kuroto involves himself in, it becomes a really big thing.
Just consider Ninja Academy, for instance, although the academy was always important because of the role it played in Konoha, it was never a topic of such big attention from all parties. The only time Academy received any attention at all was during the enrolment of the new batch, and graduation of the oldest batch. Other than these times, no one paid much attention to what happened in the academy, but now? Each and everything happening in the academy is a matter of concern for all parties, whether they are ordinary civilians, general shinobi, or the elite class of Konoha.
As the trainees saw more and more people gathering, they started to get a bit restless.
“Father, what are you doing here?!” random trainee A.
“Mama… I am here!” random trainee B.
“Oh shit, my old man is also here, what do I do?!” random trainee C.
As more and more trainees spotted their parents or relatives in the crowd, they reacted in various ways, some were happy, some were excited, some were nervous, and some were dissatisfied.
The young Haruno Sakura is also one of the children, as soon as she spotted her parents excitedly waving at her, she was embarrassed, and sighed, “Don’t they have anything better to do? They are putting so much pressure on me!”
“Mother, father… watch me as I make both of you proud!” Yakumo muttered to herself as she looked at her parents in the crowd.
Naruto held his hands at the back of his hands and said with a smirk, “Parents and all, they are so troublesome, good thing that I don’t have them.” Of course, this was just him putting an indifferent front on the outside, internally, his heart was crying, he too wanted to be in the same embarrassing situation as the rest.
Of course, Naruto wasn’t the only one with such a thought, even Shion was saddened, she missed her mother. But Shion was happy that Yui and Kuroto were there for her.
Sasuke sneaked glances in the crowd from time to time, hoping to find his parents as well, and soon he spotted his mother and Izumi-nee waving at him, his brother smiling at him, and his father looking at him with expectations in his eyes, Sasuke swore in his heart, ‘Otou-san and Nii-san have come to see me, I swore I won’t disappoint them. Today I will let the entire Konoha understand just how amazing and powerful the Uchiha Clan is!’
Just as Sasuke spotted his family, Neji also spotted his father, Patriarch, and the young Hanabi in the crowd, and swore to protect the glory of the Hyuga Clan.
As the two young children swore to shoulder the reputation of their respective clans, they subconsciously turned to each other with imaginary lightning crackling between them.
For Neji, Sasuke is the biggest obstacle to ranking highest in this assessment, he is not really worried about anyone else, Neji has the confidence to defeat them all, but he is not so sure about Sasuke. Sasuke had the same thoughts as Neji and believed that Neji was the biggest obstacle standing in his way.
Watching the exchange between two top trainees in their class, the other trainees also realized that this was going to be serious.
Standing on Neji’s left side, Uchiha Kiyomi pumped up her fists and said with a smirk, “Neji-kun, even if he is my Nii-chan, we are still going to defeat him! Because I want to win!”
Standing on Neji’s right side, Rock Lee clutched both his hands and said with tears of excitement, “Neji-san, I promise not to hold you back, so let’s work together and try to win this!”
Neji withdrew his gaze from Sasuke, and said to his two teammates, “Sasuke, I will take on myself, for the others, I will leave them to the two of you…”
Suddenly, there was a burst of noise and loud cheering from the entire crowd, no matter how far or near, Everyone was exclaiming in surprise and shock and it attracted the attention of all the trainees.
Listening to the murmurs of many people in the distance, Ino muttered doubtfully, “Is Hokage-sama here?”
Chōji, with chips crumbs on his face, muttered, “It seems so.”
Shikamaru thought about it and shook his head, “No that can’t be it… If it was only Hokage-sama, the cheering wouldn’t have been this ostentatious.”
Mika nodded from the side, “I heard my aunt tell me the other day that the Kages of other great shinobi villages are also in Konoha. It’s very likely that they are also here.”
Hinata couldn’t help but question, “But why would all the five Kage come to watch the assessment?”
Shikamaru shrugged, “Beats me.”
Although he shrugged it off, however, internally, he did have some thoughts that might explain this unusual situation, ‘Don’t tell me this is all being done in order to raise the morale of the village.’ Shikamaru felt that his guess was pretty spot on, therefore, he couldn’t help but sigh in tiredness, “What are the adults thinking? So, troublesome.”
The actions of Danzo and Akatsuki have caused a lot of destruction in the past few months, and this has greatly affected the morale of the entire village. This is why the information about the Five Kage Conference was not so classified and the rumors about it were circulating. This is done in order to assure the populace that the management is working.
As Mika expected, the five Kage soon climbed on the temporary high platform.
Looking at the ‘supposedly’ five most powerful shinobi in the world, all the trainees became nervous and excited.
Neji and Sasuke were no exception as they looked at the five Kages in awe and amazement.
It was at this moment, that the dreams of several young trainees took shape, especially the dream of Uzumaki Naruto. Up until now, he used to shout out that he wants to be Hokage and whatnot, but he didn’t truly understand what being Hokage would mean, Of course, he still doesn’t understand, but one thing he has fully understood is that if he wants to be accepted and loved by everyone then he has to become someone like them… someone like those five people.
“One day, I too am going to stand there,” muttered Naruto with a determined expression.
Anyway, after the crowd calmed down, and the five Kage spoke a few words for the crowd, Kuroto the principal of the Academy and the organizer of the asssessment announced, “That concludes the explanation of rules that you will have to adhere to for this assessment. Before we officially begin the assessment, I want to emphasize one point… Do not treat this assessment just as a regular assessment, anyone not being careful and acting recklessly might end up dying… keep this in mind.”
All the trainees, whether nervous or excited nodded.
“With that out of the way, without wasting any more time, let’s start the assessment.” Said Kuroto as he waved his hand.
Immediately, staff members who were waiting on the sidelines came forward and led the different teams to the different entrances of the Forest of Death.
Watching the trainees disappear in the Forest of Death, Kakashi came beside Kuroto and asked lightly, “Kuroto… what you said just now, you weren’t serious right?”
Kuroto raised his eyebrow, and questioned, “What do you think?”
At this time, Shisui came over and said, “Kuroto-san, Asuma-san, and the others have arrived.”
Kuroto nodded, “Perfect timing, tell them to wait for a while, I am coming in five minutes.”
Shisui nodded, “All right.”
On the side, as Kakashi heard Shisui mention Asuma’s name, Kakashi was taken aback, and asked curiously, “What are Asuma and the others going to do?”
Kuroto patted Kakashi’s shoulder, and said, “You will find out.”
…
At the same time, somewhere deep in the Forest of Death.
Wearing a mask, Obito stood on a tree branch and looked at the liveliness on the other side.
While Obito was observing the distance, Zetsu protruded his body out of a tree and said, “I wasn’t able to find Deidara, he is probably hiding somewhere else.”
Obito looked at Zetsu with a thoughtful expression on his face under the mask, and nodded, “Leave it.” Then questioned, “What about Tobi… Did you bring him?”
Zetsu shook his head, “Tobi is dead.”
Obito nodded, “I see,” then looked back in the direction of people.
As for Tobi, Obito didn’t care all that much.
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