Chūnin Exams (IX).

Considering there were currently five teams in the cave, which brought their number up to eighteen if you counted the sixth team that was guarding the entrance, it was surprisingly silent.

'On the other hand, maybe it's not surprising at all,' Yugito silently conceded. After all, they were all from different villages, none of which had close relationships with each other. So, while they might have allied for the duration of this exam, the atmosphere could hardly be called 'comradely'. They were currently resting while they waited for their last ally, the group from Konoha, to return, hopefully with another team. 'Though it can hardly be called resting when everyone sits with their backs to the wall and watches everyone else for anything suspicious.'

The only group that seemed somewhat at ease was the one consisting of the two teams from Suna, which was also the only village from their group that had more than one team. They probably thought themselves safe because of their numbers.

There was also a tension in the air that hadn't been there previously. Not surprising considering this were the last few hours before the fighting would begin. Once the team from Konoha came back, with or without reinforcement, they would allow them a break before heading out to the enemy camp to end this exam one way or another.

There were no doubts in her mind that the coming confrontation would be victorious.

She snorted at that. Before the exam began, she had been so confident that she could pass this exam in a matter of hours at most, so assured that all it would take was beating some random team and then reach the centre of the training ground, but where was she now, two days later? In some stupid cave with a group of people that should be her enemy, that's where.

A commotion at the entrance made her turn around just in time to see the three shinobi from Konohaw walk inside.

"We found no one," the girl of the group said, her face set into a frown for once instead of the wide, fake smile she seemed to wear all the time. It had probably something to do with the fact that they failed to find the other remaining Konoha team. "Seems we will need to do with the numbers we have."

To be fair, they were more than they initially had hoped for. It seemed like they had been fast enough to contact most teams before they could be picked up, managing to get together seven of the ten teams that weren't from Iwa.

"We should be enough as we are," Mezo, the leader of the Ame team who had become something like a spokesperson for their group, said. "Additional support would have been optimal, but we don't necessarily need it."

"Right, their group has only fifteen more people than us," someone called sarcastically. "No big deal, right?"

Mezo momentarily glared in the general direction the exclamation had come from before replying. "We knew from the beginning that we would be outnumbered. As it stands, there are more of us than anyone has expected. As long as we have the element of surprise on our side, we're more than even with them."

There was some muttering, but no one openly disagreed.

"Alright," Mezo continued. "Let us go through the plan one last time.

First, we will split into two teams. The first one, which contains the six of us that claim to be capable of suitable powerful Ninjutsu, will use their techniques to do as much harm from afar as possible before the actual battle begins. The members from team Taki" –he nodded at the three members of the aforementioned team- "have scouted the area and managed to find a passable place north of their camp from which they should manage to stay unnoticed until they attack.

The rest of us will use the commotion to attack from the south. Their attention will be elsewhere by then, allowing us to fall into their back when they're the least prepared. Remember to throw explosion tags into their ranks first; it causes a lot of damage to those close by and disorientates the rest.

As soon as the fighting begins, the first team will descend upon them as well, forcing them to fight on two fronts. Both of our teams will then fight their way through their lines until they meet in the middle. At that point, most of the enemies should have been either beaten or forced to flee.

Also, let me remind you that we're allies. We all know that that doesn't mean much, but we will lose if we don't work together. No one asks you to be the best of friends, but you should help each other if you see someone struggling. Up to eleven teams can reach the finals, so there is no need to worry about not getting the pearl your team is missing."

The plan was rather simple, but that was an advantage as plans tended to fail as soon as you made contact with the enemy; the more complex the plan, the higher the odds that something would go wrong.

Yugito stopped listening when people started to discuss possible additions or changes to the plan, knowing that nothing would come from it. They had this conversation several times over the last two days and every time it was agreed that the plan was as good as it would get. Everything else they came up with was either too complex to actually work, above their skill level, or depended too much on actually trusting each other.

No, rather than wasting her time by listening to that nonsense, she observed the youngest member of the Konoha team.

Sending such a young Genin into these exams seemed stupid, but he wouldn't be here if his village didn't think him ready. They would hardly send an Uchiha to his death just like that. Besides, Konoha was known for plopping up a child prodigy every generation or so, much to the chagrin of everyone else. The likelihood of this boy being one of them was high and the prospect of seeing his skills for herself excited her.

Even now, he was standing in the back of the cave, hidden in the shadows while his teammates did a good job at steering any attention away from him. She was sure she would have fallen for it as well if she hadn't deliberately looked for him.

Yes, there was no way his teammates would act like that if they didn't trust his abilities. By helping him to vanish from view and trusting him to watch their backs, thus allowing them to appear less attentive and less of a threat to everyone else, they made everyone underestimate them. After all, what could a team of two careless idiots and a little child possible do, right?

She grinned.

Maybe this exam could still be fun.

The location of the Iwa camp wasn't poorly chosen, Itachi thought, although it could have been better as well.

It was located on the border of a relatively plain field with no rock formations or boulders to speak of, allowing them to easily see approaching enemies from far away and thus making sneaking up on them nearly impossible. The group had built their camp with its back to the mountain in the north, giving them a safe front on that side as well.

For civilians, such a camp would have been as secure as it could get; it was impossible to attack from the mountain without the use of chakra to walk on its rocky cliffs and it was impossible to surprise them from any other side. That and their numerical superiority put together made for a good base, no doubt about that.

They had chakra, though, which meant they could attack from the mountains. Their opponents obviously knew that as well, which explained the two outposts on earth platforms above the camp. They were placed very well too, their position making it impossible to easily sneak up on them from any side. Also, as they were in clear sight of each other, you would need to eliminate both guards simultaneously to evade discovery. Under normal circumstances, that would be nought but impossible, at least for Genin or even many Chūnin.

Fortunately, the Genin from Iwa had become too confident in their superiority and eventual victory, so sure in their assumption that no one would dare attack their camp when there were so many of them, that the guards were lax in their duty. That in turn was what made their attack possible in the first place.

Itachi was currently sitting with the majority of their little group far to the south of the camp, just close enough to see the light of the campfires but too far away to hear any voices. He guessed they would need approximately five minutes to reach the camp if they ran at full speed, which was even more reason to pay close attention; they needed to start running the moment their other team started their offensive to support them as fast as possible. Every second mattered, for the longer the enemy had time to react, the more likely it was that they could reorganize.

It would be bad if they arrived and the others were already taken care of, especially because both Anko and Yukio were part of that team.

He would have joined that group as well if there hadn't been enough others to do so, but when it turned out that there was a sufficient number of Ninjutsu users, he decided against it. His age was already an advantage in that it made others underestimate him and the less of his abilities he revealed, the longer that would stay this way.

Also, he wanted to stay out of Yugito Nii's as much as possible. She apparently had already picked up on the fact that he was hiding his abilities to some extent if the way she watched him was any indication and he didn't want to give her more chances to do so. Too much attention was never a good thing, especially if it came from an opponent.

He was pulled out from his thoughts by the sight of fire, earth, water, and lightning descending upon the camp from above, giving them the signal they were waiting for.

There was no need for any command; silent as the night, they started running.