Chapter 184: Different Strengths

Hiruzen paused beside Kakashi to watch Sakura's projection.

"Her marks are excellent," he said, "but she struggles under pressure. You'll need to guide her."

On the field, the girl's body remained untouched. In the scene above her forehead, she faced another attack she had learned about in a classroom and could not yet answer in battle.

The difference had never been so plain to Hiruzen. Why had he not thought of teaching this way? A shinobi could acquire hard experience without being lost on the first mission that exposed a weakness. If only the technique were easier to learn.

"If they pass my test," Kakashi said. "All three have problems of their own."

For several years he had rejected every team assigned to him. Strength alone had never been what he sought. This session would show him more of the prospective students, but they would still have to meet his standard.

In another forest, Kiba had already died once.

The sudden change of place and the first attack had caught him unprepared. By the time the scene reset, his training had begun to take over.

"Akamaru. Find him."

The little dog sampled the air, turned, and barked. Man and dog rushed toward the hidden enemy together.

Their target realized he had been found. He formed a seal, and senbon began to fall through the branches. Kiba and Akamaru caught the danger overhead before the needles reached them. Both flickered clear, then turned upon the attacker.

Two spinning forms tore through his position. The shinobi fell beneath the attack.

Akamaru barked again, but the forest was already changing. Sand replaced the leaf litter beneath their feet. The trees vanished into a wide, empty desert.

Kiba sniffed. There was danger here too, yet the scent gave him no useful direction.

The attack came from beneath the sand. Neither he nor Akamaru escaped it. The desert disappeared with their deaths, leaving them to begin again.

Shino recognized the illusion almost as soon as he entered it. His attempt to dispel it failed. That told him something about the technique's strength, though not yet its purpose.

Shuriken flew from the trees while he was considering it. His body broke into insects, and the attacker advanced toward the place where he had stood.

The man stopped. His face darkened; a moment later, he collapsed.

Shino emerged behind him and examined the body. It remained where it had fallen.

A promised reward. The Hokage present. Captain Tobitake performing a genjutsu that transported them to a battlefield. The pieces fitted together.

"Combat training," Shino murmured. "Then there will be more."

His insects spread through the surrounding jungle. When the next squad approached, he was ready. Traps disposed of them, but other enemies followed, each presenting a different problem. Their methods increasingly countered his own.

He kept adapting until he had no chakra left. The final attacker reached him with a kunai.

When awareness returned, so had his chakra. Shino pushed his glasses into place. That confirmed it. Dying was part of the exercise, and the exercise would continue.

Hinata stood near the Academy, or what remained of it. Its sign lay in the dust. Fighting sounded from the streets around her and from somewhere overhead. The village itself had become a battlefield.

"Hinata! What are you doing? They're coming!"

Naruto ran toward her, with several figures in pursuit.

"Naruto..."

Her face warmed as he drew close. Then she saw the shinobi behind him more clearly.

"What's happened to Konoha?"

"Stone attacked us. Everyone's fighting. Come on!"

He held out his hand. Hinata looked at it, blushing more fiercely, and began to reach for him.

A kunai struck her chest.

"I'm not Naruto, fool."

The transformation dissolved. A Stone shinobi stood before her where Naruto had been.

The street twisted away.

Hinata was back beside the fallen sign, and Naruto was running toward her again. This time she activated her Byakugan. The approaching figure wore his face, but the chakra inside was wrong.

Anger overcame her hesitation.

"You're not Naruto."

As the false Naruto reached for her, she stepped into him with Gentle Fist. Sixteen strikes landed in quick succession. The enemy hit the ground hard enough to raise dust.

"Hinata! What have you done?"

She turned. Neji was approaching, staring at the fallen figure.

"How could you kill Naruto?"

"Neji, I didn't. He's an enemy. He was—"

An earthen spike drove from his hand before she could finish. His face changed as he struck her: another Stone shinobi, another borrowed likeness.

Hinata could scarcely understand it before the scene began again.

Kurenai watched her three prospective students, pleased with two and increasingly concerned about the third.

"Kiba and Shino could both make good captains," she told Hiruzen. "They adapt well. It takes an unfamiliar method to expose a serious weakness. Hinata keeps trusting familiar faces."

Even the Byakugan had not saved her from the second disguise. The moment someone she knew challenged her, she stopped using the ability that should have exposed him. A sensory shinobi could not afford that habit.

"Good prospects," Hiruzen agreed, watching Shino begin another encounter.

The more he saw, the more he wanted this technique established throughout Konoha. It could prepare young shinobi before their first dangerous assignments; after a war, it might help restore the village's fighting strength far faster than conventional instruction alone.

It would have to remain a village secret. Tonbo could not be allowed to spread it indiscriminately. They needed suitable shinobi selected and trained to learn it, and a department to manage the work.

There would be costs beyond instruction. Around the field, assistants were feeding specially prepared military ration pills to the graduates according to Tonbo's directions. Training an entire village this way would consume a great many of them.

The Akimichi and Nara clans could produce only so much medicine and so many ingredients each year. Konoha would need supplies from elsewhere, and more funding from the Land of Fire. Those negotiations would take thought.

Hiruzen watched another projection change as its student learned from a fatal mistake. The practical problems were considerable. They did not alter his decision.

The village would establish the program.