The Preliminaries Begin.

[Four days later.]

Tendo could be seen sitting cross-legged in the exact same spot he was many days ago. He was training his senses constantly in the past few days and his abilities had improved considerably. The range of his chakra sensing, how fast he could activate his sensory abilities, and how accurate they were had all been increased. Tendo got up and did a few early morning stretches, releasing the tension and pain that his muscles had accumulated.

Tendo: 'Its finally the fifth day huh? It has been interesting looking at the world from another perspective but I miss my sight. Although it was worth it, I can finally take off this blindfold.'

Tendo slowly put his hands on the back of the blindfold and ripped it off, his sight coming back to him in full force. He had to let them get adjusted to the light but after a short while, he opened his eyed fully and scanned the room. The first thing he noticed was his incredible eyesight that dwarfed anything he had before in comparison. Without even activating the Byakugan, he could access some weaker abilities of the activated version. He could see through walls, see chakra points and even see a few kilometers away just by looking at normally. Overall, Tendo was happy with this development.

A while later, a chunin came into the room and told him it was time for all the shinobi who passed to congregate and meet up with the Hokage. Tendo shook his head and followed the shinobi until they got to a giant room that had two giant hands forming a hand sign. Around the room, there was a place where people could stand at the stop, and at the bottom section where they were was wide open, obviously built for some type of grand event or battle.

As Tendo arrived, he could see the large crowd of genin that had passed the exam and a few of the higher-ups standing with them. Among those higher-ups were Anko and as soon as she saw him, she started to stare at him intently. He had gotten a spare shirt from one of the Chunin a few days back so he wasn't shirtless anymore, meaning that she couldn't see the new curse mark on him. Tears started to build up in the corner of her eyes as she saw that her student was alright even after Orochimaru broke into the exams.

Tendo felt like he could sense her worry for him even though she was only looking in his direction. He was slightly confused about how he was able to sense her emotions but as soon as the rest of the people in the crowd saw him, what was happening became clear. He made his way to the front of the crowd and stood there, waiting for the Hokage to start his speech.

Tendo: 'I sense nothing but fear, anger and...awe? These are the emotions being directed towards me. One of them is radiating hate and I can guess that's probably Gaara. Hm, my only guess on this predicament is that because I absorbed the nine tails I can sense emotions, positive and negative ones. This could be very handy...'

The Hokage cleared his throat and began his speech about the true purpose of the Chunin Exams, aiming to shine a light on just how important it is to the villages. When he said that it was basically a form of war between the villages, some leaf genin immediately sounded out their voices in anger and confusion. They didn't understand why they had to fight with their lives on the line so early. It felt unfair to them. The Hokage calmly answered everything he could and calmed them down, addressing most of their worries. Not too long after, one of the Chunin that Tendo met when he passed the exam appeared and bowed down in front of the Hokage.

???: "Forgive my interruption, Lord Hokage, but if you don't mind, can you hand over the rest of the proceedings to me, Hayate Gekko, proctor of the third exam?"

Hiruzen: "Hn...Alright, go ahead."

Hayate: "Good to meet you, everyone, I am Hayate. Umm, before we start the exam I must ask you all to do something for me. You see, there are some preliminaries before we get to the proper exam and whether you proceed to the main exam or not is contingent on how you do in those. You see, we have too many applicants and under the traditional rule of the exam, we must hold a preliminary to reduce the number. As Lord Hokage mentioned, many important guests will be watching so we must make the main exams intense, tight, and fast-moving. So umm, anyway, now that you know what this is about, is there anyone who doesn't feel up to the challenge? They can walk away by taking one step forward because the preliminaries start right now!"

The room was in an uproar as Hayate delivered the news to the genin. A young man from the leaf with glasses and a grey ponytail stepped forward.

???: "Well, im outta here."

Hayate: "Hmm, aren't you Kabuto Yakushi of the leaf? Yes, you can go. Umm, I forgot to mention that from here on out you fight as individuals so you can make decisions for yourself without worrying about your team."

No one else stepped forward as they were having their own conversations.

Hayate: "So uhh, it looks like no one else is bailing out. Ahh, well then, we will begin the preliminaries which will consist of individual combat matches as though this were a tournament. As they're a total of 22 combatants remaining, we will hold a total of 11 bouts. This is no-holds-barred combat, each pair of combatants will fight until one of them is dead, unconscious, or admits defeat. Umm, since we don't want a total bloodbath on our hands we will step in when we ascertain that there's an undisputed winner. But, don't count on that. At the start of every round, we will display the names of the two combatants on the electronic scoreboard. So umm, not to hurry you to the slaughter but let's begin. We will announce the first two names."

As the scoreboard clicked, it stopped on the names of the first two combatants.

[Sasuke Uchiha Vs. Yoroi Akado]

Everyone else cleared and went to the stands at the top to watch the battle. Tendo went to a spot by himself and braced on the wall to watch the battle. He could feel multiple eyes on him but he knew who those people were. He knew Orochimaru was disguised as a sound-nin instructor so he wasn't surprised when he found the aforementioned instructor staring at him with a wicked smile on his face.

Tendo ignored him and just watched the battle between Sasuke and Yoroi.