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It was a pretty good outcome, too.

Just by showing off his superior Body Flicker, he'd ended the match in an instant.

Minato was also famous for his speed—would he take special notice of him… Tōji walked off slowly, glancing toward the Hokage's viewing stand.

But it was too far away—aside from barely making out Minato's handsome face, he couldn't catch any details.

"Izuno Natchi and Nio Shinobu—please enter the arena!" Tōji had barely reached the stairwell when Shinku called the next pair to prepare.

"…"

Sensing something, Tōji looked back—Natchi had already dropped into the arena without making a sound!

『Has Natchi's special training really gotten him this far? This improvement is almost unbelievable!』 Tōji knew how difficult it was to fall from height without creating air friction noise, and landing required precise force-dissipation technique to avoid making any sound on impact.

Shing shing shing! A figure performed several rapid "jumps" along the wall and reached the arena in an instant.

『This Nio Shinobu has some skill too.』 Given Tōji's knowledge of standard Body Flicker, he naturally understood the difficulty involved.

At the very least, this Nio Shinobu's Body Flicker was already better than many newly promoted chūnin. 『Showing off his skills through his entrance, huh.』

Tōji felt this match of Natchi's would be worth watching. He didn't linger at the stairwell and started heading upstairs.

"Tōji—aren't you coming up to watch?" It was Izumo's voice.

"Izumo—you're okay now?" Tōji saw Izumo walking over from the side, looking perfectly fine.

"Of course—let's go up and watch!" Izumo was clearly in a good mood, his visible eye crinkling into a crescent smile.

"Oh, by the way—I saw Iwashi earlier. He beat Mizuki, right?" Izumo asked as they climbed the stairs.

"Yeah—he put up a really good fight." Tōji replied casually.

Back in the contestants' waiting room, Tōji noticed Tsubaki had returned to her usual spot.

"How's Natchi doing?" Tōji and Izumo walked to the edge of the viewing area and asked Kotetsu.

"See for yourselves!" Kotetsu didn't even bother explaining.

"You didn't spend all your time training just Body Flicker, did you?" Neru asked quietly as Tōji returned to his spot.

"Why not?" Tōji gave her a quick smile, then focused on the arena.

"They've been trading close-combat blows at high speed for about two minutes now." Neru rarely gave commentary, but she did this time.

"Has Natchi shown anything new?" Tōji was still concerned about his teammate.

"No. And as you can see, he hasn't even used the 【Cat Cloak】 yet. His opponent hasn't used any jutsu either—they're both just trading taijutsu under Body Flicker." Neru's eyes never left the action.

"That guy Natchi really loves to brawl." Tōji smiled wryly.

No sooner had he spoken than the man called Nio Shinobu—the one in sunglasses—spit out a large fireball, forcing Natchi back.

After leaping away, Natchi took the chance to activate the 【Cat Cloak】.

"Natchi's getting serious." Tōji watched with interest. "So his opponent is a Fire Release user."

But then, Nio Shinobu quickly formed hand seals—his hands began to glow faintly with fire, giving the sense of power waiting to be unleashed.

"That's the 【Fire Release: Flame Strike】." Izumo explained. "A C-rank jutsu that releases a burst of flames from both hands—either when it hits the enemy or from extremely close range."

Izumo really did know a lot.

At this point, Natchi's speed had skyrocketed—Nio Shinobu couldn't keep up, and those flame-hidden hands hadn't touched Natchi even once!

Tōji silently assessed, 『Natchi's Beast Imitation agility is no less impressive than the Inuzuka clan's.』